On the fringes...
Oct. 11th, 2010 10:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vixenmageA while back, maybe a year and a half, two years ago, I created this character, Rolf. He was a little bit character, but I kinda knew when I wrote him that he'd have a bigger role, in more than one story. I tried writing his own story up, but it never came together for some reason-- just a shop doesn't cut it. He was the old man who sold Jim his portalling guitar tuner, and the glowering man with dreadlocks who ran the Shop That Opens Every Now And Then across the alley, and the uncle of one main character in my last NaNo attempt, the shopkeeper who sent them on the road to Coyote Connor, the shaman on the mountain. He's got a backstory, but I don't know that I want to write it just yet, and he's got a slightly disconcerting habit of breaking the 3.5th wall by commenting on the plot, pacing, or narration from time to time. And making suggestions. And so on.
He's also, incidently, a cloudy sort of mirror to my own guilt complex. Not sure where that came from, but to explain would take the wind out of the sails of his backstory. I just remember telling my Chem teacher about how I had the tendency to blame everything that went wrong on myself. He raised an eyebrow and went, "Wow. You're really not that important, you know." It made me think. So... um, yes.
Here's a little bit-- I started writing in preparation for NaNoWriMo, and have been poking at him.
“You realize this is wasting valuable word-count on needless preparation?”
“First of all, no, it’s not needless. If I start getting into the habit of a few hundred words to a thousand or two per night, it will be easier when the month comes around.”
Rolf snorted and grabbed the key from the drawer. “Uh-huh,” he muttered, walking up to the front. “That’s definitely going to happen.”
“Besides, who says I’m wasting word-count? No rule I’ve got to use you in this novel; you didn’t exactly help out with the last one.”
“Oi!” The old wizard shook his fist. “I gave you several potential plot-points, you lackwit! It’s not my fault you never got around to using them!” He unlocked the door and gave it a test shove, then turned back towards the counter, grumbling quietly. “Could’ve moved… anything would’ve worked… narrate worth a sh—”
“Who’re you talking to, Rolf?”
He nearly dropped the key, jumping a good foot in shock. “Gah! Hain’t I told you to stop sneakin’ up on me like that?”
Lance raised an eyebrow and put his bundle on the counter. “Uh-huh… I called your name three times, Uncle.”
“Bah, sure, kid.” He pulled a box out from under the counter and handed it to his nephew with a grunt. “Got a delivery, today. Mad Old Wyfred wants this.”
“What is it?”
Rolf glared at him. “Ain’t payin’ you to ask questions.” The tall blond made a wry face and tapped on the box carefully, one ear cocked—he’d learned very quickly that shaking the boxes was a bad idea. Rolf snickered. “Nice try, but it’s soundproof. ‘S a set of wind-chimes, set t’ play a different chord for every eighth direction o’ the compass.” He grinned proudly, despite himself. “Adds a sharp if it’s over 60 percent humidity, an’ a flat if‘s under 20. Plays th’ chord in three octaves if a storm’s comin’.”
“…That’s rather impressive.” Lance looked back at the box with a new respect, and hoisted it a bit more carefully. “Directions?”
Having already moved on to the register, it took Rolf a moment to drag his consciousness back to work this out, and he gave Lance a withering look before speaking. “In th’ car. Numbskull.”
A wild wind blew through the shop as Lance turned to go, whistling across the shelves, blowing up swirls in the thick carpet, and jangling the bell wildly. He swore as it tore at his shirt and whipped his hair into a frenzy, but pushed on towards the door; the wind exited with him, attacking the unsuspecting dust on the sidewalk up as it went, and disappeared entirely from the shop. Rolf snickered quietly at the dirty look his nephew threw back through the front window on his way to the car.
“That wasn’t entirely necessary.”
“Oh, shut up. Namby-pamby brat needs to have his head set straight every now and then,” he grumbled, punching buttons on the register—at first, according to direction, but with increasingly random vigor as the thing sat, stoic and unmoving. It finally opened with a loud, cheerful clang, and he rolled his eyes. “Thank you very much, you piece of absolute—”
“Watch your language!”
“You’re far too sensitive. You don’t even have the excuse of age, but you’re twice as bad as—”
“Alright, alright! Don’t you have something to be doing?”
He swept the dust off the register, finished counting, and spat (very carefully, very neatly, into the garbage can) with a sneer. “I was, until someone decided to distract me with this fourth-wall-breaking nonsense.”
“Dialogue is healthy, it’s not the fourth wall unless I’m in the audience, and you’re just crazy.”
“What’s his story, anyway?” Rolf asked, walking into the back room.
“He modifies the chimes, and they—”
“He what?! Do you know how long those took me?” The door to the room slammed, and Rolf barely showed a sign of the kick hurting, though it had to have been fairly painful. “The research alone was worth half the bloody price, and that’s not even touching on those charms, took a bloody tome of runes to write the wind bit in, and he bloody modifies them?”
“That’s about the size of it, yeah.”
Rolf dropped into his seat, sighing heavily. “What does he do, then?”
“He makes them a sort of danger detector. They play Beethoven’s Fifth—” he snorted derisively. “Yes, it’s, rather clichéd— if anyone he doesn’t know or trust approaches. They save his life three times, and one of the would-be attackers gives him the clue he needs to start hunting down a messenger of Mephistopheles – the Jackal gets involved, and they manage to avoid a war, along with a few others.”
The wizard looked interested, despite himself. “That might actually be an interesting story, shockingly enough. Have you told it yet?”
“No. I don’t even know if his name’s Mad Wyfred yet.”
“…Huh,” he said, absently, and pulled his chair into the work table. “Let me know, if you ever get around to it.”
“Will do.”
The silence stretched on as the old wizard worked, his fingers moving more nimbly than one might have expected. In lieu of any commissions, he was working on his own project, for the moment—he supposed he could always send it to the Market, if nobody was interested. The work was intricate, and more than once, he took a brief pause to upgrade to an even larger lens. The creeping feeling of disapproval might have daunted another, but he was used to it, and nearly grinned as he finished the detailing on the first section. He was completely unsurprised by the interruption.
“That’s really not fair, you know.”
Laughing, he put the piece away. “Fair? Interesting concept, that. You play your games, and I’ll play mine—fair’s fair. Show, don’t tell.”
You can’t glare with a disembodied voice (it’s all in the eyes), but the tone conveyed its idea fairly well. “Those are entirely disconnected sayings, Rolf.”
“What do you expect? I’m a wizard, not an English teacher.” He glanced up at the mirror as the shop bell jangled to see a young, dark-haired woman walking in, her face obscured by the angle. “Well, that was an awfully convenient interruption.” There was no answer, and he rolled his eyes and walked back out front.
--Fin
I think posting drabbles here is probably going to be a routine thing; I've learned the hard way to back stuff up on the Interwebs. I'll keep cutting it, though.
He's also, incidently, a cloudy sort of mirror to my own guilt complex. Not sure where that came from, but to explain would take the wind out of the sails of his backstory. I just remember telling my Chem teacher about how I had the tendency to blame everything that went wrong on myself. He raised an eyebrow and went, "Wow. You're really not that important, you know." It made me think. So... um, yes.
Here's a little bit-- I started writing in preparation for NaNoWriMo, and have been poking at him.
“You realize this is wasting valuable word-count on needless preparation?”
“First of all, no, it’s not needless. If I start getting into the habit of a few hundred words to a thousand or two per night, it will be easier when the month comes around.”
Rolf snorted and grabbed the key from the drawer. “Uh-huh,” he muttered, walking up to the front. “That’s definitely going to happen.”
“Besides, who says I’m wasting word-count? No rule I’ve got to use you in this novel; you didn’t exactly help out with the last one.”
“Oi!” The old wizard shook his fist. “I gave you several potential plot-points, you lackwit! It’s not my fault you never got around to using them!” He unlocked the door and gave it a test shove, then turned back towards the counter, grumbling quietly. “Could’ve moved… anything would’ve worked… narrate worth a sh—”
“Who’re you talking to, Rolf?”
He nearly dropped the key, jumping a good foot in shock. “Gah! Hain’t I told you to stop sneakin’ up on me like that?”
Lance raised an eyebrow and put his bundle on the counter. “Uh-huh… I called your name three times, Uncle.”
“Bah, sure, kid.” He pulled a box out from under the counter and handed it to his nephew with a grunt. “Got a delivery, today. Mad Old Wyfred wants this.”
“What is it?”
Rolf glared at him. “Ain’t payin’ you to ask questions.” The tall blond made a wry face and tapped on the box carefully, one ear cocked—he’d learned very quickly that shaking the boxes was a bad idea. Rolf snickered. “Nice try, but it’s soundproof. ‘S a set of wind-chimes, set t’ play a different chord for every eighth direction o’ the compass.” He grinned proudly, despite himself. “Adds a sharp if it’s over 60 percent humidity, an’ a flat if‘s under 20. Plays th’ chord in three octaves if a storm’s comin’.”
“…That’s rather impressive.” Lance looked back at the box with a new respect, and hoisted it a bit more carefully. “Directions?”
Having already moved on to the register, it took Rolf a moment to drag his consciousness back to work this out, and he gave Lance a withering look before speaking. “In th’ car. Numbskull.”
A wild wind blew through the shop as Lance turned to go, whistling across the shelves, blowing up swirls in the thick carpet, and jangling the bell wildly. He swore as it tore at his shirt and whipped his hair into a frenzy, but pushed on towards the door; the wind exited with him, attacking the unsuspecting dust on the sidewalk up as it went, and disappeared entirely from the shop. Rolf snickered quietly at the dirty look his nephew threw back through the front window on his way to the car.
“That wasn’t entirely necessary.”
“Oh, shut up. Namby-pamby brat needs to have his head set straight every now and then,” he grumbled, punching buttons on the register—at first, according to direction, but with increasingly random vigor as the thing sat, stoic and unmoving. It finally opened with a loud, cheerful clang, and he rolled his eyes. “Thank you very much, you piece of absolute—”
“Watch your language!”
“You’re far too sensitive. You don’t even have the excuse of age, but you’re twice as bad as—”
“Alright, alright! Don’t you have something to be doing?”
He swept the dust off the register, finished counting, and spat (very carefully, very neatly, into the garbage can) with a sneer. “I was, until someone decided to distract me with this fourth-wall-breaking nonsense.”
“Dialogue is healthy, it’s not the fourth wall unless I’m in the audience, and you’re just crazy.”
“What’s his story, anyway?” Rolf asked, walking into the back room.
“He modifies the chimes, and they—”
“He what?! Do you know how long those took me?” The door to the room slammed, and Rolf barely showed a sign of the kick hurting, though it had to have been fairly painful. “The research alone was worth half the bloody price, and that’s not even touching on those charms, took a bloody tome of runes to write the wind bit in, and he bloody modifies them?”
“That’s about the size of it, yeah.”
Rolf dropped into his seat, sighing heavily. “What does he do, then?”
“He makes them a sort of danger detector. They play Beethoven’s Fifth—” he snorted derisively. “Yes, it’s, rather clichéd— if anyone he doesn’t know or trust approaches. They save his life three times, and one of the would-be attackers gives him the clue he needs to start hunting down a messenger of Mephistopheles – the Jackal gets involved, and they manage to avoid a war, along with a few others.”
The wizard looked interested, despite himself. “That might actually be an interesting story, shockingly enough. Have you told it yet?”
“No. I don’t even know if his name’s Mad Wyfred yet.”
“…Huh,” he said, absently, and pulled his chair into the work table. “Let me know, if you ever get around to it.”
“Will do.”
The silence stretched on as the old wizard worked, his fingers moving more nimbly than one might have expected. In lieu of any commissions, he was working on his own project, for the moment—he supposed he could always send it to the Market, if nobody was interested. The work was intricate, and more than once, he took a brief pause to upgrade to an even larger lens. The creeping feeling of disapproval might have daunted another, but he was used to it, and nearly grinned as he finished the detailing on the first section. He was completely unsurprised by the interruption.
“That’s really not fair, you know.”
Laughing, he put the piece away. “Fair? Interesting concept, that. You play your games, and I’ll play mine—fair’s fair. Show, don’t tell.”
You can’t glare with a disembodied voice (it’s all in the eyes), but the tone conveyed its idea fairly well. “Those are entirely disconnected sayings, Rolf.”
“What do you expect? I’m a wizard, not an English teacher.” He glanced up at the mirror as the shop bell jangled to see a young, dark-haired woman walking in, her face obscured by the angle. “Well, that was an awfully convenient interruption.” There was no answer, and he rolled his eyes and walked back out front.
--Fin
I think posting drabbles here is probably going to be a routine thing; I've learned the hard way to back stuff up on the Interwebs. I'll keep cutting it, though.
