Because I saw often identified certain of my enduring fictional characters with real people (a few since have become very real of their own essence), initially I felt rather neurotic about introducing enemies. I didn't write very much about anyone you could conveniently label as "evil." Life is a work, time is filled with our works; I envisioned ourselves in those stories steady at tasks of discovery, exploring the nature of people and things---adventurous philosophers---able to step into ideas visited in dream.
Stories you can relate to visit problems and struggles upon their protagonists precisely because we are already at odds with our hearts' desires, each and every one of us, whenever we seek to manifest anything at all we want in life. At the time, I considered us as spirits in symbolic, conceptual struggles. I did not want to imagine and envision people in conflict with one another without producing peaceful resolution; I did believe we should forgive everyone, whatever power it takes, and strive for what could be described in morality's metaphorical terms as our higher angels (problematic, when one is simply attempting to describe benevolent humanism, which I found required an endless supply of trust). Concepts and extra-dimensional, existential menace not unlike that we already find when thinking for ourselves, were the opposition; you could say "for we struggle not against flesh, but against principalities" to quote Paul in the Bible.
So, just as stories require a creative, story telling engine, so do relationships.
Now, characters spouting philosophy while they hike weird places with an idealogical cause attached is still bound to be a feature of my writing, but it is the rare individual (and there SHOULD be something for them) who would accept traveling ecologues full of information. There is a reason few people read encyclopedias the way they watch movies (though I highly recommend treating yourself to articles in the spirit of information as a story).
Let's come down to earth, then, where these ideas are needed! I languished and practiced and typed enough to realize I'd learned the hard part and now needed to dig into the part I'd ignored so often: the part of life where all of your feelings happen. ALL of them---not just the untouched mystical planes of our secret identities here in cosmic existence, but something of the world where ideals and expectations generate clashes great and small, the place for where we'd best prepare.
Where each character of mine generates their trust, there we find the fountainhead of their motivations. I learned a great villain or thief may not only hold a fascination or even touch upon some subliminal terror or even longing, but demonstrate for us the verity of a wisdom evident, perhaps in their words---perhaps in our repulsion at their example.
All of this leads to undertaking the groundwork for creating deeply relatable casts where, as in life, situations pit people in opposition. My interest in creating characters that stand up to multiple episodes means finding circumstances that will create stories that explore different facets and flesh out the people involved, and maybe leave me with that deeper sympathy, and hope for others, that we are discouraged to abandon in the fallible somethings of life. Along the way, we'll discover characters to which we can relate, together with us in our struggles.
Essays on creations, life lessons, and many original stories; also visit integr8dfix.blogspot for even more!
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Sun Strike and Valkyrie Maid
Sun Strike and Valkyrie Maiden
Our hero is grabbed as a teenager and transported to an immortal realm where all technology uses power from the sun; this dimension exists parallel to our own save for a special nexus, yet they share the same star as we. There he acquires a mentor, a rough-hewn, short-tempered and secretly, very frightened teacher, who reveals to him everything has been thrust upon him quite suddenly, and he now must grab our hero before his chosen time and hastily prepare him to be the last line of defense. Every guardian of the realm has been converted to living flame, unmoving torch effigies, brightly light, yet mere shadows of themselves.
Our heroine finds said hero dying one day, and discovers she is a human incarnation of a valkyrie maiden. She saves him. They fight alongside one another, they love, they wed. She exchanges her powers for a special protection that will trade her sons for her husband’s magical ancestors in times of mortal danger. Together, they move into a suburban neighborhood...and the story begins.
Origins file: Quite honestly, I was revisiting the idea of a warrior champion reminiscent of the Iron Fist of my adolescence, during which period I also intensely enjoyed David’s issues of NOVA. This time the champion would be allowed to grow and mature in ways unexplored by restricted commercial characters. Our hero and his love, who becomes a valkyrie warrior, also have twins, in which I was entirely inspired by David, the big Iron Fist fan, and his love for Amy, who likes the Valkyrie; they also have twins! So in the brain storm, I thought about how I didn’t want to give the kids powers, too, just yet---that is, I wanted to do stories where Mom, Dad, and the kids all enjoy/ cope with being normal people. The normal people angle evoked Nova, Marvel’s effort to capture the “everyman teenager who leads a secret life where his hidden powers thrust him into superhuman difficulties” ethos that inspired Spider-Man. Now, Spidey’s powers are not the place to look for that “lightning-in-a-bottle”; the comparisons would be smothering, if the powers and backstory wre not fundamentally different. Nova’s concept inspired my own imagination, plus he was a favorite of Dave’s. I wanted Dave and I and our wives to collaborate on the content for an all-original story.
All-original was important: I have a wonderful Avengers story, only applicable as a sample of my writing unless Marvel’s buying, intended not only to encapsulate that type of adventure, but also to serve as the last part of a trilogy (though the beginning is a two-parter), in fact a post script that sets up events in the middle story behind the scenes. But they may work best as stand-alone adaptations, as they were not originally plotted as an arc, despite having my novel in common. At any rate, one item I was dealing with was how a character named after Holt tied into the Dragon’s Line portion of the adventure, which hinged upon the presence of the captive Valkyrie, who he loved. I immediately thot of the less-used members of the DL, particularly Dangard, still searching the astral plane and future for the whereabouts of Nic, Marc, and Ray. The triplets---his adopted children with Wanda---also seemed to play into the search. Later, I began envisioning Holt’s sons, in adult adventurer versions, joining the quest. I wasn’t sure why Amora would work with the absorbing man and his crew, but last night I figured out Odin placed a ward to prevent her, Loki, and other Asgardian of malicious intent from entering the hiding place of the melted Destroyer robot (the maguffin). The story seemed to have something real to say, so I stuck with it despite the usual derision (usually justifiable?) of fan fiction (“it’s a pastiche, I keep saying...”). The important thing seemed to be that I could later remove the Marvel characters and still design a new adventure, but Now I see that David, his boys, and the connection to the Dragon’s Line should be lifted for an entirely different story---indeed, they together create a new story engine.
“So how do I protect the kids from mortal harm if they don’t have powers?” I asked aloud. What if there was a way to swap the kids to somewhere safe? Interestingly, I had somewhere to send them, logically, if they traded places with the Triplets, who presently dwell in the Misty Hazel’s Garden realm in the fifth dimension (or sixth, maybe). Initially, I didn’t make that connection, not till later in the hour, but I was sure the Trips switching places ala Captain Marvel would allow Mom and Dad to continue their adventures. What kind of powers would the Trips have? So long as they have the power to bring those boys back safely, it works. So far Marc Kane is the one who’s written them at all, and she says she knows they are telepaths and will be empaths in time, capable of psychometry and other feats. They are, magically speaking, initiates. As the twins grow older, their switches will conjure their similarly maturing counterparts, according to Marc.
How did their mom get this deal? I postulated, initially, she sacrificed her powers in order to gain this magical boon, to cast said protection spell in times of danger. She has retired, as has her husband, to raise their family and have a normal life together. Some phenomenon will occur that calls upon them both, and in the bargain, the children will be able to link hands and vanish---and since the Trips are known to dwell in Misty’s Garden sometime after the passing of their parents, why not send them there?
So! How was their Mom unique from Valkyrie? While thinking over the different motivations/ stories given to Marvel’s own, it became clear she could be a Valkyrie incarnated as a human (the Don Blake scenario occurred to me as well, and i knew I wanted her to have a blinding transformation trope). However, she is 100% really a human, a choice made by her spirit as her career as a Valkyrie began...and ended! Apparently, she was fascinated by the world from which the valkyries drew their fallen heroes to bring to Valhalla. Moreover, said heroes ceased to come to Valhalla; whether they are simply going to some other place, it is not known. It seems unfair, after all, to say no dies a hero on a battlefield anymore. So she chooses a human incarnation, and the plan is that she is looking for heroes, and the first one she meets activates her powers as the Valkyrie Maiden, clothed in navy blue and cloaked in mahogany. (I am trying to settle on a reddish orange tone for him.)
However, the hero she finds dying truly does not want to die---is from an entirely different spiritual discipline, and is in fact an atheist. His name is Sun Strike, and his origin is a cross between Nova and Iron Fist, made original by the writing itself, providing details such as the solar-powered nature of the realm whose champions stand like statues of living flame, rendered inactive by the technology of an invader from the future. The mentor specifically is intended to be an asshole, his response to being left out of the ranks of champions and his fear that they will not be resurrected. At any rate, he embodies the great power of the champions, yet, only by training and concentration can he access said power and possibly free the realm from oppression. At this much later date, he roams the earth as Sun Strike (I believe the name inspired the solar-powered nature of the realm). Strike has wound up in a Scandinavian milieu and quite possibly gotten himself killed, save for her efforts. Trust me, he will make it worth her while as soon as he can.
So here came his name...soon came her name, both run by the Marc Kane in the space of a few minutes. From about nine till midnight I kept revisiting the new idea, while also working out my Avengers story besides, confirming Thor’s choice of disguise to keep tabs on the villains, the nature of the Deviant’s technology, and revisited the vision of the Trips leading the sons to the Norn Stones, which fall into the hands of their father, who is without powers in this reality.
So! Expect my Avengers story over in my new sister column of pastiche fictions, "Integr8d Fix" and hopefully, as I catch up on my backlog and birthday present stories, SS and VM will spring to life!
Our hero is grabbed as a teenager and transported to an immortal realm where all technology uses power from the sun; this dimension exists parallel to our own save for a special nexus, yet they share the same star as we. There he acquires a mentor, a rough-hewn, short-tempered and secretly, very frightened teacher, who reveals to him everything has been thrust upon him quite suddenly, and he now must grab our hero before his chosen time and hastily prepare him to be the last line of defense. Every guardian of the realm has been converted to living flame, unmoving torch effigies, brightly light, yet mere shadows of themselves.
Our heroine finds said hero dying one day, and discovers she is a human incarnation of a valkyrie maiden. She saves him. They fight alongside one another, they love, they wed. She exchanges her powers for a special protection that will trade her sons for her husband’s magical ancestors in times of mortal danger. Together, they move into a suburban neighborhood...and the story begins.
Origins file: Quite honestly, I was revisiting the idea of a warrior champion reminiscent of the Iron Fist of my adolescence, during which period I also intensely enjoyed David’s issues of NOVA. This time the champion would be allowed to grow and mature in ways unexplored by restricted commercial characters. Our hero and his love, who becomes a valkyrie warrior, also have twins, in which I was entirely inspired by David, the big Iron Fist fan, and his love for Amy, who likes the Valkyrie; they also have twins! So in the brain storm, I thought about how I didn’t want to give the kids powers, too, just yet---that is, I wanted to do stories where Mom, Dad, and the kids all enjoy/ cope with being normal people. The normal people angle evoked Nova, Marvel’s effort to capture the “everyman teenager who leads a secret life where his hidden powers thrust him into superhuman difficulties” ethos that inspired Spider-Man. Now, Spidey’s powers are not the place to look for that “lightning-in-a-bottle”; the comparisons would be smothering, if the powers and backstory wre not fundamentally different. Nova’s concept inspired my own imagination, plus he was a favorite of Dave’s. I wanted Dave and I and our wives to collaborate on the content for an all-original story.
All-original was important: I have a wonderful Avengers story, only applicable as a sample of my writing unless Marvel’s buying, intended not only to encapsulate that type of adventure, but also to serve as the last part of a trilogy (though the beginning is a two-parter), in fact a post script that sets up events in the middle story behind the scenes. But they may work best as stand-alone adaptations, as they were not originally plotted as an arc, despite having my novel in common. At any rate, one item I was dealing with was how a character named after Holt tied into the Dragon’s Line portion of the adventure, which hinged upon the presence of the captive Valkyrie, who he loved. I immediately thot of the less-used members of the DL, particularly Dangard, still searching the astral plane and future for the whereabouts of Nic, Marc, and Ray. The triplets---his adopted children with Wanda---also seemed to play into the search. Later, I began envisioning Holt’s sons, in adult adventurer versions, joining the quest. I wasn’t sure why Amora would work with the absorbing man and his crew, but last night I figured out Odin placed a ward to prevent her, Loki, and other Asgardian of malicious intent from entering the hiding place of the melted Destroyer robot (the maguffin). The story seemed to have something real to say, so I stuck with it despite the usual derision (usually justifiable?) of fan fiction (“it’s a pastiche, I keep saying...”). The important thing seemed to be that I could later remove the Marvel characters and still design a new adventure, but Now I see that David, his boys, and the connection to the Dragon’s Line should be lifted for an entirely different story---indeed, they together create a new story engine.
“So how do I protect the kids from mortal harm if they don’t have powers?” I asked aloud. What if there was a way to swap the kids to somewhere safe? Interestingly, I had somewhere to send them, logically, if they traded places with the Triplets, who presently dwell in the Misty Hazel’s Garden realm in the fifth dimension (or sixth, maybe). Initially, I didn’t make that connection, not till later in the hour, but I was sure the Trips switching places ala Captain Marvel would allow Mom and Dad to continue their adventures. What kind of powers would the Trips have? So long as they have the power to bring those boys back safely, it works. So far Marc Kane is the one who’s written them at all, and she says she knows they are telepaths and will be empaths in time, capable of psychometry and other feats. They are, magically speaking, initiates. As the twins grow older, their switches will conjure their similarly maturing counterparts, according to Marc.
How did their mom get this deal? I postulated, initially, she sacrificed her powers in order to gain this magical boon, to cast said protection spell in times of danger. She has retired, as has her husband, to raise their family and have a normal life together. Some phenomenon will occur that calls upon them both, and in the bargain, the children will be able to link hands and vanish---and since the Trips are known to dwell in Misty’s Garden sometime after the passing of their parents, why not send them there?
So! How was their Mom unique from Valkyrie? While thinking over the different motivations/ stories given to Marvel’s own, it became clear she could be a Valkyrie incarnated as a human (the Don Blake scenario occurred to me as well, and i knew I wanted her to have a blinding transformation trope). However, she is 100% really a human, a choice made by her spirit as her career as a Valkyrie began...and ended! Apparently, she was fascinated by the world from which the valkyries drew their fallen heroes to bring to Valhalla. Moreover, said heroes ceased to come to Valhalla; whether they are simply going to some other place, it is not known. It seems unfair, after all, to say no dies a hero on a battlefield anymore. So she chooses a human incarnation, and the plan is that she is looking for heroes, and the first one she meets activates her powers as the Valkyrie Maiden, clothed in navy blue and cloaked in mahogany. (I am trying to settle on a reddish orange tone for him.)
However, the hero she finds dying truly does not want to die---is from an entirely different spiritual discipline, and is in fact an atheist. His name is Sun Strike, and his origin is a cross between Nova and Iron Fist, made original by the writing itself, providing details such as the solar-powered nature of the realm whose champions stand like statues of living flame, rendered inactive by the technology of an invader from the future. The mentor specifically is intended to be an asshole, his response to being left out of the ranks of champions and his fear that they will not be resurrected. At any rate, he embodies the great power of the champions, yet, only by training and concentration can he access said power and possibly free the realm from oppression. At this much later date, he roams the earth as Sun Strike (I believe the name inspired the solar-powered nature of the realm). Strike has wound up in a Scandinavian milieu and quite possibly gotten himself killed, save for her efforts. Trust me, he will make it worth her while as soon as he can.
So here came his name...soon came her name, both run by the Marc Kane in the space of a few minutes. From about nine till midnight I kept revisiting the new idea, while also working out my Avengers story besides, confirming Thor’s choice of disguise to keep tabs on the villains, the nature of the Deviant’s technology, and revisited the vision of the Trips leading the sons to the Norn Stones, which fall into the hands of their father, who is without powers in this reality.
So! Expect my Avengers story over in my new sister column of pastiche fictions, "Integr8d Fix" and hopefully, as I catch up on my backlog and birthday present stories, SS and VM will spring to life!
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Is it even odd?
Is it even odd?
You know, whenever I find myself 5 millions parsecs from home, I'm sure my belief in any 4 such noble spirits will bring me their eternal protection. Such are my guides, that I may learn to walk without fear. Somewhere we may well be the difference between good and evil; my soul, it's right here in my actions real, as well as any imagined place!
Four: Charlie, Dixie, Angela Dawn and I up l8 Saturday night (I'm always potentially the rowdiest guest despite myself:-) And then the next day my sister met up with us, and we hosted the hummingbird, which you know was str8: the first time I felt like sad, I got up and found my camera and started stalking the yard from the very edge, only to capture the quarry Charlie's sought so many mornings, but never was the camera so readily at hand (easier to become Peter Parker than SpiderMan (>_xB huh never tried making a Spideycon like that).
So Charlie got to shoot pics, too, which is how we end up with a picture of 58008. She listened intently to us openly expressing things of ourselves such as mundane life requires, to keep eternal perspective. We took the chance to openly discuss Dixie's dreams which return her to a location with regular continuity, though you and I might say she's missing some of her run, if I might suggest she has issues with dreams. I personally had the realization deeply that comic books sometimes came closer to hinting at the truth of what our souls are really capable of becoming; in fact, realizing that's what we really are, our perspective on what we wanna really do with our bodies becomes more clear. The rest can happen when it happens. I'm already waving at myself from the Other Side, my own powerful friend, allied with as many gr8 spirits as ever crossed my mind. Perhaps most fantastic of all is that such should even be, rather than not!
Four: my family of friends who could be anywhere in the multiverse, who touch the earth at the Rocky Mountain Project..We could easily call it Monday Last.
Now on Monday last I, the other kind of "brother" brings his own four: Himself, the sister born October 3rd, the wife and sister in law, born October 2nd, and innndubitably, Aunt Linda, who shares Debra's October 3rd birthday in spirit alone for the first time, because it seems her curiosity about us is keeping her around us----not like Dad making the toaster oven go off without it being set on a verbal cue, but for some reason always talking on and on like she did in life, but like an indistinct AM channel reading for clarity: maybe that's to keep me from going nuts until I type up her story from my notes. I know she didn't make it out there to picnic with her friend Betty like she'd wanted, but I felt like I was going to freak out or cry if I didn't get to take us away from the house, with its two too many dogs inside and her boyfriend, with whom she literally broke up the day before I gave her the news, continuously playing along as though it's not over, and whatever unresolved tidbits Mom and Debra have in an already uncomfortable life change (geez, Deb's unemployment check didn't pop up for several months, til yesterday, if I'm not jet-lagged) . Away, Away, just ...Away.
And Mom's leg's been acting up (more later) so it's just the three of us, so naturally we had to have our "invisible woman" if you'll indulge me the comparison.
I used to go to the woods and turn them into the world of my very own take on comic books and cartoons. Rather than climb into my ample, rediscovered Vertigo comics stash, why not ask Deb to take us all out there to the woods, and travel its smellicious freedomways while not losing the twilight trail? I even buttered her up real good with a walk down to Pasquale's for a sit down and chow, almost too good for her to drive without Mama to help us wolf that 5.99 large pepperoni pizza down...I ordered up another one for picnicking with Mom l8r at Ridge Ferry Park, where we played and sang 'The Stars' first from the swings, and I saw my best friend Tamra and her own family from my Up the Creek days.
More there, too! Her, her husband (a drummer!), her daughter, her sister (ooo!)...whaddya know, another four. Walking sticks, frogs, baby salamanders, pawpaw leaves, and an impressively scary nest by the waters were among the oh so many things. Debra even told us about hikes with her friends in places I've yet to see in this life. Then, finally, four, as Mom left the house of her departed sister to join us beside the river that runs through Rome.
That four went one more time together, to Hartsfield Airport, so we could become two pair again, just as you and I, reader, have paired til this parting. Yet in a way, this life and its exhiliarating, ever-death defying flights, tho it may end some day as elegantly as Chris Dodd today paying faretheewells to Teddy Kennedy, may also be found to never end. It is simply a preview of the greater companionship shared by us in any number, however even we be...or odd.
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