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stunt_muppet at 03:50pm on 20/02/2009 under epic fail, life, things i want to write, writing
stunt_muppet at 03:50pm on 20/02/2009 under epic fail, life, things i want to write, writingWikipedia and TV Tropes just weren't enough, apparently. Although, like many of my internet distractions, this is still entirely TV Tropes' fault.
Really, I should just stop looking at the Nightmare Fuel pages. "High Octane Nightmare Fuel: Other" pointed me to The SCP Foundation, telling tales of the ghoulish and terrifying things that were listed as "collected objects".
And...well, yeah. Some of them are pretty disturbing (SCP-231-07 hits several major squicks; SCP-173 is a Weeping Angel sculpted to look like an aborted octopus-human hybrid fetus), but the concept of the site is really, really cool. I love it when the web plays with a story like this, acknowledging something as fictional but creating an entire, intricate, multi-layered universe for it and integrating it into our world as if it were real. It's a form of storytelling that I think the Web has really revitalized, and I think it's really well-executed here.
The SCP Foundation is, supposedly, an organization devoted to researching, cataloguing, neutralizing, and containing "extra-terrestrial and extra-dimensional artifacts". These "artifacts" are created and submitted by users, in the form of research dossiers and documentations, and range from the hilarious (SCP-394, "The Perpetual Motion Non-Name-Brand Gelatin Dessert") to the entertainingly braintwisty (SCP-055, "The Unknown", SCP -299, "The Boolean Sidestepper") to the disturbing (see above, plus SCP-217 "The Clockwork Virus"). It's all rather ingenious and fascinating, and I've spent far more time reading the pages (even the troubling ones) than I really should.
Anyway, it got me thinking about this character - well, plot device, really - that keeps cropping up when I try to write original fic but which I've never actually used. Even when I try to write genfic, I always end up with The Plot being some consequence of The Man Behind The Man - there's always a puppetmaster, someone else who's pulling the strings, someone who keeps throwing things at Our Heroes once they think they've won.
And, lately, the Man Behind the Man has been a giant robot.
Well, not a robot precisely. The Engine (that's all it's called) is an immense...well, engine, bigger than an apartment block. It's a mostly-formless mass of gears, rivets, turbines, pistons, and heavy artillery - "heavy" here meaning weapons that can punch holes in reality or remotely-detonate stars. It's never been heard to speak, or, indeed, communicate in any way, and while it moves around somehow (appearing in different places) nobody's quite sure how it does that.
The Engine is somewhat self-aware - it knows it exists, it knows that it was created, and it knows what it is capable of. What it does not know is why it was created, or when, or by whom, or to what purpose. It has no directive to obey.
And so, instead, it goes wherever it thinks itself useful, offering itself to those who it feels need its assistance. Of course, since the Engine has no sense of morality, it's not always very discriminating in who it decides needs it, and has been known to fight on both sides of wars at varying times, with little external rhyme or reason to when it switches sides.
And, for some reason, he's managed to worm his way into the plot of almost every Doctor Who genfic I'm writing or planning to write. Including stories where he just doesn't fit, because really, it doesn't matter if he nicely wraps up the plot of "Nothing Up My Sleeve", you really can't transfer from slightly silly historical to vaguely-Cosmic Horror Steampunk Thing. Even if I don't play it entirely for serious.
But I just can't help thinking - what if I did end up tying my adventures together like that? And then, eventually, as the Doctor encountered the Engine more and more, the stories would become more and more specifically about the Engine, until I'd set up an entire plot arc or something omg you guys. :D
Mostly, I just really want to write him. I've never written a completely noncommunicative and completely inhuman character before, and I'm growing increasingly fond of the Engine now that I've rediscovered it.
Real Life post to happen later, but at the moment I've got a class to run to and then a very serious nap to take.
Really, I should just stop looking at the Nightmare Fuel pages. "High Octane Nightmare Fuel: Other" pointed me to The SCP Foundation, telling tales of the ghoulish and terrifying things that were listed as "collected objects".
And...well, yeah. Some of them are pretty disturbing (SCP-231-07 hits several major squicks; SCP-173 is a Weeping Angel sculpted to look like an aborted octopus-human hybrid fetus), but the concept of the site is really, really cool. I love it when the web plays with a story like this, acknowledging something as fictional but creating an entire, intricate, multi-layered universe for it and integrating it into our world as if it were real. It's a form of storytelling that I think the Web has really revitalized, and I think it's really well-executed here.
The SCP Foundation is, supposedly, an organization devoted to researching, cataloguing, neutralizing, and containing "extra-terrestrial and extra-dimensional artifacts". These "artifacts" are created and submitted by users, in the form of research dossiers and documentations, and range from the hilarious (SCP-394, "The Perpetual Motion Non-Name-Brand Gelatin Dessert") to the entertainingly braintwisty (SCP-055, "The Unknown", SCP -299, "The Boolean Sidestepper") to the disturbing (see above, plus SCP-217 "The Clockwork Virus"). It's all rather ingenious and fascinating, and I've spent far more time reading the pages (even the troubling ones) than I really should.
Anyway, it got me thinking about this character - well, plot device, really - that keeps cropping up when I try to write original fic but which I've never actually used. Even when I try to write genfic, I always end up with The Plot being some consequence of The Man Behind The Man - there's always a puppetmaster, someone else who's pulling the strings, someone who keeps throwing things at Our Heroes once they think they've won.
And, lately, the Man Behind the Man has been a giant robot.
Well, not a robot precisely. The Engine (that's all it's called) is an immense...well, engine, bigger than an apartment block. It's a mostly-formless mass of gears, rivets, turbines, pistons, and heavy artillery - "heavy" here meaning weapons that can punch holes in reality or remotely-detonate stars. It's never been heard to speak, or, indeed, communicate in any way, and while it moves around somehow (appearing in different places) nobody's quite sure how it does that.
The Engine is somewhat self-aware - it knows it exists, it knows that it was created, and it knows what it is capable of. What it does not know is why it was created, or when, or by whom, or to what purpose. It has no directive to obey.
And so, instead, it goes wherever it thinks itself useful, offering itself to those who it feels need its assistance. Of course, since the Engine has no sense of morality, it's not always very discriminating in who it decides needs it, and has been known to fight on both sides of wars at varying times, with little external rhyme or reason to when it switches sides.
And, for some reason, he's managed to worm his way into the plot of almost every Doctor Who genfic I'm writing or planning to write. Including stories where he just doesn't fit, because really, it doesn't matter if he nicely wraps up the plot of "Nothing Up My Sleeve", you really can't transfer from slightly silly historical to vaguely-Cosmic Horror Steampunk Thing. Even if I don't play it entirely for serious.
But I just can't help thinking - what if I did end up tying my adventures together like that? And then, eventually, as the Doctor encountered the Engine more and more, the stories would become more and more specifically about the Engine, until I'd set up an entire plot arc or something omg you guys. :D
Mostly, I just really want to write him. I've never written a completely noncommunicative and completely inhuman character before, and I'm growing increasingly fond of the Engine now that I've rediscovered it.
Real Life post to happen later, but at the moment I've got a class to run to and then a very serious nap to take.
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I think the Clockwork Virus or the Coin would make for a brilliant Torchwood episode.