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Friday, July 28, 2023

Followup to my last post

Okay, so it looks like the D3rp & Pr0xy project has come to a complete standstill (writer's block and some strong emotions that were, thankfully, very good to have). Instead, I've got something in the works that just feels right, somehow. Basically, it's a vampire who captures a human but ends up learning how to be human again. It's set in a complete fantasy world (so don't try to find these places on a map, globe, or Google) and this one isn't going to be rated as "All Ages" (having no filter for swearing doesn't make something completely inappropriate… there's times when a well-placed F-bomb is called for, assuming you're most people) due to the content, so I might have to look into other avenues for it. Until I'm sure about how to go about publishing it, I'm not going to release any information about it, apart from the following bullets:

  • The vampire's name is Inga
  • The vampire is feral and animalistic
  • The vampire has (effectively) no memory (on her own) until the night she was turned (eight years prior to the first chapter)
  • The human's name is Orlin
  • He lives in (what is essentially) an '89 Dodge Grand Caravan with everything behind the front seats replaced with Tiny RV stuff (this lasts until the first chapter)
  • He is the last human in that kingdom
  • They are both in their early-thirties
  • Neither are immortal

Monday, July 10, 2023

D3RP & PR0XY (Early Preview №5)

I’d decided to call it quits after another smoke, »Mother of shit, this gets old quickly,« I said in Serbian.

I could hear Penelope’s pagan horseman music through the walls of her house, as well as the unmistakable sound of her swearing her ever-loving ass off in Chinese. The entire time she was trying to do something, I could bet hard Dinar that she was cooking meth.

Sha bi, wang ba dan!” I heard her scream before looking at my cigarette for a minute.

»Ah, fuck it,« I muttered, putting out the thing in my bucket before spraying down and going inside.

Feel better?” Mom asked as I tossed the empty pack of cigarettes in the trash, “Again? You know how I feel about you smoking, Rhys.”

“That was a pack of twelve, Mom,” I said, “It lasted me four days.”

“I don’t know what’s worse,” she said, “Your smoking or Penelope’s massive caffeine intake.”

Hard to say,” I said, taking my clothes out of the dryer, “But don’t get onto her about it.”

She’s my niece!” Mom said, looking at me as I went into my bedroom and changed into something that didn’t smell like tobacco and sweat.

Look, I’ve got something to go to at the college, so I can’t do it tonight, but I will talk to her about it in the morning.”

Will you two please put that feud of yours on hold for a few days, too?”

“No promises,” I said, putting on a brown jacket and teal shirt, “Look good?”

What do you have to do at the college?”

The books,” I said, grabbing my keys, “They were a loan. Since they’re still in the plastic, I get my money back because they’re technically still unused.”

Well, just be careful,” she said as I headed out.

The books had been loaded up in the back of the car for a few days, so that wasn’t an issue, although I wouldn’t be sad if the car were to be taken to Asia and dumped in the Mekong River.

Just saying.

As soon as I had my sunglasses on and the engine firing away, I was city-bound, baby!

What in the fuck!?” I said, looking at a cop car on Reese Road before noticing one of the cops was walking up to the passenger side of the car.

“Ma’am, can you roll the window down, please?”

»I’m sorry, but I don’t speak your language,« I said in Serbian.

The window. Now.”

I shrugged my shoulders, acting like I didn’t understand him, “Srpski jezik.”

Roll it down, or I bust it down!”

I opened up Google Translate and started using the Serbian setting to explain that I was just visiting family in America and that I’d be heading back to Serbia, Yugoslavia sometime next week. Unshockingly, he took it, so I drove on my way.

Idiot,” I said, smirking as soon as I got to the park entrance, “Cops are so stupid.”

Yugoslaivan Rock and Yugoslavian Disco were my two favorite (bar-none) genres of music in the world. Serbian is a beautiful language, what can I say? Russian is overrated, just like any WWII-era story mentioning Hitler.

The rest of the drive to the college was about as mundane as you could get, save for a fender-bender in town, but some people just shouldn’t be allowed to drive, period.

As soon as I made it to the campus, I took a park on the street that was still within walking distance of the OneStop. The textbooks were already in my bookbag, so it was just a matter of carrying them in the bookstore and showing them my rental voucher.

Everything I’ve saved in unused textbook rentals, I could probably take to the dealership and put a nice down-payment on a new Mitsubishi Mirage sedan or some other Asian import, but that wouldn’t take care of the parking pass. The Yugo it is, then.

“Rhys Morgan Tauben?” the cashier said as I put my books and voucher on the counter.

“That’s me.”

“What do you do with these books when you rent them?” she asked me.

“They stay in my bag next to my bookcase,” I said, “Why?”

“The only books you’ve used were your Music Theory book and a math textbook. Everything else, you’ve used your voucher on, even the Russian and Serbian textbooks!”

“What can I say?” I said, “I’m a smart cookie who knows Serbian and Russian.”

The cashier shook her head before processing the voucher, “How would you like the refund?”

“Same as always,” I said with a shrug, “Mail a check to my house.”

“Alright.”

 ~~~~~

For this preview, I decided to change the narrator and give you guys a hint of Chapter 6, which is a flashback from Rhys Morgan's point of view. Here, we can see a some similar personality quirks that we can see in Penelope (though Yugoslavian instead of Asian). Rhys Morgan's smoking has its roots in an OLD (emphasis) version of Aleks where he was a vampire and never went anywhere without a mustard glass, silver chain (with the Chrysler Pentastar, of course) and a cigarette.

My, how times change.

Anyway, now for an explanation of my absence last week. Towards the end of June, I had shoulder surgery (three of them, it needed several pins, screws, and a bone graft. Getting better now!) and got the sutures taken out Wednesday. I know I've probably got readers from other countries (this is the World Wide Weberverse, after all!), so I didn't want to just leave everything high-and-dry. Between piecing together the music for Trizonesien-lied (The Song of Trizonesia) and finding (enough of) the sheet music for Хороши весной в саду цветочки [Khroshi vesnoy v sadu tsvetochki] (Beautiful Flowers in the Spring Garden), the week just kinda got away from me. Mix that in with a nasty sinus issue, and it was just a miserable week.

I only found out afterward that green tea can help with that (though to a limited degree).

Anyway, so there's the preview and my ramblings. Depending on how I feel later on in the week, I'll try to post another preview to make up for last week's inactivity! Happy reading!