Michael J. Bode's Blog, page 6

Recommended Viewing: The Quest

So when I first heard about a reality TV show set in a fantasy world I admit that it sounded completely ridiculous. I am not generally a fan of the genre to say the least.

At it’s heart, The Quest incorporates a scripted narrative into a reality competition, with the prize being named the “One True Hero”. The show is rigorously true to its formats in both its aspects as a fantasy story and a reality television competition. Anyone familiar with Survivor will quickly recognize how the game works– immunity challenge, elimination challenge, voting and elimination.

The fantasy elements of the story are absolutely archetypal and if you had a fantasy trope bingo card, you would fill it completely by the end of the ten-episode season. There’s a savior prophesy and a demonic Dark Lord wreaking mischief in the land of Everrealm. The quest is for a powerful item that can can defeat the darkness. There’s a noble queen, a gruff drill sergeant who becomes friendly and an unfriendly vizer who turns out to be… Well, you can guess. There are no original or memorable ideas in this story but the performers deliver pretty well, given that a lot of their task is essentially improv/LARP.

But that’s where the beauty comes into play. Because in this world of stock fantasy characters they’ve created you have real, actual people. At first the emphasis is on why these kind of stories appeal to the contestants– fantasy was an escape for them, a refuge. As a creator, I know that feeling as well, but it reaffirmed to me the importance of the work we do as writers in this genre. The delight of the contestants is palpable when they arrive at a real live castle fully populated with medieval extras.

But it gets even better. There’s character development in the paladins (something that all too rarely happens with fictional paladins) as they work together and compete to complete the challenges ahead of them. For the most part the challenges are a bit contrived and somewhat unsafe looking. At first the people don’t know how to react to this staged world and their interactions with the actors are awkward… but as the season progresses they really, really get into it as themselves.

The Quest is probably the best example of how real people would exist in a fantasy universe. They all want to be heroes, but they share a reflected examination of what it means. They struggle with their own flaws and work to overcome them in ways that are often moving. One woman, Laeticia, won a fighting challenge over a wrestler and an MMA fighter. As a child she always got beat by her brothers when they would roughhouse, and looked to fantasy as a place where women could finally beat men. And she fucking did it. Courage and confidence are a recurring theme for the women in the Quest.

The jock (Andrew who is hot as fuck btw) who always acted impulsively, had to use his brain and he came out ahead– he also learned some valuable lessons about what makes a “true hero”. These are real templates for character research. I could see someone like Shando, the driven competitor or Patrick, the protective father and math teacher reacting to being captured by lizard people.

It’s also refreshing that the Machiavellian drama typical to these sorts of shows is quickly recognized and squashed. There are friendships but no real alliances and people are kept in the competition on merit rather than shoved off the island to level the playing field. People behave… heroically and everyone is gracious, for the most part. There’s no cash prize– just the satisfaction of defeating Valox. The budget clearly went to costumes and extras.

It’s a ton of fun to watch and it’s streaming on Netflix so you can waste a good part of a weekend.

Is Rape Necessary in Fantasy Literature?

There has been some tremendous discussion about the level of rape in Game of Thrones, and to a lesser extent George R. R. Martin’s books. The general consensus from the vocal critics is that the scenes are awful and unnecessary to the story. The most persuasive argument from the defenders is that it’s an authentic depiction of how violence and misogyny would have existed in a male dominated, pre-democratic society. As much as I love the books, it’s exactly these sorts of things that remind me Westeros would be a horrible place to live for practically anybody. Is it gratuitously depicted for the sake of setting or are the GoT rape scenes essential to the narrative?

Here’s how I handled it in my book, and why.

Before my first book, there was another project titled Runaways, a nearly completed first draft of a story that was the basis for The Queen of Lies. The book opened on Jessa, running away from her newly wed husband, a brutal man who surprise, surprise… violently raped her on her wedding night. My goal was to give her a motivation and establish the villain. The character never developed, no matter how much I tried to give her an identity. The arc about her finding strength was forced.

Fortunately my better angels prevailed. I scrapped that draft completely and started from scratch– same setting, same characters but “remixed”. Jessa’s character is still a survivor, but of much more insidious emotional abuse; and she occasionally serves a witty riposte to her domineering mother. I challenged myself to come up with something different for her: A young woman from a highborn family who initiates consensual sex, in spite of the scandal. It’s much fresher stuff and illustrates the character’s development into personal agency.

But it’s not just about telling a good story or moving a plot forward.

Storytelling is about emotion, not of the characters but of the readers. People have physiological reactions to what they read. People will laugh out loud at the funny parts (hopefully they were intentional) and when scenes get steamy… well people physically react to that too. Different readers respond differently. One thing you have to be very careful with in writing is making your reader upset to a point that constitutes emotional injury.

Animal torture or harm to small children get a visceral reaction of disgust. I think it’s because we’re biologically/culturally wired to form quick emotional bonds with babies and domesticated animals. I don’t generally rub strangers in public; but if I see a friendly dog, especially a puppy, I think nothing of going over and getting all up in its business. If you gratuitously kill a puppy in your books, people are going to hate the book, and quite possibly the author. You need to handle those topics with the care and precision you would when handling ebola bacteria.

For survivors, rape evokes that same strong reaction of horror; often much stronger than a writer without those experiences intended to create. It’s easy as a male writer, crafting in a genre where a certain amount of murder and violence is expected, to equate rape with any other “bad thing” that happens, like mass murder or cannibalism. After all, from a legal standpoint those other two examples are objectively worse. But a book is about the feelings and experiences of your readers and chances are they haven’t been murdered or cannibalized.

So, is rape necessary in fantasy literature?

I don’t believe in shying away from controversial topics or any form of creative censorship, but it’s also about risk and reward. If the reward is a positive, transformative emotional experience, then any risk is worth it. If you’re giving voice to injustice, same thing. We control the worlds our readers live in and that’s a big responsibility. Creating an enjoyable experience is as much about distancing the reader from all the terrible things as it is connecting them with the story.

The writers of the Game of Thrones TV show take a risk when they air those scenes. While I’m not bothered by it, I completely understand why others are. Given the spate of controversy I don’t think Sansa’s scene at the end of last week’s episode was a wise decision. The show is starting to alienate a lot of people without making any important point about the subject other than “rape is bad”.

I’m very pleased I chose not to go with the first manuscript*. Jessa may not be a Strong Female Heroine™ but she works better when she’s not a victim.

 

*In Runaways Maddox was also a horrible racist, Sword had no personality, and Satryn was a minor character… so you can see already what that book would have been like.

 

Mike bode is the author of The Queen of Lies, the first installment in the ongoing series, Architects of the Grand Design. His next book comes out September. Sign up for the mailing list for more info.

The Reviews are Coming in and…

..the response is positive! Beth Brock has a great website that reviews LGBTQ+ speculative fiction worth following. Her reviews are succinct and give a very good idea about the books’ content without spoilers.

Check out what she had to say about The Queen of Lies:

“The story in The Queen of Lies is incredibly complex and detailed, as an epic fantasy should be, and we have several wonderful point of views to explore. There’s Maddox, the arcane student who fucks up his exams and accidentally winds up immortal—at first no one is certain whether they should praise him or condemn him. There’s Jessa, heiress to the throne of a long line of storm-callers. Her mother is conniving and maniacal (I may be downplaying the crazy part). And there are Heath and Sword, who are essentially mercenaries; Heath is a fallen priest of sorts, and Sword is… well, he/she’s a sentient sword who inhabits people’s bodies. Eventually they all come together for a fantastic epic adventure, full of monsters, political drama, and love—yes, love.

I had so much fun with this novel. The humor and dialog are spot on, there’s plenty of intrigue, and on top of that there’s a sweet magic system that I still haven’t completely figured out, and copious unforgettable characters. Every character felt authentic, and each had their own extremely colorful past and captivating motivations. I also appreciated how none of them were completely innocent, in fact, most were assholes (that’s high praise from me because I happen to adore assholes), but all of them were highly entertaining. I have to admit, I’m a little in love with Sword. The idea that a person, who’s technically a magical artifact, could find humanity by inhabiting other beings and absorbing their memories and personality, is truly fascinating and was very well done by Bode.

Another refreshing aspect of this novel was the portrayal of a wide variety of gender orientations and sexualities. You have heterosexual, homosexual, pansexual, and transgender people all over the place. Even a manwhore. I definitely found characters I could relate to (ha). Though I do review quite a bit of erotically-charged Romance, I would not label this novel as erotic or romantic (in case the presence or absence of either is important to you when you read). If you like LGBTQ+ fiction, epic fantasy, memorable characters, or all of the above, check this out.

Note: I noticed on Bode’s website that the text in the print version of The Queen of Lies is in Baskerville Old Style typeface—how delightful. I find that typeface easy to read, well-proportioned, and semi-masculine. Look at those Q’s! And drop caps are definitely a sexy addition. Is it getting hot in here?”

This Review was originally posted to Queer SciFi:

Dreamspinner Press–Where Dreams Come True… International publishers of quality gay romantic fiction since 2007. http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com

DSP Publications–Off the Beaten Path. Worth the Journey.http://www.dsppublications.com

Harmony Ink Press–LGBTQ+ Young Adult Fiction.http://www.harmonyinkpress.com

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Making the Amazon Bestseller List

Up until May 28th I’ve been offering the Queen of Lies eBook for FREE on the Kindle Market. (If you haven’t picked up a copy, there’s no better time– every download boosts my seller ranking).

I’m pleased to say the result first marketing campaign has been a huge success in getting visibility for my work.  With a little publicity, I made it to #4 in epic fantasy. I also made the #2 spot in LGBT Fantasy, beating out a ton of MM romance and werewolf erotica.

How hard is it to make the top 10 lists with a free promotion? Harder than you’d think. There thousands of promos running daily in addition to free books established authors use as funnels into their series. Making it tot the Top 10 means that my cover and description are solid enough to merit interest.

This has been and continues to be an ongoing process of learning and discovery.

 

 

Book Signing Saturday 5/30/15 6-8PM

I’m doing a book signing on Saturday at Felix’s bar in midtown! Great chance to pick up a signed paperback copy for $15. Plus I’ll be extra drunk

Quitting My Day Job: Part 2

It is a scary thing to face the unknown in exchange for security.

I used to write about frugality on a money blog. I was good at saving and living below my means, habits I more or less retained to this day. When I got my big break in corporate America I didn’t go out and buy a new car or get myself entangled in a mortgage on a high rise condo. I spent frivolously on some things, but never more than I made and I always put something aside which enabled me to make this change in my life.

But nothing quite prepares you for the anxiety that comes with leaving behind a steady income for something completely unknown. As of today, I don’t have an income unless someone buys my book, which is not something I can easily predict. The money I have now could well be all the money I will ever have and I have to think about that every time I buy something. It’s easy to blow through cash on daily expenses. Plus there’s costs like marketing, editing, and cover  design that need to be budgeted.

Suddenly that pile of money starts looking very small. It’s not like living on fixed income. It’s living on no income.

There’s a part of me that still can’t believe I’m actually doing this.

The biggest lesson I’ve had to learn so far is patience. With books, nothing moves quickly. Even with books that have great first day sales, those were probably in the works at major publishing houses for a year. It’s been a month and there have been modest sales through friends and family. But that organic sales channel is dying out. In the mean time there are literally millions of ways to market books. It’s a slow process of trial and error to see what gooses sales.

Waiting for the book to take off is the hardest part. If it flops, gets tons of one star reviews, then fine– I’ve learned something and I can chalk this up to a life experience. Hey, at least I tried, right?

 

 

Mike bode is the author of The Queen of Lies, the first installment in the ongoing series, Architects of the Grand Design. His next book comes out September. Sign up for the mailing list for more info.

Recommended Book: Short Fuse by Brent D. Seth

A couple weeks ago I had the pleasure of meeting author Brent D. Seth in the workshops at Outlantaccon. We traded signed copies and I am pleased to report that the book is very, very good.

The novel is billed as a sci fi comedy, and the humor comes through the observations of the main character, Jason Miller, a grocery clerk who becomes abducted by aliens. The comedic elements are dry and witty. Seth never tries to hard to make a joke land, which shows impressive restraint when writing humor. It can’t be funny all the time and it isn’t.

The plot takes our hero from humble beginnings into a galactic war between two species: a race of technological slavers and a race of telepathic plants. Jason’s shenanigans go from bumbling around space ships looking for a way to light his cigarettes to truly epic accomplishments as he becomes more self-possessed and confident.

Along the way we meet an interesting cast of characters, including Leo, the cat. Animals as characters is a tall order to write well, but you will come to love this cat– which becomes somewhat of a badass in his own right. My personal favorites were Oola Oola, the melon headed alien from a species that lacks an understanding of suspicion; and fido, the six legged sack of translucent jelly with a heart of gold (not literally but it would be visible if he had one). Tony, a buff policeman who was abducted with Jason, has some good moments, but the character was the least compelling of the main characters for me.

There is an impressive cast of minor characters. Seth gives us a ton of species with their own unique personalities and specialties aboard the space station TBNL. Seth creates a living society, complete with intrigue, politics and factions whose infighting drives the story forward. They have relationships: A father becomes proud of his reluctant son. An angry bird finds love.

Nanotechnology features as the primary system of science in the book. Jason is altered by nanites to be ageless and can access any computer system by using his nanites. At times the power of this ability made me wonder if there wouldn’t be more safeguards or restrictions on how it worked, but the concerns are addressed and don’t take away from the ability to enjoy the book.

It’s a fun read and the book really starts to pick up when Tony and Jason leave their ship. There’s no point where it feels like it drags on Seth’s style is simple and readable with great balance between action, description, dialogue and narrative.

I can’t wait for the next installment. I just hope Jason finally finally gets a cigarette.

 

 

Mike bode is the author of The Queen of Lies, the first installment in the ongoing series, Architects of the Grand Design. His next book comes out September. Sign up for the mailing list for more info.

Quitting My Day Job : Part 1

Back in April 2015, I made the, possibly ill-advised, decision to quit my day job and pursue writing full-time. In this series I’ll go into details about my journey, the various perks, pitfalls, and harsh realities that go into going all in on your dreams without a safety net.

I had reached the top of my career at 35 and stayed in the exact same position till I was 39. I was clearing six figures a year before bonus. While I lavished myself with every indulgence from personal shoppers to personal trainers and maid service… I spent the last year feeling very restless.

At the time it was difficult to pinpoint why I had a hard time getting in before 9:00 AM every morning and why 5:00 PM turned into my new 4:00 PM every day I could sneak out. I would ruthlessly cycle through the news, reading any article that was even remotely interesting, before jumping back on Facebook in an endless cycle of refreshing my appetite for stimulus.

It was not a typical sterile corporate job, which everyone imagines when you tell them you work with databases. We had a casual work environment, standard for IT startups. I wasn’t micromanaged. It’s a job a lot of people would kill for. I also wasn’t happy doing it.

Deciding to quit a job can be like ending a long term relationship, when you don’t have someone else lined up. You just want to be on your own and it’s hard to say why. You start to blame it on all the stupid little things that didn’t used to bother you: documentation procedure, commute times, conference calls, performance reviews. Everything starts to seem like such pointless, irritating bullshit that could be better spent on literally anything else.

I’ve decided a good measure of how happy you are at your job is this intellectual exercise I will pretentiously call the Bode Parachute Scale. In the exercise imagine you are called into your boss’s office and told your position has been eliminated effective immediately but that you’ll be given a severance package (golden parachute) to support you for three months.

Imagine how that would make you feel on a 1-10 scale of happiness from Utterly Inconsolable to Divine Rapture. Now imagine how afraid you’d feel of what happens after that money runs out (will you be able to find acceptable work? will you starve? are you in crippling debt?). Rate that from 1-10 on the fear scale from Terrified to Blithely Unconcerned.

Really try to feel the mix of emotions. That’s a good measure of how ready you are to quit your day job. If you’d be sad to leave your job, don’t. If you’re afraid of the consequences, either stay or line up something else. But if the prospect doesn’t frighten you and it does make you happy, then you might want to consider why you’re sticking around. (Health insurance is not a good excuse anymore)

That’s where I was. I would have done the eight minute extended version of the Macarena right there in the office if I was told to go home early, let alone handed a check for three month’s pay. I had a years’ worth of money saved up in cash plus more in liquid assets, so I wasn’t afraid. I’m also highly marketable. My biggest concern wasn’t finding another job, it was finding one closer to my house where I could still wear flip flops. #Whitepeopleproblems

For me this is the start of a new chapter in my life. It’s not always what I imagined it would be, but no matter what– whatever happens next is completely depends on me.

 

Mike bode is the author of The Queen of Lies, the first installment in the ongoing series, Architects of the Grand Design. His next book comes out September. Sign up for the mailing list for more info.

 

Splitting Adam: Short Fiction and a Lesson in Rejection

I wrote a short story called “Splitting Adam”. Rewrote it. I workshopped it on Critters.org to a bunch of strangers, very few of them professionals. I re-rewrote it. Then… I handed it over to my journalist friend for editing. I re-wrote it again.

When I finally worked up the nerve to send it out for publication I submitted it to Clarke’s World. I was out celebrating my first step with friends that evening and before I finished my first drink, I I got the email that my story was rejected. It took them six hours to say: “Interesting concept, not well told.” The rejection letter from Asimov’s came by SASE after only a week… it went to my neighbor who opened it by mistake so my shame was semi-public. Accounting for the time it takes to mail things, my story didn’t last a day in their offices either.

Maybe the re-writes killed it. I also had to admit, I don’t read much short fiction, let alone any of the markets where I shopped this story. I wrote short fiction because I thought that was the stepping stone to becoming a novelist. That’s simply not true, (many authors have never published short stories) but I believed it at the time.

Below is the entire story, Splitting Adam. It’s 2,300 words that took over a month to finalize. That’s the length of an average chapter in my book, which takes me less than a day to write. It’s a quick quirky read that I think deserves to see the light of day.

Splitting Adam

 

The six of me could not agree on anything.

We knew one thing: The accidental exposure of our original self, Adam Whittier, to a Higgs field displaced his normal timeline and generated six identical Adams. We argued our next course of action for the better part of two hours. We paced furiously around the cluttered garage, tugging at our mousey brown hair. Our bald spots and love handles were more evident than I’d previously been willing to admit. My deodorant was no match for twelve arm pits and six unwashed green t-shirts during the afternoon heat of L.A. in August.

Adam Epsilon kicked an empty bottle of Mountain Dew at the smoldering wreckage of the matter replicator. The machine, which I spent the last year assembling in my spare time, lay in ruins—a burnt metal frame, the size of a phone booth covered in melted wires and cracked Plexiglas. Around it lay a blast zone which was quite possibly the remains of our former self.

Adam Beta and I were trying to replicate the mathematical model for our accidental discovery with little success on the whiteboard. We had more Greek letters than frat row and the diagrams resembled what Hawking might draw if he were a football coach for a rag-tag team of subatomic underdogs.

Beta and I were still the same rational person but Adams Alpha, Gamma, Zeta and Epsilon reacted differently to the accident. Epsilon was disturbed and pacing. Gamma became fixated on sexual experimentation and was attempting to document if getting drunk would make us more attractive.

Zeta and Alpha were vying for the privilege of being the primary self. I’d never found it easy to make myself do things I didn’t want to do and Alpha and Zeta were discovering it’s exponentially harder when you and yourself are separate individuals.

“Two of us can generate income from jobs, one can handle household maintenance and the other two can be dedicated to developing new projects,” Alpha explained.

“Naturally one of us has to manage these activities.” Zeta said.

Alpha puffed his chest proudly. “Since I materialized closest to the device, that makes me oldest by several picoseconds.” That interval was the only measurable difference between us.

“You just use that as an excuse to treat us like cheap copies,” said Zeta, who materialized farthest from the device. “We need to go public with this event, get funded and work toward selling these matter replicators. Can you imagine what the military would pay for this?”

“What if we can’t recreate it? Do you realize the level of legal nonsense we’d have to deal with by going public and having to explain why there are six of me? What about ID, Social Security numbers, taxes, credit scores?”

“You’re thinking too small. Besides, we all have IDs.” Zeta patted the wallet bulge in his back pocket. “In case you hadn’t noticed, it replicated our personal effects.”

“It was supposed to duplicate the bottle!” Epsilon yelled and booted the two-liter into the corner between the overflowing recycle bin and the dust-coated remains of the AI mainframe I built last summer. Poor DSXM; within seconds of achieving self-awareness it calculated the futility of existence and decompiled its operating kernel.

“A serendipitous discovery,” Alpha said, “That will be more advantageous if it’s kept secret.”

Epsilon locked his gaze with Alpha. “If we’re looking to gain advantage from this freak occurrence, we must consider euthanasia, storage of donor organs and preservation of the bodies for later study.”

As annoying as some of us were becoming, they were still me. Killing one of myselves still felt like murder; possibly even suicide.

Gamma offered me a beer as the other three fell into bickering. He eyed my upper arms as I sometimes do when I check myself out in the mirror. Whenever I was alone and drunk, I typically found my hands down the front of my trousers. This may have technically qualified as such a time but it hardly felt appropriate.

“The problem is that each of us has the exact same agenda,” Beta and I said simultaneously.”We’re just confused about the particulars. Let’s—”

“Things sucked before the accident,” Epsilon exclaimed angrily. “You really think our pathetic life is enough for six to share?”

“Is someone having a bad reaction to our antidepressants?” Zeta asked. I wasn’t always unhappy, but I was thirty-five, single and had nothing to show for my life besides several failed inventions. The other guys in my R&D division still made fun of me for my microwave hair dryer. Although the hair grew back, I’d earned the reputation as the guy who built the “zombie oven”.

Epsilon glared. “It’s like I’m staring into a funhouse mirror or hearing my voice on the answering machine.”

“After three beers, subject appears 50% more irresistible….” Gamma flexed provocatively. He was starting to slur his speech. It became painfully evident to the remainder of us why I’d had such little success with women. He licked his lips. “Let’s do this.”

“Can you do— that— privately?” Alpha averted his eyes.

“It’s nothing we haven’t seen, or done thousands of times,” Zeta said, obviously starting to consider it after his second beer.

“Besides, it’s not like we haven’t tried before,” Gamma said, “Remember that time I bought those yoga DVDs so I could learn to fold myself in half?”

“Ugh.” Our collective face reddened.

Epsilon rubbed his temples in frustration.

“There’s a statistical pattern in our divergence,” Beta and I said as one. “It’s a Freudian paradigm.”

“You two are fucking annoying when you do that.” Alpha snapped at us before turning to the others, “And that.”

Gamma threw his empty beer to the floor and grabbed Zeta’s cheeks, pulling him in close. Zeta returned the embrace, unsure of where to place his hands. “Celibacy just got interesting,” he said and proceeded to make out while the rest of us watched in awkward fascination.

“Do I slobber when I kiss?”

“No. Why? Do I?”

“No. It seems a standard quantity of saliva. I just always worried about it.”

“That’s it.” Epsilon headed toward the green door that led into the house. “If no one’s committing suicide, I’m killing myself.”

“Wait.”Alpha grabbed his shoulder, “Are you going to kill yourself or kill by yourself? Personal pronouns are unclear in this situation.”

“Does it even matter?” Epsilon sighed and marched through the door into the kitchen.

Alpha trailed behind. “Well… yes.”

Epsilon strode through the living room and up the stairs as Alpha, Beta and I hurried after him, leaving Gamma and Zeta behind. There wasn’t much in our 1970’s style split-level that posed an immediate danger unless he decided to gorge on questionable leftovers or pull the flat screen TV down on top of himself.

We followed him up the orange-carpeted staircase and to the end of the narrow hall where he entered the bathroom. He locked the cheap brass knob from the inside. We could hear him rattling through the medicine cabinet and filling the tub. Alpha pushed us aside and tried the handle. He pounded on the flimsy wooden door. “Open up now! This isn’t funny!”

“No, it’s hilarious.”Epsilon sounded like his mouth was full of something crunchy.

“Why are you doing this?” Beta and I demanded in stereo.

“Listen to yourself.” Epsilon laughed through the door. “You’re ridiculous, petty, repressed, self-centered, narcissistic, flabby, base and weak. Have you ever noticed that you exhibit all the same traits you hate in other people? Why does the world need one of me, let alone six?”

“Enough of this.” Alpha kicked the door so hard the flimsy latch gave way, revealing Epsilon standing over the filling bathtub, the chrome of our microwave hair dryer gleaming in his hand. Chalky dust coated his lips and the corners of his mouth. Leftover medication covered the floor.

“I’m removing variables from the equation,” Epsilon said solemnly as he set one foot on the edge of the tub.

“That hair dryer is our only prototype,” Alpha pleaded. “And this is our only bathroom.”

“You’re terrible at this.” I cut in front of Alpha. The good thing about witnessing my own behavior is that it gave me plenty of opportunity to learn from my mistakes.

He hovered, arms crossed impatiently, outside the bathroom with Beta.

“Look,” I said, “There was a 16.6% probability I was going to react badly to the temporal split. Your behavior is obviously an expression of that outcome. But you have free will. You can choose a new outcome.”

Epsilon narrowed his eyes. “I like to think of myself as a predetermined consequence of my accident.” The tub started to overflow. “Just because you can’t predict my actions doesn’t mean I possess some mythical capacity for self-determination that goes beyond my feelings, thoughts and experiences. Besides–“

I was in the middle of formulating the perfect counter-argument when he decided to smack me in the face. A blur of silver flashed in front of my eyes followed by the exploding stars of pain.

With a shriek, Epsilon attacked me. It was that scene from a horror movie when the reflection leaps out of the mirror, its face twisted with rage. The deodorant and pill bottles around the bathroom sink clattered everywhere. I felt a burst of sharp pain as the back of my head shattered the mirror behind me.

“This hurts me more than it hurts you.” He laughed maniacally, one hand clenched around my throat while the other brought up the hair dryer.

“Careful, you’ll break it.” Alpha grabbed him, trying to wrest the prototype from Epsilon, but it hissed to life. Epsilon kicked me back up on the counter, using the force to smash Alpha into the towel rack. Beta stood outside, paralyzed with indecision.

Epsilon grabbed Alpha as he bounced off the wall and held him close as he threw himself into the overflowing tub. I watched helplessly as the roaring hair dryer tumbled toward the open water. Epsilon’s attack pushed my body on the counter, keeping my feet inches from the water that gushed onto the floor.

The two of them thrashed in the tub like fish, legs kicking over the edge. The lights dimmed and flickered. Gallons of water sloshed onto the already flooded yellow linoleum. Within seconds the unnoticeable hum of the house’s electrical appliances went silent. And then they slumped into an embrace—one body atop another, his head cradled on the other’s chest. Dead eyes shimmered behind the final bubbles rising to the surface.

Beta ran screaming down the hallway, leaving me alone for the first time in my two hours of existence.

If the bathroom stank of death, the plug-in air freshener did an incredible job wrapping it in a fresh linen aroma. I sighed at the mess around me. The tub continued to overflow; and discarded pills bobbed like tiny boats in a vast sea. I could see blood trickling down my neck in the shattered mirror.

Even though the breaker already flipped, I unplugged the hair dryer. The safety record on my products proved spotty at best.

Cold water soaked through my shoes as I set my feet on the ground. I took a deep breath and shut off the faucets. I reached into the tub, brushing against my lifeless doppelganger’s flesh. I pulled out the stopper and let the bodies settle as the last of the water swirled down the drain. A few streaks of blood made their lazy way there too.

As I relieved myself in the toilet, I considered the tableau. As macabre as it was, I found the experience of seeing my own cadavers exhilarating. Witnessing self-sabotaging behavior carried out to its most logical conclusion put the rest of my life in perspective. I had four remaining chances to be the man I wanted to be. But more importantly, I had a plan to fix everything.

I zipped up and went under the sink to grab the rubbing alcohol and bandages. I didn’t bother asking for help as I’m squeamish around blood. The last thing I needed was three of us fainting.

I wandered back down the stairs and could see them talking in the kitchen. “We should be okay burying the corpses in the back yard after dark. Most bodies get found because someone reports them as missing persons… We’re the opposite of that.” Zeta concluded.

Beta took a sip of beer. “That should be fine. I mean, I wouldn’t have wanted to spend a lot of money on a fancy funeral.” They muttered in agreement about the unnecessary expense and fuss of burial.

“Should we chop them up first?” Gamma said with more enthusiasm than seemed called for.

“I have a better idea.” I left a trail of wet foot prints in the shag carpet as I made my way into the kitchen. “We rebuild the matter replicator, but tweak it to disintegrate the bodies.”

“Yeah but, last time we tried to use it—“

“Last time we weren’t trying to destroy anything. With our track record, this can’t fail.”

Zeta walked out towards the garage. “I’ll get the power back on.”

Without me even needing to ask, Beta went to grab the blueprints. Gamma ordered four extra large pizzas with mushrooms and bacon. I started on a list of parts we’d need to reconstruct the main core of the device. Since this project could take several days, I also wrote down a reminder to get more plug-in air fresheners in case the bodies upstairs started to reek.

The four of us worked like a frictionless machine, our actions perfectly synchronized. And as midnight approached, I realized there was no other person I would rather be four of. We could be open and trusting with each other on a level that’s impossible for singular people to understand. Heck, everything humans need from society— acceptance, intimacy, approval— we could give unconditionally to each other.

Sartre may have been right when he said hell was other people, but I found paradise within myself.

 

Mike bode is the author of The Queen of Lies, the first installment in the ongoing series, Architects of the Grand Design. His next book comes out September. Sign up for the mailing list for more info.

 

Outlantacon: Lizard People Steal Your Copper to buy Nivea Skincare Products

I had the fun of visiting Outlantacon this last weekend. This was my first time attending a con as an author (i.e. someone with a business related reason for being there). The turnout was very low, but that made it easier to interact. Everyone was super friendly and there’s a sort of feel good vibe that comes with getting a bunch of queer nerds together where we can do our own thing.

I will be attending next year for the full weekend. Next up is the mother of all cons, Dragoncon. I’m really looking forward to the lit panels. There’s a lot of business and networking to be done, not just getting hammered at the hotel bar and looking at costumes. (There will be some of that I’m sure).

I attended some great small panels and made some really good connections. Brent D. Seth has also just come out with his debut book, a sci-fi comedy titled Short Fuse, so it was really great to connect and pal around with him and his partner Jeffrey at the convention.

Brent ran a workshop on writing what you know. One of the participant’s ideas prompted a hilarious idea about secret lizard people, dry skin, and stealing copper from recycling bins. You had to be there, but it was great fun fleshing out ideas in a workshop with other writers and authors.

Kage Alan ran a great session on blogging and social media, with great tips from Kayelle Allan. I’m still flipping through my notes, which is basically a list of websites and tools I’d never even heard of. There is always more to learn. Got some great ideas to freshen the content of the blog so it’s not annoyingly promotional.

I was hit on and felt up an adequate number of times at the parties and called a “young man” more often than seems reasonable for someone who’s almost 40. Good for the self-esteem to accept the flattery without engaging in any meaningless con hookups, which are usually bad (or net neutral) for the self-esteem.

It was wonderful being able to befriend other authors and learn some of the ins and outs of the business.  I’m glad I got off my ass and went.