Moe Lane's Blog, page 637
November 19, 2021
11/19/21 Snippet, THE STARS ARE WRONG.
This is getting interesting to write.
Patreon!Jak’s good humor guttered and died as we approached our destination. After full dark, the neighborhood of Crooked Point was no safe place for a single Guardian, and it did not welcome us in the morning gloom, either. I fancied I could feel eyes watching us as we moved through silent, too-wide streets. Some muttered it was naught now but the southernmost point of the Razor District, and so not worth any attention besides the scourge’s. Others were more sanguine, and dismissive of the muttering; but no respectable person visited Crooked Point these days. But then, a Guardian is not quite respectable.
But respectable or not, my heart sank to see the ongoing degeneration of the neighborhood. This was a better place, in my childhood, full of incense and vapors and the calls of priests; but all of that had drifted away, pushed aside by an increasing stream of Kee, backwards tribesmen from beyond the western walls. The new immigrants were brutes, ill-formed to our eyes, with the degenerate stamp of the ancients on their faces; and there was something very profane in the way they laughed, or cried. But the Kee proved useful, doing the hardest work for the meanest pay, with sullen but silent industry. So Seacity let them gather in the Razor District, and did not concern itself about the queer rituals and customs that the new arrivals brought with them.
November 18, 2021
Snippet, THE STARS ARE WRONG.
Still adding a little to this.
Patreon!It was the fifth day of the month of the Bloody King when I traipsed up the stairs to the case-room. It was generally agreed by all of my fellow-Guardians of the Way that the extra two flights of steps were well worth the unparalleled view of the mists of Seacity harbor… and the heady smells that came when the east wind freshened. That morning I fancied I could scent spices from Far Foreign ships, the exhalation of Seacity itself, the lingering fragrances and odors from the festivals last evening; and beneath it all, the musk of the sea. I have never gone far enough west to lose the sea-scent, and I hope that I never will. As long as I love the sea-scent, I am not wholly lost to madness.
But I indulged myself in contemplation for only a moment. It would be a long morning, no doubt; the day after Festival is a busy time for Guardians. Many people today would be waking up with the consequences of last night’s actions alongside them, and some of those people would react poorly. The ancients had a saying: If you would have peace, be prepared to slay. A wise thought, if from a vanished and vanquished people.
NaNoWriMo, Day 18: 1,520 / 39,770.
Every day is a gain.
Patreon!Syah paused. “Before you ask: no, I’ve never smoked deathheart. Nobody I know has. You smoke it, supposedly you get seventeen trips like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Seventeen, huh? Don’t tell me, let me guess: the eighteenth kills you dead.”
Syah swigged his beer. “Got it in one. As in, your brain leaves your skull via your ears. At high pressure.”
“Ahh! I’m eating here, Syah. And I was joking!” He spread his hands and gave me one of those too-good smiles, so I wasn’t sure if he was exaggerating. He might not have been. The Tomb Worlds aren’t for the timid.
“You don’t have deathheart on Jefferson, then?” asked Syah. “Must be nice.”
I ignored the very slight edge in his voice — the other colony worlds sometimes resent how ready Jefferson was for human habitation — and answered his question. “Not in the field. Back during the Assertion of Independence a militia company found what I guess you’d call a seed bank: there were a bunch of alien plants in it, ready to be planted. Deathheart was one of them. But that’s not surprising, right? The plant can thrive, under a lot of different planetary conditions. I guess Bolivar just hadn’t been cleaned up enough for humans yet.”
“Lucky us,” muttered Syah.
Cool lunar eclipse tonight!
Peaks at 4 AM, Eastern time. I may set my alarm.
What’s full and bright and red all over? Tonight’s Moon!
— NASA Moon (@NASAMoon) November 18, 2021
It’s the longest partial lunar eclipse since 1440, and it’s so close to total that much of the Western Hemisphere will be able to see the Moon turn red in Earth’s shadow.
How to #ObserveTheMoon: https://t.co/J9trqnx6mF pic.twitter.com/qdrXTXRGYF
Warner’s Smash Bros. Clone MULTIVERSUS looks insane.
Not necessarily bad, but definitely nuts.
Smash Bros is something my kids play, but even I can tell it’s a clone. But I can see Kotaku’s point: the cooperative effects look interesting.
Moment of Raw, Adrenal Terror Tweet of the Day, …See The First Part Of The Title edition.
WHEE!
Frozen vials marked "Smallpox" found in lab freezer in Pennsylvania, CDC says https://t.co/PqIITYtxmm
— CBS News (@CBSNews) November 18, 2021
Via @presjpolk.
November 17, 2021
NaNoWriMo, Day 17: 1,530 / 38,250.
I continue to claw. I’m hoping for some uninterrupted time, this weekend.
Patreon!Rubicon leaned forward. “Interesting. Can you trace it back to the original creator, Programmer Syah?”
“Him?” asked Greg. “Why not use The Process? It’d do it faster.”
“Because I’ve already tried that,” replied Rubicon. “Process, who was the person who entered this malware into the system?”
“General Kylee Ramirez, United States Space Force, Commander of the American research vessel Enrico Fermi,” The Process replied immediately.
That got a little silence. “Process,” I said, “What is the status of General Ramirez?”
“General Ramirez died on January 23, 2079, during what is now called the ‘Consolidation Coup.’ Her death was initially given as ‘heart failure,’ but evidence in 2165 confirmed that she had been illegally executed. And, to anticipate your question: I am aware of the discrepancy, Wind-Walker Tanaka. But internal records clearly indicate that General Ramirez was the one who entered the information.”
Movie of the Week: TREMORS.
Mostly because of this video, and a general agreement that the only people who hate TREMORS are Communists:
In your heart, you know I’m right.
#commissionearned
