Vagabonds: A practice in Frustration.

So I figured I’d start this off with a failed project that had me tackling several things I wanted to try. 

Vagabonds, which was a working title because I couldn’t think of anything better. The idea stemmed from a dumb thought in D&D (a lot of my creative ideas stem from that game) about how a half-orc and half-elf can be from the same mother. So what if two siblings were like that? The more I thought about it, the more I thought about a setting to explore.

I decided on space travel. Primarily because there were things in science fiction space stories I never saw get addressed (but I didn’t delve much beyond shit like, Star Wars (which isn’t really science fiction) and Star Trek (basic episodes, never binged)). Things like how to tell time between rotating planets, time dilation, how one cooks in space when oxygen is flammable, and other stuff.

It got me world building, something that I tend to avoid purposefully unless I’m doing it as I write. I’ll talk about that more in future segments, but right now I wanna talk about the character that introduces the reader to this world: Thax.

Thax is basically taking my frustration at mundane issues, but is an actual adult when dealing with them. He (unlike me) is the responsible older brother (well, he’s the younger brother) who runs the ship in everything that doesn’t require technical know-how. Cooking, cleaning, paperwork, Thax does this all with gusto. But it wears on him. It’s tough being the voice of reason in a group where no one seemingly listens.

My writing group at the time asked me why I didn’t just make him captain. I personally didn’t think there would be much tension between him and his brother if he was the captain, so that’s why I avoided it. It just felt more interesting for him to be the second in command, bearing the responsibility while his brother acts as the face. This backfires often though, with how his brother ends up taking jobs/causing messes that he finds himself needing to fix over and over.

Before I wrap up (because I’m taking too long) I want to talk about Tolk. Tolk isn’t the first time I’ve written an AI in my stories, but it’s probably my most consistent. I tried capturing the essence of this program that runs, well, like a computer. It doesn’t have the concept of caring, only falling orders set about it. Thax acts like he hates it, but he’s reliant on Tolk doing its job to get him up in the morning. And I found the gear shifting bed thing to be, well, funny.

We’ll explore Captain Gel in the next chapter. And no, his name isn’t pronounced like hairgel.