Front Porch Rambles

Griffin awoke to a strange sensation. He opened his eyes, looked down, and screamed. He was 150 miles above Xenith and falling, and he suddenly couldn't remember how in the hell he had gotten there. Far, far below him was the dark green shape of the Ruthinyx Continent, separated from him by nothing but a thin layer of swirling clouds. He grabbed the controls for his jetpack, but one hand slipped and he was rapidly whirling. There was nothing to cling to and he knew he was dead. He flailed in his panic, screaming and spinning in a wild gyration. In his confusion, he saw nothing but the flashing of black night and green planet.  He exhausted his breath in a wheezing whimper of hopelessness, and there was silence. He felt like he was floating, instead of free falling. "Wait..." Everything fell into place as his brain finally snapped the rest of the way into consciousness. Then he vomited in his spacesuit.  Or he would have, if he'd had anything to eat in the

Lozan caught himself staring at the triangle of stars over Group Captain Mighels head again. It was about to happen. The rookie he'd put in charge had better not mess this one up, but it was fairly straightforward operation, if risky. Once Griffin ran out of oxygen, the net would close and Griffin would be tractored quickly into the medical shuttle that he'd attached to the unit. He wasn't sure his brother knew how to take responsibility for his actions, to understand how he was squandering his gifts. Griffin was too stubborn to listen, maybe a close call would straighten him up. Lozan blamed himself. He hadn't expected to be a soldier either, but he'd fought hard to be the best there was, to rise in ranks, to gather back some of the power he had lost. He had been raised from birth as the Crown Prince of Lord Zeskin's Empire. Educated by the finest tutors that seven civilizations could offer and supported by all the resources he could dream of, Lozan had no eq

The technicians wouldn't stop staring.  It wasn't the brightest and best that were sent out here to compile data and operate the machinery of the outpost, the astronomers and politicians were all sitting comfortably at home reading the final reports. The folks who found themselves at Longstar didn't have any other prospects, or they wouldn't be here.  To say they didn't get many visitors would be a joke, because in actuality they had never had one before Axar.  Supply ships would infrequently bring the staples of life and little else, but that was the extent of actual human contact between the shift changes that happened every five years. They weren't completely cut off though, the dataweb reached most corners of the cluster, and the isolated crew had access to the latest entertainment and news, and a variety of virtual means for reaching out to civilization. The handsome young officer with the big name was not virtual. He was larger than life and clearly agit

Griffin was questioning his life choices as he was forced to listen to the tenth recital of a filthy song in Canto, a language he did share with the drone, about a woman who accidentally went to a port went she'd meant to go to market. As there was no way for sound to travel through the vacuum of space, Otis had obliged himself by hijacking Griffin's short-range radio for communication. "Will you stop singing that? It's literally right in my ear." "Not a chance, toilet-pants. Chontooooooooo...  Chonta boon shib rykooooo..." Dealing with an entirely contrary VI was beginning to feel to Griffin like it couldn't possibly be worth it. Each time he'd tried a new approach, it had set off the headache machine. At first the wise-crack responses and sarcastic one-liners had been hilarious, then tolerable, until finally Griff had stopping trying altogether. That's when Otis had started singing.  A particularly evil part of his Solstice gift

Jeffers Welm wished for the first time that he was back in academy, and that his was all just an elaborate prank by the other junior commanders, like the time they had convinced him that there was a  surprise rebel assault and he had been halfway through scrambling the fighters before someone had come in and put a stop to it. At least he wouldn't be personally responsible for rescuing the son of the man who ruled over seven star systems, the brother of his commander... "I'm just too agreeable." He often spoke aloud to himself when flying, always careful to switch off the comm. It helped him work through his issues. Cheaper than therapy, and what else was he doing? "Sightseeing in a trash heap, that's all." The search had been on for a day and a half, and this was Ensign Welm's seventh run over the distant debris.  It would be a simple enough matter if they could perform visual sweeps, the single-seat scout fighters had large enough viewports t

Griffin couldn't believe his luck. The maintenance drone was still powered, but there was definitely something wrong with it. No signs of physical distress, though there was an odd bit of welding on the rear panels, where the memory was stored.  Griff set it spinning slowly before him and surveyed the machine. The body was spherical and yellow, covered with tiny holes for maneuvering jets-this class of drone did most of it's work in zero-gravity. There were two wide black treads running the circumference of the body's cross the top and bottom, with a pair of arms on each side, and a big eye protruded from the center on a long slender neck. The glass eye seemed unmarred, but the shutter inside it was completely closed. All four appendages were intact, two manipulators stuck out like bony arms with long fingers, it was also equipped with a compact but powerful welding laser and a telescoping sensor array. Nothing was apparently wrong with the thing, except that it didn't

It was a bad day to be stuck on an asteroid at the edge of the star system, and Axar's mood had not improved upon hearing about Griffin. The projection of Axar's old pal Murg flickered and froze momentarily.  The outpost was nearly was far away as the holographic data would travel before degrading too much to be worth it. Murg shrugged his oversize shoulders and looked sympathetic. The young man was Cantonius, and had a vestigial ridge that rose across his shoulders and peaked behind his head. Once Murg had fully matured, it would grow ridges and harden like armor. The remnant of his ancestors' exoskeleton made some of his movements look awkward and somewhat comical to humans, but nothing was funny today. "Sorry Ax, that's all I know. My cousin Tom was flying the shuttle and told me as soon as he got the chance. You know Griff, I'm sure he just decided he'd rather take a walk than join the army today. He'll pop up in another airlock before long, you

Telling a high ranking officer that his kid brother was dead in the middle of a fleet-wide drill was by no means a normal circumstance, and Lt. Commander Lozan Zeskin was an intimidating figure in the best of times. Ensign Welm cursed his luck, and for good measure cursed Lt. Joreg. It was supposed to be Joreg here delivering the news.  The weasel had been overjoyed to see an Ensign, and had immediately relieved himself of the loathsome responsibility. Welm found it hard not to think of the old saying about what not to do to messengers, and how all proverbs start somewhere. He didn't really think he'd be shot. It's not like this was the first time Griff Zeskin had gone to extreme measures to make his point clear.  When he was twelve, Griffin had caused the evacuation an entire deck of the ship-over a thousand people- by manipulating the sensor relays while locked in his room.  Last year, he reprogrammed the maintenance bots in his own image: apathetic in response to command

Griffin's confidence began to waver. He had been searching for hours, and still hadn't turned up anything he could use to escape.  The stars glittered above and the planet glowed from far below. It was so quiet he could hear his heart beating behind the sound of his breath.  The communicator was off, there was no one he wanted to talk to. He checked his oxygen gauge. Half-empty, with no refills. Just another day in paradise. No going back now.  There had to be ship that still had a spare tank intact out here somewhere. Griffin tried not to pay attention to the fact that he was floating in zero-gravity one hundred and fifty miles above the surface of the planet, and that absolutely no one knew where he was.  It wasn't how he'd originally envisioned his sixteenth birthday. His escape plan had been simple, if a bit insane: make a surprise exit out of an airlock, use only the EVA suit's jets to drop down to the junk belt, use scrap parts to bring one of the derelict

It's been a bit more than a month since I last posted anything here.  I have pursued a few minor creative tasks in the interlude, but nothing very involved with the exception of a homemade iron man costume. That project was fun, but I can't say I nailed the helmet. Which turned out okay, because my son didn't wear it much, he wanted to be able to see everything. The real reason for the hiatus is that I was reading. A lot. I read the Outlander books by Diana Gabaldon (rhymes with stone in case you read them and need to shake your fist to yourself and exclaim it aloud whilst reading). There are 8 of them out, and I figure there are around 3 million words, give or take a few hundred thousand.  When I have the opportunity to binge read a robust series that beckons my spirit of adventure while shaming me with her virtuous, hard-working, passionate, and intimate main characters.  I desire very much to be like Jamie Fraser, the main male protagonist. I find that reading a characte