Independent Stories

1.) Sasha being taken in by the Psi Collective as a girl of 11-12. What happened with her birth family? We know some of them are still alive, because they come to her funeral. We know she had to leave the Ecclesia at some point. I mentioned in a feedback show that Fiona formed a bond with her early, that Sasha was the first close friend she had, and that she developed romantic feelings for Sasha that Sasha initially couldn't return — so, out of love for her friend, Sasha made the choice to have her sexuality "re-streamed" from a Kinsey 0 (completely straight) to roughly a Kinsey 4 (a little more gay than straight). Was this the choice that led to her breaking with the Ecclesia? Both Sasha and Fiona were foundlings, outsiders in the creche world of the Hive; this may have been what led them to bond.

2.) Explore what Artax is up to now that he's on the run from Imperial Intelligence. He's living in disguise, of course, which isn't much of a problem for him — but how are things for Tunstall? And what is Artax doing to continue his work while his shop is closed?

3.) Horror story where the Sommers Cell's children are being targeted by the revenant of Victor hin'Kavos. At least some of this should be from the older children's POV.

4.) Morgan meets for coffee with another vampire, a woman in the lower ranks of the Syndicate and/or the Church of Eternal Brotherhood. The other woman is trying to encourage Morgan to come back into the fold. This would be more of a short vignette or character study.

5.) Character study on Kevin, the gay pyrokinetic from Making the Cut, and his partner Steven. What's the story behind them? What do their lives look like on the edges of the Collective, especially now that the Sommers Cell has been doing its little experiment for a few years? Oooh — what if they petitioned the Hive to adopt a foundling telepath?!

Series: Psi Ops

A series of short novels following Brian, Fiona, Sasha, Del and Trace during their tour of duty with MID. Fast-paced military science fiction with a strong focus on the growing bonds between the characters and their coming of age from raw recruits to mature professionals.

[b]Book 1:[/b] MID takes its new recruits away from Metamor City and puts them through psi-op boot camp. Brian finds that he is being moved into field work instead of the analyst position he was hoping for, and has to deal with the fears and insecurities that come from being a non-athletic kid being thrown into combat exercises and brutal physical training.

[b]Later books:[/b] (Unsure about the order of these)
* Espionage and sabotage against Yakuza-style crime gangs in one of the Southlands corporate states.
* Tracking down the "Angels" of Majestic Industries' Project Tanaatha — where do they come from, who do they work for, and what threat do they pose to the Empire?
* Taking down the warlord at the heart of an international drug trade (Rain?).
* Counter-Intelligence against spies of a rival nation operating in the Empire.
* A telepathic community is located in a remote part of the world that has been targeted for ethnic cleansing. In accordance with MID's agreement with the Psi Collective, the psi ops are sent in to extract their people from the war zone.
* An MID operative has gone rogue, perhaps having been bought off by the Vamps or Majestic Industries. The psi-ops need to track him down and catch him.

I've written some "mashed potato" scenes. The kind of thing that can be fit into just about any story with a little tailoring and I'm still fleshing out/auditing ideas for the "meat" part of it. Currently I'm toying with the idea that some kids from some important houses lost big at a high-end casino and are convinced that things were rigged somehow. They hire Rafak to try and prove it. Going to want to get him a wingman/woman to go along just so I as the author have someone for him to talk to. I'm toying with the idea of Kate or Nona (that was a great scene in BoS with her btw, very nicely done from a script point of view at least. I still haven't gotten around to listening to the audio versions. I need to do that.) Once I decide on who I can backfill a reason based on appearances or skill set. Vamps will probably run the casino, but I'll probably use them as just a red herring side trail before they discover the actual mischief, to be decided on.

I'll take another look at them and see if inspiration strikes.

The Case of the Golden Egg

Rafak Aliri and the Book of Shadows

It might be interesting to delve deeper into one of the streams Rafak has already explored. What do you think?

Holy cow, Lady Lotus! That is made of pure, distilled awesome. Thank you so much for putting this together! I love the fact that it has links back to the original articles in the wiki.

So far I've added what is on the events page from the Metamor City and Metamor Keep wikis that had dates to the overall Metamor time line, and the stories that also have dates listed on Metamor City's. Also there is an individual timeline for Making the Cut, but it hasn't been populated at all yet.

Let me know what you think.

http://mk2k.wikidot.com/timeline

I have revised the Storybuilding page to reflect my most current thinking about where the plot is going. (The details of how the final story ends, however, I'm keeping secret for now.) Seasons 3-5 are likely to involve additional short stories, but I don't have any specifics planned.

Your thoughts, as always, are appreciated…

—Chris/Raven

A general plotline I was working on and will edit this post as i develop it on my own or with feedback is such:

Part 1:
Late at night in Metamor city's deep dark underground, the lowest of the low levels, a woman can be heard shrieking for help. Her cry falls upon one set of ears, a vampire with less than upstanding morals who essentially hears a dinner bell. He runs to find her and when he does, he sees her change into her mid form. The woman is a Theriomorph and is tied tot he animal form of a queen ant. The scene ends witht he unfortunate vampire becoming dinner for the woman's many many many (did i say many?) children.

Part 2:
The investigation of disappearances in the underground of Metamor city, (perhaps you could recommend which MCPD would be best for the lead role here or I could invent one) and their investigation leads them into a little bit of what is considered Theriomorph culture and eventually ends with them having an early confrontation with these ant theriomorphs and the hunt is on to find them.

Part 3:
Our protagonists from part 2 are on a hunt to find the colony and try to enlist various means to find it in ways only Metamor City could provide. This builds up to a raid on the colony and in the very end a final confrontation witht he queen. How this could be dealt with in the end is up in the air I'm open to suggestion. This could also be the point of revelation on how the curse could go so very wrong and the steps the queen went through as she transformed from Human to abomination

Aside from my usual complaint and the red eyes I can't think of an improvement. The end in particular was particularly enjoyable to read, both with Isaac's rejection of the Fae (I loved the delivery about the changed reason for not being able to look at her) and Abbey's invitation to take him in. :)

I've added about 3000 words to the story, so I'll be interested to hear what you all think about the latest developments…

As for the divine energy that was invested in him, it blasted out in all directions. Some of it was probably captured and reclaimed by Kyia. A lot of it would have gone out and perforated the fabric of reality, making weak spots in the barrier between the material world and the outer planes. And if some enterprising mages happened to know that T-X was about to go boom, they might have been able to channel that energy into a magic ritual that was already in progress. Only avatars, aedra, daedra, and potential Keys/Vessels can store divine energy, but it could potentially be steered into a waiting spell in order to power it. Hmm…

In the end I chose Miriam's scene because it sets up a hook that is of obvious importance for future stories — most readers can probably guess that there WILL be a reckoning of some kind between Miriam and Malcolm, once she is freed — but it doesn't do anything to tip off the big secret of Jared's importance.

I also liked the scene from a stylistic standpoint: I envisioned doing it entirely as radio drama, with just voices and sound effects. The addition of prose narration was a concession to the needs of a text-based format, but it did give me the chance to present a unique narrative POV. I may or may not keep the narration in the podcast version.

As for Chapter 30, I knew that I had to keep the ball rolling at that point and get us to the action as quickly as possible. I'd been over the Del/Trace guilt complex so many times that I didn't want to belabor the point now; there's no way they're not going to forgive him after the way he saved Fiona, and the loss of Sasha makes Del and Trace's deaths seem small by comparison. I had to hit the key emotional points and move on to the final confrontation.

I'm not sure which part you're referring to you when you mention "Victor's reaction to it all falling apart." There are a number of things falling apart around him during this story, after all. :)

At any rate, THANK YOU for sticking with me through this long, long process! All the way since May 14, 2007 — you've been waiting for this conclusion longer than anyone. I hope that, on the whole, it was worth the ride. :)

There are parts of Chapter 30 that feel rushed and glossed over, particularly Dan's revelation about his involvement in Del and Trace's deaths and Victor's reaction to it all falling apart.

All in all the tie-ups in Chapter 31 worked to provide the necessary closure to the various subthreads. I'd have moved the Miriam Epilogue piece to just after the section beginning with "Fiona never saw Miriam Bahktavar again" or just after the Malcom and Braddock section. There's not enough distance between the first to build suspense, and the ending I think is better served by having one of the other sections come last. A section with the new Sommer's cell would be more appropriate to the lion's share content of the story, but I almost want to recommend ending with the Jared bit as an epilogue as it leads strongly into the critical MK2K plot of the future and unlike the Miriam piece DOES have the greater distance/suspense from the last time it was examined in text.