“Swimming, Writing and Being Physically Fit”

Recently a friend of mine pointed out there were some similarities between swimming and writing.  After I finished blinking my eyes, I asked him to explain.

“Think of it like this,” he went on.  “What does it take to make a good swimmer?”

I ticked off a few traits: stamina, upper body strength, sense of rhythm, coordination and timing.

“Okay, let’s compare this with what it takes to make a good writer.  Take stamina, for example.  Anybody who’s ever written a book or a novel knows a thing or two about stamina.  It often takes months, sometimes years, to do that.  Somehow, a writer has to be able to sustain an imaginative effort over that period of time.  How do they do that?”

“They’re obsessed with the story and the characters, “I replied.  “Maybe it’s like doing a triathlon.  You do it to see if you can do it.”

Then my friend mentioned strength, specifically upper body strength.  “Swimmers have powerful upper bodies, especially in their shoulders.  Swimming is mostly upper body work anyway. Writers need their own kind of strength, you see.  Unless you dictate your words, you use your hands and fingers like all the time.  Flexibility and durability are critical.  Plus you’re hunched over a computer or a desk all day…what if you didn’t have upper body strength and flexibility?  You’d be like an old man, forever hunched over and bent down.  Don’t underestimate the importance of good posture, even while you’re typing.”

“Okay, I can buy that.  That’s two areas of similarity.  What about a sense of rhythm?  When I swim, I can tire myself out really quickly if I’m fighting myself for strokes.  But when I get into a smooth rhythm, it’s like heaven.  It’s like I’m a fish.  The water just glides over and around me.”

“Exactly,” my friend said.  “Think of when you’re writing and the words just come naturally, the precise word exactly when you need it.  That’s a writer’s rhythm.  It comes from preparation, practice, lots of hours just writing and writing and writing.  Plus a lot of reading.  You’ve got to store up a lot of energy to be a good swimmer and release it in just the right way, at the right time.  Same with words, for a writer.  Words are to a writer what muscle energy is to a swimmer.  It’s what makes you go.”

“Then there’s coordination and timing,” I pointed, right on cue.  “Any swimmer will tell you that stroke mechanics, turns, everything comes together better when it’s all in synch.  I couldn’t begin to tell you how often I banged my feet on the wall trying to master flip turns.  That one is for sure all about timing.”

My friend shrugged, smiled with understanding.  “You’re really on top of this, aren’t you?  Same with writers.  Coordination and timing are critical to writing.  When do I introduce this new character?  What’s he supposed to say?  Maybe this is just part of storytelling generally, having a sense of when to tell and when to show, when to narrate and when to dramatize.  It’s all in the wrist, by the way.  A writer has to juggle a lot of balls and make it look effortless, to keep the story flowing and the reader interested.  Drop a few balls, pull back the curtains and reveal a few nuts and bolts and you know what happens to a reader.”

“Vamos,” I reply, displaying my erudite knowledge of Spanish.  “Gosh darn it, you’re  absolutely right.  Swimming and writing do have a lot in common.”

“Body and mind,” my friends said, wisely.  “They both have to work together.  They’re a unified whole.  Get the body working right, with exercise, proper nutrition and sleep, appropriate breaks and you’ve got a well-oiled machine.  You’ll be ready for your Olympic tryout.”

“I’ll settle for telling a good story,” I come back.  “Let’s not get carried away.”

And that’s how I learned an important lesson.  Maybe it’s a bit of a stretch to compare swimming and writing but the underlying message is still important.  You won’t do good work if you feel bad.

Word Shed is taking a one-week hiatus after this post…just a little vacation time. The next post to The Word Shed comes on May 8, 2017.

See you then.

Phil B.

“Alien Languages or What’s Not to Tell?”

Any time a science fiction writer creates an alien world, he has to deal with the idea of an alien language.  Wikipedia calls this ‘xenolinguistics,” truly a field of study without a field.  The Wikipedia article goes on to say:

“A formal description of an alien language in science fiction may have been pioneered by Percy Greg's Martian language (he called it "Martial") in his 1880 novel Across the Zodiac,^[1] although already the 17th century book The Man in the Moone describes the language of the Lunars, consisting "not so much of words and letters as tunes and strange sounds", which is in turn predated by other invented languages in fictional societies, e.g., in Thomas More's Utopia.”

In my own recent works such as The Farpool, I have created a language called Seomish (the planet is called Seome).  Here’s what I said about the language in the Appendix to this story:

“Seomish is designed phonetically to carry well in a water medium. Hard, clicking consonants are common.  The ‘p’ or ‘puh’ sound, made by violent expulsion of air is also common.  Modulation of the voice stream, particularly at high frequencies (sounding much like a human whistle) produces the characteristic “wheeee” sound, which is a root of many words.  Translation from Seomish to human languages like English requires some inspired speculation, since so many Seomish phrases seem to be little more than grunts or groans, modulated in frequency and duration.

“Most Seomish words are grouped according to several characteristics: (1) Who is speaking (the personal);  (2) who is being spoken to (the indicative); (3) state of mind of the speaker (the conditional); (4) the kel-standing of the conversants (the intimant).

“Each classification has a set of characteristic pre-consonants, to indicate the nature of the coming words, etc. Thus:

1. k’, kee, t’
2. tch, g, j, oot
3. m’, p’, puh’ (both anger, dislike, distaste, etc), sh, sz (both joyful)
4. each kel identifies itself with a unique set of capitalized consonants, like a vocal coat of arms.  Example: t’milee, or CHE’oray…Seomish  versus Timily or Chory…English.”
    
   Indeed, I’ve even got a small vocabulary of Seomish words.  One entry is below:
    

VISHTU:             One of the oldest customs of the Seomish, the vishtu or companionship roam, is very much in the traditions of Ke’shoo and typically involves two people although there is no set number.  Roams can last anywhere from a few minutes to a few days, even longer, with the average being a few hours.  Debate and talk is usually discouraged during the roam in order to let the physical beauty of the landscape work its magic.  Often a prelude to some intense, emotionally draining activity, such as sexual intercourse, the fine points and protocol of a roam are learned by Seomish at an early age.

A writer who deals in alien languages has several things to watch out for.  Here are five:

1. The alien language, whether Seomish, Klingon or Tralfamodorean, has to sound alien without being alien.  That is, a truly alien language might be something so bizarre as to defy comprehension.  Think of how bees communicate in the hive, using wiggles and scents.  A truly alien tongue could be so alien no Earthly reader could ever understand it.  So the writer must walk a fine line, between alien ‘sounding’ and actually being truly alien.  Of course, there are a variety of ways to do this
2. One of my favorite techniques is to use the alien word or phrase in a context where its meaning is clear.  Or even better, tell the reader what the word means.  “This device is called the ot’lum, or lifeship.”  Alternatively, use an index somewhere in your book.  In The Farpool, I did both of these.
3. A little goes a long way.  Use alien words sparingly.  Use them enough to give the reader a sense that this truly is an alien world.  Overuse makes it hard for the reader to understand what’s going on or follow the narrative line.  Most of your sentences should be readily understandable English.  Insert an alien word every few sentences or every few paragraphs.  Your reader’s imagination, along with your descriptions, will do the rest.  Sometimes, I have intentionally used awkward sentence constructions to convey alienness as well.  Again, don’t overdo it.
4. Don’t write a treatise on linguistics, unless that’s part of the story.  I developed some guidelines for language and vocabulary for myself, so I would be consistent in how I portrayed the language.  My Seomish characters are intelligent marine creatures; they communicate through grunts, clicks, whistles, squeaks and honks.  I even developed a device called an echopod to have a ready-made translation device available for my human characters.  I evolved the concept into a translator and encyclopedia, so that my human visitors could receive translated words and also more detailed explanations of things if they desired.  The concept worked out pretty well.
5. Don’t be afraid to let the reader do a little work.  In other words, you really don’t have to translate everything.  Leave a little to the reader’s imagination.  Intentionally leave some words or phrases untranslated or explained.  Isn’t that real life?  There are phrases in German and Spanish and many languages that don’t translate well or even at all into English…and vice versa.  I’m pretty sure alien languages will be the same.  As long as you don’t do this a lot, your reader will get the gist of the idea and still be able to follow the story, especially if you set the context and the dialogue the right way…the narrative thread will still be there for the reader to hold on to.
    
   Remember, truly alien languages will likely be so different from our languages that we may never fully understand what they’re saying.  The aliens may not even vocalize their language.  It could be based on scent, touch, dance or some weird combination.  Look around you at our own natural world and see how other creatures communicate.  I can’t imagine alien languages would ever be any less bizarre to us.
   
6. The next post to The Word Shed comes on April 24, 2017.
    
   See you then.
    
   Phil B.
    

 

 

 

“Excerpt from Johnny Winger and the Battle at Caloris Basin”

The final story in my series Tales of the Quantum Corps will be available on April 14, 2017.  This story brings to a close the adventures of Johnny Winger.  I have to admit to having mixed feelings about bringing this series to an end, having spent many years with this character and his comrades on their many missions for Quantum Corps.   But it is time and I want to give all my readers an early taste of what is to come.  So, here goes…

Chapter 2

UNIFORCE Headquarters

The Quartier-General, Paris

March 26, 2155

1845 hours U.T.

General Lamar Quint was right in the middle of composing a report to UNSAC about what Sentinel and Farside had detected out beyond the inner Kuiper belt when the apparition first appeared in his office.  He’d been scanning after-action reports from recent Quantum Corps ops when a faint rustle along the window got his attention.

When he looked up, he saw a faint shimmer in front of the glass.  At first, he thought it was only a reflection of night-time Paris outside.  Jetcab and turbo traffic was always fierce at this hour along the Boulevard St. Michel.  The 5^th Arrondisement was thick with tourists and pilgrims swarming around the City of Light for the upcoming Easter week. 

But it was no reflection.  As Quint stared, the shimmer evolved into something thicker, something with faint pops and flashes of light embedded, the thing eventually mutating into a fog which obscured the window altogether.

The hairs on the back of Quint’s neck stood up.  He knew what this was and how the hell did an unknown swarm make it past UNIFORCE security screens anyway?  Even as he glared dumbfounded at the gathering form, he told himself he wasn’t imagining the apparition.  He’d had a light dinner downstairs in the officers’ mess, maybe a few too many wines, but then this was Paris, after all, and he felt clear-headed.

Even as he watched, Quint could see the form materializing into something more substantial.  Whatever it was, the config was good.  Only a few flickers and pops of light and the thing was already beginning to take on visible substance as its bot master slammed atoms to build structure, to look like—

No, there was no way this could be—

The very fact that an unknown swarm could have breached some of the tightest security screens this side of Mars made Quint uneasy and as he was about to sound the alarm, the form snapped suddenly into full blown substance, no longer a shimmering veil but now recognizably, incredibly…this can’t be happening, maybe I did have one too many Merlots…one Johnny Winger.

General John Winger right in front of him.  A nanobotic angel, a blast from the past.

Quint rubbed his eyes.  He knew all the details by heart, how Winger had perished on Europa back in ’21, during the Jovian Hammer mission, presumed to have been consumed by the Keeper that had been trolling across the icescape of that tortured world.  The memorial service was the stuff of legend.  He’d seen the vid more times than he cared to remember.  The original atomgrabber and now…and now….

“You can’t be…what you look like.” Quint muttered.  “This is some kind of trick, some kind of config…and how the hell did you get in here anyway?”  He moved to press the alarm button under his desk, but the angel spoke, loud and clear and in a voice that sounded authentic.

“General…before you go sounding alarms…let me explain.”  The angel’s face and mouth tracked well, no blurs, no pixelating, no delays, no latency.  Damn, this one’s good, Quint realized. 

“Why don’t you do that, son?” Quint slowly withdrew his hand from the button, then steepled both hands on his desk and eyed the swarm cautiously.  No sudden moves, nice and easy.  He didn’t know what this angel was capable of.

The swarm drifted closer, but kept some distance from Quint’s desk.  It stood at something like attention.  In every detail Quint could see, the angel was a near perfect replica of the original Johnny Winger.  But that couldn’t be…Winger had died thirty-four years ago.

“Despite what you may be thinking, General, I am actually Johnny Winger.  I know what this looks like but I can prove it to you.”

Quint was dubious, to say the least.

“I doubt that but go ahead.”

“Well—“a hint of a smile, “obviously I look a little different than I used to.  In fact, your eyes aren’t deceiving you, General.  I am a swarm.  But I’m still Johnny Winger.  In fact, my original memories and identity are still around, tucked away in a drawer, you might say.”  Winger didn’t want to go any further than that…the Shadow Man might be listening in, might already know the truth of what he had become. 

“You don’t say—“

How do I convince this dinosaur? Winger wondered.  “I used to be married.  Dana Tallant.  I had…have…one son Liam and a daughter Rene.  They’ve all—well, let’s just say they’re like me.  I shoved off for Europa on the Jovian Hammer mission on February 25, 2121, on board the Kepler.  The dock hands called her K-Dog.  Hideki Yamato was captain.  I scored a ninety-eight percent on my first SODs test in nog school, you can check that out with the Academy…”

Quint put up his hands.  “Those are all publicly known facts.  Just data.  Any spy could come up with that.”

Now Winger’s expression changed.  More like a knowing kind of smirk.  “You’re right, General.  Probably there’s nothing factual I can say that’ll convince you that I really am Johnny Winger.  So I’ll try another approach—“

Quint’s face hardened.  How do I get Security in here without activating something?  His mind raced with possibilities….

“So, I’ll try the truth…why I’m here.  General, I let myself be consumed by the Keeper on Europa.  It was a deliberate act.”

“Why would you do that?  I never knew the Great Atomgrabber to be a suicidal maniac.”

Now it was Winger’s turn to pose a question.  “Why did we try so hard to put agents and informants and operatives inside Red Hammer?”

Quint was rapidly growing impatient with this little game.  Still, maybe it was best to humor this rather insolent angel…Jeez, what an attitude.  “I don’t know…intel?  Recon?  Sabotage?”

“Exactly,” Winger said.  “That’s what I’m doing like this.  The Keeper’s nothing but a forward observer for the Old Ones…the big cahuna.  Surely you’ve heard of them…it’s been in all the news.”

“Very funny.  So you’re a…what?  A spy?  A saboteur?  A swarm inside of a swarm?  Isn’t that stretching things a bit?”

“Look, I know this is hard to take,” Winger said.  The angel leaned forward, wrapped both hands around the edge of the desk.  No fuzz, no blurs.  You could almost believe this actually was John Winger.  “And I don’t have a lot of time.  I’m taking a risk even doing this.”

“What…now you’re going to dissipate if you don’t get home by midnight?  Come on, ‘General Winger’, I wasn’t born yesterday.”

“No and you didn’t become CINCQUANT by closing your mind and holding your breath.  Will you just listen, for God’s sake?”

Now Quint glared back, saying nothing.  Maybe I can reach that button, before he zaps me.  Carefully, he unlaced his fingers and splayed them open on top of the desk.  “I’m listening…for the moment.”

“The Mother Swarm is on our front doorsteps…you know that as well I do.  Farside’s basically confirmed that.  What the hell do you think this KB-1 anomaly really is…Little Red Riding Hood?  Look, the Mother Swarm operates according to some program called the Prime Key.  I don’t understand it myself…it’s like a main program.  A major algorithm, something like that.  The Old Ones are coming, they’re here now.  They mean to absorb everything into the swarm…like Earth, the Sun, all the planets.  The truth is they’re the ones who seeded life on this planet, only it didn’t turn out like they wanted.  We’re supposed to all be swarms…like me.  Evolved from viruses.  But that didn’t happen.  Evolution went off the track.  Man is a mistake.  So they’re coming back to fix that mistake.”

Quint scowled.  “I’ve heard all this before…it’s the same old Assimilationist crap.”

“It’s not crap,” Winger told him.  “It’s the truth.  They even plan on building a forward base somewhere on Mercury, maybe Caloris Basin, if that means anything to you.  And some kind of ring to intercept as much of the Sun’s energy as they can.  Quint, we don’t have much time.  I have some room to get around, to maneuver inside this…mother swarm.  Don’t ask me to explain it.  But I have intel I need to get to UNSAC.  You should be making plans right now, plans to equip an expedition to Mercury, something to stop this.  I can work from inside.  But you have to do your part as well.”

This is all just a bad dream, Quint told himself.  Maybe those Merlots were stronger than I thought…the French do that.  “Okay, General…I’ll humor you.  If you really do have some intel we can use to fight off this KB-1 anomaly, Old Ones, Mother Swarm, whatever you want to call it, how does that intel get to us? To UNIFORCE?  Is there some way you can set up a schedule of contacts, download a file, show me some pictures or something…UNSAC’s going to want some bona fides as well, something to prove you’re not just a case of me having indigestion.”

The Winger angel gave that some thought, if a swarm could be said to think.  “I’m actually running a pretty serious risk even being here now.  But I intend to do whatever I can to stop the Old Ones…without us working together, we have no chance.”

And, with that, the angel began dispersing.  Quint had more questions, but Johnny Winger had other ideas.  He watched with amazement as Winger began fading out, going almost translucent, almost like an old photo.  In minutes, the faintest outline of the angel was all the remained, dust motes caught in shafts of light from outside the window.  Maybe that’s all it ever was…dust motes.  Then, even the dust motes were gone.

And Lamar Quint was left with only the image and nothing more.  They’ll think I’m as loony as a monkey reading poetry.

Quint rubbed his eyes and blinked.  No Johnny Winger stood before him.  He got up and went to the window.  Normal tourist traffic outside.  Jetcabs swirling around the Eiffel Tower, buzzing lovers in Luxembourg Gardens next door, alighting like moths outside street cafes to disgorge their fares.

He decided to talk a walk, maybe a little fresh air and without really meaning to, found himself riding a lift up to the eightieth floor, to UNSAC’s suite of offices in the Command Center.  He went through all the security screens, retinal scans and other biometrics and asked the duty officer outside UNSAC’s office if the Commissioner was in quarters.

“Yes, sir, Madame Commissioner is in quarters but asked not to be disturbed the rest of the evening.  Would you like to leave a message, sir?”

Quint scowled down at the scrawny buzzcut O-3 anchoring the desk.  The captain’s name plate read Towley.  Probably assembled from parts of recruiting posters, he decided. 

“Captain, please inform the Commissioner that I would like to see her on a matter related to KB-1…it is urgent.”

Towley looked like he had just sat on a rake.  His eyes narrowed.  “Of course, sir.  I’ll put it right through.”

Two minutes later, Quint was shown into the office suite of UNSAC.  Angelika Komar was tall, red-haired and had a face like a schoolteacher, Quint had always thought.  Darting eyes, always ferreting out misbehavior or original thinking among her downtrodden students.  CINCQUANT could well imagine Komar brandishing a rod, always ready to smack the hands of any wayward charges.

Komar offered Quint a drink.  They stood together for a moment, toasting nighttime Paris, then stepped out on the veranda to get a better view.  Only the faint veil of a nanobotic security barrier marred the scene.

Quint described what he had just encountered in his own office.  “I don’t know whether it was an angel, or a ghost or just indigestion.  But the thing looked and acted like General John Winger.”

Komar sipped at her Chardonnay.  “Nonsense.  Oh, I suppose somebody’s cooked up an angel that resembles the General.  It wouldn’t be hard…he was the most decorated atomgrabber in Quantum Corps history.  There must be trillions of images and likenesses floating around in the ether.  But after thirty years…even if it was an angel, why now?  Why thirty years after the General was consumed in a blaze of glory on Europa?  That doesn’t make any sense.”

“None of this makes sense,” Quint admitted.  He polished off his own drink, momentarily tested the barrier.  It buzzed and kicked his fingers back, like it was supposed to. 

“The…thing, angel, whatever…said it was inside the mother swarm of the Old Ones.  That he was somehow deconstructed and absorbed but had maintained his original identity, if you can believe that.  He said he was working to sabotage the Old Ones from inside.  I couldn’t think of what to say back.”

Komar put a hand on Quint’s shoulder.  “Let’s just say I have doubts that what you witnessed was in any way, shape or form General John Winger.  Face it, Lamar, you imagined the whole scenario.  It’s either a trap laid by elements working for the Old Ones or a stress reaction to all that’s been going on.”

Quint sighed.  “A distinct possibility, Madame Commissioner.”

Komar was sympathetic.  “I want you to sign yourself into sick bay tomorrow for a checkup, Lamar.  I need my top staff whole and hearty for the days ahead.”

Quint agreed to do that and left.  Maybe she’s right, he told himself on the lift down to the seventieth floor.  I haven’t been getting enough sleep lately.  And with what Sentinel has been reporting lately, anybody would be spooked.

He resolved to do as UNSAC had ordered and returned to his own quarters, intending to find something that would help him sleep later.

 

So that’s the excerpt.  Look for the entire story on April 14, 2017, available at Smashwords.com and at fine ebook retailers everywhere.

The Word Shed  next post comes on April 17.

See you then.

Phil B.

 

 

“The End of Nanotroopers”

 

My serialized story “Nanotroopers” is finally coming to an end, after 22 episodes.  The final episode entitled “Epilogue” was uploaded on March 31 to smashwords.com and will soon be available to readers at fine ebook retailers everywhere.  Go look for it.

In this post, I want to provide an excerpt of this story, but before I do, a few words about the entire effort.

Twenty-two episodes have taken me about 15 months to write, edit, and upload.  As of this writing, there have been 4692 downloads reported by Smashwords.  Somebody out there is downloading and presumably reading these stories.  I undertook this project for several reasons: 1) to accept the challenge and the discipline of writing and uploading a new story every 3 weeks; 2) to keep my name and work steadily appearing before likely audiences; and 3) to extend and further develop the fictional universe of Johnny Winger, Quantum Corps and all the gadgets and adversaries implied or explained therein.  So how did I do on these objectives?

As to 1), I managed to slog through 22 stories, partly by cannibalizing text and characters from Tales of the Quantum Corps and partly by just bending to the task and banging words out on a regular schedule.  I learned a lot about myself as a writer, how to plot and write, how make every word count in stories that averaged 50 pages and how to start and end stories that were themselves part of a greater enterprise.  Time will tell (from readers) how well I did but the experience was valuable.

As to 2), that was definitely achieved.  As of March 31, and from January 2016, a new story by Philip Bosshardt (and a free story at that) was appearing on Smashwords every 3 weeks.  I am proud that I never missed a deadline.  From a marketing point of view, that should count for something.  I’m sure, from the numbers, that there are many readers who looked for my work and my name on a regular basis.  It was interesting to see just how quickly downloads started when I posted an episode on Smashwords…sometimes within minutes.

As to 3), I think I did explore more and more of the possibilities and ramifications of what life would be like as a nanotrooper where your enemies could be the size of molecules or viruses.  And without giving too much away, I enjoyed the challenge of having my main character, Johnny Winger, actually evolve into and become an actual nanoscale warrior.  I didn’t necessarily start out with that goal in mind.  In the end, it seemed inevitable.

So, here now is an excerpt from Nanotroopers, Episode 22 “Epilogue”:

 

Chapter 1

“Ship of Theseus”

 

“The role of the infinitely small is infinitely large.”

Louis Pasteur

 

Mesa de Oro

Yucatan State, Mexico

December 30, 2049

1230 hours

 

Dr. Ryne Falkland pointed to the imager display, revealing a faint scaffolding in the center of the screen.

General Wellman Kincade, base commander, squinted at the sight.  “Looks like a flower trellis.  What’s that dark mass…looks like a bunch of grapes.”

Falkland tweaked the resolution of the imager.  “We’re growing a new Johnny Winger in there, General.”

Kincade made a sour face.  “I don’t suppose it’s like growing tomatoes, is it, Doctor.”

“Not exactly.  In fact, it’s quite a process.  First we have to build the core module, with all the memory modules, the buffer, the config translator.  Then comes the main platform and actuator mast, the casing and all the effectors, sensors, the propulsors.  It’s pretty involved.”

“What kind of time frame are we looking at?”

Falkland gave that some thought.  “If all goes well, probably a week.  And then come the tests…learning in the comm centers, basic replication, launch, recovery, elementary swarm ops, that sort of thing.  It’s a bit of an art form, General.”

Kincade growled.  “I’ll never get used to this…,growing nanotroopers like geraniums.  What’s that ship model about?”  He indicated a small wooden model of a Greek trireme on top of a nearby cabinet.

Falkland chuckled.  “A bit of joke, I’m afraid.  That’s the Ship of Theseus.”

Kincade was puzzled.  “What’s that…a Caribbean cruise ship?”

“Not exactly.  More of a philosophical conundrum.  The ancient Greeks had a ship called the Ship of Theseus…a famous craft that they really treasured.  They wanted to keep it up, so from time to time, they had to replace the ship’s planks.  The philosophers got into an argument about whether, if all the planks were replaced, was their ship still the same ship?”

Kincade scowled.  “What’s that have to do with Major Winger?”

Falkland shrugged.  “Not much.  Some have made the same argument about angels and nanobotic creations.  Once I re-grow Winger, is the new model the same as the old one?  That’s the conundrum.”

Kincade said, “Thinking like that makes my head hurt.  I’ll stick to commanding this base.  Keep me posted, Doctor.”

“Sure thing, sir.”

The general left the containment cell, cycling himself out through all the locks and biometrics and headed up to the Ops Center.  It was sunny, hot and humid for the day before New Year’s.  Kincade had about a million things to do and reports to write for UNIFORCE, dealing with the aftermath of the Himalaya Strike mission.  He wanted his 1^st Nano commander, Major Winger, back whole and hearty for the days of debriefing that he knew would be coming.

Even if Winger had to be grown from a vat.

 

The big day came and Kincade gathered with Dr. Falkland outside the containment chamber.  Inside the chamber, a small bed had been placed, for Johnny Winger to lie on when ‘he’ was fully assembled and formed.  Just in case, electron beam injectors were primed and ready.

“We can’t violate safety protocols, even in this situation,” Falkland explained. 

Kincade rubbed his sandy moustache nervously.  He glanced up at Falkland.  “I know you’ve done this before, Doc, but I’m still not quite sure how to feel about it.”

Falkland nodded.  “Of course, I understand completely, General.  It’s natural to feel a little…nervous?  Is that the right word?  Perhaps, a mixture, I think.  Something between fear, anticipation, anxiety and hope.  A cocktail.  Shaken not stirred.”  He smiled at his own little joke.

Kincade was doubtful but said nothing, while Falkland scanned his board and made some adjustments.  “I’ve got the Config Engine loaded now.  From the scans we did before, we have lots of data.  I had a quite a time massaging and tweaking and converting all that data, trying to get something clean.  You don’t know it, but I’ve already run some tests…yesterday.  Things looked promising.”

Kincade was curious.  “What kind of tests, Doc?”

Falkland was reluctant to go into details now.  Clients were sometimes sensitive about these matters.  “Oh, just little tests.  I extracted some of the data and ran it through the Config Engine…you know, assembling small things, simple structures.”

“Of Major Winger?  What kind of simple structures?”

“It was just a test—“

“What kind of structures, Doc?” Kincade asked, a little more firmly. 

Falkland shrugged, went back to his instruments.  “A finger here, a hand there.  Really, it went well.”

Kincade nearly choked.  “A finger?  You assembled one of the fingers?  And a hand?  What happened—“

 “The test went fine.  The Config Engine performed as expected.  I examined the…er, the structures and found them well formed, molecularly correct, consistent with the templates from your data.  It was…what can I say?…a finger.”

“And a hand.”

“Exactly.”

“What did you do with them?”

Falkland looked surprised.  Sometimes, he figured it was better if the clients didn’t know all the details.  People reacted differently.  “I let it go.  That is, the Config Engine broke them down, disassembled them.  Back into feedstock.”

Kincade swallowed hard.  Maybe Falkland was right.  Normal commanders shouldn’t be able to just conjure up limbs and fingers of their troops.  But then again, since nanobotic assemblers had been invented, maybe they could.  It was all very confusing.

“Okay, Doc…I guess I really didn’t need to hear about that.  What’s next?”

Falkland turned back to his control station.  “Next is releasing the feedstock into the chamber.”  He pressed a few buttons and on the monitor, a faint mist began issuing from a row of ports.  The chamber quickly filled with the mist.  “Just raw stock.  A bunch of atoms and molecules…standard stuff…oxygens, irons, phosphorous and nitrogens…you name it.  Ingredients for the cook….”  Immediately he wished he hadn’t said that.  Every client reacted differently.  And this one was base commander at Mesa de Oro.

The filling took about three minutes.  “All the templates of Major Winger are loaded in the Config Engine now.  When the previous…uh, version was scanned and disassembled, I took a memory field map of all those atoms in structure and created these templates.  We should be able to put together a new Johnny, better than ever.”

Kincade just shook his head.  “This is just creepy, Doc, hearing one of my troopers talked about like this.  Get on with it—“

“Of course.”  Falkland pressed a few more buttons.

Inside the containment chamber, the master assembler had just been released.  The master was a nanobotic device that orchestrated assembly of feedstock atoms and molecules into whatever structures were contained in the template. 

The monitor showed a mist filling the chamber, like an early morning fog, only this mist sparkled as if a billion fireflies were embedded.  The mist thickened until the bed was lost to view.  Minutes passed.  Falkland followed his instruments, adjusting the Config Engine on the fly.

“Threshold density,” he announced.  “Memory field steady….all parameters in the green.”

The first hint of structure emerged from the fog, in the form of a faint, translucent, almost ghostly hand, alongside the edge of the bed.  Fluctuations in the fog caused more structure to become intermittently visible: several fingers, part of a forearm, a brief glimpse of a knee.  From these structures, Kincade silently estimated where Johnny’s head and face should be.  But nothing was visible yet.

More minutes passed.  Then, the general sucked in his breath.  He pointed.

The barest outlines of a face materialized into view, slipping in and out of the fog like a wraith.  There was the upturned nose, the same mole beside his nose.  And the lips—

“It’s him!” Kincade watched in amazement as more and more structure came into view.  From everything he could see, it was Johnny Winger.  He knew how the technology worked.  Falkland had done this before, several times.  He understood how assemblers slammed atoms together according to a template.  As base commander of a battalion of nanotroopers, he’d run more configs than Falkland had ever dreamed about.  But this…this was different.

The thing seemed as real as the wooden Ship of Theseus model on the cabinet. 

Falkland watched the monitor and his instruments carefully, making some minor adjustments.   “Config still stable.  No alarms…no issues.  He’s coming in beautifully.  Everything within tolerances, right in the middle of the band.  I’m adding more feedstock… we’re approaching minimum density….what do you think, General?”

Kincade let his eyes play across the prostrate form of his company commander, inside the containment chamber.  Part of his mind told him this couldn’t be Winger…it was a sim, a near-perfect likeness, but still a likeness.  But his own feelings overruled that hard logic and he felt a lump in the back of his throat.  It couldn’t be Johnny Winger.

But it was Johnny Winger.

To keep control of himself, Kincade focused on the instruments, on the swarm inside the vault, on critiquing the process, on config stability, anything to smother all those feelings that were bubbling up. 

“How long, Doc?”

Falkland studied the board, watched as more and more of Johnny Winger emerged from the mist into solid structure.  “Well, scans are showing about sixty-five percent complete.  This should be done in about two more hours.  After we reach target density, I’ve got to run some tests.  See how stable the config is.  Make sure the pattern buffers are cleared out.  And we’ll spot check the config against the original memory field.  Plus there’s still loading from the file Doc II made…neural patterns of memory and personality.  That’ll be another hour.”

“This is so unreal,” Kincade said.  “He looks so lifelike….”

 

By mid-afternoon, Falkland pronounced himself satisfied.  Looking through the portholes of the containment chamber, Johnny Winger was lying on his side on the bed, seemingly asleep.  He seemed to be breathing; his chest rose and fell with a rhythmic pattern.  Wellman Kincade knew full well that it was part of the config, in effect, a breathing simulation program was running on the main processor.  But the physical impression was so real, it was so easy to imagine—

 

And that’s the excerpt.  Go to Smashwords, Apple ibooks or Barnes and Noble Nook books and download the entire story to see what happens.

 

The next post to The Word Shed will come on April 10 2017.

 

See you then.

 

Phil B.