Hey faithful readers, sorry that this hasn't really gotten off the ground quite the way I wanted, but rest assured I haven't abandoned it just yet.
I wanted to make a quick post here and link another blog I just started where you can find short stories, backgrounds, and sidestories of characters that will appear in not only Voidlands but all of my creative works. It's something else you guys can take a look at while you're waiting for my updates here, and it's another way to try to force myself to keep writing.
You can check it out here: http://kitcorner.blogspot.com/
I'll try to regularly update both Voidlands and Kitcorner at least once a week, though I'd really like to do more. Feel free to harass me in comments as much as possible. As always, I'm open to ideas, critiques, feedback, or kudos!
Next part of Voidlands coming soon, I promise!
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
Monday, March 31, 2014
Lost and Found in the Voidlands
The skeletons of once-majestic skyscrapers jutted out of the vast, empty landscape like claws grasping at the red-orange horizon to catch the twilight sun in its slow, somber setting. A lone figure trudged through knee-high sands to reach the outskirts of what once must have been a busy city with a bright night life. He wasn't very tall - probably not more than 5'9" or so - and seemed even smaller amid the gutted glass and steel corpses that loomed on either side of him.
He wore a long trenchcoat that looked like it had been through whatever cataclysm had left the city abandoned. The heavy leather was ragged at every edge and stained with a veritable rainbow comprised of all the colors of a city sewer. Atop the trenchcoat's head rested a crooked, oversized fedora that kept having to be pushed up when it fell to conceal dark blue eyes and a few dirt-stained blonde bangs.
Below those pools of azure and the mud-crusted golden straw that danced before them the stranger's mouth twisted into a grimace as he surveyed the roads filled with nothing but a multitude of decrepit piles of rusted steel and melted rubber. The sun slowly crept lower and lower in the sky, now firmly clutched by the skeletal claws of the skyscrapers. The stranger moved quickly with long strides for his small frame out of the street and into one of the buildings. A marquee above what once was likely a revolving glass door denoted it as something once called a mall.
The stranger's boots scuffed along sand upon cracked marble floors until he'd moved a few dozen feet into the building. It was incredibly dark with only the last tendrils of the dying sun reaching into the building through shattered windows and holes in the concrete walls that made it look like Mother Nature had gotten herself a semi-auto and taken revenge on her cheating lovers. The scuffling soon turned to the crunch of broken glass and other things, and the stranger jolted at the sudden sound, scrambling to reach the only weapon on his person - a shovel strapped from shoulder to hip at his back.
His breath caught in his throat as he brought the tool from behind him and turned in place slowly, brandishing it like he was some knight in armor. He didn't feel armored, though.
He felt vulnerable and alone - just like he always did.
A few tense moments passed and he still did not breathe. The stranger took another step and shattered the silence again with another symphony of crunches from the stone floor below. This time, though, the sound brought him ease instead of panic and for the first time in about thirty seconds he breathed again, muttering a curse.
"Damn it, Tristan. There's no one here. There's never anyone there."
Ah, Tristan, the stranger no more, then.
Carefully Tristan strapped the shovel back in place at his back and then dug around inside the great coat he was wearing, fingers going to a pocket just above his heart and withdrawing a small black cylinder. A counter-clockwise twist should've set the thing to working, but it took that and a few frustrated smacks upon his hand to bring the small pocket light flickering to dim life.
The light gave him courage and ease, and so Tristan dared relax a little. And as he looked around at the emptiness and the darkness that seemed to be encroaching upon him all around he shone the light on the floor.
It was littered with debris: toys, glass, jewelry. These were all things he'd heard about or read about or been told about when he was a boy but to actually see them. His breath was stolen again, and he kneeled slowly - almost reverently - as his fingers reached into a past so distant that none alive were aware of it to pick up a small black rectangular device.
The penlight's flare flickered weakly across a broken glass screen and Tristan's eyes widened as he realized what the thing in his hand was. He smiled slightly - the only kind he had ever managed were the slight ones - as he remembered his father telling him how his father had told him that people a long time ago had magic devices that allowed them to communicate with others anywhere in the world - no matter how far away they may be. He called them a 'phone'.
Every bit the pack rat, Tristan quickly added the phone to one of his pockets with other trinkets he'd gathered in his never ending travels. And just as quickly his eyes and his flashlight scanned the rest of the floor both seeking further treasures in this veritable trove. Meanwhile, the sun had retired for the day and night had made the outside of the department store ruin just as dark as it was within.
A few hours passed until Tristan was too exhausted to search anymore. He'd managed to cover most of the first floor from what he could tell, and having returned to where he'd first found the phone he set up the few pieces of furniture and wooden boxes that time or wild animals hadn't claimed completely to make himself a makeshift dwelling until the morning. His flashlight was letting off only a trickle of light by then, and if he had pushed his luck with it he'd have been left stranded in the dark completely.
So he cleared away a small three-foot by three-foot circle of debris from the floor and dug in his coat for more trinkets. This time he withdrew a small black and yellow AM/FM radio with a solar-power strip on it. It had taken him forever to figure out that the sun charged the mechanical device, but when he had it had united him with his only friend: DJ Danny Jams of 104.3 FM. Danny was always bringing the hits from 8 to 10 pm.
Tristan didn't really know what Danny was hitting or what he needed 8 to 10 pms for, but it was nice hearing another voice. And the music that Danny played was incredible. If he could ever figure out where Danny was and how his voice was reaching the little sunlight-powered box he was going to go there and meet all the musicians that Danny hung out with. There had to be at least a hundred of them!
Along with his radio, Tristan brought out a handful of nearly-melted wax candles and set them up around the area. He put four on the crate he was leaning against and then four more just outside of the circle he'd cleared on the floor. The last two he placed at either end of the old broken-down sofa he'd slid over from what was once a bedding store. He intended to sleep on a different one, but a rather angry raccoon gave him second thoughts, so he took the second best one instead - after making sure he wasn't disturbing another creature's home.
Out of his pockets came next a checker-square patterned table-cloth and a utility knife that he used to cut off a section before tucking those two items away again. He spread the section he'd cut out in the circle he'd cleared and then brought one of his most prized possessions out: a pen.
It was in near pristine condition, and along the side it bore the name of someone named "Bic". He adored the pen most of all the trinkets he'd found in his travels because when he was young - before his parents were taken from him - he remembered his father using another of Bic's pens to teach him how to spell. Tristan admired his treasure lovingly for a few moments in the flickering light of his dying flashlight.
When the light died altogether he was brought from his reverie with a sigh, and he fished in his pockets again for a box of matches. A few moments later and his little space was feeling quite cozy. The soft light from the candles was just enough for him to write by, and over the course of a few hours he turned his square of cloth into a rough map of the floor he was on while listening to Danny and his hits.
The darkness of night held at bay by a few small candles and some broken-down furniture didn't feel nearly as oppressing to Tristan now, but the long walk from the last ruin of civilization had taken a toll on him. He was more exhausted than he realized and as he started nodding while trying to recall the landmarks for his map, he finally resigned himself to sleep. Danny had already called it a night a while ago.
Tristan began pocketing his treasures - both old and new - but before he blew out his candles he stood amid them and looked around into the darkness beyond. As he gazed into that darkness he inwardly cursed himself for what he was about to do, and yet he knew he was going to do it anyway. He had to do it.
Trying to hide the desperation in his voice, Tristan put his hands to his mouth, cupping them to shout.
"HELLLOOOOOOOOOO?!"
Silence answered him.
"HELLLLOOOOOOOOO! IS THERE ANYONE ELSE HERE?"
There was no one.
"WELL, IF YOU ARE THERE, I HOPE YOU DON'T MIND. I'LL BE SLEEPING HERE TONIGHT!"
This last call came out the most desperate. Tristan would've relished some half-crazed madman leaping from the darkness at him, accosting him for being where he should not. At least it would be another person. He hadn't seen one since his parents were taken so long ago.
Even if he was beaten.
Even if he died.
It would be worth it just not to be alone. He was always alone.
With a defeated sigh Tristan blew out the candles and curled up on the moldy, musty couch. He tried to ignore the feeling of insects disturbed from their nests in the cushions probing their way across his flesh, but thankfully he was too tired to be kept from sleeping by that.
He rested well that night, surprisingly, and he awoke to the warmth of sun on his face and the coolness of a steel gun-barrel pressed against his temple.
He wore a long trenchcoat that looked like it had been through whatever cataclysm had left the city abandoned. The heavy leather was ragged at every edge and stained with a veritable rainbow comprised of all the colors of a city sewer. Atop the trenchcoat's head rested a crooked, oversized fedora that kept having to be pushed up when it fell to conceal dark blue eyes and a few dirt-stained blonde bangs.
Below those pools of azure and the mud-crusted golden straw that danced before them the stranger's mouth twisted into a grimace as he surveyed the roads filled with nothing but a multitude of decrepit piles of rusted steel and melted rubber. The sun slowly crept lower and lower in the sky, now firmly clutched by the skeletal claws of the skyscrapers. The stranger moved quickly with long strides for his small frame out of the street and into one of the buildings. A marquee above what once was likely a revolving glass door denoted it as something once called a mall.
The stranger's boots scuffed along sand upon cracked marble floors until he'd moved a few dozen feet into the building. It was incredibly dark with only the last tendrils of the dying sun reaching into the building through shattered windows and holes in the concrete walls that made it look like Mother Nature had gotten herself a semi-auto and taken revenge on her cheating lovers. The scuffling soon turned to the crunch of broken glass and other things, and the stranger jolted at the sudden sound, scrambling to reach the only weapon on his person - a shovel strapped from shoulder to hip at his back.
His breath caught in his throat as he brought the tool from behind him and turned in place slowly, brandishing it like he was some knight in armor. He didn't feel armored, though.
He felt vulnerable and alone - just like he always did.
A few tense moments passed and he still did not breathe. The stranger took another step and shattered the silence again with another symphony of crunches from the stone floor below. This time, though, the sound brought him ease instead of panic and for the first time in about thirty seconds he breathed again, muttering a curse.
"Damn it, Tristan. There's no one here. There's never anyone there."
Ah, Tristan, the stranger no more, then.
Carefully Tristan strapped the shovel back in place at his back and then dug around inside the great coat he was wearing, fingers going to a pocket just above his heart and withdrawing a small black cylinder. A counter-clockwise twist should've set the thing to working, but it took that and a few frustrated smacks upon his hand to bring the small pocket light flickering to dim life.
The light gave him courage and ease, and so Tristan dared relax a little. And as he looked around at the emptiness and the darkness that seemed to be encroaching upon him all around he shone the light on the floor.
It was littered with debris: toys, glass, jewelry. These were all things he'd heard about or read about or been told about when he was a boy but to actually see them. His breath was stolen again, and he kneeled slowly - almost reverently - as his fingers reached into a past so distant that none alive were aware of it to pick up a small black rectangular device.
The penlight's flare flickered weakly across a broken glass screen and Tristan's eyes widened as he realized what the thing in his hand was. He smiled slightly - the only kind he had ever managed were the slight ones - as he remembered his father telling him how his father had told him that people a long time ago had magic devices that allowed them to communicate with others anywhere in the world - no matter how far away they may be. He called them a 'phone'.
Every bit the pack rat, Tristan quickly added the phone to one of his pockets with other trinkets he'd gathered in his never ending travels. And just as quickly his eyes and his flashlight scanned the rest of the floor both seeking further treasures in this veritable trove. Meanwhile, the sun had retired for the day and night had made the outside of the department store ruin just as dark as it was within.
A few hours passed until Tristan was too exhausted to search anymore. He'd managed to cover most of the first floor from what he could tell, and having returned to where he'd first found the phone he set up the few pieces of furniture and wooden boxes that time or wild animals hadn't claimed completely to make himself a makeshift dwelling until the morning. His flashlight was letting off only a trickle of light by then, and if he had pushed his luck with it he'd have been left stranded in the dark completely.
So he cleared away a small three-foot by three-foot circle of debris from the floor and dug in his coat for more trinkets. This time he withdrew a small black and yellow AM/FM radio with a solar-power strip on it. It had taken him forever to figure out that the sun charged the mechanical device, but when he had it had united him with his only friend: DJ Danny Jams of 104.3 FM. Danny was always bringing the hits from 8 to 10 pm.
Tristan didn't really know what Danny was hitting or what he needed 8 to 10 pms for, but it was nice hearing another voice. And the music that Danny played was incredible. If he could ever figure out where Danny was and how his voice was reaching the little sunlight-powered box he was going to go there and meet all the musicians that Danny hung out with. There had to be at least a hundred of them!
Along with his radio, Tristan brought out a handful of nearly-melted wax candles and set them up around the area. He put four on the crate he was leaning against and then four more just outside of the circle he'd cleared on the floor. The last two he placed at either end of the old broken-down sofa he'd slid over from what was once a bedding store. He intended to sleep on a different one, but a rather angry raccoon gave him second thoughts, so he took the second best one instead - after making sure he wasn't disturbing another creature's home.
Out of his pockets came next a checker-square patterned table-cloth and a utility knife that he used to cut off a section before tucking those two items away again. He spread the section he'd cut out in the circle he'd cleared and then brought one of his most prized possessions out: a pen.
It was in near pristine condition, and along the side it bore the name of someone named "Bic". He adored the pen most of all the trinkets he'd found in his travels because when he was young - before his parents were taken from him - he remembered his father using another of Bic's pens to teach him how to spell. Tristan admired his treasure lovingly for a few moments in the flickering light of his dying flashlight.
When the light died altogether he was brought from his reverie with a sigh, and he fished in his pockets again for a box of matches. A few moments later and his little space was feeling quite cozy. The soft light from the candles was just enough for him to write by, and over the course of a few hours he turned his square of cloth into a rough map of the floor he was on while listening to Danny and his hits.
The darkness of night held at bay by a few small candles and some broken-down furniture didn't feel nearly as oppressing to Tristan now, but the long walk from the last ruin of civilization had taken a toll on him. He was more exhausted than he realized and as he started nodding while trying to recall the landmarks for his map, he finally resigned himself to sleep. Danny had already called it a night a while ago.
Tristan began pocketing his treasures - both old and new - but before he blew out his candles he stood amid them and looked around into the darkness beyond. As he gazed into that darkness he inwardly cursed himself for what he was about to do, and yet he knew he was going to do it anyway. He had to do it.
Trying to hide the desperation in his voice, Tristan put his hands to his mouth, cupping them to shout.
"HELLLOOOOOOOOOO?!"
Silence answered him.
"HELLLLOOOOOOOOO! IS THERE ANYONE ELSE HERE?"
There was no one.
"WELL, IF YOU ARE THERE, I HOPE YOU DON'T MIND. I'LL BE SLEEPING HERE TONIGHT!"
This last call came out the most desperate. Tristan would've relished some half-crazed madman leaping from the darkness at him, accosting him for being where he should not. At least it would be another person. He hadn't seen one since his parents were taken so long ago.
Even if he was beaten.
Even if he died.
It would be worth it just not to be alone. He was always alone.
With a defeated sigh Tristan blew out the candles and curled up on the moldy, musty couch. He tried to ignore the feeling of insects disturbed from their nests in the cushions probing their way across his flesh, but thankfully he was too tired to be kept from sleeping by that.
He rested well that night, surprisingly, and he awoke to the warmth of sun on his face and the coolness of a steel gun-barrel pressed against his temple.
The Voidlands: A Community-driven, Crowdsourced Story Starring Your Characters and Mine
Welcome to the Voidlands!
On this page I have set out to perform a social experiment as well as a creative writing exercise, and I want YOU to be a part of it. Each day I will post a new chapter of an on-going story set in a post-apocalyptic world filled with characters contributed by you, the readers.
Participation is easy! After you read each new chapter of the story, please feel free to leave a character name and details in a comment. Be as detailed or as vague as you'd like because before the next day's post I will select one of your characters to bring into the story in the next chapter.
Want to contribute in another way besides a character? No problem! If you have suggestions for plot, setting, or any other part of the story of things you'd like to see, leave them in a comment. I can't promise all of the suggestions or characters will make it into the story, but since I will be writing with no preparation time I will be relying heavily on your feedback and contributions in your comments.
So, if you're an avid reader or a shy aspiring writer please join me in creating this story. I invite you - all of you - to turn my personal journey as a writer pursuing his dream into a platform for your dreams as well.
In the event that this experiment ever becomes publishable beyond the internet, all contributors will be credited in full in the printed version.
On this page I have set out to perform a social experiment as well as a creative writing exercise, and I want YOU to be a part of it. Each day I will post a new chapter of an on-going story set in a post-apocalyptic world filled with characters contributed by you, the readers.
Participation is easy! After you read each new chapter of the story, please feel free to leave a character name and details in a comment. Be as detailed or as vague as you'd like because before the next day's post I will select one of your characters to bring into the story in the next chapter.
Want to contribute in another way besides a character? No problem! If you have suggestions for plot, setting, or any other part of the story of things you'd like to see, leave them in a comment. I can't promise all of the suggestions or characters will make it into the story, but since I will be writing with no preparation time I will be relying heavily on your feedback and contributions in your comments.
So, if you're an avid reader or a shy aspiring writer please join me in creating this story. I invite you - all of you - to turn my personal journey as a writer pursuing his dream into a platform for your dreams as well.
In the event that this experiment ever becomes publishable beyond the internet, all contributors will be credited in full in the printed version.
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