Slartibartfast

This is a novelette. It does not end here. I will continue to revise and re-post. I hope you enjoy.

Many thanks in advance:

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Shards of alien-rock ricocheted off the hull of the ship, while hunched maniacally in his Easy-Lean Admiral’s Recliner, Captain Daniel Blackheart bobbed to and fro with an almost child-like panache. The entire crew held their breath in quiet trepidation as the bulky space rocks drifted into the path of the vessel. Blackheart gripped the controls with determination and excitement. Beads of sweat trickled down his face, and into his gaping mouth.

“One more, people!” The Captain bellowed. “Prepare for impact!”

The massive burgundy space rock loomed, deceivingly peaceful in the view screen. Blackheart’s brow creased downward into a tight knot. He scooted even further into the wrinkled, pre-aged leather cushion of the recliner. His fingers trembled sadistically around the leather control-column as he prepared for the split-second counter-measure.

“Wait for it…” he said in a long drawn out tone. He had always wanted to say ‘wait for it.’

Just as the nose of the ship came to be acquainted with the dusty surface of the asteroid, Blackheart’s entire body jerked to the left—more for effect than anything—barely skimming the hulking mass of iron and ore. A disturbing shriek encompassed the bridge and its crew. All faces winced in agony as Blackheart willingly thrust the ship against the uneven rock surface. The sound resembled a bustling metal foundry, working feverishly to rip and tear its precious resource to shreds—it was the sound of chorus to Blackheart, the resonance of ecstasy. To the majority of the crew, however, it was the worst possible sound one could possibly endure, which is why the Captain loved to prolong the process. After what seemed like a week in purgatory, the tail of the ship said its long-awaited goodbye to the colossal aberration, and the stability and hysteria of the ship and crew resumed its normal levels.

The Captain did not like boredom, finding it very boring, and had firmly established to himself and the crew that dodging asteroids was highly entertaining—or at least something that would pass the monotony of deep space. The suggestion boxes would be filled to the brim with protest and disapproval—that is, if there were such boxes to be found on the Algonquin. For a short period, Cybertech-Tronsoft had fashioned a suggestion android aptly named the Suggestion Outreach Liaison (SOL), but quickly became aware that the majority of comments and complaints were directed towards the SOL unit itself, and were therefore forced to create a second SOL unit for the sole purpose of documenting the SOL unit’s personal grievances. This worked for a short time, but staff and engineers promptly found each SOL unit trapped in a bicker-loop with its corresponding grievance unit. Soon after, the entire SOL project was scraped, and chamomile dispensers were installed in their places.

Daniel knew he was considered reckless by the crew, and sometimes this even bothered him—but their complaints fell on deaf ears. Zargonian’s, by nature, are impervious to guilt, and the only reason he felt a slight tinge on the back of his neck was because his Mother was good ol’fashion homo sapien. However, in the end, Capt. Blackheart was mostly just a selfish jackass, and being Human or Zargonian was neither here nor there.

He was of average human height, and was of relatively similar build. The only real distinction between his half-breed species and a full-blooded human was of skin tone and texture—although it had the appearance of being a smooth mauve, very close inspection revealed an almost reptilian quality. His hair was short and disheveled, resembling either a worn out druggy, or a trendoid college student. Another distinctive trait passed on by the Zargonian blood, was the size of his pupils—large sinister discs floating in his eye, almost completely concealing his dark-blue irises. Some say that he resembled a Tlutonian Fliss at a peace rally.

“Mr. Bender…” Blackheart said as he fiddled with a few smaller knobs and switches which puzzled him. After a few thoughtless moments, the Captain remembered that he himself required Bender’s services, nervously cleared his throat, and quickly called out again, “Bender!”

“Sorry, yes sir…what seems to be the problem?” Bender said with a strong sense of indifference. Bender was the ships first mate—Nathanial Bender—lover of space, collector of vintage uniforms, and all around nice guy. After a polite pause for answer, Bender continued, “We haven’t a single asteroid on scanner; you've destroyed them all. Now, I suggest—”

“You suggest what exactly Mr. B.?” the Captain interrupted. “That we resume our previous course? That we zip along until destination boring planet number three-billion and three? I’m sick of this B. I'm sick of this ship. I’m sick of you. And her,” he said pointing to a random blonde service-woman. “I can’t stand her…who is she anyway? And what exactly does she do?”

“Sir," Bender quipped. “We are getting off topic as usual. I think we should definitely resume our previous course.”

Blackheart sat for a moment whistling “Dazzy Maize’s Three Leg Cow”, when just moments after the first moment, he decided it was in good fashion to resume their previous course, and he was glad that he’d thought of it. “Yes. Resume our previous course. And for Zargon's sake, will somebody ask that woman what she's doing on the bridge!”

The ship twisted unnoticeably around the stars as it changed course. Blackheart and the rest of the crew took in a deep breath, and prepared for quiet, undisturbed space. Sometimes years would go by without a single sign of action or adventure—this was one of the main reasons Blackheart felt the need to spice things up in the first place. In fact, time drove on so slowly that a majority of the crew had inconveniently slipped off to the cryo-freeze chambers years ago; they figured if they were bored stiff, they might as well get on with it. Walking the stalks (large tubular walkways for pedestrians) late night was the same as walking them at day. Incidentally, there really wasn’t a day and night, and there really wasn’t ever a flow of pedestral activity—the entire occupancy of this C class ship was just under one-thousand, and over half of those were sound asleep. All of this created an air of timelessness. Days would slip into weeks, weeks into years. Clever simu-environment devices were placed all over the ship replicating cycles of the day—subtle shifts in hue, intensity and temperature. On occasion live performances would even be scheduled to jazz things up, but the majority of those performing were in suspended animation and consequently would always miss the show. The crew was stir-crazy, and Blackheart was weary of his static existence. Even though asteroid dodging was enough to briefly raise the heart rate of the entire ship, nothing could cure the pure, unadulterated boredom every one on board felt.



Chapter Two is on page two.

Due on Maple Street

An interesting piece. I enjoyed it. The tone feels right for whay you seem to be attempting. It was easy to follow and entertaining. The jokes are subtle yet funny.

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Critique is always welcome. I will try to return the favor.

Rob

I didn't find it entertaining, I'm afraid, and lost interest quite quickly. I read on, all the way through, but nothing really happened. It's just a lot of description, not gripping, not even really funny. Dodging asteriods might have generated some interest, but it was mentioned as something that had already happened, so no interest.

Don't let the negative comments put you off, but I think you need to do more to entertain the reader.

Cheers,
Omni

Benjirama

I would have to agree. On the whole it was a prity good peice, i espically like the bit concering the SOL android.

The only thing i will say as criticism is that the last two paragraphs seem out of place, where the rest of the short concerns the absurdities of human interaction of the ship, the last portion seems to be a phyical description of the ship itself and seems to change the theme of the short.

Prehaps you could change the ending to somthing akin to punchline, or somthing which reaches a resolution within a human context.

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rincewind

an interesting piece. kind of reminded me of the red dwarf books, though not quite as funny i`m afraid lol
i do feel the piece would have been much more interesting if it had opened with the actual dodging asteroids scene. rather than just telling us about it afterwards. overall though. not too bad

mammamaia

The deep crimson ship slid silently through space, as smoothly as oil through water.

...with a start like that, i'm afraid i wasn't at all tempted to read much further... problems with that sentence:

'deep crimson'... crimson is a deep color on its own...

'deep' is not only extraneous/redundant, but could be referring to the ship's draft...

and oil floats on water, does not 'slide through' it...

to me, it went downhill from there... so, i didn't enjoy reading it, found it not at all entertaining and not that easy to follow... sorry, but you did ask...

i suggest you do more reading of the best writings by the best writers in this genre, to see how they do it...

love and consoling hugs, maia

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ihope127

I like it. I like science fiction in general, I guess, as long as it doesn't throw technical-sounding gibberish around. Some technical issues, though:

I'd go with "finding it very boring" or "having found it very boring" instead of "he found it very boring".

Were directed towards the SOL until itself? What does that mean? (Also, the name "Algonquin" reminds me of the name "Qui-Gon Jinn".)

Zargonians, homo sapiens.

That first comma should be a semicolon.

Unless you want "deep" to be an adjective along with "quiet" and "undisturbed", that last comma shouldn't be there.

I'd use a comma or dash instead of that semicolon, or put "that was" before "one of the reasons", or use both a dash and "that was".

Not much reason for a hyphen in "drove-on", and that second comma probably shouldn't be there.

I'd go with something more like "The ship was sleek, with . . . cascading down . . .".

Wouldn't that be "fungus"?

...Okay, I guess it's more than "some". I guess I probably went a little overboard... well, yes, there it is.

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Destroyer

It sounds like a really good piece of work to me. A little like Red dwarf, but as already said, not quite as funny. But you've got something good here. I wouldn't mind reading more. It's definately a good read.

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Cran

I've not read the Red Dwarf books
(they haven't shown up in my neck of the wheatbelt),
but I note from your choice of name, Slartibartfast,
that you are a fan (or admirer) of Douglas Adams ...

The title of the thread says that this is a short story;
your opening post includes "Chapter 1" ...
as a story, it seems incomplete ...
do you want it critiqued as a stand-alone piece?
or as the opening chapter (or scene/part of a chapter) of a longer story?

Perhaps, but Algonquin has a much longer history than Star Wars, and seems a worthy name for a ship in my view ...


Go with the comma, avoid the em-dash whenever possible, and use the semicolon sparingly ... other than that, I agree with ihope127 ...

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Slartibartfast

Excellent critiques. Thank you so much. To answer a few questions, or confusions:

*Algonquin is a Native American tribe who long ago lived in north east America and Canada (NY). I'm part Algonquin.

*I love the emdash I'm afraid. I use it a lot--mostly in the place of a possible semicolon. It inserts the perfect pause and sidenote. I prefer not to use elipses in serious works. Personally, I steer away from semicolons. We all have a style, and that is one I'm working on. I mean...I love Melville because of his broken, long drawn out sentences...and his wife went crazy when she edited his work. But it's his style, and even though it is difficult to follow somtimes, there is something charming about it. But thank you for the advice...

*This is a short story yes, perhaps even a novelette. The piece does not end where you see it. There will be a lot more. I suppose that was confusing. I apologize.

*Deep crimson...yes, it is a bit redundant and I thought about that myself. I will pull that out. And "oil through water"...perhaps you're right. But think of when a drop of oil falls into a pool of water. It glides down and into it...through it, with seemingly very little friction. That's what I was going for. I will try and re-word that.

*"until" is meant to be "unit" --one of those tricky typos that are hard to catch.

*Fungi...Fungus: I was thinking of the galaxy-devouring fungi as one lifeform. One unit. Isn't the singular of fungus, fungi? If there was a bunch of them around it would be fungus...right? I don't know...

Being a first draft there is much to be done, and every one of your comments are helpful to me. Yes, I'm very inspired by Adams, and his writing style. I will take in consideration all of the comments, and will in time re-post for a second set of critiques.

Humoristic sci-fi novels are directed towards a pretty small audience. Most people don't get into them...but I'm well aware of this. As long as my target audience is pleased, that's all we can ever ask for...right?

Again, thanks.

Slartibartfast

I've made some of the suggested changes, as well as basically re-writing the entire opening of the story. I've tried to add a little more action and tension, and capture the attention of the reader.

Below is Chapter One--on the next page, you will find Chapter Two (or you can use the link below)

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Newest version has been moved to top of page. ^


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chapter two http://www.writingforums.com/showthr...t=75909&page=2

trifthen

Gaping.

"One more, people!" the Captain bellowed.

... loomed, deceptively peaceful

Blackheart's brow.

Holy crap, that's one sentence. It also contains both 'itself' and 'themselves,' which is probably unintentional. If you're trying to imply the second unit documents transgressions and complaints registered against the other SOL unit, say so. You also may want to hint that SOL stands for more than Suggestion Outreach Liaison. "True to it's acronym, the SOL unit itself became a source of many complaints."

Lots of extra words here. "but everyone knew that because..." could easily be transformed into "... but their complaints fell on deaf ears. Zargonians, by nature, are impervious to guilt." Similar changes can be applied elsewhere. Also, make this a single paragraph. Describing his features is a subject change.

Ellipses imply your robot trailed off. He was interrupted, rudely. The common convention here is to use an en-dash.

Eep. You never closed your em-dash, and then reverted to an ellipsis.

Good story. Hopefully you have more than just this one chapter.

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Slartibartfast

I don't close my em-dashes all the time...I use them in serveral different ways: both in the traditional sense (a sidenote, closed off), and as a general pause. I've done a lot of research, and find that these things can be author specific. For example, reading Moby Dick, there are many "rules" that are bent or broken. I understand it's best to establish yourself as a solid writer first, and then stray...I choose to establish myself with a unique style right off. I know...I'm a bastard.

You think that SOL sentence is long...sheesh, try reading Moby Dick. I know I keep using Melville as an example...I just love his work. I will see about reworking that sentence. Personally I like the way it plays out...I'll tool around with it. I know I may seem wordy...but this is actually part of my style and charm--just as it was with Douglas Adams. Things rattle on, sometimes completely void of reason. I honestly am not justifying...it's just the way this particular story will be told. I'm curious though...I used "itself" in reference to the robot unit, and "themselves" in correlation to the grievences. Isn't that ok? Well...I changed it as you see in the version...but I thought that was legitimate. I don't know.

I like the "...fall on deaf ears. Zargonian's, by nature..." I like that...I may use that or a variation on a theme.

Thank you for those wonderful suggestions. I will get right on some of those. Do I have more? Yes, but extremely rough. Brainstorms, plot ideas, characters, etc. The only solid stuff, is what you see before you. I work pretty fast once I get moving.

FYI: Bender isn't a robot. I know the name may suggest so, but it's actually Nicholas Bender. He's human. First mate. I wanted to stay away from a robot sidekick, and/or an alien sidekick.

I have written: "...after what seemed like a week in purgatory..." --I'm thinking this does't work, because the whole meaning of purgatory is forever. Without forever, you don't have purgatory. Am I right in my assumtion?

((version 1.3 is up now, taking into consideration trifthen's suggestions.))

trifthen

It was questionably, technically legitimate. However with long sentences like that, there's the very real risk of subject/object and pronoun confusion, if not in your writing, than in the reader's head. Your previous version of the sentence had two separate robots, two different sets of complaints, and lots of possibly redundant pronouns that just feel out of place, requiring multiple readings to sort-out the whole mess.

There's an enormous difference between that, and the authors you've cited for their proclivity toward long sentences. They didn't do it simply as a type of style, but to---and I may be reaching here---color the scene and add weight to a confusing situation, or follow a single train of thought to full conclusion. You're right that you should have your own style, possibly even something that rejects commonly accepted rules, but I don't think you fully understand the methods you're trying to emulate, or maybe you're just trying too hard.

For instance:

For a short period, Cybertech-Tronsoft relied upon a suggestion android aptly named the Suggestion Outreach Liaison (SOL), which quickly became the greatest source of crew ire on the entire ship, forcing the creation of a second SOL unit for the sole purpose of documenting SOL grievances; this second unit was just as surly and unhelpful as the first, and so both units became trapped in an infinite bicker-loop, flooding the whole ship with complaint forms and generally making a nuisance of themselves until finally, the project was scrapped in favor of infinitely more useful chamomile dispensers.

Still one (maybe technically two) sentences, but I removed many of the possibly ambiguous grammar elements, and clarified some points. See what I mean, now?

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Slartibartfast

Wow. Me likes. Different, but the same. Well done, Adams would be proud. Thanks for the clarification/s. I wish I could steal that, but I won't. But, I will re-write. I do understand the style I'm using, and the style of those I mimic. But I won't lie, I'm still a budding writer, with a long way to go. I'm 30...and although that isn't really young, and I have always loved to write, it is only in the past few years that I've worked to polish my technique and style.

Blast you and your skillfull skills!