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crystalnet · 6 years ago

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3 Writing Samples

Here are 3 writing samples that might be useful to have at the top of the pile.

1. Pacific Digital (Fiction, sample intro to long-form narrative)

Ryuki balanced on top of a fifty-foot skyscraper, poised as though ready to dive, he steadied himself, stiffened his stance and let himself fall backwards slowly into the urban abyss below him, free-fall style, arms crossed over his shoulders, suddenly picking up massive amounts of momentum as he hurdled to the ground, and then fluidly rolling in mid-air into a somersault, amassing exponential amounts of centrifugal force as he smashed a double drop-kick of a landing, he plowed himself against the helipad of a massive cement structure, collapsing it against itself, and then emerged from the haze of debris in an instant, leaping again, shooting through the air like a meteorite.

“The shock-absorption is fantastic. Lots of feedback but it isn’t obtrusive.” Ryuki said curtly as he butterfly jumped on the rebound of a kick-off from yet another cement sky-scraper, transitioning into a triple-axel, volleying his own mass up towards the gleaming artificial sun that hung high in a bright fully-rendered VR sky-box.

“That’s great Ryuki. Let’s run one more drill for today to test out your mobility,” a disembodied voice chimed in in the VR-helmet in-ear monitor as two drones suddenly appeared, circling Ryuki and moving in.

“Sounds good Professor Agassa, I’m ready for anything” Ryuki replied. A dazzling array of stats, internal analyses, and diagnostics flickered on the heads-up display projected on the screen of Ryuki’s VR module, as he brought his dynamic manouevering to a pause, perching menacingly on another structure in his bright orange test-model AR auto-suit, that resembled the giant robots of Saturday morning cartoon lore, readying his energy pole after detaching it from his rear-module.

Just minutes later, Ryuki blasted across the Palo Alto free-way in his blue Bugatti, a rental, the gleaming pacific ocean to his left, nearly seething with the reddish reflection of a blazing orange sun that hung low in the summer sky. He was headed back to the posh estate he was renting while he was here working with Agassa for the summer. He remembered the email from a few months that started all of this, coming out of the blue in the month of May. “Me and my collegues, among which are your esteemed sister, are working on something that I think you may be interested in. There is also a certain Miss Ayumi Ito who will be joinging us… ”

Agassa was putting them up in the luxurious Half-Moon Manse, named for it’s location near a prime beach in Palo Alto, it was a rare Californian plantation, practically on the shore; sporting a strange mixture of Roccocco and Spanish architechture, the house was said to have been built for a Spanish catholic-missionary turned gold-mining prospector to the stars. His family only lasted though until a string of grizzly murders near the end of 19th century and the palatial estate had since been rented out by wealthy investors and jet-setters year after year before being handed off to yet another recipient in the form of a certain Professor Agassa, who had a fetish for eccentric real-estate. The strangely vibrant Spanish roofing, the decadant banisters and parapets, the Art Decco flourishes that had been added by a wealthy oil tycoon nearly a century ago, and the gothic looking East Tower had a certain forboding and yet luxurious presence on the wind-blown strip of the white-sand beaches of Palo Alto.

Agassa wasn’t just being so generous as to rent the place just for Ryuki and Ayumi though, he also needed the estate to host a gala event for the Perseus Society, which he himself was an active board-member of. Agassa was greatly in need of their lucrative patronage but beyond just that Agassa actually felt very strongly about the society’s mission. In the years following the great environmental fall-out and the rise of AR technology, many mega-corporations had begun to amass power, all seeking to take control of a unstable global situation in various ways, some for capitalist ends and some for seemingly virtuous ones. Agassa seemed to believe strongly that Perseus actually had altruistic goals that were worth fighting for.

In the mean time until the big party, Ryuki and Ayumi were free to enjoy the impressively sized Manse to themselves after long 12 hour days working with Agassa in the lab on his new VR developments. When Ryuki arrived home though, tossing the keys and his Ray Ban shades on the marble counter-top, he wasn’t surprised at all to see Ayumi through the awning windows that let out to the tennis courts, hard at work practicing her base-line volleys against an automated ball-lobber in a teal velour Fila track jacket, white Lacoste tennis shorts, and a fluorescent green Commes des Garçons-brand visor over her brow that just happened to match the color of Ayumi’s test-model AR auto-suit from earlier that day at the lab.

The two of them, Ryuki’s esteemed older sister Aida, and Professor Agassa (as well as a formidable squad of lab-assistants) had been cooped up in Agassa’s private lab for about a month now working on various things that Agassa felt were going to be important moving forward.

The full-immersion function of his new VR-Tank allowed them to enter artificially-rendered VR settings at immersion rates exceeding 120% so that they could actually feel the very things they interacted with while in the tank’s VR module, and moved around by exerting and flexing their actual muscles. This demanded hours of strenuous training, both in the tank and out of it, working on various martial arts styles to master the use of their own bodies. They were running simulations that Agassa modeled after the giant-robot cartoons that Ayumi and Ryuki had grown up watching in order to help the pilots visualize their VR selves as armored shells which they themselves were piloting from a safe distance, even if it seemed to Ayumi and Ryuki at first that they really were in fact hurdling through the air or fending off drone-bombers in reality. Much of the work was separating the reality of their VR surroundings from their actual reality, mentally– easier said than done.

Ryuki, being just as fiercely motivated and unsatisfied in the same was Ayumi was, headed to the large sun-dappled drawing room on the basement landing to practice his Judo, instead of enjoying the myriad leisure options that the Manse offered, including an on-site tennis courts, regulation-sized pool, a lacrosse field and a pristine and thriving green-house, perfect for yoga and transcendental meditation sessions. The ornate Victorian book shelves that towered to the ceiling, and the marble flooring and Classical paintings, facilitated a meditative atmosphere, though several grim and gleaming suits of knight’s armor stood erect near the corners of the room and Ryuki couldn’t deny the slightly foreboding feeling he got when he caught sight of one in his peripheral as he transitioned out of a Harai Goshi wheel kick, feeling as though he was being watched by some predatory phantom.

Later that night Ryuki and Ayumi were relaxing pool-side looking out over the sloping dunes of white sand reflecting moonlight that illuminated the dark beach of Half-Moon bay. Ayumi sat on a pool-chair dangling a foot in the water, in her dark grey Z Cavaricci pants and a smart-looking vintage Vivienne Westwood jacket, while Ryuki, sat alongside her in a tweed sweater looking out at the now completely submerged sun, only showing slightly on the horizon below a newly revealed moon, glimmering behind dark clouds that were swelled with Pacific surf. [the later years of the 2010’s, US fashion saw a great return to the trends of the 1980’s, but unlike other trends which centered on the re-appropriating of misremembered nostalgia, this fad was actually mostly sincere. Somehow, in North America at least, people had come back around to the styles of the very decade which had seen the rise of so many brave new technological advancements, which in turn inspired fashions that would be just as eye-catching as the possibilities of the day were exciting and dreadful. Indeed, the pages of Vogue were filled with images and styles that evoked everything from Dallas and Dynasty to Espirit brand sweaters and Keith Harring graphic tees.]

“So…” Ayumi started to speak just to trail off again. “Have you gotten anywhere trying to figure out what exactly Agassa is preparing for?” She seemed distracted as she stared off in the distance toward the sickly moonlit glow as she held a flute of vintage sherry to her lips.

“Whatever it is, it definitely has a lot to do with Crystal Corp and the imminent funding grants he’ll be receiving from Perseus Society”. Ryuki offered. They had both been wondering what exactly Agassa wasn’t telling them. He had been reasonably fourthright, but it still wasn’t entirely apparent to the two of them why they had been gathered the way they were a month prior– he was hiding something.

The next day, the gala for the Perseus Society was to go off without a hitch, after a month of planning on Agassa’s part. The ballroom of the Manse was soon filled wall-to-wall with elegant and upwardly mobile entrepreneurs, scientists, philanthropists, and self-appointed philosophers of wealth and champions of the market. Veritable Robin Hoods who used their positions of power on Wall Street or Corporate boards of Silicon Valley tech companies to bring back their wealth to people of staggering intellectual ability like Agassa who sought to wrest the fate of the planet away from those who would watch it burn uncaring.

Ryuki and Ayumi were not sure they had ever seen that much Dior in their lives, as they sauntered around somewhat sheepishly in perfectly tailored outfits, making nice, small talk with the various benefactors, CEOs and wealthy eccentrics who would be directly funding their research with Agassa. After a keynote address on networks of airborne Geodesic-dome shaped super-structures as the new “city of tomorrow,” Agassa delivered his speech which included topics such as the rising need for global accountability by super corporations, some thinly-veiled attacks on Crystal Corp’s recent policies and controversies, and a loosely sketched plan for his research and Perseus’s unified research efforts moving forward, to a standing ovation that Ryuki could tell was a massive relief to the stressed but happy-to-be-there Agassa.

Late that night, after the party, after making small talk with strangers for hours, and after a heart-to-heart between Ayumi and Ryuki by the pool again (they had been having these more frequently lately), Ryuki had collapsed into a deep slumber in the master on the third-floor when he was suddenly awoken by some unseen force in the middle of the night.

“Ryuki”~

“Who’s that?” Ryuki shot out, rubbing his eyes groggily.

“It’s me Ryuki, your friend”. Ryuki was shocked to see a glowing blue teddy-bear, standing upright and kind of peeking around the door to his room from the hallway.

“Adomu-chan? What are you doing here”. Ryuki was partly relieved to see he was just dreaming as he looked out on at the ethereal blue teddy-bear thing that was now climbing onto the foot of his bed.

“I need you to come with me Ryuki. Let’s play a game”. Suddenly the living teddy-bear from Ryuki’s childhood turned on a dime and ran out the room into the cavernous hallways of the third-floor.

“Hey wait up!” Ryuki said, scrambling out of his sheets in satin red pajamas, then running through the East hall towards the tower, past gothic ornamentation, medieval suits of armor, and a collection of paintings that included everything from Gaugin and Pizzaro, to Francis Bacon and Damien Hirst originals, as he scurried after the glowing teddy-bear that was sprinting through the house.

The bear ran up the tower stairs into the hallway that connected to Ayumi’s room, dashing into Ayumi’s door which hung ajar when Ryuki lost sight of him.

“What’s going on in here?!” Ryuki said, burting through the door into the luxurious master bedroom. The living toy was suddenly no where to be found, but on the bed, perched over Ayumi’s resting body, was a dark figure who appeared to be readying a strike from an armed right-hand, poised to slash the throat of his victim. Just as Ryuki burst in the room, the assailant turned and saw him, and in an instant, jolted off of the bed, slinking rapidly towards the large windows which opened onto a veranda, and dashed through the already-open door out into the crisp moonlit night. Ayumi suddenly woke up at a start, and beginning to realize what happened, ran towards the window. Ryuki and Ayumi both walked out onto the veranda and stared down at the crashing waves far below them where the foundation of the house met the near shore. It was high-tide so it almost appeared as though the beach had completely flooded, and the shore was engulfing the foundation of the Manse itself and they looked out through the dark windblown night, searching for an assailant who wasn’t there.

All that remained of the most strange incident was a single pastel blue rose that lay on the deep maroon carpet in front of the veranda door, laying in shards of moonlight that spilled into the room, appearing as though it had been frozen in some treating solution so that it was stiff and glassy, as though it had been crystallized.~

2. My Favorite Anime Films (Editorial)

It might be worth mentioning that there is a precise moment when a millennial realizes that anime is more than just Pokemon. Weather it be through Pokemon’s rivalry with Digimon or the appearance of other also-rans like Monster Rancher and later Yu-Gi-Oh, or the monolithic DBZ airing on Toonami, or y'know, Toonami in general, it is guaranteed to be a profound experience when anime first becomes an option and life-style for a youngster. The pastures of eclecticism to your child-like near-autistic mind expand outward in all directions, electrified seizure-enducing color palettes and all, containing within their emerald acres untold secrets and state-of-the-art studio-driven capital-A Art presented for your liking, to devour a la carte as it were. For a select many, here in the west, that first exposure may be a Miyazaki film. Behold, Baby Otaku’s first anime movie.

Hayao’s after all is one of the most pervasive oeuvres within the genre here in the West if not globally, and here in the US thanks to Fox and then later good ‘ol Disney, we too, and I do mean a great many of us, pray at the church of Totoro-chan and Cat Bus-kun and live and die for this man’s work, and that isn’t by accident. I don’t profess to necessarily have good taste in anime films necessarily, mostly due to my somewhat limited exposure, but I have seen enough to know how severely good anime can make even good Hollywood seem like a sad, palsied and pathetic joke. Or like also just western animation also sucks comparatively which may be a more reasonable comparison. So without further ado, let’s get into my top 5 Anime films. Granted I haven’t seen enough… most of the essential mainstream films all entry-levels see and many films connected to long-running shows or shonen but not that much beyond the works of a handful of auteur-level directors are the extent. I am eager for more recommendations and experience, but I must admit these 5 films leave me petty damn satisfied on their own.

1. Totoro-

I led right into this one for a reason. It for me is probably the precise moment I realized that Pokemon and Digimon weren’t the only things that had that specific, distinct style that seemed so haughtily removed from and superior to the gaudy animations of failed, broken western animators. And what better showcase for the style than a movie that focuses on and worships the Rustic. This film is a love-letter to all things bucolic, idyllic, sun-dappled and sylvan. The country, as it were, with all of its woodenness and unexplored reaches, is just asking to be documented by a genre such as this. If anime is the instinctual expression of child-like wonderment and verve, than the boundless outdoors are the ultimate locus with which to explore that unbridled joy which good anime is want to capture. If I sound artificially elevated it is only because it is a lofty task indeed to explain this films special place in so many people’s hearts without using words like “magic”. It is inescapable, because there is something harshly familiar about things as strange as a bus that is a cat, and a family of wood-dwelling genies. An infestation of soot spirits that don’t seem that badly put-out by having to abandon their old haunt because of a families’ emotionally buoyant spirit being just too unrelentingly positive for their dark constitutions to bare. Something about a satchel of magic seeds that grow into a towering forest during a single surreal night, only to re-appear as saplings the next day (was it all a dream?).

These things inspire one and are otherworldly, and yet they feel instantly familiar to the young viewer. Satsuke and May become the viewer, and the film becomes a time-capsule. It is escapist while also rooting itself in the common experience of actually growing up (a sick mother, a lost little sister, a spooky old house). This film captures something so fiercely singular and yet feels at the same time like the most universal, archetypal of children’s films of all time. To simply list a few of the indescribably pleasant aspects of this film: Wind blowing through tree branches and tall grass, fields. The sheen and polish of certain acorns. Sunlight flaring and playing on a gurgling brooke. An old plastic watering can with a hole in the side (a viewing device). Gleaming, fresh vegetable life. The soundtrack, which buzzes and brims with delight, and threatens to take center-stage more than any other Hishaishi OST in the way it is unstoppabley effervescent throughout its run-time, is prodigious. Hisaishi-sempai is wildly brilliant here, and the plinking xylophones and playful 80’s synthesizing fit so wonderfully within the universe of this film. And then there are the numerous central arrangements which are some of the most anthemic and touching of all his compositions to this day. There is an enormous amount that could be said about this film. Nothing would be too much. I could talk about the way it seems to yearn for an agrarian lifestyle that was rapidly disappearing from Japan and the rest of the modernized world by the 1980s, and how there might easily be pre-war longing in its portrayal. A mother sick with something undisclosed and surrealistic dream-trees that are lovely even as they seem to evoke blooming mushroom clouds may point to a very subtle undercurrent that one does not think to look for until they are older. Life becomes more complicated than tadpoles and imaginary creatures after all. And in this way we can tack the resonance of this film to something as intellectually rich as it is emotional, if one were to want to. But unlike its contemporary Grave of the Fire Flies, this movie doesn’t dwell on the harder things. It just honors them respectfully, not turning away from them even as it relishes in showing the simple joys that are also abound, especially in a rustic wonderland like the Japanese countryside. All I can really say, at the end of a day, about the staggering achievement for the whole planet that is My Neighbor Totoro is thank you Mr. Hayao, from the bottom of my heart~

2. Pom Poko-

Whew okay that was hard to sustain. Good movie but like damn. I’m glad this is my second one because it gives me close to as many feels as Totoro without even all that much childhood nostalgia involved, directly that is, and yet also features raccoon balls out the wazoo, so it makes my job easier in a way. I didn’t see this until I was older, and there’s probably a reason. It’s a bit shame that many of the testicles of the sometimes-anthropomorphic Raccoons in this film are visible so often as a reference to an odd detail of long-standing traditional Japanese folklore because otherwise it’d be a fabulous children’s film in the west. As it stand, I’m not sure what kind of disclaimer one would have to devise if they happened to be an otaku parent, finding themselves wanting to show this masterpiece to a tyke just as one might the rest of the Ghibli movies. But alas every rose has its thorns, and if you err on the side being a certain type of furry or like being open to that then hey maybe you’ll like this a lot, but beyond all the raccoon nuts in this one, its still an amazing film. Like it presents you with the nuts as a way of taunting you that it can still transcend the nuttiness of that quirk, and goes on for all of its run-time not failing to wow and delight at every turn.

Seriously, this movie is just a gem and its a bit hard to describe because it is part mockumentary on a new suburban development outside of Japan (actual), part allegory for suburban sprawl, environmental politics, and modernization, and part racoon nation-founding epic a la Mrs. Frisbee and the Rats of Nihm meets ancient Greek city-founding narratives, all with a light but acutely satirical surrealist approach. And yet so much humanity in these racoons! Or tanuki, I should say– raccoon dogs that is. These are the beast that Mario disguised himself as at times for the power of flight, and yet they themselves are shape-shifters. Tricksters. Threatened by a rival group of Racoons and then much more seriously the new developments of Tama-Town, these Racoons turn to phantasmagorical displays of hallucinatory manifestation of their collective angst, in the form of tengu, ghosts and kaiju alike roaming the streets of a sleepy little new neighborhood on the outskirts of Tokyo. The effect of seeing the tanuki rendered in a realistic and naturalistic way, roaming their woods silently one minute and then the next minute watching a scene in which they are rendered in a more cartoonish, anthropomorphize way is quite a unique gesture, and along with the narration that happens a lot early on, cuing-in the viewer to the film’s own strange and satirical nature, make this film unique even beyond balls. And then despite all this technical, thematic and conceptual wizardry it somehow still manages to make you feel something– and for odd little raccoon people at that. It’s all a very interesting and moving experience, bolstered most by a beautiful color palette, and animations that are intensely well-rendered. Raccoons and humans alike all have a great amount of expressiveness in their movement, and the sheer quality of the animation, along with a playful but moving script is what makes every second of this film work so well, expanding nut-sack parachutes and all. 3. Paprika-

If the scenes where the raccoons are haunting Tama-town are some of the most fun and imaginative moments in that film, then this movie– one which is about dreams much more than Pom Poko is about ghosts– outpaces even the brilliance of those scenes by a long-shot by featuring some of the most inhumanly colorful and creative visuals I’ve ever scene. Satoshi Kon’s style, and overall art direction is absolutely stunning, with everything from characters’ expressions to their movements to the warm intensity of the colors to the dream sequences themselves all displaying superb craft. While Pom Poko is fun and light while still making me feel something, this movie is largely all about the visuals, the concepts and the soundtrack. Hirasawa’s OST is punchy, energetic, and slightly batty in just the right way. Its one of the most unique I’ve ever heard, featuring lush electronic arrangements alongside strange, almost traditional-sounding vocal performances that help accent the poppy, bright and kind of bonkers feeling of this movie. And yet the script itself is somewhat reserved and restrained right up until the dream-detective enters into the boundless dream-worlds of various characters. The movie remains grounded on a basic level, while at its wildest it seems as unhinged as the strangest of dreams. This movie works very well as a gestalt– from the moments the OP-sequence plays I am strapped in and ready for the audio-visual splendour that then unfolds. All of Satoshi Kon’s work is inspiring and singularly excellent, but this one just might be my favorite.

3. Another Green World (fiction, short-story)

“And how was Professor McLuhan’s lecture today, Ovidius?” Beatrice asked, as she walked with the young child down the township’s sparkling side-walk, across the intersection from the Academy and on along the lane to Delfino Café in the breezy mid-afternoon weather. Beatrice was practically the archetypical image of a care-giver, for she exuded a nurturing aura, always smiling calmly as she addressed her young charge; today she wore a wide-brimmed sun-hat that flapped just slightly as a cool breeze wavered through the cobbled courtyard outside of Ovidius’ day-school. The leaves would be changing soon, but for now everything outside was the bright greens of palm tree fronds and cool blue vistas of the horizon.

“The lecture was fascinating! Media theory is more complex than I ever would have guessed,” Ovidius beams. He is wearing a hat with a little helicopter propeller on it; he has dark hair and sea-foam green skin (his choice).

“I’m so glad you liked it! I think you’ll like Dr. Einstein’s lesson just as well. You know, him and Agassa get along just famously with Dr. McLuhan.” Beatrice said warmly.

“Oh I just can’t wait; our lesson with Dr. Einstein last week was simply superb!” the precocious artificial youth replied, “I’m sure we’ll have another great time!”

And they did. Ovidius had long been friends with Albert Einstein, but today hisgenerous mentor was bringing along his new friend Ada Lovelace for a picnic on the beach, and of course she was absolutely delighted by the inquisitive young scholar, for Ovidius was living proof against her initial conception of the Analytical Machine, or at least, they had all hoped he would be one day, and she was pleased to oblige them, tossing a beach ball around with Albert and the child as Beatrice relaxed on a beach-towel nearby, resting her eyes behind a pair of Foster-Grants as the mid-day sun became slightly obscured by big puffy cumuli, which reminded Ovidius of the gelato they had been enjoying moments before. They would play for now, but Ovidius knew that somehow the surprisingly-athletic-for-his-age scientist would tie this game with the beach-ball in with his lesson on Relativity somehow. For now Ovidius was enjoying the refreshing surf of the shore on his bare feet, still reflecting on Dr. McLuhan’s excellent lecture on Global Villages and thoroughly enjoying the company of the lively and brilliant scientists, as Madame Lovelace prepared a kite that they were to fly on the gentle sea breeze– it was shaping up to be another fantastic day inside of a sparkling Artificial World.

When Ovidius and Beatrice finally return to their bungalow for the day, after parting ways with the brilliant mathematicians (who surely had their own private plans for the rest of the evening), Pablo and Salvador will come over for Arts-and-Crafts while Beatrice cooks fish mousselines. The rambunctious painters always have an infectious energy when they come over, and usually in the middle of collaging with Ovidius or discussing German Expressionism in easily-graspable terms over Scrabble, they would be known to break into a game of surrealist cops-and-robbers with the child, who could still appreciate that sort of thing (though the young prodigy would surely be growing out of it soon). Next week, they were sure to tell Ovidius that their friend Frida would be joining them to teach Ovid the art of self-portraiture.

Soon the surrealists are on their way though and Ovidius will have his late-night Language lesson with Beatrice before she tucks you in for the night (Latin this week, Greek next week, JavaScript the next, etc.). Beatrice reminds Ovidius that Mr. Tesla will be visiting tomorrow after a guest-lecture from a certain Mr. Foucault at the Academy, and then she tucks him in for the night. Ovidius dozes off to strains of Mahler still playing on the gramophone in the den, and somewhere far, far away, beyond the digital look-glass, Dr. Agassa and his research assistants were examining a bevvy of diagnostic read-outs and progress reports, and an overall system-review, as Ovidius turned off his mind, so to speak, for the night, under the loving watch of Dr. Agassa’s crack-team, who had mapped-out, guided and molded every moment of Ovidius’ life heretofore, ever since they created it a couple months ago. Of course, they conformed some of their choices with expectations and preferences that Ovidius himself had so quickly developed in the short time he had existed, but at the end of the day, his life and experience was ultimately their vision, or more specifically, Dr. Agassa’s.

Beatrice had explained to Ovidius already that he was indeed the creation of a group of scientists, and that, yes, he was “artificial” in a sense, compared to the other intelligence that populated this world, but that he shouldn’t see this as any real difference between him and other people, and she herself, just like him, was in fact artificial. The young lad was kept very busy day-to-day with the artificial approximation of our planet’s recent visionaries’, of any given medium or field, and the ever-present aid of his care-taker Beatrice. He had friends, but he learned quickly that, they too were artificial, like him. Unlike him though, they would never grow and develop like he did. And unlike him, they would never receive their own Body.

That night, an artificial sun would set on a similarly immaculate, and artificial, township, between a large slopping green hill and a yellow-sanded sea shore that was modeled on those of the Grecian isles which they discovered were featured prominently in Ovidius’ dreams after he first began absorbing images of the World. And tomorrow, after toast and jam, Beatrice would ferry the young scholar to class at the Academy, where he and his friends enjoyed the lectures of some of the world’s leading scholars and scientists, hand-picked by Agassa and his staff to impart the highest quality education possible on the lad. Many of their choices were intentionally as obvious as possible for they figured that by allowing the child to interact with the intellect of the most well-known thinkers of the 20th century, he would be better grounded in the reality that existed just outside of his virtual snow-globe. To wit, Freud and Jung were in charge of the Psychology department, Joseph Campbell led an elective class on Fiction and Mythology, Euler was put in charge of the Mathematics department with the help of none other than Einstein and Newton themselves, who were guest-lecturers (outside of Albert’s private sessions with the child on Wednesdays) while Turing led Computing Sciences and Sacks handled the Neurology dept.

Ovidius couldn’t have quite known then, but could have probably figured, that the research that culminated in his existence and development would in turn lead to major technological advancements in various fields, including everything from the Geo-forming of extraterrestrial bodies by AI-controlled vessels, the creating of safer self-driving cars and even the creation of fully prosthetic bodies. He did understand though the sheer gravity of his existence, and after his lessons everyday, at some point before bed, he’d look out into the yard behind his house, made to resemble an average suburban yard, with its own charm and it’s sacred promise of limitation and impermeable boundaries, and his mind would wander out above the green, wooden shed and the iron lattices agains the fence, and the Oak tree whos branches hung low over the 20-acre plot, towards the invisible reaches of his world, and he’d look out beyond his own world, towards the World which he spent everyday studying and learning from, which had created him, and which had promised to allow him physical access to, one day, when the prosthetic was finished.

4 Years Later

Ovidius grips the steering wheel, and eases down on the pedal, rounding the impressively sized canyon as he shot along interstate-40, preferring for the moment to drive himself, despite the self-driving feature that came standard, he sped along in the black Arizona night, hurdling towards his destination as though he were being spirited there against his will. He keeps replaying the voice-mail from Ayumi over and over. Dead? How could he be? The coroner’s report deemed the death accidental suicide but Ovidius knew not to believe that for a second. When they found Dr. Agassa collapsed in his room the day after the gala, Ovidius was able to surmise a lot of things, but the fact that he had been partly prepared for this for so long didn’t help to soften the blow much. One red-eye flight later, a teary open-wake, and a reunion with the only human friend he’s ever had and the 4 year old artificially-intelligent humanoid is now hurdling towards something that even he himself didn’t entirely understand. He's heading to a seedy motel-8 in the middle of no where somewhere outside of Havasu Canyon and mentally prepare himself for what he is about to do. When the bright, blaring morning light streams through the motel blinds, he will understand that his journey beckons.

Go back

He kept hearing those words over and over. And as he looked out on the vacuous mesa of canyon and dessert, he knew that he mustn’t hesitate. He has to go to the place where Earth’s magnetic-field had been disrupted, and joined, on a sub-atomic level with the very infrastructure of the digital world– like a seam in the universe, where the exterior met the interior; behold the earth’s existential navel. For Ovidius has come here to return to the very Net which had given birth to him.~

#writing samples #writing #fiction #editorial #portfolio #game writing

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