Moe Lane's Blog, page 631
December 2, 2021
Child’s Play Charity Auction tonight.
Tickets are still available, I think: the festivities start at 9 PM Eastern Time. I also need to get around to doing a holiday donation to Child’s Play generally. I am extremely grateful that my family’s never needed their services.
12/02/21 Snippet, THE STARS ARE WRONG.
Burglary!
Patreon!“Here it is,” Goody Blem told us, a weird satisfaction in her voice. Like we had doubted that she was the victim of a crime, and this was her proof to show us up as fools. The common folk do not love Guardians; nor should they. Usually the thing we guard them from is their own neighbors.
‘Around the back’ was a shack, stouter than I expected, with barred windows and a sturdy door. Or it was sturdy: the padlock had been pulled off, the doorframe itself was scarred, and the hinges half-ripped out of the wood. It looked like some foul beast had come in from the hills and ripped the door off in its quest for what was inside, and certainly such things have happened, but …I frowned. “Nobody heard a sound, you say?”
“I did not say! But if my neighbors heard this, they kept mum. I didn’t hear nothing myself until I came back here yesterday to gather the offerings for the Festival. They were gone! And who’ll pay for this door, I ask you? Good work, it was, though it cost me too much…” And with that Goody Blem was off again, muttering about the Kee and how they charged too much and took away all the good jobs, and where were the Guardians then, hey?
12/02/21 Snippet, THE DOOM THAT CAME TO LUNA CITY.
What could possibly go wrong?
Patreon!“They put the air filtration system at the bottom of the central dome,” Abby told the working group two hours later. “Five levels down the main stairwell, and just off the main doors in Maintenance. Just like us, but with two more levels to go down. And climb.”
One of the techs raised her hand. Jilly Hawthorne, Tobias reminded himself. Civilian with Tesla-Grummond. “The power’s out completely, then? Major,” she added after a second, with the wince of a woman who was reminding herself about military courtesy.
“We’re assuming so, based on the last telemetry,” Abby said. “We’re also assuming no light, no atmosphere, and no survivors. Which means no looters, either. Or, you know… anything else.” The grimness of that ‘anything else’ hovered over the table, silencing everything it touched.
December 1, 2021
Don’t, Guillermo del Toro.
…Don’t give me hope.
According to Del Toro, one of the first potential projects he took to Netflix was At the Mountains of Madness, and he said that he would change some things up with the script.
First Starship orbital tests in January.
But let me translate Elon Musk, here:
It was announced earlier this month that Elon Musk, the creator of SpaceX, will make an effort to launch his company’s futuristic, bullet-shaped Starship into orbit in January, but he is not optimistic about the outcome of that maiden test flight.
(Via Instapundit) Translation: that sumbitch gonna blow up. Which is why there’s not going to be a single thing on that prototype that won’t be a sensor to help engineers better understand why it blew up. Fortunately for Musk, by now it’s understood that SpaceX routinely incinerates a few rockets on its way to the next step. That has proven to be quite valuable to his long-term plans…
12/01/21 Snippet, TINSEL RAIN.
A smart one.
Patreon!“I want to know everything, Mr. Vargas.” The Banshee sipped her drink. “So start lying to me.”
“Sure,” I immediately replied. “There’s a plot by the other Archmages to go after you before you can get settled down here. Probably you’ll get assassins in the night. Unless you strike first.”
“Not bad,” she allowed after a moment, “but I said to lie. High-probability guesses and basic common sense I can do myself. You’re the barbarian from a tribe of shrieking storytellers; surely you can come up with at least mildly diverting nonsense.”
My gut doesn’t always like me, or maybe it just enjoys being punched. I ain’t judging. But it doesn’t try to get me killed, so I listened when it told me to push things a little: “All right. The Castle’s cleaning up after the Royals. They got a little careless with their toys, and I’m the trained seal, barking away and blowing the horn so the rabble won’t figure it out.”
“Much better, Mr. Vargas.” She actually sounded pleased. “That is exactly the nonsense you people would spew, for the usual fools we’ve sent. They’d eat it up with a spoon, the smug buffoons. And they’d probably compliment themselves on coming up with such a clever ploy of inadvertently getting the truth out of you. Because who would dare lie to a Dominion ambassador?”
The “THE MATRIX: RESURRECTIONS” THE MATRIX: RESURRECTIONS trailer.
I was going to do an elaborate meta-joke about THE MATRIX: RESURRECTIONS, but I got it out of my system with the title. Really dodged a bullet there, huh?
…This might not suck?
12/01/21 Snippet, THE DOOM THAT CAME TO LUNA CITY.
I like the title, if I do say so myself.
Patreon!Heinlein Station
American Administrative Zone
Luna
2103 AD
Once upon a time, Tobias would have glared at the broken bit of gadgetry as if he thought doing so hard enough would magically put it back together. These days, he didn’t dare. Doing so might have actually worked, and then things would start getting so much worse.
Besides, he was too tired to glare. They all were.
“All right, Major. What do we need to do about this?” he said.
Major Abhiti Kazimi raised an eyebrow. “Just like that, sir? I was expecting to have to get you up to speed.”
“Why bother, Abby? It’s broke, we must need it for something, and if we had a spare already you wouldn’t be bothering me. You’re the chief engineer, God help you: so go ahead and tell me what we need to do to unstick this situation. You’re here in person, so I already know I won’t like hearing it.”
November 30, 2021
Yeah, I got nothing.
I am tapped, slacked, and ready for the rack. And tomorrow I have to bite the dang bullet and start up the TINSEL RAIN hurdy-gurdy. I put down money for the cover. I gotta get going on fixing up that puppy, now.
Open thread.
