Sak · Maps
"The Map is not the territory.""The Word is not the Thing."
- Alfred Korzybski, General Semantics
About
Subscribe
Atom
RSS 2.0
Recent Articles
- Go With It
- Linux Identity: Base in OpenOffice.org 3.2
- Tip Jar
- Sak's Red Beans and Rice Mess
- Seattle Seasons
- Sak's Spicy Stir-fry
- Little Creatures
- The News, Spam, and Beer
- SF Hypocrite
- My Top 10
- Teriyaki Salmon Fillet
- Distracting Abstractions
- Bookliving
- Secrets
- Sak's Chunky Uhsghetti
- On Reading: Choosing Battles
- 030909
- Escape 01: Compiled
- Escape 01:11 Discovery
- Escape 01:10 Nightfall:Entrant
Archive
Links
Hosted by
Powered by
Tip Jar
03.08.10 13:06Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - Sak, Vignette
“Hi. What can I get for you?” She said.
“Oh, you already have,” he said.
Little Creatures
01.26.10 21:20Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Essays
Imagine that all throughout your life there are tiny, invisible creatures that hover about you. Well, they’re not entirely invisible; you can see them if you want to.
Bookliving
11.17.09 16:43Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - Sak, Reviews
I have to be honest: up until a couple weeks ago, I’d never heard of Jeff Vandermeer. Now, however, I’m glad to have. It’s surprising, too, given that Jeff is a science-fiction author, and I have something of an interest in that genre. While I’m not sure how much I’d get into a cop story in a land of mushroom people, after having experienced his other latest work, Booklife, I’m keen to give Finch a try now too.
Escape 01: Compiled
02.28.09 13:44Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
The entire first series of Escape is now available as a single download for those interested in reading it from beginning to end. I have no plans yet to produce a second series, though I think I might. Thanks to everyone for their comments and interest on this little project.
Escape 01:11 Discovery
02.15.09 19:10Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
Samara walked through the large, empty house for several minutes before she found Robert sitting on the edge of a king-sized bed in the master bedroom. He was slumped over, his elbows on his knees, with his head down. She walked in and crossed the room, standing by a massive picture-window that looked out onto the lake. “You okay?” she said.
Escape 01:10 Nightfall:Entrant
02.08.09 18:52Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
Reaching up and grabbing a small, green rope I tugged down the garage door as I listened to a series of pops and whispered gargling noises coming from the raiment behind me. Three or four of those enormous bugs that I had seen in the apartment flew in under the door as I brought it down. They circled around the garage, then landed on the shoulders of the raiment, folded themselves up into smaller units, and disappeared in to little compartments. After another pop, the chest plating on the raiment lifted up, opening from somewhere near the crotch, and stopped at about a hundred and ten degrees when the tip of the crotch hit the ceiling of the garage. The entire front of the raiment then fell forward, revealing the top of Samara’s head, her shoulders and back, and a cable that trailed out from her upper back into the back of the raiment. She straddled the raiment, as though she were on horseback and hugging the neck, though her arms were actually tucked down inside the little arms that had fallen forward with the front of the raiment. She lifted herself out of those arms and sitting up against the back of the raiment, still straddling it, her thighs disappearing into the legs of the raiment, she reached back and unplugged the cable from her upper back. She then grabbed two handles near her hips, tapped some buttons, and another popping noise followed. The legs of the raiment expanded outward at the thigh and calf plating, and she lifted her self out of the machine and stepped onto the floor of the garage.
Escape 01:09 Nightfall:Host
02.01.09 15:21Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
Samara had been crouched in the bushes for nearly twenty minutes. For the first half she struggled with relaxing, trying to keep from tensing while waiting for the moment to sprint across the meadow and snatch the resupply unit. It was like waiting to do a hundred yard dash on the starting blocks while the official went out for a beer; any second the shot could go off, and she’d need to be at peak performance. During the last half of the wait, she began counting the soldiers, memorizing their locations. Practicing, in her mind, squeezing the trigger in bursts, repeating to herself: “Right one, right two, center three, left four.”
Then it began.
Escape 01:08 Trust:Entrant
01.25.09 18:52Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
We had spent such a good portion of the day getting across town that by the time we had found the resupply unit it was already approaching early evening. The sun had moved over toward Magnolia, and would melt into the Olympic mountain range within a couple hours. My mind wandered off into those mountains as I thought of my librarian friend, and her hiking and snow-shoeing adventures. I hadn’t expected it to take us so long, but then I realized that we had been winding around considerably, dodging other people, taking side tracks through alleys and between houses to remain under some semblance of cover. I even felt a little guilty as we looked out across the meadow toward the resupply unit as it was being fished out of the lake by a rather menacing looking tactical raiment; as though it were somewhat my fault for not getting to it first. Damn my meandering ways; mind, body, and apparently now even my very soul. We now faced a bit of a challenge since that supply unit contained food, water, and other necessities that we would need in order to make it to the eastern foothills. After a brief assessment of the situation I had come up with a knee-jerk plan, though, and my gut told me it would work.
[1] CommentsEscape 01:07 Trust:Host
01.18.09 12:28Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
Samara stood silently, watching Robert as he lay sprawled out in the grass breathing heavily. She leaned back into the raiment’s resting position. Every detail became strange viewed through the raiment’s optics, as though watching some sort of living film, where moments pass by in frames that can be viewed over and over again, set apart, studied. She zoomed in on Robert’s face, watching as his jaw flared from the grinding of his teeth, and closer still to notice the wetness forming around his eyes, a small droplet sliding down his temple to merge and disappear into sweat. Samara closed her eyes for a minute, resting, and whispered to herself, “He doesn’t know.”
[2] CommentsEscape 01:06 Reveal:Entrant
01.11.09 14:14Section: Maps
Filed Under: Copyright - CC, Series
I could tell that I had started to annoy her, but I couldn’t get over the emotional pitches that I’d recently been enduring. And the raiment blew my mind. I circled it several times after she had turned off its camouflage, just studying it. At first I kept asking where it was being controlled from, as though it were a remote vehicle. She assured me that she was inside, but that it wasn’t really prudent for her to dismount at this particular time. Standing at about eight or nine feet, the suit had much of the same form as a biped, except without a head. Instead, an arch that spanned from shoulder to shoulder secured a sphere that spun around, and seemed to contain several lenses. The suit’s right arm seemed like any robotic arm with a hand for grasping and manipulating things. The left arm, however, turned into a slightly bulky cylinder from the elbow joint forward. There were also two small appendages sticking out of the chest of the thing that ended in little spheres. The large, proportionate arms mirrored the actions of the these little arms.
[1] Comments