I have my inspiration. Cloud Imperium Games has made a universe that lends itself to storytelling. Not just because of their own great and talented lore team. Their lore team paints a vivid picture of what is going on in the verse and that has only added fuel to an already intensely burning desire to create, but its also my experiences with friends. That is what is worth writing about.
Now my writing of fiction in the past has been basically just rough drafts and first-hand scribbles. Nothing I really sank a lot of time into or invested a lot of thought. So when I first started writing Star Citizen fan fiction, it was just stories from my experiences in-game. I allowed myself for a moment to remember what it was like as a little boy sitting in a box in my living room pretending I was in space. I put myself in my character's shoes and thought about "what if this was real?"
This is what started my new process. I was now taking writing fiction seriously and I was dedicated time, effort, and planning into making this work. What I decided to do was, adapt stories of my friends and I playing Star Citizen, into a blend of both "actual" (virtual) events mixed in with a fictional backstory.
At the time a few of my Org mates had their hands on some Vanguard Wardens and we started to play with them as a group. The large size of the ships and the nature of their mission appealed to us as milsim players. You see we started off a Military Simulation community and evolved into a Star Citizen organization. So when the time came to talk about coming up with a backstory, I started to connect a few dots here and there.
Most of the founding members of Shackleton Enterprises are lifelong friends of mine. Some of these friendships date back to when I was in High school, almost 20 years ago. I have a diverse background of friends from all walks of life, but most of them have one thing in common. They have seen the "Elephant". We have a lot of combat veterans in our mix. I myself was never in the service, but I served in West Africa in a Private Military Company. I was the director of training and logistics for a company called Osprey Security Services. So my time spent in West Africa was spent with actual mercenaries, cutthroats, pirates, and a cannibal or two.
All these friendships, stories, personalities, growing up and seeing changes within ourselves and each other, all of that coupled with an overactive imagination and a game that is like heroin for someone who dreams...and you have the makeup of a story.
The "Vanguards of the Void" was born. A series of novellas covering our adventures as we grow our Organization and experiences in the game. It is a mix of real-life adventures, stories from the past in other games adapted to Star Citizen, the Lore within the Verse, and from the collective imagination of my group. This is without a doubt a collaborative effort, and I am merely doing the effort of connecting all the dots.
So what I have now is, I take what we do in game. I link it to a story that I have started to develop and it basically tells our story. We are a group of Civilians, Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, and I even think we have a coastie floating around. We have known each other many decades and have followed each other on many adventures, around the world, and around the virtual world. I call on those experiences and here is what I have:
The Vanguards of the Void
A group of unlikely heroes, bound and determined to map the vast endless black void of the unknown Univers. They never seem to get where they intend on going. Through these misadventures comes their sense of humor. Those that have been in dark places develop a dark sense of humor and the Vanguards of the Void are without a doubt, dark.
The First book of the series is entitled Ugly but Well Hung and chronicles the formation of this friendship. A group of Navy Pilots from the UEE are stationed along the outer rim in a series of Frontier Outposts. They are tasked with providing security to a group of former mercenaries, now contracted explorers, Shackelton Enterprises.
The Naval squadrons on the Frontier are known as Vanguard Squadrons. Part of the focus will be on two rookie pilots, "Badger" and "Ripper". They are former Hornet pilots who got themselves into a little bit of trouble. Bounced out of their dream position as hot dog pilots in a Hornet squadron, they are assigned to a Vanguard Squadron. Squadron 143, the Pukin' Dogs.
Teaser
I am growing near the completion of the first book. So to wet your whistle a bit and to show you a little behind the scenes here is a little Excerpt from the first chapter of TheVanguards of the Void: Ugly But Well Hung :
(Text in this color, represents an excerpt from the book)
“Hey...Badger...”
“What?”
“Do you think it will fit?”
“What...through that? No...its not going to fit...”
“Oh, ye have little faith...”
Pressing the throttle forward causing the engines to whine and howl like a demon possessed, Ripper, squints his eyes and with his cocky tell-tale fighter pilot grin (The kind of grin one can only obtain by truly believing they are a living god) as he aims his Hornet fighter on his intended flight path. The path of course was set between two rather large pillars of rock that jutted out from the canyon below.
The Canyon was carved out from some ancient river that flowed through this now desolate, red and dusty moon. A tiny stream was all it took to carve out this massive gash across the barren moonscape, eroding away the rock and sediment over the course of millions of decades. The two pillars were made by the winds, an unseen but driven force that also chipped away at the seemingly indestructible rock. Time is what shaped this landscape, time and patience.
For Ripper, Time and Patience were “four-letter words”. He was a man of action, quick thinking, snap judgments, and clear action. Great qualities for a fighter pilot. You need to be able to process a lot of events and information at once. You need to be a speed reader, a quiz boy champion, a cowboy, and a math major all while straddling a few tons of screaming hate and discontent. So for him, the ideas of “slowing down” or “taking your time” were beyond his radar. Not even a tiny blip. The only thing on his mind right now was...
“How fast you think I can get this fucker to fly between those two Pillars?”
His Hornet now making a screaming run right at the pillars bucked slightly as he puts the spurs to her...kicking on the Afterburner he lets out a yell hearkening back thousands of years to what was once known as the American frontier.
“YEEEEE HAWWWWWWWWW”
Pillars that have stood for millions of years and were carved by both wind and water understood the virtues of patience. It took a long time to mold what they would become so they not only demand your respect. They demand your obedience. An object that approaches an immovable object soon finds itself greatly impacted by both speed and time. Especially when that object clearly will not fit between two, rather large, pillar-like objects.
“Caution...Caution...Caution...starboard shield failure, weapon system destroyed, hull damage critical...”
“Oh are you fucking kidding me....this is bullshit..”
What was bullshit to ripper, was a reality for him as well. Badger was confident in his voice when he told his wingman ripper what he thought of his plan...his half ass-ed plan. Seeing the incident from his safe, and higher vantage point, Badger saw the tip of Ripper's hornet clip the edge of one of the pillars. The blue pules of his shield indicted that there was an attempt to stop a foreign object from penetration. The shield was apparently not rated to stop “mesas” and penetration was achieved. The pillars that took so long to mold, made quick work of the tip of the hornets metal frame. Sheering it off and taking with it one of the craft's weapons hard points, and laser cannon. As they spun off and impacted below the shock wave of the explosion cause the hornet to pitch up violently and to the right. Throwing it off course and into an uncontrollable spin.
“What?”
“Do you think it will fit?”
“What...through that? No...its not going to fit...”
“Oh, ye have little faith...”
Pressing the throttle forward causing the engines to whine and howl like a demon possessed, Ripper, squints his eyes and with his cocky tell-tale fighter pilot grin (The kind of grin one can only obtain by truly believing they are a living god) as he aims his Hornet fighter on his intended flight path. The path of course was set between two rather large pillars of rock that jutted out from the canyon below.
The Canyon was carved out from some ancient river that flowed through this now desolate, red and dusty moon. A tiny stream was all it took to carve out this massive gash across the barren moonscape, eroding away the rock and sediment over the course of millions of decades. The two pillars were made by the winds, an unseen but driven force that also chipped away at the seemingly indestructible rock. Time is what shaped this landscape, time and patience.
For Ripper, Time and Patience were “four-letter words”. He was a man of action, quick thinking, snap judgments, and clear action. Great qualities for a fighter pilot. You need to be able to process a lot of events and information at once. You need to be a speed reader, a quiz boy champion, a cowboy, and a math major all while straddling a few tons of screaming hate and discontent. So for him, the ideas of “slowing down” or “taking your time” were beyond his radar. Not even a tiny blip. The only thing on his mind right now was...
“How fast you think I can get this fucker to fly between those two Pillars?”
His Hornet now making a screaming run right at the pillars bucked slightly as he puts the spurs to her...kicking on the Afterburner he lets out a yell hearkening back thousands of years to what was once known as the American frontier.
“YEEEEE HAWWWWWWWWW”
Pillars that have stood for millions of years and were carved by both wind and water understood the virtues of patience. It took a long time to mold what they would become so they not only demand your respect. They demand your obedience. An object that approaches an immovable object soon finds itself greatly impacted by both speed and time. Especially when that object clearly will not fit between two, rather large, pillar-like objects.
“Caution...Caution...Caution...starboard shield failure, weapon system destroyed, hull damage critical...”
“Oh are you fucking kidding me....this is bullshit..”
What was bullshit to ripper, was a reality for him as well. Badger was confident in his voice when he told his wingman ripper what he thought of his plan...his half ass-ed plan. Seeing the incident from his safe, and higher vantage point, Badger saw the tip of Ripper's hornet clip the edge of one of the pillars. The blue pules of his shield indicted that there was an attempt to stop a foreign object from penetration. The shield was apparently not rated to stop “mesas” and penetration was achieved. The pillars that took so long to mold, made quick work of the tip of the hornets metal frame. Sheering it off and taking with it one of the craft's weapons hard points, and laser cannon. As they spun off and impacted below the shock wave of the explosion cause the hornet to pitch up violently and to the right. Throwing it off course and into an uncontrollable spin.
This, of course, leads to a series of ass chewings, and if there is something that I love to write or see on film, its a good ass chewing. I could not include a teaser without including part of the epic ass chewing that follows.
“He tried to shoot a gap he should not have. He asked me if I thought it would fit and I replied in the negative. He proceeded to try anyway and failed. In doing so he impacted his starboard wing onto a rather large pillar jutting out from the surface of a canyon we were flying inside...”
Badger trailed off as the C.O.'s head snapped up in anger.
“We? So...you were right there with him...”
“Aye sir, we were flying the canyon to better aquatint...”
“You were being hot dogs...don't bullshit me.”
Watching the C.O.'s face Badger knew he would not be able to cover for himself or Ripper.
“Sir I would never bullshit you, we were absolutely being hot dogs.”
“Okay Hotdog #1, since you were in charge you get to be #1...proceed...”
“...at the point of impact Ripper lost most of the end section of his wing taking with hit a missile rack and a weapons hardpoint...I believe it was a laser cannon...made a helluva explosion when it went up...you should...”
Seeing no signs of life on the planet that was the face of his now, beet red, superior officer, Badger decided not to finish that sentence, clears his throat and continues forward.
“The explosion from the weapons caused Ripper's Hornet...”
“The fuck did you just say? Rippers what? Hornet? That isn't his fucking Hornet you arrogant egocentric cocky little shit...that is the United Earth Empires fucking Hornet! The 12th StarFleets fucking hornet! The 185th Squadron's Hornet! In other words, it's my god damn Hornet, so let's get that fucking clear right now. He broke MY fucking Hornet. Not his. I let him borrow the Navy's Hornet to do a job, that was not his property to fucking bend.”
Badger trailed off as the C.O.'s head snapped up in anger.
“We? So...you were right there with him...”
“Aye sir, we were flying the canyon to better aquatint...”
“You were being hot dogs...don't bullshit me.”
Watching the C.O.'s face Badger knew he would not be able to cover for himself or Ripper.
“Sir I would never bullshit you, we were absolutely being hot dogs.”
“Okay Hotdog #1, since you were in charge you get to be #1...proceed...”
“...at the point of impact Ripper lost most of the end section of his wing taking with hit a missile rack and a weapons hardpoint...I believe it was a laser cannon...made a helluva explosion when it went up...you should...”
Seeing no signs of life on the planet that was the face of his now, beet red, superior officer, Badger decided not to finish that sentence, clears his throat and continues forward.
“The explosion from the weapons caused Ripper's Hornet...”
“The fuck did you just say? Rippers what? Hornet? That isn't his fucking Hornet you arrogant egocentric cocky little shit...that is the United Earth Empires fucking Hornet! The 12th StarFleets fucking hornet! The 185th Squadron's Hornet! In other words, it's my god damn Hornet, so let's get that fucking clear right now. He broke MY fucking Hornet. Not his. I let him borrow the Navy's Hornet to do a job, that was not his property to fucking bend.”
The Inspiration
Here is a video that shows what led to this story. Org mates and I were just flying around Daymar, showboating and having some fun. We decided to have a little race and it ended up not going so well. From that and coming up with a fun and engaging story. I also, of course, draw on a lot of movies that I love, I am after all writing what I want to read and what my friends want to read. I just also hope, that you want to read it...and enjoy what I have come up with.
I should be done with my first book around the time 3.1 is released for Star Citizen. I will post more updates and show more inspiration for the story behind the story.
are you allowed to sell it?
ReplyDeleteAs far as I know...I guess when I get sued I will know for sure LOL
DeleteTo expand on that, I suppose I will have to wait and see. https://robertsspaceindustries.com/fandom
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