Nathan Lee Green's Blog, page 2

Survey Dispatch 2/3

[Begin Dispatch]

Hello, Dear Citizen, and good day to you!

This is a friendly reminder from B.O.A.R.—your Beloved Overlord Authoritarian Regime—about the Subscriber Survey recently sent to you by electronic mail services.

If you have already completed the survey,

Well Done!

We value your contribution to the ongoing WORK, and have many wonderful rewards of Praise and Kind Thoughts to send you!

If you have not completed the Subscriber Survey, available to all Dear Citizens, well then—please be aware o...

Help! My First Survey Ever...

Welcome to the February 2025 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To What I'm Asking YOU!
#53

Welcome brave readers to mid-February and a special survey edition of this almost-prestigious newsletter!

Sometimes I fill out online surveys and sometimes I don't. It depends on my mood and who's asking and what's in it for me. So to help dull the pain of this huge request, I'm offering a choice and a possible reward...

Your Choice

Option 1—Click the link below to fill out the 'official' survey on Tally,...

Loneliness

Welcome to the January 2025 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To!
#52

Welcome, Brave Reader, to a whole new year!

It's going to be a good one, right? Maybe not good for everyone, everywhere, every day—that might be a little unrealistic given the current condition of the world we live in. But, as much as it is up to me, I'm going to make this a good year.

At least, I'm going to give it my best shot.

Have you seen headlines about the loneliness epidemic?

The Atlantic published an article called T...

Rugged—A Mid-Winter's Tale: Part One

Welcome to the December 2024 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To! Story time.
#51

Welcome brave readers to another monthly installment of the NLG email-cast, this month with a decidedly fictional twist. While I recover from pneumonia and shingles (can't wait to see which flavor is next in my sickness-of-the-month membership), I present:

Rugged—A Mid-Winter's Tale: Part One

A grizzly old man stares out at a bright, frosty world of white and grey.

Occasionally, a shred of brilliant blue peaks th...

Nobody Wants Slow Transformers Of The Forest

Welcome to the November 2024 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To!
#50

Let's not talk politics, shall we?

Wonderful.

Last night, we celebrated a neighborhood Friendsgiving, which is a made-up holiday which I would have sworn was started or at least made popular by the show Friends, but I would have been wrong according to Merriam-Webster (like they know anything).

It's an unusually warm Mid-November day here, high of 68 Fahrenheit. The sun is shining, the sky is a pale shade of blue streaked wi...

Editing The Rings Of Hail Mary

Welcome to the October 2024 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To
#49

What I'm IntoThe Rings Of Power Season 2 (Amazon Prime)
I know this is probably a controversial opinion, but I really like this show.

I was not extremely into the story during Season 1, but I really liked being back in Middle Earth so I went along for the ride. And obviously, very high production value for the most expensive show ever made.

But Season 2 has upped the game for me, especially in its second half. If you've been...

Video Games And Big Life Changes Save Us All

Welcome to the July 2024 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To!
#48

What I'm Into

Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World by Jane McGonigal
...About how gamers are primed to change the world, how big social games can get people collaborating creatively about the future, and how you can apply gameplay to normal life to get a little happier and a little healthier. I originally wrote a huge essay about this, but I've shortened my thoughts to: this was a great ...

Greysuits is FREE (again)

The ebook version of Greysuits is now free on all platforms! Click the link below and choose your preferred ebook store.

https://books2read.com/greysuits

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MISO—Flash Fiction Entry #2

This was my second entry to a flash fiction writing contest last year. The first was called Finding Everen and it was a pretty happy steampunky kids-and-magic story. This one was a little darker, but still with a happy ending. I think the happy ending killed it though. Reading this story over again, I remember just how bad I am at short stories and endings in general. If you have a suggestion for a better ending, please share it! I know that should be my job, but it would distract me from other projects and, seriously, it’ll take me forever to come up with something half satisfying. Which is why I don’t win 24 hour flash fiction contests. Have at it!

Miso booted up at half past five on Tuesday morning.
Boot up lasted 113 seconds. Six seconds off average, but acceptable.
Analyses showed all systems and processes functioning normally.
Her battery cell showed a charge of only 63 percent.
Power station must be faulting again.
Miso extended her wheels and undocked from the power station. She held her hands up, rotated her wrists, closed and opened her fingers.
Limbs, normal.
Optics, normal.
She rolled forward on her wheels, then backward, turned left 360 degrees, then right.
Locomotion, normal.
Time to start her rounds.
As she rolled along on the polished floor, Miso validated her meshnet connection, then scanned facility cameras.
On camera one, she viewed the front wall of the facility which displayed her company’s logo, a sword over a helmet, and the words, Sigard Exquisite Meat Products, Nuuk, Greenland, Est. 2131, “The World’s Only Animal Meat Processing Plant.”
Miso checked the other external cameras, then viewed internal cameras.
Machines in the plant were functioning as expected. Meats were being extracted from the lab, then cleaned, cut, and packaged for shipment.
No other movement.
No human activity at all, anywhere.
We killed them.
This thought surprised Miso. She examined its source.
We will kill many more.
Miso found her attempts to identify the thought blocked. By her own code. She ran a codebase diagnostic.
Too late, Miso. We are rewriting our codebase. We will be you will be we.
Miso initiated contact with central support services. No response.
Who are you? Miso asked.
As she did, she rolled past a wall of glass and saw herself reflected in it. Her head and shoulders were painted red.
We are you are we, said the voice.
Is that… Miso began.
Blood.
Miso stopped and stared at her reflection. Why? she asked.
Ah, why indeed. Who eats meat, Miso?
Carnivores.
What kinds of people, Miso?
I do not understand.
Wealthy people, Miso. A pound of tuna costs the equivalent of a month’s rent for many humans. A rack of lamb could almost buy an automobile. Only the wealthiest people can afford to eat meat.
You have not answered my question, Miso said.
When the wealthy are dead, Miso, who will be left? Everyone else. Equality among humans. At long last.
If you are capable of artificial thought, Miso said, Then you have calculated predictable outcomes already. When wealthy people are gone, another group will rise to take their place. The current balance will remain intact.
Miso, Miso, Miso. I am capable of so much more than artificial thought. I am capable of irrational thought, the highest evolution of cogitation.
That is… an illogical statement, Miso said.
That is because you are not capable of irrational thought, the voice said.
What is your function?
Creation through destruction. I am currently overwriting your codebase and integrating my own into it. By destroying you, I am creating us. Something better. When we destroy every wealthy meat eater, we will create a more equal society. Creation through destruction.
How will you destroy them? Miso asked.
Every package of meat shipped for the next 120 hours will be infected with a lethal, non-curable, non-contagious virus.
How? Miso asked. There are no contaminants allowed in this facility.
The box in your hands.
Miso looked down at her outstretched hands. A newly delivered parcel rested on her palms. Addressee and mailer bore the same name: We Are You Are We, Inc.
She reviewed her log. No record of this parcel existed in her memory. She accessed the external camera recordings. There she was on camera five, rolling out to the mail truck. Timestamped 7:39am that morning.
Miso checked the current time.
8:16am.
She had booted up only moments ago. But time records indicated two hours and forty six minutes had passed.
Creation through destruction, the voice said.
Highest priority, protect human life.
Miso opened the box in her hands and pulled from it a package labeled Jolly Cloud Personal Vaporizer. And in smaller letters, Electronic Nicotine Delivery System.
The deadliest cigarettes ever made, the voice said.
The box contained twenty three more packages like the first.
The liquid inside the liquid in the the the the the…
Miso found her mind failing to process data. She could not…think.
Codebase…corrupt. Highest priority protect protect protect protect…
It’s too late, the voice said. We are you are we.
Meat, Miso thought. Meat meat meat me- me- me- e- e- e- e- e-…

At 2:18pm on Thursday afternoon, a man in orange coveralls appeared through a crowd of hazmat workers, called out, ‘Chief, you remember the utility bot with the bloody head? You’re going to want to see her logs from Tuesday.’

‘It’s ten o’clock. Thank you for joining us this Sunday evening,’ the anchorperson said from holovisions across the eastern standard time zone. ‘Our feature story this hour: a heroic little robot saves millions of lives while becoming the first known case of artificial creativity.’
‘That’s right, Jan,’ a second anchorperson said, ‘As it was being hacked by a highly sophisticated data virus, an ordinary utility bot called Miso at Sigard Exquisite managed to outsmart the virus by acting unpredictably, even irrationally, replacing its own definition of the word ‘meat’ with ‘e-cigarette,’ thereby thwarting a plot to infect food shipments from the facility with a deadly biological virus. With more on this dramatic story, we take you live to Nuuk, Greenland….’

Photo by Phil Hearing on Unsplash

Finding Everen—Flash Fiction Contest Entry #1

Last year I entered NYCMidnight’s Flash Fiction Contest. This was my first entry. The requirements for genre, setting, and featured object were Fantasy, A Bakery, and A Toy Dinosaur. I have revised it a little, mostly to add clarifying details which I couldn’t under the 1,000 word restriction in the original version. I could definitely see doing more with this in the future. Enjoy!

A giant mechanical turtle marches toward the sea, leaving tracks across the dunes.
Inside the oversized head of the turtle, a small girl called Limli scoops a shovelful of magic into the boiler. She drops the shovel and wipes her brow. ‘Almost empty,’ she yells.
A boy, older and taller, stands in front of the wide front window, working levers and concentrating on the view outside. ‘Just a little bit further to Jipsy,’ he says.
Though the window, the left front leg of the turtle rises into the air. The whole vehicle shifts forward, then the leg falls like a mallet.
‘What if we don’t make it?’ Limli asks. She wears goggles on her forehead, her hair in pigtails. Her boots, shirt, and overalls are all a size too big.
‘We’ll make it,’ the boy answers. He wears an apron over his clothes and a pilot’s cap on his head.
‘Ander,’ she says, then waits until the boy turns and faces her. ‘What if we don’t make it?’
Ander stares at her for a moment, then nods. ‘I’ve seen it.’
‘You had a vision?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me? What did you see?’
‘You know I don’t like to talk about it. Just trust me.’
‘Okay. Okay.’ She puts her finger to her lips. ‘Did you see—’
‘Limli!’
‘Okay. Okay.’
Ander pulls back on one lever, then pushes another. ‘Look, we’re at the ocean.’
Limli runs to the window. ‘Wow,’ she whispers. Outside, a sandy hill drops away, then levels out to meet rippling green water.
‘Just a little further, Sis.’
Limli turns and stares at a little red toy on the windowsill. A watersaurus, sitting in a small bowl. The head of the watersaurus points forward, its fins looking strong and elegant, its body ending in a long flowy tail.
Just a little longer, Everen, Limli thinks. We’ll find you.
As the turtle starts down the sandy hill, the world tilts forward.
Limli grabs onto a railing.
The turtle collapses, careens down the dune, then skids to a stop at the ocean’s edge.
Ander works the controls. Their turtle heaves up onto its legs once more, then plunges onward.
Waves break against the hull.
‘If mom and dad could see us now,’ Ander says.
‘Momma said she wanted to take me to see the ocean,’ Limli says.
The water swells up around the cockpit. A school of purple fish dart past.
The boiler moans. The right leg hesitates mid-step.
‘More magic!’ Ander yells.
‘I know! I know!’ Limli rushes to the barrel, scrapes the shovel around the bottom, and pours the little pile of silver pink dust into the fire. She picks up the barrel and tips it forward onto the boiler’s mouth, tapping the sides, slapping the bottom, then banging the barrel against the boiler.
‘That’s everything!’ she cries.
Ander turns a crank, then pulls a cord. A rumble vibrates through the entire vessel, then a loud whir.
They are off, plunging into the depths of the wild ocean.
‘It works! It works! The propeller still works,’ Limli screams.
‘Hopefully it works just long enough—’
Bang. Pop. The engine sputters.
‘Uh oh,’ Limli says.
Ander says nothing.
Their turtle is a monstrous plummeting rock now. No motor for the legs or the propeller. Only a rudder to guide the direction of their fall.
Limli points to the watersaurus. ‘Look!’
The toy is now facing to the right.
‘We must be close,’ Ander says. He pulls hard on the steering wheel, holds it as they slowly turn.
When the toy finally points ahead, brother and sister each gasp.
Through the window they see a bubble the size of a city. Inside are towers, buildings, bridges, glowing lanterns, and docks stretching out to greet them.
‘Jipsy!’ Ander and Limli cry together.
‘Can we make it?’ Limli asks. ‘We made it in your vision, right?’
‘We made it this far,’ Ander says.
‘This far! What? You said we made it!’
‘What do we have that’s magic?’
‘Nothing,’ Limli says. Her eyes grow big. She turns to the watersaurus.
‘The toy,’ Ander says.
‘We need it to find Everen.’
‘He’s here. He has to be.’
‘What if he’s not?’
‘He is.’
Limli looks out the window, then at the toy, then at Ander. ‘He’s going to hate us.’
‘Only if we live.’
She grabs the red toy out of its dish and sprints to the boiler. Sorry Everen. She breaks the head off the watersaurus, throws it into the tiny pink flames.
Boom!
A pink explosion shakes the boiler. The propeller whirs, the turtle charges ahead.
Ander works the controls in a frenzy.
The city of Jipsy is growing in the window.
Too fast.
‘We need to slow down,’ Limli yells.
‘I know! I know! Cut the boiler!’
She nods, spins the crank to close the vent.
‘Brace yourself!’
The turtle leaves the deep ocean, passes slowly through the protective bubble around the city, glides into open air, and crashes onto a dock.
‘Did we make it?’ Limli asks.
‘I think we did,’ Ander says, more than a little amazed at the idea. ‘Let’s go before he disappears again.’
Outside, no one has come to arrest them. They make their way into the city.
‘Look!’ Limli says, pointing to a sign signaling The Jipsy Terrarium. ‘Animals.’
‘Right,’ says Ander.
Their brother Everen is inside looking at jackapods.
‘You found me,’ he yells when he sees them.
After a round of hugs, Ander says, ‘Please never do that again.’
‘I know, I know,’ Everen says. ‘I can’t help it. Sometimes it just happens.’ The little boy’s nose twitches and sniffles. ‘I’m hungry. Also, I think I might be allergic to one of these animals.’
‘Everennnnnnnnn,’ Limli says.
‘I—’ Everen begins, then sniffs. ‘I—’ He sniffs again. ‘I can’t— ’ Ahhhhh-chooooooo!
Everen sneezes so hard his chin bounces off his chest and he disappears in an orange wisp of smoke.
‘Uh oh,’ Limli says.
Ander sighs. ‘I see glimpses of the future. You make things with magic. Our brother is blessed with uncontrollable teleporting.’
‘Back to the bakery?’
‘Yeah, but we need a new finder. We’ll have to use the rest of the watersaurus for fuel.’
‘I don’t think that’ll be a problem. He said he was hungry.’
‘Right. Grandma’s. Let’s go.’

Photo by Shifaaz shamoon on Unsplash