My Own Private Unimatrix

Bucket-list cosplay: Priss from Bubble Gum Crisis. I will have to commission the services of someone skilled in vacuforming or get *really* good with the craft foam. (Also invest in some good corsetry…)

– another in the ‘Sidequest’ series of fiction fragments –

“We’re travelers of luck – We sail the seas of space – Just to try, and make a buck – LA-VEN-DER!!”

Picture if you will a cross between Space Battleship Yamato, Yellow Submarine, and Firefly: a bizarre ship crewed by four misfits with extraordinary skills. Outcasts from their peoples, they take any jobs they find in hopes of surviving and even sometimes turning a profit. Their madcap – and sometimes harrowing – adventures have become legend.

Our Crew
- Jahmest Wecyi: owner and captain of the cargo ship “Lavender Oboe”. Looks like a classic Grey alien with short prehensile tentacles corn-rowed along their skull. Jamest is prone to making nonsensical statements under stress, or just when they’re in the mood.
- “Nearly Mad” Mike NinetyFive: “Nearly” to his friends. Mike is an aurapilot whose glitch also makes him invisible and often nearly intangible. He dyes his hair and wears sunglasses and lipstick to help friends locate his face. He rides the ether filaments better than any other pilot in or out of the Forty-One Worlds… but then they all say that, don’t they.
- Probosca: A lightly-furred, rotund being with a protruding nose, short stumpy legs, no obvious neck, and a single large eye. Her race has a remarkably sensitive, directional sense of smell, which is believed to work in tandem with the eye to provide depth perception and peripheral senses.
- Zeesuf: This being’s body shape is unknown, as it is covered with dense, blunt spines revealing only wide eyes, a small nose, and mouth. The spines work as the legs of a millipede to carry Zeesuf over even difficult terrain and can grasp and manipulate objects. The spines are capable of great dexterity and delicate touch, making zir a perfect choice for engineer.

The “Lavender Oboe”
- It is definitely lavender, but bears no obvious resemblance to an oboe, which doesn’t surprise considering Wecyi named it. It is a tall, narrow ship with a bridge section at the top of a pyramidal superstructure, upon which are mounted a complex array of sensors.
- Beginning perhaps a third of the way from the bow, two bulbous cargo pods are permanently attached flush with the ship: booster engines fill the aft section of these pods.
- The crystalline filament drive sits shrouded at the very rear of the ship, with three large radiator fins that also serve as auxiliary steering in atmosphere. The ship is covered with an abnormal amount of cargo and equipment hatches, not all of which anyone remembers how to open.
- At the very front, there is a curious hole filled with power and data conduits. Clearly, it is a socket for some powerful device. The crew refuses to discuss it under any circumstances.


Catch the all-new adventures of the Lavender and her crew, 17 episodes per binge-able season on the “Infotainer” subscription frequency!

– another in the Sidequest series: fiction fragments which may be expanded someday –

Alex Waverly stood over the crumpled shell of Featherton’s protector. The other four were dazed and wounded, but this one was dead. He couldn’t believe he’d watched her fall less than a meter away from him. The Doves couldn’t fall. It was impossible.

He grabbed the neck brooch from Wing Majesty’s immobile form. Her magically generated costume had faded to the sweatshirt and jeans she must have been wearing before transformation. The gem upon the brooch was as lifeless as its owner.

Alex clenched his fist around it. He knew he might be killed for what he was doing, but he wouldn’t let the Hate Beast do as it would with its fallen foe. Perhaps, just perhaps, he could trigger the Purification Beam in a final vengeance.

Everyone in Featherton knew the power phrase; they’d all heard it in a hundred television specials, limited movie events, and radio commercials. He held the brooch above his head and shouted it, knowing it was a futile, ridiculous act. “I Defend the Living Light!”

It served only to attract attention. Seven glowing eyes swung toward him, and the Hate Beast began to advance. Once more Alex shouted the phrase, and he might as well have been holding a plastic toy for all the good it did. The creature scuttled closer.

“I Defend the Living Light!” he screamed a third time, meaning it as he never imagined he could. A thrill shot through his body; he understood his life was over, but he had not gone down without a fight.

A strange sensation made him look up to see the Light Gem glowing brightly in his hand, sending a kind of painless burning through the nerve endings in his skin and shooting down his arm. He felt decidedly odd.

“Welcome, hatchling…” echoed a voice nearby. An image of Wing Majesty stood tall and proud beside him, no longer battered and wounded, and wearing the ornate blouse and cropped skirt of her Dove uniform. Her eyes were closed as in trance. “Only one fully committed to the Living Light may take the place of a fallen Dove. You, young lady, have shown your faith, and shall take my place as I replaced my predecessor. Kneel before me to receive your – “ She opened her eyes to look at him. “ – oh.”

Alex stared back at her. He couldn’t find words.

“Oh… oh!” She started to laugh, and laugh, and laugh. “Never in a thousand years has any Dove seen anything like this!”

“This – this isn’t funny!” he choked out.

Majesty’s laughter died down. “It is… and it isn’t. You are right that becoming a Dove is no matter for humor. Still… every Dove as far as our memories go has been a woman. Yet, you are utterly committed to the Living Light. Without it, you wouldn’t see me now.”

“What’s going on? Did I defeat the Hate Beast? Are the other Doves okay?”

“Do you wish to defeat it? Do you wish to save my sisters from a horrible demise?”

“Well… I mean… of course I do. The Light has kept us all safe, for uncounted generations. We all owe you so much.

“I believe in what you do. I have for as long as I can remember… I have always wished I could help, somehow.” From somewhere deep inside him, the words came almost without thought. “I swear with my life to defend the Living Light.”

She pierced him with her gaze. “You mean every word of that. You truly do.

“Very well. You shall be known as Wing Chrysalis. Arise, and take your place among the Doves!” Her stern expression slipped ever so briefly into a grin. “This should be interesting.”

The next thing he knew, Alex was back in the street. The Brooch of the Light felt warm in his hands, and the Hate Beast lay dead with a 15-centimeter hole burned clean through it. The other Doves were on their feet and rushing towards him.

“How did you… I saw you grab her brooch. You couldn’t have triggered a Purification!” Wing Scimitar shouted.

“Um… look at, er, him. I think maybe he could have,” said Wing Chalice.

“Oh, no,” sobbed Wing Scepter, looking down. “Majesty has passed beyond, hasn’t she…”

“And she passed it to some guy? Some random guy? Are you kidding me?” cried Wing Talisman.

Alex tried his best to follow their exclamations. “Would someone please tell me what has happened? And why do I feel so cold?”

The Doves looked at each other. Chalice nervously twisted a fold of her skirt and said, “Majesty’s brooch is yours now. You put a Purification Beam right through the face of the Hate Beast. You saved all four of us. You’re a Dove.”

Talisman had trouble meeting his eyes. “It seems so. You’ll need training, but you have the powers… the responsibilities… and the uniform.”

Alex looked down at the pair of hairless, shapely legs visible beneath the hem of his glowing, sparkling skirt… and at the fully developed chest filling his short-sleeved blouse… and fainted.

– another in the Sidequest series: fiction fragments which may be expanded someday –

The complicated diagram drawn on the wall flared in gold. In the flickering light, the arcane pattern briefly resembled the letters “VR” for some reason. A human-shaped shadow with glowing red eyes emerged from it, bellowing in anger.

“Grrraaaaaaggghhhh – oh. It’s one of you,” the creature snapped. “The last one worked very hard to free me from my debt to your bloodline. I see you’ve changed your mind.”

“That was hundreds of years ago. For generations, you’ve been a family legend no one really believed.”

“Obviously, you felt otherwise. A shame. I rather enjoyed my freedom, I must say. However: what’s done is done. You must have gone to a great deal of trouble to rediscover the secrets learned by your ancestor; especially as I can tell we are far from the mountains of Afghanistan.”

“Can you?”

“If nothing else, the sun outside your window is quite the wrong shade of blue. Let us cut to the heart of the matter. What do you people wish of me this time?” The shadow resolved into the shape of a man: one somewhat over two meters tall, with piercing blue eyes, a thin hawk-like nose, and a prominent, square chin.

“Nothing you are unused to. Shyarlok, I require your help solving a murder,” said Siobhán Marie Watson.

Since I accepted the job in North Carolina and moved to Raleigh, I’ve often felt as though my life was a roller coaster careening in unknown directions. I simply hung on for dear life, not sure where I was going but having faith the ride was better than it had previously been. Even with that faith, there's so much of my day-to-day existence on which I wish I had a better grip.

A sample: I still have too much stuff. I understand the philosophers who insist that your possessions possess you, I am confronted with this fact every day. I left much of it behind when I left the home I grew up in. I left more of it behind with every move I’ve made since, and still I have enough to dominate the second bedroom and influence much of the rest of the apartment. I can’t stand being weighed down by it all; but when I attempt to purge, memories overwhelm me and I end up jettisoning far less than I meant to.

We’ll be in this apartment for a few more months at least. I must get rid of more of these things before we leave - and preferably long before, so that I can enjoy this space more than I have been doing. The roller coaster’s exciting; but damn it, I want to feel as though I've got more control than this.

Originally published at Unimatrix Two. You can comment here or there.

Apologies for any spoilers; I’ll try to avoid as many as I can. If you’ve seen Episode IV, you have a pretty good idea whether our heroes accomplish their objective.

So how was the movie? Well, Maya – whose first Star Wars in the theater was Episode VII – thought it was wonderful, and possibly her favorite of the franchise. Me, I think it was very well done, but I was rather unprepared for the tone. While the main-storyline movies have an adventuresome matinee serial feel, this movie is frankly grim. Bad things happen to good people in this film.

However, the bad things are not gratuitous. This movie has a point to make, and it makes it well. So I think that I will call it a very good movie, worth watching again, but it’s not an Episode. Notwithstanding the many references and linkages to main-storyline Star Wars, and even nods to novel and comic ideas, Rogue One is its own beast.

And why shouldn’t it be?

Originally published at Unimatrix Two. You can comment here or there.

The Guru Trap is worse than the Dark Side. It is easy, seductive, and life-affirming. One can easily make all sorts of regrettable decisions without ever realizing it.

Let me supply a quote from the “Illuminatus!” trilogy by Shea and Wilson:

“That’s right,” Hagbard agreed. “I wanted to see if you’d trust your own senses or the word of a Natural-Born Leader and Guru like me. You trusted your own senses, and you pass. My put-ons are not just jokes, friend. The hardest thing for a man with dominance genes and piratical heredity like me is to avoid becoming a goddam authority figure. I need all the feedback and information I can get—from men, women, children, gorillas, dolphins, computers, any conscious entity—but nobody contradicts an Authority, you know. Communication is possible only between equals: that’s the first theorem of social cybernetics—and the whole basis of anarchism—and I have to keep knocking down people’s dependence on me or I’ll become a fucking Big Daddy and won’t get accurate communication anymore. If […] all the governments, corporations, universities and armies of the world understood that simple principle, they’d occasionally find out what’s actually going on and stop screwing up every project they start. I am Freeman Hagbard Celine and I am not anybody’s bloody leader. As soon as you fully understand that I’m your equal, and that my shit stinks just like yours, and that I need a lay every few days or I get grouchy and make dumb decisions, and that there is One more trustworthy than all the Buddhas and sages but you have to find him for yourself, then you’ll begin to understand what the [Discordians are] all about.”

Originally published at Unimatrix Two. You can comment here or there.

Lord Bitweaver’s Journal, 31st of Flowerbirth, 716 —

Today, I am pleased that I have made enough progress with the plot of “Discordia’s Glitch” to write an imaginary dust jacket blurb, and pleased to have friends still excited about what they see there. I am pleased to have walked 7,500 steps during Saturday’s tour of Natural Bridge with few ill effects the next day besides weariness, and I am pleased to have reached the “Person of Some Importance” phase of the Fallen London Browser game.

My current goals include finishing another chapter of the novel soon, preparing the first set of “Managlitch City Underground” podcast scripts for Season Two, working toward a step count of at least 4,000 per day, and assembling my podcast episode submission which will hopefully move me from Semi-Finalist to Finalist in the Parsec Awards. I also plan to prepare some preliminary material for the Intervention staff listing, and this weekend I’ll be heading to AwesomeCon to help with the Intervention / ReGeneration Who con table.

Tonight I’ll be visiting my Mom to see how she is doing and feed her cat. We did some heavy cleaning there a month ago, and the apartment is noticeably nicer; we’d like to keep it that way. After that, we have a friend’s birthday party to attend if we have any energy left.

So much going on in my life right now; plenty of it is darn good.

Originally published at Unimatrix Two. You can comment here or there.

Lord Bitweaver’s Journal, 4th of Swiftstorm, 716 —

Two months of no journaling… yeah, can’t say I’m too pleased with that. What happened? Many things, but primarily ReGeneration Who. What I’d planned to be a simple administrative job turned out to be many nights of collating, emailing, updating, correcting, and otherwise maintaining the staff listings for the con. On top of that, there was a fair amount of travel promoting the convention, which sucked my energies away. I managed to get 1.5 Managlitch episodes in there, and the first chapter of a novel, but that was all the creative will I could locate.

Besides that, life has stayed pretty steady. Roxy is working practically full time, which means that much of our money woes have become minor concerns. My job continues to chug along, a little dull sometimes now that I have a routine, but comfortable and positive. I’m on new medication now for my depression, and my body’s still dealing with the chemical changes involved. Oddly, my appetite’s decreased and I think I’m losing a little weight.

I worry terribly about Mom. I’m not at all certain how her situation is going to pan out – her mind and body continue to fade, but so very slowly. I hope she doesn’t start a fire with those damn cigarettes, of for no other reason than I don’t want everyone in her apartment building hurt. As usual, she can’t be bothered to do a damn thing that would improve her situation, and is content to watch cable television every waking hour, pet her cat, and slowly sink into a pile of discarded wrappers.

But in happier news, there are many good things ahead. I’m due to have a short piece of writing about Doctor Who novels appear in a charity anthology, I’ve released the 20th completed episode of Managlitch City Underground, I have that first chapter of a novel done, and Roxy has scheduled us twice-monthly appointments with a massage therapist. Soon, I’ll be able to pay off one of the two remaining large debts of mine from the move to North Carolina, which will free up money for other fun pursuits. And, I wake up every morning next to a wonderful woman who loves me. Going without that for five years wasn’t fun at all.

So here’s hoping it’s not two more months until next entry. I don’t want any more of my life to be empty of definite memories.

Originally published at Unimatrix Two. You can comment here or there.

Lord Bitweaver’s Journal, 1st of Chillsnap, 716 —

I have been working very hard lately. Hard enough that despite having important things to do, I took about ninety minutes of ‘me’ time after work to do a small quest chain in “Borderlands, the Pre-Sequel”. Have another sniper bullet to the noggin, you villainous thug, you.

But then we got down to the important stuff for the evening. Roxy has a brand new job, one with a decent working environment and a potential future! We are both extremely excited, so of course, sushi was mandatory. Mandatory for her, anyway; I’m more of a hibachi kind of guy. The point is our meals were yummy, and it was great to have a little personal date night together, even if at one point she had to sit through me geeking out about the clean, utilitarian lines of the original TV series USS Enterprise.

We got home then and I handled some convention email, then once our brains had settled we sat down for an editing session on Managlitch Episode Nineteen. Not an especially long episode, but it has three voice actors and some important plot revelations. I needed the mood to be right, and to reveal just enough to have people guessing while not so much as to hand it all out on a platter. Anyone listening through the whole run will have a pretty good idea who is behind this all, but that’s okay; we didn’t want it hidden too carefully!

Anyway, getting the script exactly where it needed to be took two or three hours of editing. This podcasting lark isn’t one; as I’ve mentioned one or two times before, it’s real work! But we made it happen, and I’ve contacted the voice actors; and I’ll actually be starting to write Twenty soon, so I can take advantage of a meetup with another voice early.

Oh, and I have officially started on Project Discordia. What with everything else we did, officially starting consisted of setting up some folders in Dropbox and roughing out some very general character sketches, but I’m calling it the start. When will it be done? Not for months, I’m certain. But I’ll drop the occasional update here once it’s really rolling: this isn’t a Sekrit Project. Thank goodness, because I hate keeping those quiet.