Grey Hat Commentary: Interlude #1 · 6:54pm Mar 2nd, 2015
This entry contains spoilers for Grey Hat. Be warned...
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I must be getting Alzheimer's or something, because I have no idea when I started to make these. The only thing I can recall is that I wanted to give the universe as a whole appear as vast as I possibly could. A piece that’s become critical to how we function now is, of course, the internet. You’re seeing these very lines over its series of tubes.
Who really knows how big that map is. It’s one of the most untamed wilds we have. It is as vast, knowledgeable, and incredibly stupid as we think it is and more. So much has spawned form it. So many job opportunities, criminal enterprises, and some strange fandoms.
Taking once again from my waifu Shadowrun, this chapter is borrowed from the Shadowlands chatroom, for which my chatroom shares the same name, as I don’t know too much about the Jackpoint just yet. There are several nodes all across the world where people can jack in and chat along with the others. Captain Chaos, another name I borrow (I assure you I do not take the Captain’s personality with him. It’s just my little nod to the netrunner), FastJack, Dodger, The Laughing Man. In a world dominated by a corporate presence, this is the place where information runs free like a river, and where the weak fight back against those that would suppress them.
The chatroom itself does have several characters that will and won’t be appearing in real life. I can’t tell you which, as that completely defeats the purpose of having an internet handle to begin with. We know for a fact that King Kludge and DaemonJack have appeared before, but who are these others? Just like I stated in the previous commentary, everyone has their own story. Only text this may be, I know what everyone does. Each and every person has a distinct personality in the chatroom. True to life, some of these avatars are under the Proteus Effect when in the Shadowlands.
I crafted these little interludes for a few reasons. The first was to give the fanfiction a bit of much-needed comedy. I’m not a funny person, both online and off. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’m showing some signs of mental unbalance. Still, I kept at it and included all the stupid jokes, filthy mouths, and lolcats as I could. Bone Collector’s stupid sense of humor and posting porn to ZomZom, for instance. Jack’s line at the end. It’s not that my comedy is bad... well, it kinda is, but I just have serious trouble in coming up with any decent humor. It was never my strong suit, and the chatlogs provide me with a great shift in mood to make it feel more natural.
Secondly, the chatlogs were to make the universe feel larger. Cyberspace is large and it contains so much, so what people do online is a valid concern, especially in a cyberpunk future. What do these people do when no one is watching? Are these their true feelings or not?
Thirdly, given that the chat logs are not required reading for the story, I included some interesting and fun little secrets for those that do decide to read them. A lot of hints at future events, including the central conflict coming up, are hidden in the chat logs long before the main storyline comes across them. If you can find them, that is.
Lastly, think of it as a friendly bit of sport. Some of these characters have real lives, and some of them appear in my story. I’m not going to tell you who is who, but think of it like a scavenger hunt. I’ve dropped a few clues to their personalities, likes, dislikes, and characters traits. Maybe even a couple ponies are among the ranks.
As for content, there’s really not much to say. The whole point, save for the secret hints, is that there was no point. It’s just a bunch of users bullshitting with each other. Synergy, yes that Synergy, is grumpy due to increased security. King Kludge is the resident goofball. There appears to be a little animosity towards Bone Collector. ZomZom hates new guys, DaemonJack, Bone Collector... pretty much everybody. My only real restriction I put on myself was that I needed to talk about the actual story at some point, thus the shift from talks about security to ponies.
I tried to keep the general randomness and interconnected lines of thought that connect most chatroom conversations together. One topic starts, then another comes do to a small facet of that being talks about, etcetera etcetera. It forms one long chain of ideas and thoughts that don’t often come back together to the source.
I had to keep it with some measure of coherence. I couldn’t have the room devolve into anarchy because this is still literature. It has to have a point, even if that point is to show that it no longer has a point. On the other hand, it’s still a chat room and what I wrote needed to be to a certain level of... chaos. Spelling mistakes, dick jokes, trolls, mods stepping in; I needed to balance the forces of law and chaos. I think it worked out well. The chapter is legible and still has that feeling of dirtiness I wanted. Yes, all the spelling mistakes are intentional. I swear.
In terms of story, the only real points of interest are their own individual thoughts on the matter, and DaemonJack’s bombshell at the end. Still, everything was like herding cats. I don’t have too many users in the chat room right now, but I certainly have more in later interludes. Connecting all of these guy’s thoughts and responses was hard. Shirotora beat me to the punch on revealing Twilight’s marriage, but only because he posts three days earlier than I do. I wrote my chapter first, so suck it!One obstacle for developing each character was balancing what they could/would say. I’m an architect, so if something was going to be said later, I needed to set the proper foundation for them to actually say it. The very nature of the chat room makes what I can say a little more robust than normal, but everything needed a reason. If they say something OOC, maybe something happened IRL to them to cause a shift. Still this was fun to make, from the less than altruistic motives a few of them hold, to the discussion they have surrounding Twilight at the end. The mix of views came very natural to me, and i look forward t making more in the future.
