Skeletons of the Future

[Yanks13]

Just thought it was time for me to try out an interactive-type setting for one of my stories. I'll put a link to this topic at the end of my chapters and see if we can't get any good discussions going, or if any of you have any questions for me. 

 

So... without further ado, here's the link to my story. Chapter 1 is up and I'll be posting Chapter 2 as soon as I can .

 

Skeletons of the Future

 

 

[LJH]

I love the compassion between Jesse and Trav. Also the fact that you use dialogue to show other characters. You place the characters in a world you have created from scratch and i admire that. So i could not find much fault with the 1st Ch. I was able to be there with them, thanks for showing instead of telling. Vivid images of the station. The thievery also hooked me, humour and suspense: he's gonna get caught i kept on saying to myself. In his situation i would also steal. In places i could feel the emotion building up inside. In places i smiledlike the Mona Lisa. Touching and exciting story. Love it so far.

[Yanks13]

Thanks LJH for the kind words! I hope the rest of the story lives up to those words .

[Yettie One]

Hiya Yanks

 

Ok I trooped along to have a gander at the story on the recommendation of Louis, and was really glad I did. Louis has an uncanny ability to spot something special, so I'm looking forward to seeing where this goes, as I said in my review.

 

However, the fussy me has a few questions to ask.

The station has a population of 3000? Just an observation, but for the level of sophistication and organisation, 3000 just seemed a little small. 

Now I could well be jumping the gun here, based on the fact that maybe the outpost was designed for a bigger population at an earlier time, and this is all that is left of the community, or it may well be that it is an outpost that is seasonal maybe. This is something we don't know as yet. 

 

You also mention that security had been finding their hiding places fairly regularly, yet they were able to move in a ventilation system fairly easily without being seen or worrying about being found. It did make me wonder why they had not retreated to hide there?

Sorry I am just fussy about detail, and so tend to ask lots of random questions, that probably don't make much differences, they are just points that occur to me as I read along.

 

But Louis is right. I salute you for creating a world from scratch for your characters, and losing us so easily in that world. And I really do enjoy the playful nature of the boys that you work into the text. The desperation to get to the stew,  the glee at bouncing on a bed for the first time in a long time. These are things that work so well for the characters, and give life and colour to the characters. 

Love it.

[Yanks13]

Yettie, you're right in the fact that in my mind the station's max capacity is far larger than how many actually live on board. But of course I won't say why that is as I believe I cover that in a future chapter

 

And as for security always finding them, some of their hiding places were out in the open (which happens in that nebulous "time before the story" space heh). As to why they just don't live in the vents, well who would want to live in such a cramped space if they didn't have to? I certainly wouldn't lol. And sometimes I get a bit claustrophobic so that'd be a big no-no for me .

 

I had fun writing this first chapter, not going to lie heh. I never had to experience any of this type of hardship but this is how I imagine it could be like given their circumstances. And most of my stories before this had brothers who were so loyal to one another I thought it was a nice change to make them slightly antagonistic towards one another and create a bit of tension on occasion between the two. I certainly didn't have a great relationship with my sister as we grew up heh.

 

Thanks for all the comments and reviews so far!

[Yanks13]

Just posting here to say that I added Chapter 2 to the story. Hope you all like it!

[LJH]

I would imagine there are many other outposts similar to this one. Probably in the same zone or farther afield. And surely the guards know that the ventilation system is a hiding place. It seems to me that the outpost may have been the scene of a mutiny some time back but thats only speculation.

 

[Yanks13]

Just wanted to say that Chapter 3 is up and ready for your reading pleasure!

[Yanks13]

Chapter 4 is now up! Go read!

[Yanks13]

Chapter 5 is up. How the collars came to be on the station gets covered. It's starting to get interesting!

[Yanks13]

Sorry about that but life got a bit in the way for me posting Chapter 7, or for forgetting to mention I posted Chapter 6 here! . I hope 7 will be a good read! But 7 is up so go read!

Edited June 21, 2013 by Yanks13

[Yanks13]

Chapter 8 is up. Hope it's a good one for you all!

[Kitt]

So- why the change in the collars? And what was Kevin promised that would make him give up  his ideals and the guy he claims to love?  What went so wrong with him and Travis ?  Can Julian free the other kids the way he freed Jessie?  

 

And how in the name of space travel does a gay male robot become pregnant????????

 

LOL I know, I know, keep reading and i might find out. 

 

Seriously, creating an entire world is a lot harder than one might think. I know - the author I am currently working with is in the process of doing just that. She gets frustrated with me coming up with the million questions and then realizing if i am asking so would every reader. Kudos to you for doing it so well, even if I am asking the questions again.

[Yanks13]

Thanks for the questions Kitt! Let's see if I can answer those questions for you (and anyone else that might have them heh)

 

Collar change - I don't think I actually said anything about this in the story but the reason I put that change in was so that it was harder for the kid(s) to be saved from them without risking bodily harm to them. There was a reason the collars were used that I haven't touched on yet but will... hopefully soon

 

Kevin - With him "defecting" and all, it was actually a sudden change for him. You see him through the story just doing his thing, mostly the right thing, and eventually pressures got to him and he basically lost all of his moral compass since he saw an easier life, a way out of being in charge. He never really wanted to be in charge of his little orphanage but he took over when no one else will. And since he did that at such a young age, the lack of a real childhood caught up to him in a way. 

 

Kevin + Zane - In regards to this, it goes back to Kevin just snapping a bit. It also didn't really help matters when Zane, being more rebellious and more arrogant than everyone else there kept rubbing Kevin a bit raw. Sure they loved each other but as the story progressed Zane's personality ended up being more of a negative in Kev's eyes.

 

Kevin + Travis - To be honest, I don't have much to say on this point other than to me it made a bit of sense to give those two some history before the story even got underway. It helps to give Kevin reasons for wanting to help Travis and Jesse, even with their sometimes limited resources. This point is something I do want to expound upon eventually.

 

Freeing the collard kids - Once Julian figured out how to free Jesse, he's able to fix it so that he can help the rest. It took some time for him to do as, even being a kid, it was hard for him to explain the procedure to others - he more or less got lucky with Jesse and managed to get lucky a second time. Once he got a few collars under his belt he was better able to explain what he was doing and it helped to speed up the process.

 

Riley getting pregnant - This actually stemmed from an earlier idea I had about Riley. First he started off as just a robot but then I evolved him and, when going into his creation a bit, got the idea that when he was being built he was both male and female for a good length of time, only getting a final gender right before completion. So in that regard Riley has all the stuff a female has internally and was fully functional. And then that's when it hit me - why not make him still be able to give birth? The moment I thought it I got excited and helped me to churn out some more writing - I was having a bit of writer's block at that moment in the story (ick!).

 

The reason I went ahead and said all this is because I feel what I did say was either already covered or (in a lovely error on my part) thought I wrote it in when I actually didn't (!). If it's the latter ,don't worry! I'll get it taken care of... somehow heh.

 

Glad you liked the story and once again good to hear from you and also to all the ones that have left reviews on the story! It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside reading all that stuff.