labingi | Entries tagged with ghanior

Chapters 1-6 on AO3

Chapter 7

Our Journey, Day 9, Continued

In the evening's cool, I hugged the fire, the beach rocks hard beneath me.

"It's a dangerous tech that makes you see dreams you can't snap out of," said Nyra as she stirred the pot. The smell of her stew almost dispelled our troubles. She was the hand of reality reaching into our dreams.

She and Lastri'nom maybe.

"Yes, it is," I said to her, then went on in Vunizh, "But was it caused by our tech? Tanez do you think you saw into Jana itself or...?"

"Or had a psychotic break?" He smiled.

The joke did not amuse Lastri'nom.

"It could well be Jana," said Glin. "The fact that we're being slammed doesn't mean our jae bands are inactive. We could be receiving input from Jana."

"Without consciously directing our minds toward Jana?" Anger colored Lastri'nom's voice. "That would be without precedent": would be frightening, he meant.

"It's not. You know it's not," said Tanez. "My father has spontaneously felt the presence of Jana almost since you First Walkers began."

"Your father has a unique connection to Jana. Everyone knows that."

"Still," said Glin, "one case doesn't equal unprecedented. Slamming's been rare too till now."

"Chi'anové?" I asked.

"It could be," he said sleepily. If anything, the idea of being connected to Jana comforted him.

Glin picked up a piece of sandstone and starting filing her nails. The sound of the tide rolled in to us like a giant's sleeping breath. The beach, blanketed in placid gray, was nothing now except itself. It carried no flavor of dreams.( Read more... )

Chapters 1-5 on AO3

Chapter 6

Our Journey, Day 8

For three days, we had crossed a terrain of steep, coastal hillsides, often with a mere depression in the rock for a trail. The scrabbling took a toll on Chi'anové. His legs ached and sweat clung around his eyes, his frustration compounded by hurt pride: he was a skilled rock climber; aside from Jana, climbing was his prime element. But now that his health was defeating him, no one saw his talent. Again, he was misjudged--or so he thought. In fact, Nyra noted his poise, and seeing how he struggled when he ought to have outstripped us alerted her to his illness. I didn't tell him that; he chafed under her attention.

But she asked me about it as we gathered kindling, and I explained what I could: that sickness was building up inside him and he needed a machine to cleanse it.

The idea filled her with pity and revulsion. "If he were of our folk, we'd let him die. We don't hold with machines to stave off death."

I nodded. "'Let die.'" It was one of the most famous Kiri precepts, the admonition not to cling to things beyond their time. "But if he were one of you, he would never have been a Walker."

"That's so." Nyra cracked a stick hard across her knee. "Thus, he wouldn't be ill."( Read more... )

Chapters 1-5 on AO3

Chapter 5

I awoke to clamor, floundering in the water. A moment later, I woke truly on dry sand, woke to agony, throbbing, nauseous, his mind gasping, I did it, but where?, and a need to hide till the lightning in the brain stopped and sight was possible. And fear from us all, and cries and chatter.

A handlight clicked on--Chi'anové's. I groped for mine. So did Glin, and then three lights shown on the man crumpled by the embers of our fire.

I recall Tanez next to him, Tanez's voice, sharp, "It's Ghanior. He's a friend."

Ghanior? 'Ghanior Lastri'nom? The Director of the Walking Program. One of the First Walkers, the first generation. He had Walked to us--or been slammed, a thin, middle-aged man in a blue-black sy'gad's uniform, the second highest rank in the Ash'tor; he had come in Ash'tor's name.( Read more... )

Chapter 1, Notes, and Acknowledgements
Chapter 2

Chapter 3: Learning English

Ghanior did not like to admit, even to himself, how afraid he was. What frightened him was nothing more than physical pain, the banal intruder into his higher consciousness. An Ash'torian soldier should not operate in that domain, like an animal. A man who had nothing but duty left had no right to balk at performing his duty. But he was tired of hurting. He had hurt from the moment his ship had Walked through, and even though the ship had been programmed to follow the current and Ghanior's own Jana band had been minimally active, Jana had kicked him in the gut as always. And since he'd Walked to Ishan's house, he hadn't thrown off the pain behind his eyes. And now he had to hook his head into this damn machine.

In the waning afternoon, he sat in the dust and ate half a sandwich, torn between hunger and the virtual certainty he'd throw up when this language printer stuck into his nervous system. He welcomed the wilted leaves and soggy bread and overprocessed meat-like product. Good food would only have made him remember the possibility of relaxation.

Ishan and Mei paced up and down like spiders weaving a web from the central axis of the ship, testing the range of his makeshift diffractor. He kept pulling his eyes forcibly off Ishan. He looked so young, so not very different from the boy who'd fallen into Jana all those years ago. A decade ago he'd returned (like a dream), like a ghost... like the long-fleeing brother. Even the cut of the long, black hair he let fall around his shoulders was the same. Ghanior planted his eyes on the ship.( Read more... )

I've been putting off posting this for way too long, waiting to get it fully polished, but it's as polished as it will be for a while. Doubtless I'll go back and re-edit in times to come. For those who've been primarily reading my X-Men posts, no relation between Eriks.

Summary/Teaser: Erik had no memory of his life before awaking five years ago in a dream called America. Now a man from another planet, who claims to be from his past, is telling him it isn't a dream at all. (M/M here and there.) Also on AO3

The Dying Cycle

Chapter 1 plus notes

Chapter 2: Three Walkers

Erik stayed out till midnight. Matt wasn't at home, wasn't at the Domino, wasn't out in the woods behind Kingsley School. It went without saying he wasn't answering his phone. Erik made the rounds three times, then waited up by his apartment another hour. Finally, he bummed a piece of paper off a SmartMart clerk and left a note telling him Asoiya was alive. The fact that Matt had never told Erik her name, even in his dreams, should sell the authenticity of it, if Matt remembered her name... which he would.

Erik pushed the note through his mail slot and went home. The idea that Asoiya had survived depressed him. He recognized envy as an old pattern with his life, even in the absence of all but five years of memory. Or was "jealousy" a better word? He'd just lost Matt, and it made him bitter. Was that so reprehensible?

At home, he found Ghanior asleep on the couch. He didn't stir as Erik came in, which seemed a bad sign. Ghanior ought to be a light sleeper, especially in a strange place. A memory stirred, no, not a concrete memory, more a realization.

I know this because we used to be roommates. No, we had other roommates. We were never roommates.

It was all made up anyway; it had to be. That thought alone made it manageable.

Erik sat on the coffee table and watched the night-lit outline of Ghanior's face. The low light softened the years and resurrected his beauty. And that was bad too. Erik went to bed.( Read more... )

This is an original science-fantasy novel, set in the same universe as my novel, Perdita, and my in-process film, The Hour before Morning. I do hope someone will take a chance and read a bit despite its not being fic.

Summary/Teaser: Erik had no memory of his life before awaking five years ago in a dream called America. Now a man from another planet, who claims to be from his past, is telling him it isn't a dream at all. (M/M here and there.) Also on AO3

Many thanks to

louderandlouder for massive, massive beta work. Thanks, too, to

sixish for giving me a fresh reader's insights, and thanks to my in-person writer's group for more fresh (and men's!) insights.

There is/will be quoting of copyrighted texts in this work. This chapter references Dune, Babylon 5, and the 1985 Star Trek novel, The Final Frontier. I disclaim ownership, give credit, and do not profit.

The Dying Cycle

Chapter 1: The Man from Another Dream

Again, he awoke or became aware of himself awake. Again, he'd lost his name. He'd had many once, when there had been ones to name him, but long ago he'd shed those names behind the misty veil.

The same scentless wind blew off the ocean; the same gray clouds swept high. Long ago, the air had been filled with creatures, black wings and claws and bulk; he couldn't remember their shape. Long ago, he had subdued them, or they had slipped into hibernation. Behind him, he knew, lay skeletons, and so he faced the wind. Behind him, a ghost passed, like a moth's white flapping just beyond his feet.

Talya? His depths disgorged the name and an after-glimpse of black-reed hair and bloodless skin.

A hand almost touched his shoulder, then was gone, and Matt said (again), "I hope you realize it's your fault that I've lost her."

I'm so tired of this, he thought.

Then he woke to the other dream.

( Read more... )

From

petronia via

lady_nara:

Pick a character I write, and I will give you the top five ideas/concepts/other I keep in mind while writing that character that I believe are essential to depicting them accurately. This includes both original characters and characters about whom I write fanfic.