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Click hereCentral Operations, Liramor-23, Piscium System
Fiona was going over items with Fayad Ouihya at Ops when the sensors began to detect multiple blips in the Navy inbound lane.
"Multiple FTL events in the Navy inbound lane!" Fayad called out. "I am seeing four, now five, now seven ships arriving!"
"Shit! Man the weapons, activate IFF, NOW!" Fiona yelled.
"IFF indicates Navy vessels!" the Comms O advised. "I'm seeing NS Kologn, NS Kindalla, NS Wimple, NS Claridge, NS Betelgeuse, NS Orion, NS Kennedy, and NFT Roger Dancer. I think our fleet has returned home, ma'am!"
"Liramor-23 Central Ops, this is the NS Wimple, Capt. Bouyé Whatt commanding. You tell those lazy scientists of mine their ship is back, and I expect them to be ready for work at Second Shift. Over."
Fiona took the comms.
"Whatt, you son-of-a-bitch! Is that my fleet your bringing in?" Fiona's happy voice rang out.
"Yes, ma'am," Whatt confirmed. "The Fleet is home!"
End of chapter twenty-two.
I am reminded of what a great writer once said: "When a story is read from the heart, and entered into through the mind, when the book is finished - the story itself isn't necessarily completed...it remains in the heart and mind of the reader and the emotions invoked can be revisited by the reader again and again."
Over the years, I have forgotten the name of that writer, but not the words. Now, I am beginning to fully understand what was meant. When I was young, and I finished a good story, it sometimes led to adventure, often whimsical adventure found only in the mind. Sometimes I would be a knight, or a famous detective, or a forest thief.
Sometimes thinking of a story led to particularly strong feelings shared by my heart with the protagonists, as they flittered from one adventure to the next, while I eagerly anticipated what was to come in youth unable to foresee the future of the storyline, a future that I can today most times predict.
It is said that no story today can be written that has not already been. But that is not necessarily true, for we are continuously bombarded by new and interesting concepts, new and interesting plots. It is the heart and mind that make a story: the mind of the writer places words to paper, real or electronic. The writer's mind may create the plot and the storyline, but it is the writer's heart that brings a story to life. For without the love, the fear, the jealousy, the anger, or the frustrations that tug at the readers mind, the story can hold no weight.
It is the combined effort of the heart and mind of the writer that creates a truly good story worthy of being read. But it is the heart and mind of the reader that empowers a story, read from the heart and entered into through the mind...a gift from the writer to the reader.
We are today, getting away from the written word. But stories in video format do not allow our imagination to flourish as broadly as does the written word. The video story is there on the screen, complete. The plot, the storyline, the actors, the imagery of the story itself, is there for us to follow, rather than for us to anticipate.
In the written word, our imaginations are allowed to soar, to anticipate the plot, the storyline, the emotions, and even the very looks of the protagonists, every event given to our imagination, until we have finished reading the book. Then our minds must return to the story to understand what we have read, to make sense of our eager anticipation of what was to come and reconcile it with what did happen, our minds and hearts still working long after the book is read. Unlike a video, where we can put the story to rest with the credits or sometimes simply shut off those boring credits, written works demand our imaginary involvement.
Writing is a skill that is being lost by the young. They seem to think that wordsmithing programs are the end all of a good story. They forget, or simply do not understand, that emotions are an integral part of a story. We must teach our children to read, and to write, and more importantly to use their imagination, for without our youth, who will write those future stories? Indeed, who will read them?
I apologize for the tirade, but I had to let my thoughts out. Thank-you for reading.
Please rate and comment but remember to keep your comments respectful.
Be well, Be kind to one another, Be safe.
bigtddybr
- COMMENTS
294day5 months agoSo glad I stumbled upon your story. Truly a great read.
Thank you very much.
Now back to reading more of this awesome book.
Calnet2289over 1 year agoI love, love, LOVE this story! And you are so right about the written word versus the video 'word'. As a new middle aged man (I just turned 60), I remember with great fondness of the Gray Lensmen, the continuing voyages of the starship Enterprise, the heroes of Shannara, and of course the tales of Middle Eaerth!
With a professional editor , I think this could be published! I for one would be proud to have this on my bookshelf! And even though you're 'publishing' it through Literotica, there are many who would miss this great tale because it's on a 'smutty porn site'. I've read many other stories that have detailed sex scenes in them, and the primary story always came through, as it does with yours.
Anonymousover 2 years agoFantastic. And I completely agree with your point that the written word leads to the kind of images that the video format simply cannot do. Thank you. Thoroughly enjoying the story . 5 stars all the way
Anonymousover 2 years agoWriting is a talent. Being able to read that art is a blessing. Thanks for this story.
Anonymousover 2 years agoI gave you five stars for this story, strictly because of your end of chapter comments. I could not agree more. /Salute
JT.Krysalys
Anonymousover 3 years agoAnother excellent Chapter in this epic saga! Thank you for your hard work and sharing it with us!
I love it when the story that I am reading makes me feel like I'm right there living the adventure.
Kevin
monkeybones420over 3 years agoJust WOW . As a father I try to get my kids to read books not a screen. You are right we are loosing the imaginative mind .
Crusader235over 3 years agoAll the previous commenters bring up excellent points, Me, I just love this Space Adventure! Can't wait for you to get to those Bad Ass Aliens. Five Stars plus from this old Jarhead, Semper Fi!
arrowglassover 3 years agoThanks again for this remarkably good read with a story that both grows and stands out! I am thoroughly enjoying the webs you are weaving...the characters...the different things going on...the whole tall tale...you make it believable!
bigtddybrover 3 years agoAuthorWarmonger: Sorry to see you go, but this is an adventure series with epic battles on a large, and small scale. There are going to be casualties and, while the times now out there are chaotic, good storylines are meant to engage the reader, but the term "Good storyline" does not necessarily mean good news storyline. Please accept that fate sometimes gets in the way of us all, in fictional life, as in real life.
Abiostudent: I know the rough direction of my story, and not all the battles are given to the "lazy" method, though I do not find writting to fate dropped by dice as lazy writting in the least. It is a challenge for me. I adopted this method because I could not compel myself to kill off any of the characters I have spent so much time creating. If you are familiar with dungeons and dragons game play, the dice are weighted in favor of the more powerful player, but every so often, they turn on the strong player in favor of the weaker. Thus, the storyline will move more or less in the direction I want, with a few bumps in the road. That said, those bumps have so far produced some pretty serious rewrites of what I had intended. Not lazy at all.
To the other commentators, thank-you for your words and thoughts, they are greatly appreciated.
Baelnornover 3 years agoRegarding killing main characters: I'm working on a rather expansive bit of sci-fi myself and am also going to kill the "main" character about halfway in. I already know exactly the circumstances of their demise (despite that moment still being real-life years and literally hundreds of written pages away), what decisions will lead to it, and the consequences following it.
My opinion on this topic is to *not* do what GoT did (because the last two seasons were just dumb -.-), but rather to remember what ASoIaF started: establishing a world where people can become victims of the circumstances, make decisions according to their own agendas and goals, and suffer the consequences for it. That is what made ASoIaF/GoT so compelling, that the "good" guys could make bad decisions and *not* get away without suffering the consequences (aka "play stupid games, win stupid prices"). That was the prime aspect, not the tits and incest and gratuitous violence.
Don't kill a main character because it would be a convenient way to spike the story with drama, or for the shock value. Kill a main character when it makes sense. When they've been too careless in dangerous situations, when they've underestimated a lethal opponent, when they've put themselves into a vulnerable position without an escape plan. Far too much of modern storytelling completely drops the ball on this - yes, I'm looking at you Discovery and Picard (-.-).
For example, I found the second pirate attack on LMC-23 in chapter 17 to be a very good example of how to kill named/known/recurring characters. Quite a lot of those died in that battle, but not a single one of them felt cheap or lazy or unnecessary to me. All of them were believable and had a reason behind them.
Some died because they became victims of the circumstances, like the wounded miners getting murdered in the infirmary because they would be worthless as slaves. Others because they weren't paying attention on the battlefield, like the crew of Rockhound 528 who missed a pirate vessel turning a gun turret their way. And again others because of the decisions they made, like the people in Central Ops not immediately evacuating the unarmored space-facing control room when the whole station was getting pelted with torps and missiles.
If you want to amp up the risk factor for the protagonists, maybe you could simply not let them get away without a scratch from dangerous situations anymore instead of outright killing them. Flesh wounds, burn scars, broken bones, getting winged by a stray bullet, and so on could serve as a happy medium in between "invincible plot armor" and "insta-gib," especially if it does put them out of action for some time and introduces some other complications.
Just as a thought experiment: let's say you wanted to kill Fiona. To me it would feel like a bad idea to just have someone sneak into her quarters and slit her throat while she's asleep. Aside from not really logically working within the established boundaries of the story (24/7 personal bodyguard, high security on the station, probably metal/weapon detectors on every entrance to the vip office/living areas, doors locked with personal codes/biometrics, etc.) it would feel gratuitous and as if it was done just for the shock value.
On the other hand, if Fiona decides to visit a sick family member on Earth and refuses to bring any security along because she "doesn't want to draw unnecessary attention" the situation is completely different. In this case she's willingly taking the risk, gambling on being able to fly under the radar while knowing that she's got a juicy bounty on her head. And if that fails and a hitman does find her and eventually puts a bullet in her neck, then that's a consequence of her own decisions.
Sure, accidents can always happen. But considering the plot armor some characters have had in the past it would feel quite disappointing to lose a main character to an actual mundane car crash or structural failure or something like that.
And as for the whole dice thingy: let me just say that the D&D group I've played with in the past had the rule that the DM always rolled all dice in the open. While this sometimes was absolutely hilarious, it also royally screwed up the campaign in several instances due to unexpected and very untimely character deaths. If you're really serious about this, I hope you're prepared to face the situation of losing Liea, Raymond, and Annett in a single chapter.
abiostudent3over 3 years agoThis chapter feels a little bit more scattered than that previous ones - I think your pacing is off and the chapter should have been stretched out a bit more.
As for your future plans... As one of those young writers myself (though, without a clue what a "wordsmithing program" is), I find your rant about the loss of emotion and appreciation for writing *rather* ironic.
Determining the results of your story by a roll of the dice is simply put: lazy. If you're facing writer's block, that's completely okay; it happens to all of us! Take a break to clear your head and come back to the story when you can. (But make sure you write regularly, even if on completely unrelated subjects.)
An author lives and dies on their plot - and if not even the author has a clue where their story is going, it's going to show. You've mentioned that you never intended for this story to go even this long, and I do really think that both you and your readers are feeling the effects of that.
I suggest you take the time to outline where the story is going, what the important scenes are, and so forth. This chapter is an example of what I'm talking about - it's much less focused than your norm, and feels like a mixture of, "I need them to be here to move the plot along," "Oh, this is a cool idea," and, "Oh crap, this is supposed to be erotic, let's throw in a sex scene with this random unknown character who won't be seen again."
I know this may feel like harsh criticism, but it's coming from a place of support. I know that you can be a good writer, I love the story that you're weaving, and I want to see you produce the best story possible.
Anonymousover 3 years agoNot only was the story, again, great, but the thoughts of you, as the writer, were also appreciated as they echo my own. Being an engineer and one who is trying to enthuse the younger generation into taking up the challenge, I have to remind the young students that imagination is important. As engineers, we take the blank page to final product and have to tell the whole story of the production of the new gadget or gizmo. Writers and engineers are alike. we have to be able to tell a story.
Glad that things seem to be gradually coming about for the Senator and that the main heroes of the tale are gaining better protections. Keep up the good work and I, for one, look forward to the next installment of this and any other story you write.
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