In the mean time, I picked up a story idea that’s been floating around in my head for a year or so that I couldn’t quite get moving. I’ve also been re-reading through some of Steve Windsor’s Nine Day Novel books and trying to actually plan the story out this time, assuming the characters and settings will cooperate with me.

This story will also diverge from my normal technique in that I’m taking a deeper look at Scrivener through their 30 day trial version. At least, I’m diving in with it for the planning and rough draft phases of the project to see what it can do. To be fair, Scrivener feels like an IDE for writers and I have a distinct aversion to most IDEs and IDE like things when writing software. There are a couple of exceptions, but those exceptions usually deal with languages that are so cumbersome to work in without an IDE that you’d be nuts to use them otherwise. Plus Scrivener isn’t exactly cheap as far as software goes. Of course, it isn’t overly expensive either.

In any event, this little bit of prose is something I came up with as a prolog for the new story. I hope you like it:

The Scorpion and The Mouse

Chris S.

Once upon a time there was a young scorpion who was hungry and looking about for something to eat. The young scorpion spotted a mouse watching from the shadows and decided that mouse seemed a tasty morsel for one such as itself, a mighty hunter with a sting beyond comparison.

The scorpion looked at the mouse and said, “I see you hiding there in the shadows. Come out where I can see you plainly.”

Now the mouse was an old and wise mouse who had experienced many things in his days and knew the ways of other creatures. He knew of their nature and proclivities even better than many of them knew themselves.

“You are a scorpion, a very young scorpion at that,” said the mouse, “and I am an aging and feeble mouse. The years ride heavy upon my greying whiskers. What business do you have with one, such as I, who is not of your kind.”

“Oh wise one,” answered the scorpion. “I seek the wisdom of your age for, as you have rightly seen, I am but a young scorpion with little experience of the world. Please, come out of the shadows and share your wisdom with one such as I.”

“Do not be hasty young one. Why seek my wisdom?” asked the mouse. “Are there not others of your kind about?”

“Oh wise one,” replied the scorpion. “There are none such as yourself among my kind and even among us the news of your great wisdom has spread such that our elders wish to seek you out, though none have been so lucky as to find you.”

“Indeed, your elders are wise to seek one such as I,” said the mouse, though he did not move.

“Yes,” said the scorpion. “Are you sure you won’t come out into the light? The sun is warm and must surely feel good on your fur.”

“Perhaps I shall at that,” said the mouse. “It is not wise to stay always in the shadows lest the darkness consume you. But, you are a scorpion, are you not? In all my years, I have never known a scorpion that would not sting one such as I.”

“You are truly a creature full of wisdom,” said the scorpion. “Were it not I who had sought you, I or any other of my kind, would surly sting and you would die. But it was I who sought you out, oh wise one, to hear your wisdom. Please, come out of the dark and enjoy the light that you might better share that which I seek.”

The mouse smiled at the scorpion’s words for he knew that this was surly a young and inexperienced scorpion.

“Child, I will share my wisdom, if that is truly what you seek,” said the mouse. “But I must warn you that my lessons are harsh ones and not lightly sought. You are but a young scorpion, is it wise for one such as you to seek after the wisdom of one such as I?”

“Oh wise one,” said the scorpion. “Is it not wise to seek wisdom in any form wherever it may be found?”

The mouse smiled again and stepped forward into the light only to feel the scorpion’s sting pierce his back. The mouse only smiled, for he knew what the scorpion sought before they first spoke. In a flash, he turned and bit the scorpion’s tail.

“But how?” asked the scorpion. “My sting is like none other! No creatures have withstood it before!”

“Foolish child,” said the mouse while devouring the scorpion. “We mice feel not the sting of our prey.”

“Don’t worry your little head none about that. I’m not supposed to kill you unless you’re difficult,” said the little man. “He gave me a note to read to you. It says: Next time it will be you. What’s that supposed to mean? Next time it will …”

Something gurgled and collapsed with a heavy thud. I looked over my shoulder and saw my assailant on the ground, surrounded by dried blood. A zip-tie, pulled tight enough to have embedded itself into the man’s wrist, bound his hands in the small of his back. Next to the body was a pile of neatly folded skin and two skewered eyeballs sitting on a small ceramic dish pointed directly at me. The eyes had been placed so that they appeared to be looking into my own.

There was no need to check his pulse; the man had been dead for a long time, several hours if the Sun’s elevation could be trusted. The massive gap in my memory ached like a missing limb. How do you deal with someone who can immobilize you without warning, I thought to myself.

The plan is still to release this in an episodic form, with periodic role ups of several episodes.  The main reason I haven’t pushed out some of the earlier episodes (read that as 2) is that I’m having trouble finishing them up in a timely manner.  Once I can nail that down, and build up enough of a release backlog to have a spare episode or two waiting in the wings, The Erasable Man will hit the figurative presses.

Anyone have suggestions on a viable platform to publish episodic fiction?

Both of these texts have been part of the KDP Select program for the past ninety days and their enrollment is just about to run out. That means it’s use it or lose it time for their remaining “promotion days” and another give away for you!

If you do pick TWIN or ATC up, I’d really like to hear what you though of them. Be sure to drop a comment here, review over on Amazon, or get in touch with me via Good Reads.

This is the second time I’ve gone through one of these and I have to say that the four thousand word limit is a killer! It really forces you to cut down things that aren’t core to a story. If you haven’t been by the site before, give a whirl. You can find my entry at:

http://www.amazon.com/A-Thousand-Cuts-ebook/dp/B00ARIC1GQ

Cover for “A Thousand Cuts”

It should be ready to push out to Amazon here in the next couple of days, Until then, here’s a little taste from the beginning:

A Thousand Cuts – Excerpt

We were a happy couple, Catharine and I, moving from an apartment of little more than two rooms, into our very first real home. It wasn’t much to look at, but it was ours and that was all that really mattered. Catharine’s parents had known the old widower who lived next door for years and were good friends with his two daughters. When he passed, Mr. Gallinulae willed the property to his children. Neither of the women could use the place, and Catharine’s parents knew we were looking for something larger now that we had Julia. They helped us negotiate with the Gallinulae women, now Mrs. Nosopsyllus and Mrs. Pulex, to buy the place.

In the new house, Julia would get a room all to herself. Her crib had occupied the corner of our bedroom for just over year and a half. Now she was going to be sleeping in a “big girl bed” in her own room. She was so happy with her newfound independence, and Catharine and I were looking forward to a little more privacy.

Samson, our big orange cat, was as ornery as ever. His royal highness could not stand the indignity of being stuffed into a carrier. He scratched me good across the bridge of my nose, along my right arm, and just about anywhere else he could bring a claw to bear when I forced him into the cage. I’m sure that obstinate feline damaged the hearing in my right ear with his yowls. If the trip to the new house had been any longer than the five minutes it took to cross town that wild beast would have clawed his way through the carrier’s thin plastic.

I wonder if that was what started it? Did they smell the fresh blood from my injuries? Did the prospect of fresh food wake them from their slumber?

UPDATE:

A Thousand Cuts is in the process of being published on Amazon and should be live in the next 12~24 hours or so. I’ve already got the link setup to the right. Yay!

This story will likely turn into my next little side project. I wrote that story a long time ago and it will need a complete rewrite to turn it into something worth reading. The file in question was about 890 words long and missing a good chunk of the needed framing for the story. If all goes well, I should be looking for some beta readers in a few weeks or so. Wish me luck!