Fly me to the Moon

I am a massive science-fiction and fantasy geek

This is something that, while probably rather obvious by now, is not something that I think I have said in so many words before here on the blog.

Fantasy and SF (particularly SF these days) is the one thing that pulls me in and excites me more than anything else, to the point where I will read and watch pretty much anything from within the genre if you put in front of me (there are some notable exceptions - I have issues with some fantasy such as Terry Pratchett and with most Sword and Sorcery stuff and I generally try and avoid some of the earlier 'pulp' SF which is, for the most part horrendous), so inevitably I have read and watched my fair share of crap - as the genre can be fairly up and down when it comes to quality.

With that in mind I always get rather excited when I stumble on to something really good, whether it be a book, TV series, Movie or whatever.

Such is the case with Moon:

Moon is set on a mining base located on the far-side of the moon and it deals with last few days of Sam Bell's solitary term of employment upon the station as he comes to terms with with the culmination of three years of loneliness and isolation.

This is a film that I had heard about for a while (it came out in 2009), and had been meaning to pick up for a while as well. Well I did the other day and I loved it.

I don't want to give anything more away - you can do that yourself if you want - but I think that it is an example of the very best of speculative SF - a sub-genre which generally does not get much appreciation or attention from the main-stream movie goer.

This is not some grandiose space opera - with a few vaguely philosophical (and often preachy) concepts tacked on to a series of action sequences. Instead, Moon is a film with a simple (though not simplistic) plot that is based around the exposition of a single idea and of a single question: that of the meaning of one's identity - and it is explored in a thoroughly thought provoking, moving, and most importantly, new way.

I have to say that (apart from the various references to 2001) it reminded me of some of the better speculative short stories that I have read over the last few years (i.e. selective works by J.G. Ballard, Clarke, Asimov and to some extent Niven) and, I think, can be taken as a display of one of the major strengths of SF: which is that, as a genre, SF is inherently without limitations - as it allows you to ask questions/or address concepts and alternate possibilities in ways that are beyond the capability and scope of other forms of literature or entertainment - simply because reality within SF is an entirely flexible thing - and that if this is done well (which it is in Moon, but it is not in many other examples) then there is the potential for the reader or viewer to feel something, or think about something, in a way that they have not felt or thought about before.

Anywho, that's enough prattle for the moment - next story will be up shortly, i'm just tweaking it at the moment and trying to find a good cut off point to end it on for a post.


M

Revenant

I've always found it fascinating on how attached people get to inanimate objects. For example: my old laptop, which is currently sitting next to on my bed, refuses to display any colours other than fluro pink and green and it will usually lock me out or freeze after about half an hour of use. In other words: It no longer works as it is supposed to. Yet even though I now have a perfectly good new laptop and it now has everything that was on my old laptop on it I know that it will be a while before I can bring myself to get rid of it.

Pretty much every post that has been written for this blog so far was written on it. Pretty much every story. I watched the little 'writing' folder on my desktop go from a small smattering of stuff to a collection several hundred documents that contain completed stories, attempted stories, edits, ideas, outlines, ideas, words I liked the sound of, sentences I liked the look of and even a few attempts at drawing up physical quasi-geographical maps for some of my earliest story ideas.

Ultimately, it's not all that much compared to what it might become if I want to take this seriously, but its a start and its a hell of a lot more than what I started off with - and browsing through it, even if a lot of it isn't very good, makes me feel something that borders on pride. As I associated all that work with my old laptop I get that feeling when I look at it now, even though it is broken, so I very well might keep it.

Weird.

Anyway, as you may have noticed, OBLOGOTORY, is back and I am happy to say that I have several stories on the go at the moment (not to mention a decent amount of free time on my hands) so updates should be both varied and plentiful (Also there will be no more poetry for the foreseeable future as I feel as if I've subjected you to enough).

To start us of I thought I might trot out the first bit of something new, which I am going to tell you nothing about until the plot reaches a certain point for reasons that will hopefully become clear.

The Life and death of Alistair Grout


The sun rises. The sun sets.

For Alistair Grout it is all the same and each day the whole world passes him by in a haze.

He doesn't care.

He doesn't even notice.

But sometimes things change.

For the third time in a week he finds himself in a bar: one that he has been to many times before. He sits. He drinks. He ignores the people around him and those that pass him by and for the most part they ignore him right back.

He likes it that way. It lets him wallow without having to remember exactly what it is that he is wallowing about. Lets him feel like he is surrounded by people when he really feels alone.

Light pulses and people dance. The heavy roll of the bass washes over him and dulls his already drunken mind. It keeps him distracted, keeps him occupied. Helps him forget. Each night it is the same, and each night it is just enough: The world becomes a dizzy smear as he drinks until he no longer has any idea where he is, who he is, and what he has done.

Each night is an escape, and each he prays that the next one will see one of the more wretched parts of the city swallow him up and then never spit him out and that will be the end of everything.

He knows that he does not have the courage to do it himself.

But each night it is the same. He he sits, he drinks, he forgets and then in the morning he wakes, in the gutter, or his hotel room, but still here, exhausted and feeling worse than he did before. Eventually he will sober up completely and the whole world will come rushing back in.

He knows that it can't go on forever: Sooner or later his money will run and and he will have to stop. He wonders how much damaged he will be able to do to himself before that happens. Wonders if he can numb himself completely to everyone and everything before he has to go home to face up to what he has done.

He shudders at the thought each time and then quickly downs another drink.

Things normally have a habit of progressing from there.

Normally.

Tonight something is different.

He sits at the bar. He drinks. All around him people writhe to the pounding music. He finds it hard to dislocate from it all and the drink sits heavy in his belly and does nothing.


He can feel someone watching him. A cold fire slithers down his fire and then tweaks at his ribs as he slowly shifts so that he is facing the other way.
Gradually he begins to feel warm again and the drink hits him all at once. After a while he finds himself chuckling to no-one in particular. The bartender gives him an odd look – pours another, takes his money – and then moves on, his face returning to his earlier look of quiet despair. Probably just another young person drawn to all the glitz and glamour. Thinking to try their hand at acting, hoping that they can break into fame and fortune. Ending up tending bar, for others like him, just so he can pay the bills. He snorts – more odd looks – he wonders drunkenly if he should give the whole acting thing ago? After all, he doesn't really need to go home. Not really. Maybe he could see the world, just like he had wanted to when he was young. He wonders and twists the wedding band around his finger as he wonders. He could just disappear. Take a different name. Find something new. He would miss the girls of course – but, he realised, not enough to justify going back home. Not that he would get to see them much once what he had done got out. Their mother would see to that.

From somewhere within him something seems to come loose and starts to rattle around around, the sound erupts from his mouth as another strained laugh that, louder this time, draws still more looks from the people around him, looks that largely spoke of disgust and disdain – a curl to the lip and a slanted brow that seem to say: “What the fuck is a guy like this doing here”.

He motions for another drink, swaying in his stool. The bartender looks at him as if he has just crawled out from one of the bar stools and tells him what Alistair can only assume is something along the lines of “You've had enough. You're disturbing the other customers. Fuck off.”

He grins at the barman and holds what is left of his drink up to the light - he isn't even sure what it is – he throws it back and then tosses the empty glass casually over his shoulder. The bartender roars at him noiselessly, his words lost amongst the music and making his movements seem exaggerated and almost comical. Alistair laughs, it's like a pantomime show. Obviously the bartenders gestures attract some attention however as seconds later a hand clamps down on his shoulder and he is unceremoniously dragged from the bar by one of the more ugly bouncers he has ever seen and then thrown out onto the street, where the bouncer delivers a sharp blow to Alistair's stomach that leaves him him on his knees, coughing and retching.

The bouncer pulls him to his feet and looks him over hard eyes, only slightly dulled by boredom, his voice rolls grates like gravel being rubbed together, “Be smart mate. Don't come back here again”, he punches Alistair again for good measure, his stomach heaves. The bouncer spits and turns to go.

It takes him a while to catch his breath and for the cloud of alcohol to seep back over his mind. Eventually he stumbles down the street and into a looks ridiculously similar to the one in which he had just been. He slips into a booth near the door and orders another drink.

The night wears on.

Much later he finds himself staring blankly at his watch as he slowly begins to sober up, then again and again. Each time he finds himself unsure if he has progressed from being curious about the time, to actually reading the thing, or if he has and just keeps forgetting what it said after he looked away. Around him things are beginning to wind down. The crowd has grown sparser and the dancing more awkward as people slowly begin to sober up and realise either that they can't dance in the first place, or that they are absolutely exhausted. Mostly of the time it is both.

Someone laughs in the booth behind him. A woman. He almost finds himself laughing with her, before he catches himself. Someone else says something to her and she laughs again. He suddenly is struck by something in her voice. Something familiar. He swaps from one side of the booth to the other and surreptitiously glances over the seat in which he had been sitting . The woman, talking with one of the bar staff as he refills her drink, laughs again. He looks at her puzzled, he has never seen her before. She looks up at him, as he shrugs and switches back to his original seat. He waves for another drink as another staff member moves away from the bar.

Behind him the woman is talking now and unconsciously he finds himself trying to hear what she is saying. Maybe she was just in bars all the time? Maybe she had been in the one he had been thrown out of? He snorts and tries to push her voice out of his mind. He doesn't want to think about women. He was done thinking about women. He grimaces at that and then a wave of self disgust rises in his throat like bile. He must be sobering up. He looks at his glass, empty – he doesn't even remember drinking it. He moves to order another only to find someone holding one out to him.
“Here”
He looks up. The woman has moved from her table and is now standing in front of him with a glass in each hand. Again she offers one to him. He looks at her, slightly confused, and is taken aback by how young she is. Gorgeous, but very young. He feels old just looking at her.
“You're supposed to take one.” Her grin touches her eyes, the light from the bar makes them look much paler than they should be. He apologises and takes the glass with a sweaty hand, all the while wondering to himself how long it had been since a woman bought him a drink. He honestly couldn't remember.

She smiles again and motions towards the drink. Lost in thought he has not touched it yet.
“Try it” she says, and takes a sip of her own “see if you like it”. He raises the glass to his mouth and she place her hand on his leg and whispers in his ear, “it's my favourite. I get it all the time.”

He nods dumbly and drinks and then world disappears into darkness with a dull roar.

He tries to pull his mind back together. There is touch and sound but they are somehow muffled and distant. He tastes something in the back of his throat and a hammer of ecstasy beats down upon him and turns him inside out. He feels as if a fire has been kindled in his mouth. It burns at him, hollows him out. The fog of the earlier alcohol is slowly leached out of him and he feels shockingly alive but somehow ill at the same time. A hot weight presses down upon his chest and he struggles to breathe as the feeling suddenly quickens and becomes even more profound. It spreads through out his body. Burning hotter and faster. Each second seems to drag by both pleasure and pain in equal measure until he feels as if he cannot take it for a second longer.

He feels her hand on his arm and he comes crashing back to reality. She looks at him coolly, as if studying him. He finds himself suddenly afraid, “what did you put in this?” His voice stumbles over each word. He tries to stand, fails and looks at her confused.
In response she sits down opposite him and leans towards him.
Her voice purrs and she gives him a wicked smile, “Why? Did you like it?”
Alistair swallows and looks back down at the glass, he feels a need growing deep down inside him, stronger than anything he was ever felt in his life. She moves closer. As if hypnotised he moves closer to her as well. Her lips press against his ear again,
“You looked sad.” She croons, “I thought it would cheer you up.” He can feel her smile again. “Have another taste.”
He tries to move away, but again nothing happens. His hand moves toward the glass of its own accord. Picks it up. She whispers something he cannot understand and his brain feels like it has begun to boil. His hand shakes and then in an instant he downs the entire glass and then the whole world seems to fall away again, bit by bit, piece by piece, until only her face and a searing emptiness is his veins remained.

Too be continued.

All right, that's it for the moment, feedback and stuff are appreciated as per usual. The next part should be up within a few days as it's mostly done, but just needs some tweaking and maybe some additions.

Until then.


M

Brief Hiatus

Well I've been absent for a while, which kinda sucks, and it looks like I'll be absent for a little while longer, which sucks even more.

The primary (and really only) reason for this is that my laptop is completely fucked and it's rather hard to get any decent writing done without it.


So, long story short, it looks like the I won't be posting anything for a little while longer - or at least until I get my hands on a new computer thingy (which hopefully should be soonish - money being the major issue).

On the positive side, however, I will have plenty of material to run with once I do get everything up and running again as I've been working on several things lately that I would very much like to finish and put up.

Until next time,


M