Far, far away: part 4

Getting the job done

The Triverse is
Mid-Earth, an alternate 1980s London
Max-Earth, a vision of the 26th century
Palinor, where magic is real

Previously: Former Met detective Yannick Clarke is now a private investigator, investigating a young koth who has gone missing on Ceres. His efforts have led him to a construction guild, responsible for expanding the Ceres colony…

Lower Merkado, Ceres.
2550.

For a rock floating in space, many millions of miles from anywhere useful, Ceres did well when it came to food. Especially ten levels down, far from the more sanitised tourist and stop-off hotels that surrounded the space dock. Burrow deep enough and nobody was paying attention to the rules and regs, Clarke had noticed, one consequence being that you could buy anything you wanted — as long as it could be made there or shipped in.

It would be quite the playground for someone like Holland, but Clarke wasn’t interested in most of what lower Ceres had to offer. Except for the food: he’d made a point of trying something different to eat each day he’d been there. There was a time when all he ate were pies, fish and chips on a Friday and maybe a roast if he was feeling flush. Deviating from that set menu had seemed unpatriotic to him, once, long ago.

He looked down at this bowl, which was filled with what might have been a sandwich in a past life and was now swimming in a rich sauce. “So, what is this?” He poked at it with a fork, not sure where to begin.

“It’s a ceresinha, my friend,” the chef laughed, throwing a towel over his shoulder and moving on to the next order.

“You had it at the top of the menu in an important looking box,” Clarke said. “Doesn’t mean I know what it is.”

“Local speciality,” said the man, checking his orders on a screen. “Bastardisation of a francesinha from old Portugal. Some of the earliest settlers on Ceres were from western Europe and they brought the recipe. Most of the ingredients were hard to come by, so they improvised. And that’s how we got the unique Ceres version.”

“If I have a heart attack, I’m blaming you.”

“Die happy, though, right?”

The chef wasn’t wrong. Clarke tucked in, his mind on the case, considering his next move. He’d been given a lead, of sorts: the Ceres Expansion Guild. He’d looked them up, finding an organisation going back at least a century. A loose, semi-official union that had been formed by the employees of multiple construction corporations operating on Ceres. The CEG held considerable sway on the asteroid. If someone wanted to dig a new tunnel on Ceres, expand a level or go even deeper, they had to get the CEG’s approval. In recent decades the guild had welcomed increasing numbers of koth, with the demands of Ceres being particularly suited to their physiology. Clarke didn’t know what to look for, but a lead was a lead.

The chef whistled, catching Clarke’s attention. He was looking at the larger screen above the bar, which had been showing music visualisers but had now auto-switched over to a news report. Clarke couldn’t hear what was being said, but the screen showed what looked like an ocean, and perhaps an oil rig. A burst of orange announced an explosion.

“What’s happening?” he said, mumbling between mouthfuls.

“Ah, sorry,” the chef said, making a couple of gestures to rewind the report. It started playing again, with the volume turned up.

“What you’re seeing here is footage from the early hours of this morning. It has not yet been verified. The video was recorded covertly on Mid-Earth at the site of the Atlantic portal research station. Our reporters in Addis Ababa received the footage an hour ago and forwarded it through the portal. We’re still analysing it to verify its authenticity, but it does appear to show the Atlantic station under attack. Experts have noted that while the clip is dark and low resolution, it does indicate that the attack may have originated on the Palinese side of the portal. If so, this would mark a significant escalation of the troubles on Palinor, and the first time we’ve seen spillover into Mid-Earth.”

“Rebels getting uppity,” the chef said, whistling again. “That’s some serious shit, taking on the big boys.”

“London’s not going to like that,” Clarke said, nodding. “They’ll have warships there before you know it.”

The chef attended to his pans while he talked. “Triverse war. That’s the last thing we want.” He flipped a pancake over. “Then again, with London still on lockdown, this would give all the rest of us another way into Palinor.”

Clarke spent most of his days trying not to think about Palinor. They’d heard after six months-or-so of hiding out on Max-Earth that Bakker had ‘retired’ and moved up north. How much of that was true was hard to tell. But it was something. Of Lola Styles, not a peep. Nothing. London was cut off to them, no word in or out, nothing came through the portals without the Kingdom’s approval. The only other way to Palinor was through the Atlantic portal, which was also under the Kingdom’s control. The three universes had never felt far apart, because all it took was stepping through a doorway — until someone had shut and locked the doors.

He’d assumed the worst. It was almost easier to do that than maintain hope. When they’d been arrested, they’d had Justin show up in the nick of time and mount a rescue. Lola hadn’t had that luxury. A year into their exile on Max-Earth, the multi-pronged civil war had broken out across Palinor, with city states fighting each other and the rebels stirring the pot.

There was a time when he’d been pleased for her, getting that liaison job. Sad to see her go, but it had been the right move for Lola. In the end, all of it was just stepping stones, continuing down the path towards disaster. Just like when he and Callihan had taken the call, and decided to attend, and Callihan had been first through the door.

Life was a series of dumb decisions, each time getting closer to the final one that killed you.

There didn’t seem to be a permanent office for the Ceres Expansion Guild. Instead, it moved around, appearing at whatever construction site needed its presence. Which in this instance meant a small shack at the far end of the tenth level, where the inhabited zone ended, with its metal and plastic and structural supports and conveniences, and the raw innards of Ceres began. It was warmer, the air still and stifling.

Barely more than a shed with power, the office was next to a makeshift barricade blocking the way into the fresh tunnels. Clarke approached and discovered a koth sat inside, watching a screen and whistling to themselves. The side door was open, so Clarke walked right up and knocked on the outer wall.

“Hi,” said Clarke, grimacing momentarily at the koth’s immense bulk. Their face was marked with scars, which had the appearance of being ceremonial.

“Who are you?”

“Heard you employ a lot of koth down here.”

“We do. So what?”

“So nothing.” He pulled the photo from his jacket. “But given your track record of being an excellent employer, I thought you might recognise someone that I’m looking for.” He held out the image. “Ring any bells?”

The koth paused, for just a little too long. “Who is it?”

“Young traveller named Pa’kan. I’ve been hired to find him.”

“They in trouble?”

Clarke leaned on the door frame. “I hope not. That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

“You a cop? Immigration?”

“No. Private investigator. I’ve been hired by their parents. They’re worried.”

The koth took the photo, examined it more closely, then handed it back. “Don’t know them. Please go, I’m very busy.”

Clarke peeked into the office, where the screen was showing a game of some sort. “You do look very busy. One more question. What’s being worked on here?”

“New expansion. Extension to level ten, for new hydroponics.”

“And is it all koth working on it?”

“Mostly koth. We’re good at it.”

“No humans? No aen’fa? Robots?”

The koth laughed. “You know nothing. Aen’fa are weak. Humans are lazy.” They rubbed their thumb and forefinger together, the claws scraping. “Robots don’t have the finesse.”

“Must be hard,” Clarke said. “What kind of workforce you got here? Fifty? One hundred?”

Another uproarious laugh. “We’re the koth CEG, Earth man.”

Clarke nodded. “So, what? Two hundred?”

“No! Thirty, that’s all we need. Koth get the job done.”

Exhaling, Clarke took a step back. He made a show of looking past the barricade and down the tunnel. “Impressive.” He held up the photo. “Listen, you see this kid, you let me know? If he asks around about work.”

The koth shrugged noncommittally. “Maybe. Send me your contact.”

Now for the real test. The one Clarke always dreaded. He tapped the device on his wrist and flicked his finger in the direction of the koth. Nothing happened. He held his finger down on the screen and spoke loudly, ordering the device to transfer his details.

“Show me,” the koth said, gesturing. Clarke held out his arm. The koth did something and a second later it was done. “Took me a while to get the hang of it, too.”

“Thanks.”

The koth laughed. “Us foreigners gotta stick together.”

As he walked away, Clarke made a point of not looking back. A team of thirty working on the tunnels. Even if that had been an exaggerated boast, it gave him something to work with.

Next thing he needed was a café with good line of sight on all the entrances and exits to the work site. It had been a while since he’d done a stakeout.

He was looking forward to resting his feet.

Photo by Silvia Brazzoduro on Unsplash

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Thanks for reading.

I’m trying to get back into drawing. It’s not easy to carve out the time, but I’m determined to give it a go. Hence:

Bonus points if you know what/who it is.

Really enjoyed this interview with

Eleanor Anstruther

this week:

Why I Swapped Mainstream Publishing for Indie Publishing

In particular this bit:

The publishing industry is way behind the curve of every other creative sphere when it comes to valuing independent artists. The word indie is revered in music, food, beauty, hotels, festivals; you name it. Stick the word independent on the front, you can charge double and everyone thinks it’s cool. 

But publishing? It works for indie bookstores, it even works for indie publishers, but for indie authors, which is exactly what a self-published author is, forget it.

I’ve always been a little suspicious when people take sides on this, in either direction. The traditionalists denigrate the indies, as Eleanor points out. On the opposite end you get a subset of self-publishers who very clearly have a chip on their shoulder, a grudge to bear, feel personally wronged and will do everything in their power to rage against the system.

Eleanor has the benefit of having directly experienced multiple routes to publication, giving her a really valuable perspective on the whole thing, bridging the gap.

My general position is that writers have never had it so good, given that there are so many ways to get our work in front of audiences. Doesn’t mean it’s easy, of course.

Meanwhile, comics creator Kieron Gillen, whose brain I want to steal and somehow absorb into my own, is doing the rounds promoting his upcoming comic The Power Fantasy. I can’t wait. That also means there are some excellent new podcasts in which he talks about storytelling that are absolutely worth your time. Here’s one:

Every week I seem to have a link about AI, which is extremely tedious, but doesn’t seem like it’s going to be any less relevant. It continues to be a complex and thorny thing. This article in PC Gamer (for some reason) about Dark Horse Comics caught my eye today.

Here’s a quote from Dark Horse’s statement:

Dark Horse does not support the use of AI-generated material in the works that we publish. Our contracts include language stating that the creator agrees that the work will not consist of any material generated by computer Artificial Intelligence programs. Dark Horse is committed to supporting human creative professionals with our business.

What is most interesting about this is the emerging bifurcation of the creative world, for both creators and consumers. There’s a strand which finds AI generation fascinating and goes all-in. There’s another strand which declares it will absolutely not use AI, ever.

I’m inclined heavily towards the latter, but the split itself is the most interesting aspect of all. We could end up with two entirely separate pathways, with creators and consumers declaring allegiance one way or another.

That’s the scenario that the tech giants currently pushing the technology have fostered. They revel in drama and disruption, and everything they do is intentionally divisive.

It’s a shame, because there is an alternate universe in which this technology was developed in cooperation with people, consensually, and developed in a slower, more ethical way. Where the emphasis would have been on tools, and using them as and when it makes sense.

I suspect we’ll get there eventually, but we’re going to have to first survive this ridiculous hype-cycle, because the priority has not been artists or creation, but shareholders.

The debate continues.

Right, let’s get into the behind-the-scenes chapter notes.

Author notes

‘Far, far away’ is definitely more of a slow burn story. It’s also very focused on Clarke, in a way we haven’t really had before. Previous storylines that were Clarke-centric would still have had his partner involved, whether that be Styles or Holland.

There’s intended to be a lingering sense of dislocation with ‘Far, far away’. A feeling that something’s not quite right, and that absence of ‘a partner’ is part of it. Clarke has been heavily influenced by his partners all the way along, including Callihan who was only around for two chapters, and suddenly we find him out on his own. It feels weird for him, and it feels weird for us as readers.

It also builds in a strong desire to get back to what we had. The questions pile up: what has happened to Lola Styles? Where are the other SDC crew exiled to Max-Earth? When/if are they going to get back together? Where’s Justin? Or, to sum all of that up: what the hell happens now?

Being in that position in a story is really exciting, but it’s also unsustainable. At some point all the eventualities have to collapse into actual decisions. That’s where I always struggled with the nihilism of The Walking Dead (comic) and Game of Thrones (TV): the unrelenting awfulness and discomfort might be appropriate to the story, but at a certain point I just want to step away.

Point is, this is all going somewhere.

Some other bits: Clarke is a very traditional person. He’s an old school Englishman, set in his ways, who has been forced to reconsider just about everything. In his younger years you can bet he would have harassed non-human citizens in London. Probably any non-white people, too. That’s the Met police in the 60s and 70s (and, er, more recently, too).

And now Clarke finds himself in a foreign land, having become the migrant. He’s the one who ‘does not belong’. Everything Clarke has experienced since the start of the main Triverse story has forced him to look at everything anew. Unlike Holland, he’s also open to those new thoughts — much to his own surprise. From Callihan and Styles he’s gained the ability to be reflective, and to doubt himself, and question himself, rather than be blindly, ideologically committed to a singular world view.

They say you become increasingly entrenched in your own opinions the older you get. Clarke was designed specifically to counter that, which feels like a cheap get-out clause (regardless of whether it’s true or not). The whole point of Clarke is that here we have an old school, grumpy, set-in-his-ways, prejudiced copper who somehow finds a way to reconfigure his life towards something different.

That’s why, even with everything having gone wrong, even with him flailing in his life, there’s still hope, and optimism.

Finally, I just wanted to acknowledge the moment when Clarke utterly fails to operate his wrist device properly. What was a confrontational and slightly uncomfortable exchange between him and the koth foreman turns into something far more amicable and cooperative, simply because Clarke is terrible at using technology. It’s a little moment of normalcy inside of all the scifi trappings, and a reminder of how we can bond over really silly, unimportant things, even when the big things are feeling insurmountable.

See you next week.