This was a wacky, crazy idea... so crazy that it just might work. I had this great penpal, this girl who wrote beautifully and was deeply into an author I loved (Pamela Dean) and who adored Hamlet at the same time I did (inspired by Mel Gibson in the role). Together we came up with the idea to write a science fiction version of Hamlet. We decided that it would take place on a group of generation ships - slower-than-light spaceships that had been sent out from Earth to reach another planet far away. The trip would take far longer than any one human generation, thus the crew of the ships would have to plan to teach their children to take up the duties of ship maintenance until the distant arrival at another planet.
Hamlet (the play) takes place in Germany, Denmark and England - hence our three ships, Germany, Denmark and England. Our story takes place after the ships have been underway for multiple generations; thus changes have occurred that the original planners did not prepare for. There are anti-technology factions; Hamlet's father was instrumental in the pro-tech faction, and taught his children the lore that had been passed down to him. Also, we decided that Hamlet and Horatio are lovers, that Hamlet's father's name was Johannes (I forget what it was in the play - but we didn't like it).
And now, Hamlet in space. Note - this is not the entirety of what we wrote; there's more but I didn't feel like posting the entire thing. If you want more, let me know.
Something, somewhere was making a horrible noise, like a cat and a machine struggling over the corpse of a rat. Hamlet had seen that happen; the overburdened dusteater trying to stuff the rat into its disposal chute, the cat fighting with every wile to retain his meal. He had laughed.
He was not laughing now; struggling through layers of sleep and entangling blankets to reach Horatio's alarm and throw it across the room. Perhaps not such a good idea in zero G, but it worked. The noise stopped as the thing hit the far wall, and Hamlet managed to catch it in a fold of the blanket as it bounced back.
"Huh," he gasped, still breathing heavily, blinking in the grey light. There had been a dream, he didn't remember the details. He wasn't sure if he should be grateful to the alarm for waking him or not. He turned the sphere in his hands until he could see the luminescent readout. Only 700 hours, Germany time. Still early, but his body sense of time had been skewed by frequent trips between Denmark and Germany and he didn't think he could get back to sleep. Even given present company...
Horatio twisted slowly, half wrapped in blankets. Hamlet caught one outflung hand and towed him closer, taking quiet pleasure in the feeling of skin against skin. Horatio looked a little sharper than usual, his gaunt face drawn. Was he working too hard? Were Hamlet's frequent absences taking their toll?
"You know I wouldn't go if I could help it," he whispered.
"Mmmm?" Horatio stretched slowly and opened his eyes, and the gaunt face was suddenly enlivened by a smile.
"I'm sorry I got in so late," Hamlet answered. "Denmark time, you know, and my father had many matters to talk about."
Horatio rubbed a hand across his eyes and the smile left his face. "How is he?"
"Afeared. Things are moving, balances are changing. There are those among the kerns who are dying to get their hands on some real knowledge, but hatreds run deep. He doesn't know how fast to work..."
"There are few men who could do what he's doing."
"Yeah..." They drifted in silence for a moment, each with his own thoughts, until Hamlet exclaimed bitterly, "If only I knew what my mother thinks!"
"Does anyone?"
Hamlet looked up sharply, surprised by the tone in Horatio's voice, as though he had bitten into something sour. "Is there something I should know?"
"No, no." He didn't sound quite sure, but Hamlet didn't want to pry. Certainly he had enough secrets from Horatio that he shouldn't mind a little reticence going the other way. "She runs that court like a puzzle..." Horatio continued musingly, "thousands of tiny pieces, and she's always trying to fit them together in different ways. But what picture does she want to form?" He grimaced, then briskly gathered his mane of hair in both hands and tied it into a tail. "I just wonder how you can manage to go back there so often."
"Not by inclination, I assure you."
"Where is your inclination leading you today?"
"No further than here." They leaned toward each other as though drawn by gravity, Hamlet pushing the blanket aside and Horatio catching Hamlet's shoulders.
The terminal on the wall sounded a tone. "Incoming message. Priority one, arriving from Denmark, court of King Johannes. By the hand of his most illustrious lady Grace, greetings."
"Did you give her the access code?" Horatio hissed. Strong emotion flooded his face, but Hamlet wasn't sure just which emotions were involved.
"No!" he hissed back. "I didn't even know she knew I was here!"
"No video," Horatio ordered with commendable presence of mind, so they stared at a blank screen as the message rolled out its brutal and frightening tale.
"Johannes son of Shimon, King of Denmark and Captain of All Environs... is dead."
Chapter 1
There was a small entourage at the airlock to see Hamlet off. Horatio, of course, and a number of the other Students. Indigo didn't bother to wipe the tears from her face, solemn and steadfast as always. It hurt Hamlet to see them thus, clustered like a group of frightened children. He swallowed a painful lump in his throat and checked the seals on his jumpsuit.
"Come when you can," he said to Horatio. "I know you have things to attend to, but--"
"Don't doubt it."
Hamlet nodded. No point in saying anything more. Horatio watched through the airlock as Hamlet settled himself in the skipshuttle chair, then worked the controls himself to close the connection and release the shuttle from Germany.
"Let's watch," said Taylor, quietly. Of one accord they moved to the viewport. The port alignment modules were somewhat in the way, but a moment later the skipshuttle slid into view, moving on the momentum of that initial, magnetic push away from the hull, and then ignited its thrusters. It fell away and down. If they craned their heads and looked toward the bottom edge of the viewport they could just see the edge of Denmark, glowing with strands of green and red. Straight out and across was the vast bulk of England, like a collection of faceted spheres chained together and strung with bright lights.
Indigo shifted, glancing quickly at Horatio. "Looks like they have some burnouts in section A. Any expeditions planned?"
He blinked, and then seemed to see her. "Um, no. Do you want to organize one?"
"Indigo!" growled Bryant, looming behind her like a monstrous shadow. "Leave it be."
She looked from him to Horatio, indignant. "It has to be done. The world hasn't ended just because he left, you know!"
Bryant took a step back and pulled at his moustache. "I know. But don't you think a moment's silence is--"
"No I don't! Hamlet wouldn't like it. He's told us often enough that we have to go on no matter who we lose, no matter who is left. Well he's gone for now, but the work is still here!"
Taylor snorted. "He's not dead, Indigo. You said so yourself."
"Don't you use that tone with me, you--"
Horatio's hand slapped against the wall and brought with it sudden silence. "I need," he said slowly, "a little peace and quiet for a while. Is that all right? Too much to ask?" He stood there like a lanky brown statue holding up the wall.
"Sorry," muttered Indigo. Horatio didn't respond and after a moment she turned away. The rest of them were splitting up into groups, returning to tasks. Some of them would be shuttling to England on work crews, some returning to the classrooms. Horatio and Hamlet would have been teaching Data Access if--but she preferred not to think about that. The king is dead, thought Indigo to herself.
Chapter 2
The Queen was waiting for Hamlet on Denmark, the black of her gown making her look even whiter than usual. She held out her hands expressionlessly to Hamlet as he climbed out of the skipshuttle; they were bare of the rings his father had given her, and they looked weak and thin. But her grip on his hands was as strong as ever, and there was no corresponding vulnerability in her face. She said, formally, "My son, your father the king is dead."
"I--know," he said, inadquately. They stood still, in painful tableau, the court gathered silently around them. "He... How did he die?"
Grace's mouth twitched. "One of his snakes," she said, and let go of his hands. "He was in the garden, and they were restless, and it--I begged him to wear his shield, I put it on him and he would not take it. He said--" her voice broke. "I keep thinking," she continued raggedly after a moment, "I keep thinking, if only I had been a little more persuasive, if only I had--" She stopped again, shook her head fiercely. She was turning a worry-stone over and over in her hands as though unaware of it. "I told him so many times he should not have such uncontrolled beasts. He never believed me."
In the midst of baffled grief Hamlet found time to wonder what parody of justice would let his father die of the one thing with which he relaxed; in the garden where he let down his guard as he did not even behind layers and layers of defense. He began, awkwardly, "But they'd never attacked him before, never even started to."
The worry-stone stopped moving; his mother opened her mouth, shut it. Hamlet looked at her. After a moment he went on, "You couldn't have stopped him from going, anyway. He never listened about things like that."
"I know," she said, and sighed. "Oh, I shouldn't make you feel you have to absolve me for your father's death, Hamlet, I know! I'm sorry, honestly."
He was, through some twist he had not quite followed, now in the position of having to give her his forgiveness; and, unsure of what exactly he was apologizing for, he hesitated. She waited, too, and he was aware suddenly of the hushed silence in the room, all eyes on the two of them.
She raised an eyebrow when it became obvious that he wasn't going to say anything more. "Well. Perhaps we should adjourn to the great hall. Your--" he voice caught suddenly, "father lies in state there. The service will begin as soon as we arrive."
"Let us go, then." He declined to give her his arm, and she didn't seem to notice the lack. Why, he wondered, falling into step with the assortment of courtiers, did she always present such a changing face to the world? The grief was genuine. He was sure of that. But what more could he believe of what he saw in her? He remembered something Horatio had said a few weeks ago, a remark he had almost forgotten in the rush of work getting classes ready for the new term.
"Your mother," Horatio had said. "You haven't told her about the files we found in the abandoned levels, have you?"
He hadn't, of course. The University was something that she had no part in; it was his life, his escape from the charade of the high court, his most precious posession. None of hers. All of his, Horatio's... and of course, the king his father's.
Horatio had nodded. "Good. It would be... ill-fortune for her to know your movements too closely."
I'll fortune? Perhaps, in that she invariably made things uncomfortable for him when she knew who he was spending his time with. But had Horatio meant something worse?
Grace stopped at the grand doors, turned to face the rest of the party with one white hand resting against the painted surface.
It was ironic in a very peculiar way; Grace's grandfather had painted that very scene, of the mythical unicorn kneeling to the maiden who would betray him. The men-at-arms were cunningly worked into the trees that surrounded the white creature, camouflaged unless one knew to look for them there. Their weapons were raised, ready to strike the unicorn. That grandfather had been a kern, and his granddaughter was now as close to the pinacle of the nobility power struggle as she could ever hope to be. It was a symbol of Johannes' beliefs. He should have married a woman of the nobility. Would have, if the court had had their way, but Grace had been a gardener, and he had fallen for her and let no barrier stand in his way. And ironically she had learned to be the noblewoman he had not wanted, and he had even helped her find the place she now inhabited. Only so far he could bend for her, though...
And where are the men-at-arms? Hamlet wondered. Who is watching us from the trees? Who was watching my father?
"Galvan," she was saying, speaking to the noble who had taken her arm, "do we have a robe for my son? He must have--ah, Hamlet." Her gaze caressed him as he came close.
"I wore black," he said, and even to his ears it sounded sullen.
"This is not England," she answered. "Appearances do matter, my son. In this especially. Would it be so difficult to please me?"
Galvan wordlessly held out a heavy robe, beaded with black pearls, a match to the one he wore himself.
Hamlet resisted the urge to fling it to the floor. "I am dressed appropriately. Take it away. Gods, mother, do we have to do this here? Now?"
"I merely thought," and her tone was suddenly icy, "that you might want to bow to tradition this once. For him."
A smile flashed across his face. "I follow his traditions." As quickly the smile was gone. "In this I won't bend. Lead on."
Grace met his gaze with a sharp tilt of her head, familiar to him since childhood. So many words compressed into such a small motion, he marvelled, and she taught me that language. How ever much I chose to resist her... though perhaps I had no choice in the matter. Seeing it every day of my life I couldn't help but learn the meanings.
Just now she was capitulating.
"Very well." She rapped on the door twice and slowly the great panels slid open, pulled by the doormen inside the hall. There they were, the gathered nobles of the Denmark court, flanked by commoners and workers. Lined up by rank, stacked in neat rows, glittering with bright colors despite the sober black of robes and capes. He scanned the crowd for familiar faces, but quickly reconsidered when he spotted Laertes. What better thing to do, after all, than exchange glares with a man who'd like to have your liver for dinner? Not the only one, either.
You're looking particularly dashing, Hamlet thought at Laertes. Positively vicious tonight. This morning, rather. The repeated trips between ships were playing hell with his internal clock, and he had to conceal a yawn with an elaborate turning up of his jumpsuit collar.
So there they were, the nobles. They filled the broad, high-ceilinged room. And at the head of the room the bier.
The bier. Hamlet couldn't tear his eyes from it.
In that lies my...
Wooden. His great grandfather had made it from a tree grown in the Denmark gardens, precious beyond calculation. They hadn't cut down a tree since then. It had held five bodies, five men, since that time.
In that lies the man.
"Hamlet?" A hand touched his shoulder, slid across his neck.
He shivered, from his head to the base of his spine, and turned his head a little. Grace's expression was hard to read, too many messages combined there. Sympathy, perhaps? He shrugged off her hand and blinked in acknowledgement.
"Will you be all right?"
He shook his head, stiffly. She left him alone after that. The next few minutes were very bad for him, as he watched the shifting flow of nobility and thought about what his father would have said. What his father would have done. It was a fragile creation that he had built, and his death was the equivalent of pulling the foundation out from under it. Hamlet wasn't sure if he could get under there in time to hold it up.
The trumpets sounded. The hum of conversation quieted. The shifting colors stilled as people found their seats and put them to use. Hamlet should have been up near the front; even as he thought of it he saw Grace gesturing furiously. It was too late, though; he didn't want to draw so many eyes by pushing through that mass of people. He pretended not to see her and waited for the speaker to appear.
The lights dimmed, except for a golden flood on the semicircle of open floor where the bier lay. And then a man stood behind it. Hamlet bit his lip.
"We are gathered here today," rolled out that mellifluous voice, "for many reasons. To mourn the passing of a great man, wrapped in the memories of great deeds and inspiring leadership. For those of us who knew him, he was almost more than a man."
"My ass," hissed Hamlet, and drew a few astonished stares. But his attention was all on that figure by the bier, and a thousand different hypotheses were coming together to form certainties in his head.
"Denmark will not be the same place without him. There can be no duplicating of his accomplishments, only a striving to fill the space he occupied. I am reminded," said Christian smilingly, "of a time when he and I were walking together toward a council meeting, and he walked with his eyes on the deck, deep in thought. I had injured my foot the previous day in the gym, and I was hard pressed to keep up with him. Still, he didn't seem to notice my efforts, and I was unwilling to interrupt his thoughts. When we reached the door he stopped, and looked up as though just remembering that I was there. His thoughts had obviously been lightyears away, but he looked at me and said, 'Christian. What in the world did you do to your foot?'"
A pause, and a murmur from the audience.
"That man," continued Christian, "was aware of more than any of us knew. How will we go on without him, without that knowledge of the many ongoing processes that make up this world of ours?"
A long pause. Christian slowly spread his arms, a fine figure of a man. He was tall, broad and well-built. His head was grey but held high, his arms, weighed down by the embroidered robe, were strong. The answer he made was obvious without words.
"I am his brother." The voice fell softly now. "I do not know all that Johannes knew, but I know what kind of man he was. We grew up together, playing side by side. Still, he was always the older, and I learned by his example. I think that I have learned something of governing from him."
"You snivelling--" began Hamlet under his breath.
"I know that time will show that I am a worthy successor. I wish to thank you, on this occasion, for the votes that put me in this place. I can't be Johannes, but I will strive to be the best Christian I can be!"
"The votes?" Hamlet said, his blood gone cold. He looked for Grace; she had vanished into the dark crowd. What was this? A funeral, but what else? He became aware, in a moment, that he was being watched. From every side; men in dark cloaks were moving through the crowd toward him. He recognized some of the faces. Samuel, Christian's dogsbody. Molloy, who had taught fencing. A tall man with inscrutable eyes and hair greying at the temples. They moved single-mindedly.
"Grace!" Hamlet bellowed. Christian's monologue stopped, the cloaked men stopped. Hamlet tried to catch Molloy's eyes and failed; the fencing-master was studying the toes of his boots. Hamlet realized that the whole of the crowd was looking at him, and wondered why they didn't just turn the spotlight on him. A moment later he sensed movement, and then saw that familiar regal head cresting a wave through the sea of black. Grace flowed rather than walked. She was absolutely expressionless as she came to stand before him, cold as the smooth surface of a ship.
"Come," she said, turned and gestured for him to follow.
Alone in her study they stood facing each other. Grace moved through habitual gestures, pouring wine into two glasses and handing one to him. He didn't think she was as relaxed as she made herself out to be.
Hamlet's face was very white. "Who voted?"
"Denmark," Grace said, as though it should have been obvious. "Your uncle is much beloved here."
His hand clenched slowly around the glass. "My father decreed general elections," he said, struggling for control. "You knew that. The whole populace was to vote on this. You knew."
His mother shook her head. "No one really knew your father well, Hamlet. He was--" Her voice broke. She bit her lip, continued with only a little shakiness in her voice. "He was a secret man, and he kept his opinions to himself."
"That's not true! Everyone knew he supported the general franchise!"
"He never put a word in writing," Grace said, and she who had lived with him for decades and knew the hours and nights and weeks the king had spent arguing for free votes was sincere. "We looked, believe me--"
"When?" Hamlet exploded. "He died last night! How could you not find it? There were books of his writings! He was--"
"Hamlet," she put a restraining hand on his, the one that was not holding the glass. "Calm yourself, my son. This rash anger does not befit the heir to the throne, the prince of--"
"I was the heir to the throne before the king died! Why am I still?"
"The nobles chose your uncle," the Queen said. "They did not choose you."
The glass shattered. Hamlet looked down at the red-streaked crystal, opened his hand numbly and let the shards fall to the table. Grace gasped and grabbed his wrist in a surprisingly strong grip, fingers clamped over the arteries. "Medtech!" she called over her shoulder, voice high-pitched, and turned back to him.
He twisted his hand furiously out of her grip and stood, rocking the table. "You erased his writing, didn't you?" he hissed.
Grace shook her head, eyes wide. "Are you all right? You're bleeding all over your--"
"I know he wrote it," Hamlet said. "I know it! He would have hidden them better than you can find, I know it--"
Grace looked over her shoulder again, visibly distressed. "Medtech! Hamlet, what are you talking about?"
"I'll find it," he said shakily. "I swear it. Mother, that election should have been general and I would have won, and I will get it. I swear to you."
"I don't understand you at all," Grace whispered, leaning her forehead against her hands. "Please, please let the meds see to your hand..."
"Not your people," he rasped, and left the room.
Friday, October 05, 2007
Sunday, September 16, 2007
To make up for not posting on Saturday...
This is a story fragment I started when in the writing group I founded with several science fiction fanatics. We called ourselves Viscous Mileaux, and we wrote and shared writings and drank beer. At the time, shared-world anthologies were all the rage in the science fiction publishing world, and this story came out of my suggestion that we form our own shared world. We came up with the idea of an anachist artist colony space station, which had formed somewhat haphazardly in earth orbit and grew as various free spirits attached modules and ships to it. We agreed that there would be two governing bodies, both self-appointed - The Management, and... I forgot the other one. The main character of my story was to be severely accident prone - until she met a peculiar woman who thought she was a Viking...
And now, the story.
On the night the Aesir fresco was finished, Falla and Tiger drank a pitcher of beer together in the Cyandome. The ceiling echoed above them, gods moving in the half-light. Thor driving his goat cart, Odin hanging by one foot from Yggdrasil, the world tree, seeing runes in the patterns of leaves on the ground. Sig combing her golden hair.
"It's beautiful," said Tiger. Falla observed his face and wondered if he would sit for a portrait. "All of the Norse gods are so beautiful. A terrible beauty."
"Terrible how?" she snorted into her beer. She had pictured Tiger as Heimdall for a moment, but there was nothing terrible about him. Only that gentle, smiling beauty of the artist at peace with himself. And he was too dark to be Norse, anyway. Dark and almost inscrutable. She wondered why he hadn't asked her to have sex yet.
He smiled at her. "I think the Germanic peoples had to engineer the deaths of their gods; it was too terrible to always be in the shadow of that grandeur."
Falla snorted again. "Hey!" she suddenly yelled, and waved. Across the crowded room a slim figure was picking a fight with a contingent of fashion police. "Ted," she told Tiger. "He should be here."
Tiger nodded solemnly. It was only right that the three of them sit together. They had worked together to make Falla's vision into reality; they should sit together and toast it. The Cyandome, of all the artistic venues on the spaceport Dali, had a special place. A place firmly ensconced in the hearts of the vagabond artists who filled the vagabond spaceport; whether they admitted it or no. And Falla would never have placed her vision there without shoulders to lean on.
"You must admit," Tiger was saying as Ted made his way toward their table, "that you have felt something of that grandeur. That atmosphere; it's as though the gods breathed something heavier than air, you know? As though if you get too close to them you get drunk on the exhaust. They're like plants."
Falla held out a hand to Ted as he came up the stairs to their platform; long-legged, sandy-haired, dishevelled. He kissed each finger and murmured, "Your obedient servant."
She patted him on the head. "Sit. Drink. Be merry."
"As always," he replied, falling into a chair. "Well, what are we doing tonight? Falla, you're the very picture of a goddess."
She smiled at him and shook her head. Just an hour ago she had stared at her image in the uneven, pentagonal mirror in her makeshift bathroom. Another woman seemed to stand behind her, stepping into her golden fall of hair. Looking out of her blue, blue eyes. So she knew what Ted was talking about, but chose to ignore it.
"Tiger thinks gods are like plants. Or drugs," she added thoughtfully. "I'm not sure which."
Ted poured himself a mug of beer. "Drugs. Definitely drugs."
"No no no," blustered Tiger. Falla reflected that he was the sort of drunk who became more, not less, agitated with the application of relaxants. She wondered briefly at her own mood, the feeling of being not entirely a part of their trio. A detached observer. They were all three artists, and all three Dali bums - no obvious wall between them to cause this feeling.
Perhaps it was that she had been in the atmosphere of the gods a little too much.
"--Frank is planning a recreation of the Death Star fight scene," Ted was saying. "But the explosions could be a problem. Lots of modules can't be counted on to remain airtight. We need some kind of enforcement for that stuff, y'know?"
"Yeah, but which Government is going to do that?"
"Count on The Management," Falla chipped in. "It's in their circle of influence."
Tiger and Ted snorted together. At that moment she wanted to capture their identical expressions; the squint-eyed glare, elbows on the table, hands on beer mugs. It was endearing to think that scorn was so universal. And essentially they were so dissimilar. Ted like a gangly young whirlwind, Tiger with a meditative air and a body like sculpted bronze -- Falla suddenly wanted to freeze them in time.
"Will you guys sit for me?" she asked.
Tiger drained his mug. "Only if you return the favor."
She made a face at him. "Tease."
Ted looked from Tiger's mug to his own, which was nearly full, and then tilted back in his chair until the front legs came off the floor and poured the whole thing down his throat. Tiger and Falla, after a moment of stunned silence, burst into applause.
"Now puke over the balcony!" urged Tiger.
Ted shook his head. "Maybe later. Hey, that's an idea!"
"What?" asked Falla, already having some idea of what he must be thinking. The artist mindset, she told herself.
"Get ten guys. Or however many you want. Line 'em up on the upper balcony. Give them each an unlimited quantity of beer, but have each batch of beer colored a different shade. Instruct them to drink for as long as they can bear it--"
Tiger roared. "Why not just pour the beer?"
"But then it wouldn't be--"
They finished together, "a technicolor yawn!"
Falla looked up at the ceiling again, through the rising haze of someone's smoke. Odin kept his single, watchful eye on her. She wondered why she wanted to be someplace else, and wondered where. And why. It was so hard to finish a piece and know that the work was over. The future streached ahead unfilled. Or filled with countless small accidents.
She grimaced and drank her beer.
And now, the story.
On the night the Aesir fresco was finished, Falla and Tiger drank a pitcher of beer together in the Cyandome. The ceiling echoed above them, gods moving in the half-light. Thor driving his goat cart, Odin hanging by one foot from Yggdrasil, the world tree, seeing runes in the patterns of leaves on the ground. Sig combing her golden hair.
"It's beautiful," said Tiger. Falla observed his face and wondered if he would sit for a portrait. "All of the Norse gods are so beautiful. A terrible beauty."
"Terrible how?" she snorted into her beer. She had pictured Tiger as Heimdall for a moment, but there was nothing terrible about him. Only that gentle, smiling beauty of the artist at peace with himself. And he was too dark to be Norse, anyway. Dark and almost inscrutable. She wondered why he hadn't asked her to have sex yet.
He smiled at her. "I think the Germanic peoples had to engineer the deaths of their gods; it was too terrible to always be in the shadow of that grandeur."
Falla snorted again. "Hey!" she suddenly yelled, and waved. Across the crowded room a slim figure was picking a fight with a contingent of fashion police. "Ted," she told Tiger. "He should be here."
Tiger nodded solemnly. It was only right that the three of them sit together. They had worked together to make Falla's vision into reality; they should sit together and toast it. The Cyandome, of all the artistic venues on the spaceport Dali, had a special place. A place firmly ensconced in the hearts of the vagabond artists who filled the vagabond spaceport; whether they admitted it or no. And Falla would never have placed her vision there without shoulders to lean on.
"You must admit," Tiger was saying as Ted made his way toward their table, "that you have felt something of that grandeur. That atmosphere; it's as though the gods breathed something heavier than air, you know? As though if you get too close to them you get drunk on the exhaust. They're like plants."
Falla held out a hand to Ted as he came up the stairs to their platform; long-legged, sandy-haired, dishevelled. He kissed each finger and murmured, "Your obedient servant."
She patted him on the head. "Sit. Drink. Be merry."
"As always," he replied, falling into a chair. "Well, what are we doing tonight? Falla, you're the very picture of a goddess."
She smiled at him and shook her head. Just an hour ago she had stared at her image in the uneven, pentagonal mirror in her makeshift bathroom. Another woman seemed to stand behind her, stepping into her golden fall of hair. Looking out of her blue, blue eyes. So she knew what Ted was talking about, but chose to ignore it.
"Tiger thinks gods are like plants. Or drugs," she added thoughtfully. "I'm not sure which."
Ted poured himself a mug of beer. "Drugs. Definitely drugs."
"No no no," blustered Tiger. Falla reflected that he was the sort of drunk who became more, not less, agitated with the application of relaxants. She wondered briefly at her own mood, the feeling of being not entirely a part of their trio. A detached observer. They were all three artists, and all three Dali bums - no obvious wall between them to cause this feeling.
Perhaps it was that she had been in the atmosphere of the gods a little too much.
"--Frank is planning a recreation of the Death Star fight scene," Ted was saying. "But the explosions could be a problem. Lots of modules can't be counted on to remain airtight. We need some kind of enforcement for that stuff, y'know?"
"Yeah, but which Government is going to do that?"
"Count on The Management," Falla chipped in. "It's in their circle of influence."
Tiger and Ted snorted together. At that moment she wanted to capture their identical expressions; the squint-eyed glare, elbows on the table, hands on beer mugs. It was endearing to think that scorn was so universal. And essentially they were so dissimilar. Ted like a gangly young whirlwind, Tiger with a meditative air and a body like sculpted bronze -- Falla suddenly wanted to freeze them in time.
"Will you guys sit for me?" she asked.
Tiger drained his mug. "Only if you return the favor."
She made a face at him. "Tease."
Ted looked from Tiger's mug to his own, which was nearly full, and then tilted back in his chair until the front legs came off the floor and poured the whole thing down his throat. Tiger and Falla, after a moment of stunned silence, burst into applause.
"Now puke over the balcony!" urged Tiger.
Ted shook his head. "Maybe later. Hey, that's an idea!"
"What?" asked Falla, already having some idea of what he must be thinking. The artist mindset, she told herself.
"Get ten guys. Or however many you want. Line 'em up on the upper balcony. Give them each an unlimited quantity of beer, but have each batch of beer colored a different shade. Instruct them to drink for as long as they can bear it--"
Tiger roared. "Why not just pour the beer?"
"But then it wouldn't be--"
They finished together, "a technicolor yawn!"
Falla looked up at the ceiling again, through the rising haze of someone's smoke. Odin kept his single, watchful eye on her. She wondered why she wanted to be someplace else, and wondered where. And why. It was so hard to finish a piece and know that the work was over. The future streached ahead unfilled. Or filled with countless small accidents.
She grimaced and drank her beer.
An office-inspired story fragment
This is a story fragment that I wrote while working at the Otolaryngology Department at the U. I did a lot of writing at work, a skill that I perfected during my five years there. Just in case there might be any disapproval from my superiors, I "hid" my stories in a folder in a folder in a folder on my computer.
I had not fleshed this out beyond the opening sequence, but my vague idea was that it was somewhat bladerunner-ish - the heroine is a plant, stuck in the office for a purpose that she doesn't even know, but something keys her in and she starts researching her own past...
The office setting was inspired by my worplace at the U, although that was never so frantic.
And now, the story.
The Brauns are working overtime and the Canons are jamming about every five seconds. Nevada spends half of her time on her knees in front of the machines prying out accordioned pieces of paper no one else can find. It's almost an office litany. The cry of the distressed sek; "Nevada, could you come safe my life, dear..."
Nevada doctors her caf with a squirt of vasopressin and tries to look alert. They say the bosses are watching on the cams. It has often been said, but on this particular day it has been said with greater enthusiasm (or fear), so she's inclined to take it seriously. There's a big job coming through. The decasek has been working on it all morning, skipping breaks. Nevada has in fact never seen the decasek so coordinated; it's like they're a machine with twenty hands and a single brain. Wired together. A little spooky, actually.
Nevada is a specialist.
She doesn't merge well.
But she doesn't miss anything.
It's 5:35. Quitting time. The decasek has become an octasek. Heather had to leave at five for a dentist's appointment, and Randi had to pick up her kids. The others remain at their terminals, hands flashing and voice-activated headsets humming with the flow of information. Nevada considers leaving. The office changes character with the advent of evening; the slackers are gone, the copier running smoothly. There really isn't any need for her now. She doesn't know enough about the computer interface to take Heather's place, and Randi leaves her desk in such a mess that Nevada doesn't want to bother with it.
So.
She knocks before entering.
"Come in," says Keith. His tie is loosened but still dangling around his neck. His desk looks as bad as Randi's. Towers of paper leaning one way or another, a stack of disks, a stack of flopticals and a final stack of empty take-out containers from the Vietnamese place across the street. There's a computer on his right, a computer on his left, and a third behind his head, feeding information into his headtap via coded sequences of laser blips. "What can I do for you?" he says.
"Stamp my ticket?" she says, leaning over the desk with a smile. She presses her arms together so her dress will gape over her breasts. His eyes flicker up at her and then defocus.
"A little early, isn't it?"
"It's..." she glanced at her watch. "5:40. Everything's quiet. If I stay I'll just be rearranging things." She rubs her thighs together, shifting beneath fabric.
His mouth gapes a little. She leans further forward, getting right into his face. "You should leave early for once. Take a little time off..."
"Sht," he hisses. Two of the computers bleep simultaneously, and out in the main office one of the secs wails. Keith's eyes focus and Nevada would swear they change color from a vague blue to slate-hard grey. "You're working Saturday," he growls. "This may need to be handled hard."
Nevada closes his door quietly, and stands against it shaking with laughter. Donna gets up from her terminal and gestures to Nevada. She looks sheepish and a little ashamed.
Out in the hallway they both burst into loud gasps of laughter.
"Ohmigod," says Nevada, "I thought I was gonna die when you yelled."
Donna shakes her mass of curls. "It wasn't me! Agneta couldn't believe the computer had gone down, god you should've seen the look on her face. Speaking of which..."
"And you said it couldn't be done." Nevada stretches, rubbing her back against the wall. "So you gonna pay up, girl?"
"Of course." Donna digs in her purse, Nevada stares out at the blue patch of sky visible through the stairwell window. The whole scene feels more than a little childish now, but at least it was a moment of excitement which set the day apart from the one before it. A blip in the continuum, as it were.
The office is halfstaffed on Saturday. Generally this does not include Nevada. If the Canon jams on Saturday, Bill the Hallboy comes in to fix it. If the Braun runs out they order a hot pot from the Mainline on the corner. But these are not Nevada's only specialties, and occasionally it seems to occur to Keith that she can be useful for other tasks.
On this particular Saturday, she's filing.
Not merely filing, but hardcopy filing. It's the sort of thing that seems like an unduly demeaning task. So utterly pointless; metal cabinets full of sheets of paper with information about clients and their accounts, all duplicates of information also stored on various computer systems all over the building. But Keith has assigned her, wearing his stormy look, and Nevada is dutiful.
She is alone in the filing room. Dusty blinds mute the sunlight to a peachy glow, a fly buzzes against the glass and down in the street traffic hums. Nevada hums as well. She's not thinking about anything as she shuffles the pages, letters and numbers settling in her mind like leaves of tea in water. A single beam of sun runs across the back of her neck.
Something looks familiar. Nevada stops and pages back, scanning the text more closely now. There. A signature at the end of a document. A name she's never heard before; Damiana Luytens. She puzzles over it for a moment, wondering what caught her eye. Someone I've met? she wonders. No face comes to mind, nothing but a sense of familiarity as though a hand reached out and clasped with hers.
Hand. Writing, signing a form. The 'a' at the end of Damiana matches the flourish at the end of Nevada.
"I wrote this," she says slowly. The sunlight suddenly doesn't seem so warm. The silence is a waiting silence, hushed for revelation. But what knowledge is there to be uncovered? She reads the rest of the document, intent, but there's only the ordinary jumble of personal details and insurance company bravado.
"It couldn't have been me. I would remember. Wouldn't I?" It seems more likely that there's someone in the world who just happens to write her 'a's the same way Nevada does. But the shock of recognition is still fizzing in her blood.
Given the assumption that she did write it, how could she find out the details? When, why, how? For someone else? Might it be a forgery? Nevada sinks down to her knees on the dusty floor - she wears jeans on the weekends, so it doesn't matter - and tries to encompass the piece of paper. What would it gain her to sign someone else's name, and why would she forget about it?
After a moment she shakes her head and files the paper. The hum of traffic seems to resume. Or did it ever stop? She's not sure. She's not sure of anything at the moment.
The filing won't take long, and then she can leave. Saturdays are always short for Nevada.
Aren't they?
Long corridors flashing by, light dark light under an endless ceiling. Occasionally a head leans into her field of view, speaking to other heads. She doesn't understand their speech even though she feels she should.
"Completely blank?" one asks.
"No problem," answers another. "Been blanked so many times it's like it's her natural state now."
"Ever done it with one?"
"Once. Not worth the bother."
There is silence and a vague lack of awareness. She sees and hears, but nothing connects. Sometimes there's a longer period of dark or light.
I had not fleshed this out beyond the opening sequence, but my vague idea was that it was somewhat bladerunner-ish - the heroine is a plant, stuck in the office for a purpose that she doesn't even know, but something keys her in and she starts researching her own past...
The office setting was inspired by my worplace at the U, although that was never so frantic.
And now, the story.
The Brauns are working overtime and the Canons are jamming about every five seconds. Nevada spends half of her time on her knees in front of the machines prying out accordioned pieces of paper no one else can find. It's almost an office litany. The cry of the distressed sek; "Nevada, could you come safe my life, dear..."
Nevada doctors her caf with a squirt of vasopressin and tries to look alert. They say the bosses are watching on the cams. It has often been said, but on this particular day it has been said with greater enthusiasm (or fear), so she's inclined to take it seriously. There's a big job coming through. The decasek has been working on it all morning, skipping breaks. Nevada has in fact never seen the decasek so coordinated; it's like they're a machine with twenty hands and a single brain. Wired together. A little spooky, actually.
Nevada is a specialist.
She doesn't merge well.
But she doesn't miss anything.
It's 5:35. Quitting time. The decasek has become an octasek. Heather had to leave at five for a dentist's appointment, and Randi had to pick up her kids. The others remain at their terminals, hands flashing and voice-activated headsets humming with the flow of information. Nevada considers leaving. The office changes character with the advent of evening; the slackers are gone, the copier running smoothly. There really isn't any need for her now. She doesn't know enough about the computer interface to take Heather's place, and Randi leaves her desk in such a mess that Nevada doesn't want to bother with it.
So.
She knocks before entering.
"Come in," says Keith. His tie is loosened but still dangling around his neck. His desk looks as bad as Randi's. Towers of paper leaning one way or another, a stack of disks, a stack of flopticals and a final stack of empty take-out containers from the Vietnamese place across the street. There's a computer on his right, a computer on his left, and a third behind his head, feeding information into his headtap via coded sequences of laser blips. "What can I do for you?" he says.
"Stamp my ticket?" she says, leaning over the desk with a smile. She presses her arms together so her dress will gape over her breasts. His eyes flicker up at her and then defocus.
"A little early, isn't it?"
"It's..." she glanced at her watch. "5:40. Everything's quiet. If I stay I'll just be rearranging things." She rubs her thighs together, shifting beneath fabric.
His mouth gapes a little. She leans further forward, getting right into his face. "You should leave early for once. Take a little time off..."
"Sht," he hisses. Two of the computers bleep simultaneously, and out in the main office one of the secs wails. Keith's eyes focus and Nevada would swear they change color from a vague blue to slate-hard grey. "You're working Saturday," he growls. "This may need to be handled hard."
Nevada closes his door quietly, and stands against it shaking with laughter. Donna gets up from her terminal and gestures to Nevada. She looks sheepish and a little ashamed.
Out in the hallway they both burst into loud gasps of laughter.
"Ohmigod," says Nevada, "I thought I was gonna die when you yelled."
Donna shakes her mass of curls. "It wasn't me! Agneta couldn't believe the computer had gone down, god you should've seen the look on her face. Speaking of which..."
"And you said it couldn't be done." Nevada stretches, rubbing her back against the wall. "So you gonna pay up, girl?"
"Of course." Donna digs in her purse, Nevada stares out at the blue patch of sky visible through the stairwell window. The whole scene feels more than a little childish now, but at least it was a moment of excitement which set the day apart from the one before it. A blip in the continuum, as it were.
The office is halfstaffed on Saturday. Generally this does not include Nevada. If the Canon jams on Saturday, Bill the Hallboy comes in to fix it. If the Braun runs out they order a hot pot from the Mainline on the corner. But these are not Nevada's only specialties, and occasionally it seems to occur to Keith that she can be useful for other tasks.
On this particular Saturday, she's filing.
Not merely filing, but hardcopy filing. It's the sort of thing that seems like an unduly demeaning task. So utterly pointless; metal cabinets full of sheets of paper with information about clients and their accounts, all duplicates of information also stored on various computer systems all over the building. But Keith has assigned her, wearing his stormy look, and Nevada is dutiful.
She is alone in the filing room. Dusty blinds mute the sunlight to a peachy glow, a fly buzzes against the glass and down in the street traffic hums. Nevada hums as well. She's not thinking about anything as she shuffles the pages, letters and numbers settling in her mind like leaves of tea in water. A single beam of sun runs across the back of her neck.
Something looks familiar. Nevada stops and pages back, scanning the text more closely now. There. A signature at the end of a document. A name she's never heard before; Damiana Luytens. She puzzles over it for a moment, wondering what caught her eye. Someone I've met? she wonders. No face comes to mind, nothing but a sense of familiarity as though a hand reached out and clasped with hers.
Hand. Writing, signing a form. The 'a' at the end of Damiana matches the flourish at the end of Nevada.
"I wrote this," she says slowly. The sunlight suddenly doesn't seem so warm. The silence is a waiting silence, hushed for revelation. But what knowledge is there to be uncovered? She reads the rest of the document, intent, but there's only the ordinary jumble of personal details and insurance company bravado.
"It couldn't have been me. I would remember. Wouldn't I?" It seems more likely that there's someone in the world who just happens to write her 'a's the same way Nevada does. But the shock of recognition is still fizzing in her blood.
Given the assumption that she did write it, how could she find out the details? When, why, how? For someone else? Might it be a forgery? Nevada sinks down to her knees on the dusty floor - she wears jeans on the weekends, so it doesn't matter - and tries to encompass the piece of paper. What would it gain her to sign someone else's name, and why would she forget about it?
After a moment she shakes her head and files the paper. The hum of traffic seems to resume. Or did it ever stop? She's not sure. She's not sure of anything at the moment.
The filing won't take long, and then she can leave. Saturdays are always short for Nevada.
Aren't they?
Long corridors flashing by, light dark light under an endless ceiling. Occasionally a head leans into her field of view, speaking to other heads. She doesn't understand their speech even though she feels she should.
"Completely blank?" one asks.
"No problem," answers another. "Been blanked so many times it's like it's her natural state now."
"Ever done it with one?"
"Once. Not worth the bother."
There is silence and a vague lack of awareness. She sees and hears, but nothing connects. Sometimes there's a longer period of dark or light.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Another dream fragment
I have written a couple of stories that were actually inspired by dreams. This one was from a high school dream about a group of prisoners held on an alien planet, who had developed their own language which involved the use of lots of suffixes that had different meanings. Yeah, I have weird dreams, sometimes.
I did not get very far with this story before jumping ahead to a later, more exciting scene (with plot elements stolen from John Varley), but I think it has potential. In looking back on it I find myself tempted to change the gender of characters, in order to write a strong female character.
Swamp (a fragment)
"Wake," rasped a voice, and Erythais did.
Roused out of sleep, he struck out blindly with fingers bent into claws, rolling on his pallet into a more defensible position. His hands touched nothing, and after a moment he pulled them in to himself and listened. It was the dead of night. He could hear the whistling of his own breath, the hum of the crawling mass of insects and a faint sound, as of a foot brushing stone.
"Who are you?" he whispered. The unknown voice might be a new prisoner, slung in here to scrabble his way to a bed in the darkness. He strained to see. After a moment he uncurled a little, slid a foot off the bed and onto the floor. It was sticky under his bare foot. "Who's there?" he whispered again, not loud enough to wake Seither or Willas. "Rovinas?" He allowed hope to creep into his voice.
"Rovinoi," the voice corrected harshly. "Don't move, I'm going to make a light." A spark flared in the dark, caught on a bit of paper. By the brief flicker of light he saw a square face and a pair of hands, big, with calloused knuckles.
"I know you," Erythais breathed. "You're Lannarei, the revolutionary." He wanted to fall away into darkness, he wanted to hide his face in shame. It was wrong for this one to see him here. And he could be killed for this meeting, though it was none of his doing. He'd be Erythoi, "lost to light" as the natives would say.
The other man laughed, a throaty sound like one of the night hunters, but not loud enough to wake the sleepers. His scrap of paper burned down to nothing and they were in darkness again. "I knew I'd find you, Erythais. Eryth Scanlon Morgan. Does that name mean anything anymore?"
"No." Erythais hunched himself back on his pallet, pulling his feet up onto the mouldy blanket. "Only Erythais... section 2D. Plantation worker."
"We'll see. I think I know you better than that, little schemer. Do you remember Shomis Three? The High Council Assassinations? I was your employer. I'd chosen you from hundreds... only you."
Erythais made a noise in his throat - denial. He had hoped this one wouldn't remember. Wouldn't make him remember. The heat; he concentrated on the heat, the hum of the insects, and tried not to hear the steady, impassioned whisper.
"They thought I was crazy to trust the job to one man. I knew better. Trust, Eryth. Trust me. Do you want to get out of here? I can do it. I'm planning, working with others. It's time for you to join us. I'll contact you when we need you next - best to keep things circumspect." His voice warmed with an attempt at humor. "Think about me. Til then." And he was gone; Erythais could sense the hole of empty air where the other man's body had been.
He curled tighter on his blanket, hands around his knees where the rough cloth had worn through. He was trying to concentrate on the dull details of here and now, trying very hard not to wonder how Lannarei had come in to the cell. The door was locked, the windows barred.
Trying to forget the man he had been.
He was crouched in knee-high water the next day, the handle of his hoe resting across his shoulders, when he saw Lannarei again. Two overseers wielding pike arcs were prodding him along. Lannarei's back was welted with electrical burns, but he moved slowly with a rictus grin of hate on his face, slogging through the paddy as though he owned it.
Erythais crouched lower, inching back into the thicker reeds and watched the revolutionary's profile as he marched by. His knees trembled. He wanted to sink into the brown water and disappear, like one of the slender black snakes that crawled through the water like a piece of string. They were so quick that no one could catch them, and they'd bite and disappear before the venom stung the fresh wound. He'd seen an overseer die from one. The big, ruddy man in spotless grey had been transformed in an instant, thrashing death throes in the muddy water. Erythais had seen his face when the natives came to carry him away; a grimace of agony still dripping blood where he'd bitten through his own tongue.
A motor purred, just out of sight behind the tangle of vegetation in the middle of the river. Erythais shifted his hoe into his hands and with a practiced motion returned to dredging the muddy bottoms. Others, Lannarei had said. What others? Willas and Seither were automatons.
I am an automaton, whispered a voice in his head.
I am not, he answered it, more from habit than conviction.
The knowledge of a silent, unknown network of dissidents slipping unseen through the prison superstructure... gods, was it suposed to be cheering? Should he feel happiness? Erythais bit his lip until blood flowed.
They were brought into the main compound for a noon meal, shambling in rows to their assigned seats. Erythais found himself searching for the revolutionary, eyes darting across the sea of hopeless faces. Lannarei was nowhere to be seen. The guards had probably taken him away to solitary confinement, perhaps lowered in a cage up to his neck in the river, or strapped into a tiny, cramping box. No, Lannarei would not be at lunch. Erythais wondered for the first time what the revolutionary had done to be lashed with the pike arcs, and then shuddered the thought from his mind and accepted his bowl of reconstituted food.
The man across the table from him met his eyes for a moment and then looked away. Erythais wondered if it meant something, and stole quick glances at him as they ate their slop. Like all of the prisoners his hair was shaved close to his head, reducing his face to its most common variables. Sharp nose, dark brows, mournful eyes turned down at the edges - was there anything familiar there? A flicker of recognition, of memory?
"You veljin?" he whispered after the edge of his hunger had been dulled, lapsing into the prison slang, a blend of nativespeak, english and words that had been invented solely for the purpose of describing their wretched existence. "Walk with the shades?"
Dark eyes met his and looked down again. "Jamisei," the stranger answered. "Section 5H, jungle crew. Five years..."
"Erythais. 2D, plantation worker. Life."
"Assassin, eh?" Jamisei's eyes lit with something resembling interest. "Foven liatna e karit?"
"Hai." Their eyes met, boring into each other with a feverish intensity. Coincidence or a hoax? Here was another revolutionary, so soon after his strange encounter with Lannarei. Revolutionaries were not the norm. Neither are assassins, whispered a traitorous voice in his head. Erythais chose to ignore it, but he couldn't ignore the ferret-bright eyes of the man across the table from him.
"Implant, eh?" said Jamisei. Erythais recoiled from the words, forced himself to nod. "Well. That does throw a wrench in things..."
"You with Lannarei?"
Dark eyes looked back to him with more interest. "Why?"
"I saw him."
Jamisei murmured as he scooped up the food, "The guards found him missing last night at second check."
"I saw him last night," Erythais said slowly. "How?"
"Doesn't matter. Did you listen to him?"
"Hai."
They ate for a while, as a guard stalked the length of the table and back again.
Then Jamisei stuck his fist out in the middle of the table, slowly turned it over and opened his hand. on his palm there was a design, tattooed, Erythais guessed, in red ink. A triangle with a small triangle at each corner. "You know it?" he whispered.
Erythais nodded.
"This is our sign. It will lead you to us when you're ready." Jamisei grinned.
"What makes you think--"
"I don't think. Lannarei does. Let him think for you, too. If you like."
Erythais remained staring at him, spoon suspended over his food. There was not a thought in his head; merely a dull conviction that nothing would ever become easier for him here.
"I didn't believe at first either," whispered Jamisei with unexpected understanding. He bent his attention suddenly to his food, and shortly thereafter the guard paced by. Eryth slowly stirred his bowl.
I did not get very far with this story before jumping ahead to a later, more exciting scene (with plot elements stolen from John Varley), but I think it has potential. In looking back on it I find myself tempted to change the gender of characters, in order to write a strong female character.
Swamp (a fragment)
"Wake," rasped a voice, and Erythais did.
Roused out of sleep, he struck out blindly with fingers bent into claws, rolling on his pallet into a more defensible position. His hands touched nothing, and after a moment he pulled them in to himself and listened. It was the dead of night. He could hear the whistling of his own breath, the hum of the crawling mass of insects and a faint sound, as of a foot brushing stone.
"Who are you?" he whispered. The unknown voice might be a new prisoner, slung in here to scrabble his way to a bed in the darkness. He strained to see. After a moment he uncurled a little, slid a foot off the bed and onto the floor. It was sticky under his bare foot. "Who's there?" he whispered again, not loud enough to wake Seither or Willas. "Rovinas?" He allowed hope to creep into his voice.
"Rovinoi," the voice corrected harshly. "Don't move, I'm going to make a light." A spark flared in the dark, caught on a bit of paper. By the brief flicker of light he saw a square face and a pair of hands, big, with calloused knuckles.
"I know you," Erythais breathed. "You're Lannarei, the revolutionary." He wanted to fall away into darkness, he wanted to hide his face in shame. It was wrong for this one to see him here. And he could be killed for this meeting, though it was none of his doing. He'd be Erythoi, "lost to light" as the natives would say.
The other man laughed, a throaty sound like one of the night hunters, but not loud enough to wake the sleepers. His scrap of paper burned down to nothing and they were in darkness again. "I knew I'd find you, Erythais. Eryth Scanlon Morgan. Does that name mean anything anymore?"
"No." Erythais hunched himself back on his pallet, pulling his feet up onto the mouldy blanket. "Only Erythais... section 2D. Plantation worker."
"We'll see. I think I know you better than that, little schemer. Do you remember Shomis Three? The High Council Assassinations? I was your employer. I'd chosen you from hundreds... only you."
Erythais made a noise in his throat - denial. He had hoped this one wouldn't remember. Wouldn't make him remember. The heat; he concentrated on the heat, the hum of the insects, and tried not to hear the steady, impassioned whisper.
"They thought I was crazy to trust the job to one man. I knew better. Trust, Eryth. Trust me. Do you want to get out of here? I can do it. I'm planning, working with others. It's time for you to join us. I'll contact you when we need you next - best to keep things circumspect." His voice warmed with an attempt at humor. "Think about me. Til then." And he was gone; Erythais could sense the hole of empty air where the other man's body had been.
He curled tighter on his blanket, hands around his knees where the rough cloth had worn through. He was trying to concentrate on the dull details of here and now, trying very hard not to wonder how Lannarei had come in to the cell. The door was locked, the windows barred.
Trying to forget the man he had been.
He was crouched in knee-high water the next day, the handle of his hoe resting across his shoulders, when he saw Lannarei again. Two overseers wielding pike arcs were prodding him along. Lannarei's back was welted with electrical burns, but he moved slowly with a rictus grin of hate on his face, slogging through the paddy as though he owned it.
Erythais crouched lower, inching back into the thicker reeds and watched the revolutionary's profile as he marched by. His knees trembled. He wanted to sink into the brown water and disappear, like one of the slender black snakes that crawled through the water like a piece of string. They were so quick that no one could catch them, and they'd bite and disappear before the venom stung the fresh wound. He'd seen an overseer die from one. The big, ruddy man in spotless grey had been transformed in an instant, thrashing death throes in the muddy water. Erythais had seen his face when the natives came to carry him away; a grimace of agony still dripping blood where he'd bitten through his own tongue.
A motor purred, just out of sight behind the tangle of vegetation in the middle of the river. Erythais shifted his hoe into his hands and with a practiced motion returned to dredging the muddy bottoms. Others, Lannarei had said. What others? Willas and Seither were automatons.
I am an automaton, whispered a voice in his head.
I am not, he answered it, more from habit than conviction.
The knowledge of a silent, unknown network of dissidents slipping unseen through the prison superstructure... gods, was it suposed to be cheering? Should he feel happiness? Erythais bit his lip until blood flowed.
They were brought into the main compound for a noon meal, shambling in rows to their assigned seats. Erythais found himself searching for the revolutionary, eyes darting across the sea of hopeless faces. Lannarei was nowhere to be seen. The guards had probably taken him away to solitary confinement, perhaps lowered in a cage up to his neck in the river, or strapped into a tiny, cramping box. No, Lannarei would not be at lunch. Erythais wondered for the first time what the revolutionary had done to be lashed with the pike arcs, and then shuddered the thought from his mind and accepted his bowl of reconstituted food.
The man across the table from him met his eyes for a moment and then looked away. Erythais wondered if it meant something, and stole quick glances at him as they ate their slop. Like all of the prisoners his hair was shaved close to his head, reducing his face to its most common variables. Sharp nose, dark brows, mournful eyes turned down at the edges - was there anything familiar there? A flicker of recognition, of memory?
"You veljin?" he whispered after the edge of his hunger had been dulled, lapsing into the prison slang, a blend of nativespeak, english and words that had been invented solely for the purpose of describing their wretched existence. "Walk with the shades?"
Dark eyes met his and looked down again. "Jamisei," the stranger answered. "Section 5H, jungle crew. Five years..."
"Erythais. 2D, plantation worker. Life."
"Assassin, eh?" Jamisei's eyes lit with something resembling interest. "Foven liatna e karit?"
"Hai." Their eyes met, boring into each other with a feverish intensity. Coincidence or a hoax? Here was another revolutionary, so soon after his strange encounter with Lannarei. Revolutionaries were not the norm. Neither are assassins, whispered a traitorous voice in his head. Erythais chose to ignore it, but he couldn't ignore the ferret-bright eyes of the man across the table from him.
"Implant, eh?" said Jamisei. Erythais recoiled from the words, forced himself to nod. "Well. That does throw a wrench in things..."
"You with Lannarei?"
Dark eyes looked back to him with more interest. "Why?"
"I saw him."
Jamisei murmured as he scooped up the food, "The guards found him missing last night at second check."
"I saw him last night," Erythais said slowly. "How?"
"Doesn't matter. Did you listen to him?"
"Hai."
They ate for a while, as a guard stalked the length of the table and back again.
Then Jamisei stuck his fist out in the middle of the table, slowly turned it over and opened his hand. on his palm there was a design, tattooed, Erythais guessed, in red ink. A triangle with a small triangle at each corner. "You know it?" he whispered.
Erythais nodded.
"This is our sign. It will lead you to us when you're ready." Jamisei grinned.
"What makes you think--"
"I don't think. Lannarei does. Let him think for you, too. If you like."
Erythais remained staring at him, spoon suspended over his food. There was not a thought in his head; merely a dull conviction that nothing would ever become easier for him here.
"I didn't believe at first either," whispered Jamisei with unexpected understanding. He bent his attention suddenly to his food, and shortly thereafter the guard paced by. Eryth slowly stirred his bowl.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
SPOILERS!!
I finished this some weeks ago, after being in the enviable position of having several people offering to loan it to me. It was a delight and a sorrow to finish the epic, to bring it to a close and know that there would be no more words about Harry. He was a complex and challenging hero, in the end. In Dumbledore's words, a "beautiful boy" and a "fine man." I found that so so very touching that Dumbledore, meeting Harry in the afterlife would refer to him as a man - the first time that anyone in the series ever did. And of course it is entirely appropriate. Harry is seventeen and has gone through such experiences as would harrow the soul of a much older and wiser person. But it is Harry's essential goodness and trueness (truthiness, one might say) that leads him through the challenges. These are qualities that stay with him as he grows from boy to man. They are even qualities that he has in greater amount than his father, who in his time was not above some very cruel teasing.
Which leads one to Snape, and the devastatingly satisfying final revelations about his life and character. A wonderful, wonderful job of writing, that he should be so ambiguous for so long. The revelations about Dumbledore's earlier life, too, are devastating and illuminating in equal measure. As the series has progressed he has definitely evolved from all-powerful headmaster to vulnerable and fallible man, but never so much as he does in this last book, after his death. These revelations really complete Harry's growth from boy to man, from innocent to powerful. His power is not so much that of Wizardry, although he has that too, but that of wisdom. He makes the right decisions, in the end, and that is the true measure of his soul.
Ron and Hermione, also, rise to the occasion (how could they not?) against terrible odds. The three of them take on such challenges as would have sent them quaking at an earlier age. They don't always make the best decisions along the way, but struggling through is what shows us how worthy they are of each other.
All in all, a remarkable achievement. I was inspired to write a little about this after reading Orson Scott Card's review on his website (Uncle Orson reviews everything). He writes very clearly and accessibly about, well, everything. Check it out.
I finished this some weeks ago, after being in the enviable position of having several people offering to loan it to me. It was a delight and a sorrow to finish the epic, to bring it to a close and know that there would be no more words about Harry. He was a complex and challenging hero, in the end. In Dumbledore's words, a "beautiful boy" and a "fine man." I found that so so very touching that Dumbledore, meeting Harry in the afterlife would refer to him as a man - the first time that anyone in the series ever did. And of course it is entirely appropriate. Harry is seventeen and has gone through such experiences as would harrow the soul of a much older and wiser person. But it is Harry's essential goodness and trueness (truthiness, one might say) that leads him through the challenges. These are qualities that stay with him as he grows from boy to man. They are even qualities that he has in greater amount than his father, who in his time was not above some very cruel teasing.
Which leads one to Snape, and the devastatingly satisfying final revelations about his life and character. A wonderful, wonderful job of writing, that he should be so ambiguous for so long. The revelations about Dumbledore's earlier life, too, are devastating and illuminating in equal measure. As the series has progressed he has definitely evolved from all-powerful headmaster to vulnerable and fallible man, but never so much as he does in this last book, after his death. These revelations really complete Harry's growth from boy to man, from innocent to powerful. His power is not so much that of Wizardry, although he has that too, but that of wisdom. He makes the right decisions, in the end, and that is the true measure of his soul.
Ron and Hermione, also, rise to the occasion (how could they not?) against terrible odds. The three of them take on such challenges as would have sent them quaking at an earlier age. They don't always make the best decisions along the way, but struggling through is what shows us how worthy they are of each other.
All in all, a remarkable achievement. I was inspired to write a little about this after reading Orson Scott Card's review on his website (Uncle Orson reviews everything). He writes very clearly and accessibly about, well, everything. Check it out.
I've been pondering
I've been intending to make a blogging resolution; a resolution to post every day for a week... or to post every day for a week on one topic, and then every day for the next week on a different topic. It wouldn't be so difficult, really, once I devoted myself to it.
So today will be the beginning, and I'm going to take the easy road and post every day (through Sunday) on the topic of writing.
But first to enthuse for a moment about climbing this past Saturday with Shawn and Katie at Red Wing. Ah, Red Wing. Ah, Shawn and Katie. Shawn is a driven climber, and as such he got us on a 5.12 that none of us had climbed before - "The start of something good". The guide book says, "If you can start it, you're good." This was indeed the case, as the opening moves were godawful hard. So hard, in fact, that none of us could do them, and we had to improvise a stick-clip to clip the first bolt. A stick-clip, for the uninitiated, is a device for clipping your quick-draw and rope through the first bolt without leaving the ground. That is, a stick, that you somehow attach your rope to, and reach the first bolt with.
Anyway, Shawn led the rest of the climb, not without difficulty and hanging. Then I top-roped it, not without difficulty and hanging. But, oh was it good and rewarding. Hard, hard moves all the way, but doable, and excellent climbing.
Then we climbed a bunch of other stuff, and ended up on "Foreign Affairs". 5.10d, but with the crux between the first and second bolts, and consistently hard for the entire route. Shawn fell going for the second bolt. I caught him, of course, so it was a good lesson in the effectiveness of my belay. I think I can lead this route. It will be my new goal, seeing as how I've led my other Red Wing goals this summer.
So today will be the beginning, and I'm going to take the easy road and post every day (through Sunday) on the topic of writing.
But first to enthuse for a moment about climbing this past Saturday with Shawn and Katie at Red Wing. Ah, Red Wing. Ah, Shawn and Katie. Shawn is a driven climber, and as such he got us on a 5.12 that none of us had climbed before - "The start of something good". The guide book says, "If you can start it, you're good." This was indeed the case, as the opening moves were godawful hard. So hard, in fact, that none of us could do them, and we had to improvise a stick-clip to clip the first bolt. A stick-clip, for the uninitiated, is a device for clipping your quick-draw and rope through the first bolt without leaving the ground. That is, a stick, that you somehow attach your rope to, and reach the first bolt with.
Anyway, Shawn led the rest of the climb, not without difficulty and hanging. Then I top-roped it, not without difficulty and hanging. But, oh was it good and rewarding. Hard, hard moves all the way, but doable, and excellent climbing.
Then we climbed a bunch of other stuff, and ended up on "Foreign Affairs". 5.10d, but with the crux between the first and second bolts, and consistently hard for the entire route. Shawn fell going for the second bolt. I caught him, of course, so it was a good lesson in the effectiveness of my belay. I think I can lead this route. It will be my new goal, seeing as how I've led my other Red Wing goals this summer.
A fragment, for your consideration
And here is the first of my posts about writing; a story fragment from long ago, inspired by a weird dream about an alien planet. This fragment doesn't contain any of the dream, but it would have led up to the details of the alien planet. If I get any feedback I might be inspired to write more. So please feel free to respond.
Malk's Tale (working title)
"I was not built for this," the ship said amiably.
Malk hissed, shook sweat from his forehead. "I know," he answered. "You'll have to do."
He was jammed in the ship's belly access corridor, feet against one wall, back against the other. The hatch was closed, most definitely closed despite his best attempts to make it open. He worked on feverishly, prying the lid from a third panel in the hatch and activating the sensor set in his eye socket with a blink. He had passed the point of no return about six minutes ago, after his daring ascent of one of the landing gear legs and dizzying traverse of the underbelly. Once into the access corridor he was hidden from view, and the traffic around the ship had increased so he'd certainly be seen if he left.
"Ship," muttered Malk, sighting into the panel with infrared.
"Yes?"
"Time until liftoff?"
"Five minutes, twenty-six seconds."
"Damn." His back slid fractionally against the smooth steel, and he froze for a moment, pressing his feet a little harder against the opposite side. He needed both hands free to manipulate the tiny electromagnetic sensors, to simulate the sending of a message to the miniscule computer that ruled the hatch.
Open, he thought. There was a sudden thrum that he felt first through his feet and back, and a moment later heard with his ears. He glanced down. The open space below--a ten meter dizzying drop to the floor--was lit in red and white. A floor-hugging mist crept across from the rear of the ship, painting the lights in pink luminescence.
Back to the sensor pad, no time to waste. "Time until liftoff?" Malk hissed.
"Four minutes, three seconds."
With a curse he abandoned the third panel and moved on to the fourth and final. He balanced the lid on his lap, carefully, and reached up into the realm of circuit boards and tiny, flickering laser lights. With one tool, a tiny ray splitter, he redirected one of the beams. Seconds passed. He had turned off the clock in his visual field display--it was too distracting when working with delicate circuits--and the ship was quite willing to supply the lack. "Time until liftoff?" Malk grunted, and shifted the beam to the third of several possible targets.
"Three minutes, twenty--" the voice cut off with a snap.
At the same time the hatch above Malk's head hummed and slid open, revealing a white, oddly shaped space. "And not a second too soon," he said, heaving up and into the airlock. The hatch shut itself behind him. The 'lock was unlit, but he could see the details in infrared and sonar; a spare, small room with hatches on floor and ceiling.
"Absolutely delightful," he muttered to himself. "Ship?"
Silence. Then a shuddering that felt like noise, and a huge hand pressing against his back. Malk sat, quickly, and slid over to the corner. The rumble continued, grinding like the feet of mountains. The pressure increased, then eased abruptly. Malk gasped a breath of air.
Light blazed suddenly from illumination strips set in each wall--it would have been blinding if his eyes had been adjusted to the visible spectrum--and a voice roared, "Intruder! You will be jettisoned in precisely five minutes. Any attempt to resist will result in immediate..." A pause. Malk thought he could hear a hurried conversation through the speaker hiss, but the words were entirely garbled. A louder exclamation, still garbled, and then a sudden squeak. The comm unit clicked off.
"Well," he murmured to himself. "Curiouser and curiouser." The gravity remained steady with slight fluctuations. After a moment he stood and walked along the walls, examining each carefully. The only other exit was the ceiling hatch. "If you'd care to let me out, I promise to be good," he said to the walls. To his surprise, there was an answer.
The ceiling hatch slid open with a faint his of displaced air. "Step through and follow the blinking light," said the voice over the speaker.
He stepped through, adjusted to the gravitational frame of reference, and looked around. A perfectly ordinary and rather ill-lit corridor curved in both directions. A small orange light bobbed at eye-level a few feet away in the left-hand corridor. It moved away and Malk followed it. A cursory scan revealed that the light was actually a small, inorganic device - he supposed it was a remote of some sort. Of less interest than the owner. It led him through several intersections, all equally plain and dark, and down a long hall. At the end was a door which slid open at their approach to reveal a room half in shadow, half filled with rose-colored light.
There was a man seated in the shadow.
His face was sharply angled and overwhelmingly pale. His hair, standing straight up in a three inch brush cut, was pale green. His eyes were mostly pupil, dark, and the arches of his small, rounded ears glittered with gold rings. His large-framed, athletic body was covered entirely by a black jumpsuit.
Malk stared.
"Welcome aboard the R'kela," murmured the man. "We won't be turning back, you know."
"That is all I could hope for," Malk answered, and executed a bow. "Malk Erin of Pirner Transglobal Multiware."
"Paul Southern, Captain of the Intership R'kela. To what do I own the dubious honor of this visit?"
Malk cocked his head, switched vision into infrared. "You're a Fridean?" he wondered. "If so, you're a mutant. Only one heart and body temperature too high. Why'd you jump the take-off? By the clock you were three minutes early."
The captain learned forward in his chair, seeming amused. "I'm merely half Fridean, my friend, and you're more than half-dead at this moment. What's your game?"
Malk opted for the truth. It seemed wisest. "Body alteration. Sense amplification, extra limbs... you want it, you got it. I'm one of the best in several fields. I could give you that second heart."
The captain smiled. "One is all I require, thanks. What quirk of nature made you decide to force your presence on me?"
Malk opted for falsehood. "I have some creditors who've been waiting just a little too long for their payback."
"No, really."
Malk blinked. "Erm... well, okay, let's have it all out, then."
"I'd prefer that."
"I was hired to do a job on Galley, and as it turned out it wasn't what they told me it would be. They didn't want to take no for an answer. I left." Malk closed his lips on all that remained to be said, schooling his features to an emotionless veneer. He wouldn't have accepted his story had he been in the Captain's place. There would be questions, he was certain, and he didn’t want to answer them. It was far too humiliating.
"And what did you expect would happen once this ship had lifted off? A job? A ride to somewhere in particular?"
The question was so unexpected that Malk stood unprepared for a moment, discarding thoughts. "What I expected… yes, I guess I did expect something. Perhaps to be thrown from the airlock. Once there was breathable atmosphere outside again. Are you certain you're not interested in my specialties? Even if you don't want mods yourself, it's a very marketable skill. If you could tell me where we're going, I could…"
"I don't think so.” A deep sigh from the figure in the shadow. “Trouble breeds trouble is what they say, I believe. You are a surgeon? A biotech? What else can you do?”
“Not just bio stuff. Tech in general. I can fly a small ship, break codes, mix a damn fine martini. Quite capable of shooting weapons. I made my living as an accountant in my youth.”
Paul Southern raised an eyebrow. “A veritable renaissance man. Well, with such a panoply of skills there’s bound to be more that you haven’t mentioned. Your potential usefulness increases. Still, it’s too soon to write a contract. Will you be content to be my guest for a few days?”
Malk blinked again, taken aback twice in as few minutes. “I really don’t have a better option. I’d love to be your guest. But the take-off? Am I out of the frying pan into the fire?”
“Time will tell, my friend.” The Captain leaned forward into the light, shadows defining saturnine features. “Time will tell.”
Malk's Tale (working title)
"I was not built for this," the ship said amiably.
Malk hissed, shook sweat from his forehead. "I know," he answered. "You'll have to do."
He was jammed in the ship's belly access corridor, feet against one wall, back against the other. The hatch was closed, most definitely closed despite his best attempts to make it open. He worked on feverishly, prying the lid from a third panel in the hatch and activating the sensor set in his eye socket with a blink. He had passed the point of no return about six minutes ago, after his daring ascent of one of the landing gear legs and dizzying traverse of the underbelly. Once into the access corridor he was hidden from view, and the traffic around the ship had increased so he'd certainly be seen if he left.
"Ship," muttered Malk, sighting into the panel with infrared.
"Yes?"
"Time until liftoff?"
"Five minutes, twenty-six seconds."
"Damn." His back slid fractionally against the smooth steel, and he froze for a moment, pressing his feet a little harder against the opposite side. He needed both hands free to manipulate the tiny electromagnetic sensors, to simulate the sending of a message to the miniscule computer that ruled the hatch.
Open, he thought. There was a sudden thrum that he felt first through his feet and back, and a moment later heard with his ears. He glanced down. The open space below--a ten meter dizzying drop to the floor--was lit in red and white. A floor-hugging mist crept across from the rear of the ship, painting the lights in pink luminescence.
Back to the sensor pad, no time to waste. "Time until liftoff?" Malk hissed.
"Four minutes, three seconds."
With a curse he abandoned the third panel and moved on to the fourth and final. He balanced the lid on his lap, carefully, and reached up into the realm of circuit boards and tiny, flickering laser lights. With one tool, a tiny ray splitter, he redirected one of the beams. Seconds passed. He had turned off the clock in his visual field display--it was too distracting when working with delicate circuits--and the ship was quite willing to supply the lack. "Time until liftoff?" Malk grunted, and shifted the beam to the third of several possible targets.
"Three minutes, twenty--" the voice cut off with a snap.
At the same time the hatch above Malk's head hummed and slid open, revealing a white, oddly shaped space. "And not a second too soon," he said, heaving up and into the airlock. The hatch shut itself behind him. The 'lock was unlit, but he could see the details in infrared and sonar; a spare, small room with hatches on floor and ceiling.
"Absolutely delightful," he muttered to himself. "Ship?"
Silence. Then a shuddering that felt like noise, and a huge hand pressing against his back. Malk sat, quickly, and slid over to the corner. The rumble continued, grinding like the feet of mountains. The pressure increased, then eased abruptly. Malk gasped a breath of air.
Light blazed suddenly from illumination strips set in each wall--it would have been blinding if his eyes had been adjusted to the visible spectrum--and a voice roared, "Intruder! You will be jettisoned in precisely five minutes. Any attempt to resist will result in immediate..." A pause. Malk thought he could hear a hurried conversation through the speaker hiss, but the words were entirely garbled. A louder exclamation, still garbled, and then a sudden squeak. The comm unit clicked off.
"Well," he murmured to himself. "Curiouser and curiouser." The gravity remained steady with slight fluctuations. After a moment he stood and walked along the walls, examining each carefully. The only other exit was the ceiling hatch. "If you'd care to let me out, I promise to be good," he said to the walls. To his surprise, there was an answer.
The ceiling hatch slid open with a faint his of displaced air. "Step through and follow the blinking light," said the voice over the speaker.
He stepped through, adjusted to the gravitational frame of reference, and looked around. A perfectly ordinary and rather ill-lit corridor curved in both directions. A small orange light bobbed at eye-level a few feet away in the left-hand corridor. It moved away and Malk followed it. A cursory scan revealed that the light was actually a small, inorganic device - he supposed it was a remote of some sort. Of less interest than the owner. It led him through several intersections, all equally plain and dark, and down a long hall. At the end was a door which slid open at their approach to reveal a room half in shadow, half filled with rose-colored light.
There was a man seated in the shadow.
His face was sharply angled and overwhelmingly pale. His hair, standing straight up in a three inch brush cut, was pale green. His eyes were mostly pupil, dark, and the arches of his small, rounded ears glittered with gold rings. His large-framed, athletic body was covered entirely by a black jumpsuit.
Malk stared.
"Welcome aboard the R'kela," murmured the man. "We won't be turning back, you know."
"That is all I could hope for," Malk answered, and executed a bow. "Malk Erin of Pirner Transglobal Multiware."
"Paul Southern, Captain of the Intership R'kela. To what do I own the dubious honor of this visit?"
Malk cocked his head, switched vision into infrared. "You're a Fridean?" he wondered. "If so, you're a mutant. Only one heart and body temperature too high. Why'd you jump the take-off? By the clock you were three minutes early."
The captain learned forward in his chair, seeming amused. "I'm merely half Fridean, my friend, and you're more than half-dead at this moment. What's your game?"
Malk opted for the truth. It seemed wisest. "Body alteration. Sense amplification, extra limbs... you want it, you got it. I'm one of the best in several fields. I could give you that second heart."
The captain smiled. "One is all I require, thanks. What quirk of nature made you decide to force your presence on me?"
Malk opted for falsehood. "I have some creditors who've been waiting just a little too long for their payback."
"No, really."
Malk blinked. "Erm... well, okay, let's have it all out, then."
"I'd prefer that."
"I was hired to do a job on Galley, and as it turned out it wasn't what they told me it would be. They didn't want to take no for an answer. I left." Malk closed his lips on all that remained to be said, schooling his features to an emotionless veneer. He wouldn't have accepted his story had he been in the Captain's place. There would be questions, he was certain, and he didn’t want to answer them. It was far too humiliating.
"And what did you expect would happen once this ship had lifted off? A job? A ride to somewhere in particular?"
The question was so unexpected that Malk stood unprepared for a moment, discarding thoughts. "What I expected… yes, I guess I did expect something. Perhaps to be thrown from the airlock. Once there was breathable atmosphere outside again. Are you certain you're not interested in my specialties? Even if you don't want mods yourself, it's a very marketable skill. If you could tell me where we're going, I could…"
"I don't think so.” A deep sigh from the figure in the shadow. “Trouble breeds trouble is what they say, I believe. You are a surgeon? A biotech? What else can you do?”
“Not just bio stuff. Tech in general. I can fly a small ship, break codes, mix a damn fine martini. Quite capable of shooting weapons. I made my living as an accountant in my youth.”
Paul Southern raised an eyebrow. “A veritable renaissance man. Well, with such a panoply of skills there’s bound to be more that you haven’t mentioned. Your potential usefulness increases. Still, it’s too soon to write a contract. Will you be content to be my guest for a few days?”
Malk blinked again, taken aback twice in as few minutes. “I really don’t have a better option. I’d love to be your guest. But the take-off? Am I out of the frying pan into the fire?”
“Time will tell, my friend.” The Captain leaned forward into the light, shadows defining saturnine features. “Time will tell.”
Monday, August 20, 2007
I did ride the Monster again!
I took it out, and it was a completely different beast! No longer the clutch-monster, that terrifies me with it's barely leashed power. Ross changed the setting on the adjustable clutch lever, and it made all the difference. It's kind of cold-blooded, but once it got warmed up it purred, and it handled so magnificently. It is rock solid, so planted in the ground. It gave me great confidence in curves... more so than the CB-1, I have to say. Which shocks me. But then again it is over 10 years newer. It has a wonderful engine note, and I've always loved the looks. Ah, I'm so happy.
Always something new in climbing
Weekend before last, Taylor's Falls with Shawn. We climbed several things and ended up at the Wisconsin strip. Set two ropes, one between Batman and Walking on Air, the other on Deutschler's Corner. A couple from Chicago was just leading up Lloyd's Lament. They asked if there were any good 5.7s to lead, and we discussed the lamentable absence of 5.7s at Taylor's Falls. Recommended the 5.6 slab route as a good option. Shawn said they should feel free to climb on our ropes, too.
Shawn and I cruised Batman and Walking on Air, exploring the pitiful gear placements on Batman in preparation for some mythical future lead attempt. It's not that we're not perfectly capable of climbing it; it's just that the two gear placement options come right after the two cruxes of the route, so if you fell at the top crux you'd fall at least twenty feet.
Nope. Not me.
Then, Deutschler's Corner. It starts with this horrendous position, in which you're standing at the top of a steep slope with the vertical wall on your left, and you have to put a toe on a non-existent foothold, your left hand on a nothing of a crimp, and just jump up to a sharp-edged ledge for your right hand, while your right foot slides desperately across the rock to keep you from twisting off. I had tried it before and utterly failed to make that opening move. The first time on this occasion I flailed on it but gradually came close to getting it; I actually latched the sharp hold with my fingertips but couldn't hold on.
Second time on the rope, I just visualized, toed up, and did it. Latched it, stopped the swing. Then proceeded to climb the whole thing clean! 5.10d is mine.
Shawn and I cruised Batman and Walking on Air, exploring the pitiful gear placements on Batman in preparation for some mythical future lead attempt. It's not that we're not perfectly capable of climbing it; it's just that the two gear placement options come right after the two cruxes of the route, so if you fell at the top crux you'd fall at least twenty feet.
Nope. Not me.
Then, Deutschler's Corner. It starts with this horrendous position, in which you're standing at the top of a steep slope with the vertical wall on your left, and you have to put a toe on a non-existent foothold, your left hand on a nothing of a crimp, and just jump up to a sharp-edged ledge for your right hand, while your right foot slides desperately across the rock to keep you from twisting off. I had tried it before and utterly failed to make that opening move. The first time on this occasion I flailed on it but gradually came close to getting it; I actually latched the sharp hold with my fingertips but couldn't hold on.
Second time on the rope, I just visualized, toed up, and did it. Latched it, stopped the swing. Then proceeded to climb the whole thing clean! 5.10d is mine.
The visceral experience of being part of the pit crew at the vintage races
Clancy reflected in the headlight bezel of the Sprite.
Scott preparing to go out Friday morning.
View from a Sprite; I got to ride along on the way from town back to the track.
The replacement of the transmission; a quiet moment of cooperation.
Paul looking up through the empty engine bay as he engages in the endless task of wiping oil off of the Sprite.
Too many hands can spoil the...? The replacement of the transmission and engine.
Out on the track, but not for long.
An evening of street cars at Elkhart Lake
The vibe at the street car gathering was kinda different from the race car gathering. It was more of a "rich guys showing off their rides" rather than the purposeful racing machines of the evening before.
Below, a big American car.
I was kneeling, taking a picture of this Aston Martin DB 5, when a guy behind me said, "Do you want your picture in it?"
I said, "No way!" and he was confused for a moment before I added an enthusiastic yes, I'd love it.
But my camera was zoomed in and he didn't know how to use it, so here's me and the DB 5 steering wheel.
This is some kind of custom-bodied corvette which was incredibly hot.
Another big American car. They have a certain allure.
Below, a big American car.
I was kneeling, taking a picture of this Aston Martin DB 5, when a guy behind me said, "Do you want your picture in it?"I said, "No way!" and he was confused for a moment before I added an enthusiastic yes, I'd love it.
But my camera was zoomed in and he didn't know how to use it, so here's me and the DB 5 steering wheel.
This is some kind of custom-bodied corvette which was incredibly hot.
Another big American car. They have a certain allure.
Vintage cars at Elkhart Lake - a visceral experience
At the vintage racing weekend there are two concours d'elegans - beauty competitions for cars. On Friday night are the race cars, and on Saturday night, the street cars. The following pics are from the race car night, and a beautiful night it was. Lean and voluptuous racing beasts filled the streets, and the cars weren't too bad, either.
Below, a hot, open-wheeled racer.
Ah, velocity stacks! My favorite!
Racing MGA! Cool!
A Crossle. Some crazy British thing, I think. Ross would know.
Sinister racing corvette.
Racing Jaguar! With rivets!
Another of the odd-ball makes that show up in vintage racing; a Porsche-powered Elva. Or is it an Elva-bodied Porsche?
This is a helicopter turbine engine. In a race car! It sounds fantastically bizarre!
The picture says it all.
Clancy's Sprite, with a McLaren in the background. The extremes of vintage racing.
Below, a hot, open-wheeled racer.
Ah, velocity stacks! My favorite!
Racing MGA! Cool!
A Crossle. Some crazy British thing, I think. Ross would know.
Sinister racing corvette.
Racing Jaguar! With rivets!
Another of the odd-ball makes that show up in vintage racing; a Porsche-powered Elva. Or is it an Elva-bodied Porsche?
This is a helicopter turbine engine. In a race car! It sounds fantastically bizarre!
The picture says it all.
Clancy's Sprite, with a McLaren in the background. The extremes of vintage racing.
The garden in August
Peering across the dwarf spirea (truly a wonderful plant) at the variegated thyme.
Asilbe chinensis in the sunlight.
Cardinal climber. A couple of summers ago I grew this and it flowered profusely, and hummingbirds fed from it. This year it has flowered only sporadically. I don't know what to do. Miracle Gro?
Looking across the makeshift trellises (trellisi?) toward the house.
Tithonia - Mexican sunflower. Nice, but not as profusely flowering as I hoped.
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Vintage auto racing at Elkhart Lake
We headed off for Elkhart on a Thursday morning, cruised across Wisconsin and arrived in time to share a beer with Clancy, Scott, Paul, Mike, Cindy and the girls, Allison and Kate. (No beer for the girls). Clancy had his Austin-Healey Sprite race car there, with his son Scott driving. The rest of us were pit crew and hangers-on... or sometimes just pure spectators.
Why I climb
Climbing is my therapy, physical and otherwise. Although one might make the case that some of my aches and pains are actually caused by climbing, everything works better when I climb. If I have to go for a couple of weeks without climbing I get twinges. My forearm tendons hurt, my neck aches, my rotator cuff twinges.
Climbing clears out my mental cobwebs. I can head out for a day of climbing with doubts and tensions, but I inevitably end with clarity and peace, and a pleasant physical glow of exhaustion.
Climbing has introduced me to some of my dearest friends. Climbers tend toward the intellectual; the quiet sort who craves competition with the self rather than the crowd. Deep waters.
Climbing is my yoga, my meditation. Climbing is a mental and physical training, a way of stretching the limits of both, of learning new things about yourself and how much you are really capable of.
I need climbing.
Climbing clears out my mental cobwebs. I can head out for a day of climbing with doubts and tensions, but I inevitably end with clarity and peace, and a pleasant physical glow of exhaustion.
Climbing has introduced me to some of my dearest friends. Climbers tend toward the intellectual; the quiet sort who craves competition with the self rather than the crowd. Deep waters.
Climbing is my yoga, my meditation. Climbing is a mental and physical training, a way of stretching the limits of both, of learning new things about yourself and how much you are really capable of.
I need climbing.
Awesome day at Red Wing
Gotta get caught up!
This awesome day was actually the Sunday after the Bearded Lady Motorcycle Show. Shawn, Katie and I went to Red Wing. Katie did her first outdoor lead. I climbed several things I had not climbed before, specifically two 5.11 routes. I fell and had to hang on Crank-n-gogo, but did Quick Draw Moves to Hollywood clean. I must return and lead that one. I was hesitant to lead because my back was still sore from the muscle spasm, but it actually got better with climbing.
This awesome day was actually the Sunday after the Bearded Lady Motorcycle Show. Shawn, Katie and I went to Red Wing. Katie did her first outdoor lead. I climbed several things I had not climbed before, specifically two 5.11 routes. I fell and had to hang on Crank-n-gogo, but did Quick Draw Moves to Hollywood clean. I must return and lead that one. I was hesitant to lead because my back was still sore from the muscle spasm, but it actually got better with climbing.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Bearded Lady Motorcycle Freak Show
I need to post pictures of this event, but they're on my camera and I'm too tired and hot to try to transfer them right now, so words will have to do.
This lovely event takes place in the parking lot by Diamonds, the coffeehouse near where Ross works. We rode over - me on my CB-1, Ross on his Honda 450. I had been suffering from stiff back that morning, made worse by bending over the dog for half an hour wrestling a comb through his fur. So we get to Diamonds, I spot an opening in the line-up of motorcycles along the curb and wrestle my bike into it, and as I'm wrestling something goes bad - seriously bad - with the muscles in my back. A tremendous pain shoots through my back and all through my torso. I manage to park it and walk over to find Ross, hoping that the pain will ease. But no. If anything it grows worse, cramping my body so that I can't quite draw a full breath. I can barely tell Ross what's wrong because the stress has got me crying.
We go inside and get some water, and Ross finds a guy who works there and does some massage. He goes to work on my back, and fifteen minutes later I am at least smiling and thanking him, and able to get up and look at motorcycles. And boy, there are some cool bikes to see. The event has a somewhat rockabilly feel, with a down-to-earth grunginess competing with (or perhaps complimenting) a fifties-era style. There are new bikes, old bikes, heavily modified bikes, but mostly unique bikes full of character.
Pictures to follow.
This lovely event takes place in the parking lot by Diamonds, the coffeehouse near where Ross works. We rode over - me on my CB-1, Ross on his Honda 450. I had been suffering from stiff back that morning, made worse by bending over the dog for half an hour wrestling a comb through his fur. So we get to Diamonds, I spot an opening in the line-up of motorcycles along the curb and wrestle my bike into it, and as I'm wrestling something goes bad - seriously bad - with the muscles in my back. A tremendous pain shoots through my back and all through my torso. I manage to park it and walk over to find Ross, hoping that the pain will ease. But no. If anything it grows worse, cramping my body so that I can't quite draw a full breath. I can barely tell Ross what's wrong because the stress has got me crying.
We go inside and get some water, and Ross finds a guy who works there and does some massage. He goes to work on my back, and fifteen minutes later I am at least smiling and thanking him, and able to get up and look at motorcycles. And boy, there are some cool bikes to see. The event has a somewhat rockabilly feel, with a down-to-earth grunginess competing with (or perhaps complimenting) a fifties-era style. There are new bikes, old bikes, heavily modified bikes, but mostly unique bikes full of character.
Pictures to follow.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Riding
Rode my CB-1 to work today. It was very windy and I was cautious; I took the back roads and avoided the highway. I have unrealistic fears, still, despite the motorcycle class. I am cautious with a capital C. However I did notice certain spots on the road in which I definitely felt more confident, so perhaps the secret is just to ride. To ride longer and gradually better.
That is so obvious and yet so... frustrating. I want a secret. I want instant success. I have channelled the attitude of America, the desire for results without work. Ha ha. I want to just KNOW how to ride without having to work for it. I want magic. I'm a pathetic lazy sod.
I have not yet ridden the Monster again. Ross has several times, and he said he could understand why it scared me. That makes me feel better, but it doesn't make me want to rush into riding the Monster again. I'm more interested in getting back on the VFR. I'm glad I didn't sell it yet; it is a sweet bike.
Part of the challenge of dealing with a motorcycle is the sheer difficulty of dealing with this large mass of metal, of understanding the ways in which it moves and the ways in which you, as a smaller, frailer mass of flesh, can manipulate it.
That is so obvious and yet so... frustrating. I want a secret. I want instant success. I have channelled the attitude of America, the desire for results without work. Ha ha. I want to just KNOW how to ride without having to work for it. I want magic. I'm a pathetic lazy sod.
I have not yet ridden the Monster again. Ross has several times, and he said he could understand why it scared me. That makes me feel better, but it doesn't make me want to rush into riding the Monster again. I'm more interested in getting back on the VFR. I'm glad I didn't sell it yet; it is a sweet bike.
Part of the challenge of dealing with a motorcycle is the sheer difficulty of dealing with this large mass of metal, of understanding the ways in which it moves and the ways in which you, as a smaller, frailer mass of flesh, can manipulate it.
New cell phones
We finally broke down and got new cell phones.
We've had 'em for probably about four years, and Ross has subjected his to all sorts of damage (like throwing himself at the ground while running, and smashing into Toad's head). The batteries didn't like to charge anymore, and Ross' phone didn't always ring when it should.
So we got 'em. The LG VX8300, which has all sorts of features we'll probably never use. I've gotten carried away and have downloaded three different ringtones, and I'm tempted to download a game. I've resisted so far; I downloaded one game for my ipod and that has given me untold hours of entertainment. I'm a huge sucker for the peculiarly addictive delight of small-screen video games. I think it might have something to do with the age I grew up in... or simply a game-oriented mind. Ross, who is after all only one year older than me, is completely impervious to the lure of games, video or otherwise. It must have to do with brain chemistry or upbringing. Or both. It's just that... god, I love games. There is certainly a social element, as any game is better with involvement of friends, but I'll happily play some games solo for hours and hours. I'm not as bad as some - I do not live for games. I don't have an online persona; I don't spend my fortune on virtual gadgets.
So. Cell phones. I was listening to mpr today and they used a Cake song for bumper music and I had a sudden brainstorm that perhaps there were Cake ringtones. Indeed there were, and moments later I had "Never There" as a ringtone. Lyrics are amusingly apt - "You're never there, you're never there, you're never ever ever ever there."
We've had 'em for probably about four years, and Ross has subjected his to all sorts of damage (like throwing himself at the ground while running, and smashing into Toad's head). The batteries didn't like to charge anymore, and Ross' phone didn't always ring when it should.
So we got 'em. The LG VX8300, which has all sorts of features we'll probably never use. I've gotten carried away and have downloaded three different ringtones, and I'm tempted to download a game. I've resisted so far; I downloaded one game for my ipod and that has given me untold hours of entertainment. I'm a huge sucker for the peculiarly addictive delight of small-screen video games. I think it might have something to do with the age I grew up in... or simply a game-oriented mind. Ross, who is after all only one year older than me, is completely impervious to the lure of games, video or otherwise. It must have to do with brain chemistry or upbringing. Or both. It's just that... god, I love games. There is certainly a social element, as any game is better with involvement of friends, but I'll happily play some games solo for hours and hours. I'm not as bad as some - I do not live for games. I don't have an online persona; I don't spend my fortune on virtual gadgets.
So. Cell phones. I was listening to mpr today and they used a Cake song for bumper music and I had a sudden brainstorm that perhaps there were Cake ringtones. Indeed there were, and moments later I had "Never There" as a ringtone. Lyrics are amusingly apt - "You're never there, you're never there, you're never ever ever ever there."
I feel such a weird frustration at this juncture of my life... It's exemplified in my work situation, in which I KNOW that I have a great job, in which I'm paid very well to sculpt all day, I have flexibility galore, my boss knows and trusts me and is a friend, and... I get to sculpt all day! But I also have all this frustration about the fact that I'm doing essentially the same thing over and over. And for whatever reason I feel like I'm regressing to an earlier, less social version of myself in which I submerge myself in my work and don't connect with coworkers.
I'm wallowing in the negative view.
What makes me happy is going home and being with my Ross and my Toad and my yard and my house. What makes me happy is going climbing with my dear friends and pushing my mental and physical limits. What makes me happy is pulling weeds from my garden and lawn, and moving plants and watching plants grow. What makes me happy is doing things that I don't have to do but want to do anyway. What makes me happy is reading books... but then I become frustrated when I think about the fact that at one point in my life I yearned to write science fiction books and could have if I had sufficient gumption/encouragement/dedication. I get frustrated and angry. Maybe I am only now dealing with anger that has built up for a long time. And maybe some of that anger is aimed at myself, which leads me into a difficult and unproductive cycle of frustration and self-blame and guilt and bad feeling. It is SO difficult to be proactive and positive.
Of course even in writing that I think that some people do not find it so difficult, and if only I could be one of those positive people... and thus begins the cycle of guilt and blame.
I'm frustrated that I'm not and have never been ambitious. And because of the peculiar state that I've been in, I find it easy to blame my parents for my lack of ambition. It's not particularly fair, but there it is. Maybe this is a step along the way to truly owning my own lack of ambition. If so I should be celebrating.
The truth is that I could start writing the great american novel tomorrow. It is not too late for anything, ever. How's that for a positive thought? And here's another: I can do stuff. So do it - now. That's part of the point of this blog.
I'm wallowing in the negative view.
What makes me happy is going home and being with my Ross and my Toad and my yard and my house. What makes me happy is going climbing with my dear friends and pushing my mental and physical limits. What makes me happy is pulling weeds from my garden and lawn, and moving plants and watching plants grow. What makes me happy is doing things that I don't have to do but want to do anyway. What makes me happy is reading books... but then I become frustrated when I think about the fact that at one point in my life I yearned to write science fiction books and could have if I had sufficient gumption/encouragement/dedication. I get frustrated and angry. Maybe I am only now dealing with anger that has built up for a long time. And maybe some of that anger is aimed at myself, which leads me into a difficult and unproductive cycle of frustration and self-blame and guilt and bad feeling. It is SO difficult to be proactive and positive.
Of course even in writing that I think that some people do not find it so difficult, and if only I could be one of those positive people... and thus begins the cycle of guilt and blame.
I'm frustrated that I'm not and have never been ambitious. And because of the peculiar state that I've been in, I find it easy to blame my parents for my lack of ambition. It's not particularly fair, but there it is. Maybe this is a step along the way to truly owning my own lack of ambition. If so I should be celebrating.
The truth is that I could start writing the great american novel tomorrow. It is not too late for anything, ever. How's that for a positive thought? And here's another: I can do stuff. So do it - now. That's part of the point of this blog.
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Summer garden
Cimicifuga racemosa. Snakeroot.
Sundrops?
Delphinium, with a side order of asiatic lillies.
The same.
Climbing with katie
Had a girls' climbing day at Taylor's Falls with Katie. Tried to get Diane to come, too, but she had stuff goin' on. So Diane is moving to Boston, where she got a job with Sensable (the company that made the 3-D modelling software we were using at work). She's here through August, and has expressed a desire to get in some climbing before leaving town. But more about that later. For now the topic is me and Katie, climbing at Taylor's.
We went to the Picnic area on the Wisconsin side of Taylor's Falls. It's called the Picnic area because it is at the far southern end of the park, closest to the beach area where families gather to picnic and grill on summer days. A quick hike up a steep hill takes you to the top of the cliffs and to the very recognizable formations at the top of the climbs. As we reached the spot I groaned upon seeing a bunch of webbing and a climber flaking out a rope; I assumed that the spot was well and truly occupied and we would have to hike on. But the guy said they were almost done, and Katie and I dug out the ropes and webbing and gear and started setting anchors. As we finished our toprope setups they were tearing theirs down, and soon we were scrambling down the "easy" way to the base of the climbs.
The left rope is hanging on "Picnic crack", a very leadable 5.6 crack. In fact, after we both toproped it I pulled the rope and lead it, and then belayed Katie from the top. We then rapelled back down. She had never rapelled before, so I had the pleasure of introducing her to another essential climbing experience.
This happens to be one of the best spots for a hot summer day; shady all day with a fairly flat area for setting out gear. It can be comfy, as can be seen below. The greenish sunny area past my foot is the river.
Katie didn't realize I was taking this picture of her.
And I didn't realize she was getting in to this picture!
The blue rope was hanging between two climbs; "Picnic Face" goes straight up the face at and to the left of the rope, rated 5.10, and "Picnic Right" goes up a diagonal crack out of the photo, and then up and over the tiny overhang just right of the rope. It's a committing lead; you get gear in just below the overhang, but then the next good gear spot is a ways up. I lead it once, years ago, and on the same day my friend Tracy lead it and fell from above the overhang. It was actually a sweet catch; I hardly felt the impact when my belay caught him, but it shook him quite a bit and seemed to be the beginning of his loss of interest in climbing.
After doing those routes Katie and I pulled the green rope and scrambled around the corner to "Weird Overhang". I had done this route with my friend Dave years ago; he led it, couldn't get past this weird spot below the overhang, and I climbed up and finished the lead. This time I was going to do the entire lead. I was being kind of wimpy, taking my time and doubling up my pro. The awkward spot is in a flaring corner; you have to pull up and into the flaring corner, and then the left wall of the corner falls away into a sloping ledge. A sloping ledge may sound easy to climb on to, but the only foothold to get onto the ledge is a small, triangular spot in the corner, and the hand sequence is tricky; a righthand crimp allows you to grab a sidepull above the ledge with your left, and then by folding your torso over the ledge you can reach a good solid crack with your right. Then you can place protection in this crack (from this somewhat strenuous position) or a bold climber might make the move to get a foot up on the ledge before placing pro. I was not that bold climber; I tried a couple of overly large cams in the crack, and then had to downclimb to get the proper size cam from the other side of my harness. Then, however, it was cake.
Once you're on the sloping ledge you're actually squeezing into the space below the overhang. Swing out around the left end of it and up the wide, easy crack, and you're done. I threw a couple of cams into cracks at the top, tied off a tree root, and belayed Katie up. After feeling a little wimpy about my ascent I was made to feel like a hero as she groaned and gasped, said "I don't think I can do this" at the hard spot, and finally finished it off. When she came over the top she said, "You're a rock star." I dissembled and preened.
We finished off by rapelling the blue line, climbing it again, and hauling our packs to the top. An excellent day with plenty of climbing.
We went to the Picnic area on the Wisconsin side of Taylor's Falls. It's called the Picnic area because it is at the far southern end of the park, closest to the beach area where families gather to picnic and grill on summer days. A quick hike up a steep hill takes you to the top of the cliffs and to the very recognizable formations at the top of the climbs. As we reached the spot I groaned upon seeing a bunch of webbing and a climber flaking out a rope; I assumed that the spot was well and truly occupied and we would have to hike on. But the guy said they were almost done, and Katie and I dug out the ropes and webbing and gear and started setting anchors. As we finished our toprope setups they were tearing theirs down, and soon we were scrambling down the "easy" way to the base of the climbs.
The left rope is hanging on "Picnic crack", a very leadable 5.6 crack. In fact, after we both toproped it I pulled the rope and lead it, and then belayed Katie from the top. We then rapelled back down. She had never rapelled before, so I had the pleasure of introducing her to another essential climbing experience.
This happens to be one of the best spots for a hot summer day; shady all day with a fairly flat area for setting out gear. It can be comfy, as can be seen below. The greenish sunny area past my foot is the river.
Katie didn't realize I was taking this picture of her.
And I didn't realize she was getting in to this picture!The blue rope was hanging between two climbs; "Picnic Face" goes straight up the face at and to the left of the rope, rated 5.10, and "Picnic Right" goes up a diagonal crack out of the photo, and then up and over the tiny overhang just right of the rope. It's a committing lead; you get gear in just below the overhang, but then the next good gear spot is a ways up. I lead it once, years ago, and on the same day my friend Tracy lead it and fell from above the overhang. It was actually a sweet catch; I hardly felt the impact when my belay caught him, but it shook him quite a bit and seemed to be the beginning of his loss of interest in climbing.
After doing those routes Katie and I pulled the green rope and scrambled around the corner to "Weird Overhang". I had done this route with my friend Dave years ago; he led it, couldn't get past this weird spot below the overhang, and I climbed up and finished the lead. This time I was going to do the entire lead. I was being kind of wimpy, taking my time and doubling up my pro. The awkward spot is in a flaring corner; you have to pull up and into the flaring corner, and then the left wall of the corner falls away into a sloping ledge. A sloping ledge may sound easy to climb on to, but the only foothold to get onto the ledge is a small, triangular spot in the corner, and the hand sequence is tricky; a righthand crimp allows you to grab a sidepull above the ledge with your left, and then by folding your torso over the ledge you can reach a good solid crack with your right. Then you can place protection in this crack (from this somewhat strenuous position) or a bold climber might make the move to get a foot up on the ledge before placing pro. I was not that bold climber; I tried a couple of overly large cams in the crack, and then had to downclimb to get the proper size cam from the other side of my harness. Then, however, it was cake.
Once you're on the sloping ledge you're actually squeezing into the space below the overhang. Swing out around the left end of it and up the wide, easy crack, and you're done. I threw a couple of cams into cracks at the top, tied off a tree root, and belayed Katie up. After feeling a little wimpy about my ascent I was made to feel like a hero as she groaned and gasped, said "I don't think I can do this" at the hard spot, and finally finished it off. When she came over the top she said, "You're a rock star." I dissembled and preened.
We finished off by rapelling the blue line, climbing it again, and hauling our packs to the top. An excellent day with plenty of climbing.
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