The Adventure of Masie's Mind
Kevin L. O'Brien
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Text Copyright 2013 by Kevin L. O'Brien
Cover design and typography copyright 2013 by Kevin L. O'Brien
Trekker-3 Regular font distributed under a free use license by Weatherly Systems, Inc.
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License Notes
Please consider writing a review for this book on the retailer's website.
If you see any misspellings or typographical errors, please notify Kevin L. O'Brien using one of his online social networks. Thank you.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents, including those based on the real world, are either products of the imagination of Kevin L. O'Brien or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Because some ebook platforms do not support special characters, certain words may appear misspelled, but this was done deliberately to avoid the problem of the platforms deleting the characters. Also, the LRF platform used by older models of the Sony Reader does not permit the use of links to external URLs, whereas the PDB platform used by Palm reading devices does not support any form of linking whatsoever.
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Table of Contents
Preface
Masie's Mind
About the Author
Other Books by Kevin L. O'Brien
Connect with Kevin L. O'Brien
Sample Excerpts
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Preface
Eile Chica and Sonne "Sunny" Hiver, who call themselves Team Girl, are the second of my three primary characters, about which I write most of my stories.
My secret vice is webcomics. I follow about two dozen diligently, though I am quick to discard any if I get bored with them. One of my all time favorites was Girly by John Lotshaw. I say "was" because he brought it to a conclusion and no longer draws it. I discovered it while he was doing the final chapter, but between updates I went back and read it from the beginning. I fell in love with Otra and Winter (metaphorically speaking), and being as I had become bored with my sword & sorcery character Medb hErenn, my mind turned to devising fan fiction for the intrepid duo. I asked Mr. Lotshaw for permission, which he granted, and my first story put them in the Dreamlands where they would have an adventure with Medb.
Then something inexplicable happened. I was posting the story in installments on my Medb website and making announcements on Lotshaw's LiveJournal page, and had reached the halfway point, when he demanded that I stop. I mean that literally: he told me to stop in no uncertain terms, and he was somewhat rude about it. He gave no reason, but I acquiesced without complaint and removed my posts from his LJ page. I still don't know why he changed his mind. I thought at first that maybe he had decided to continue Girly in some fashion, but so far he hasn't since the comic folded. I doubt it was jealousy over my story being more popular than his comic; most of his followers on LJ were antagonistic though a few expressed pleasure that Girly might continue in some fashion. More than likely he discovered that he didn't like surrendering creative control to another artist.
Regardless, his revocation left me in a quandary. By then my story was two-thirds finished, and I liked it too much to simply abandon it. So I decided to replace Otra and Winter with characters of my own. To make things simple, I began by simply changing their names, as well as a few details about their appearance and personalities. "Otra" is Spanish for "other", so I chose the Irish word for other, "eile", along with "chica", Spanish for "girl", to make her name "other girl" (which has a certain significance for Girly fans). Since Winter was a blonde, the obvious alternative would have been Summer, but that seemed too close for comfort. Sunny felt like a better fit, but it was also more of a nickname. Fortunately, the German word for sun is "sonne" and pronounced "sony", so I could imagine Americans calling her "sunny". I decided to make her family name Winter as an homage to Girly, but I preferred a non-English version, and the French "hiver" sounded interesting. Hence, her name means "winter sun".
However, as I began to consider their backgrounds, I went far afield of Lotshaw's own stated bio for his characters. For example, I made Eile an orphan who was raised by her maternal uncle, while keeping Sunny's parents as two women. Eile's name led me to make her nationality Irish/Hispanic, which in turn prompted me to make her a distant descendent of Medb herself, through direct matrilineal descent. Meanwhile, Sunny's name suggested a German/French ancestry, but whereas Lotshaw kept the conception of Winter a mystery, I devised an elaborate back-story for Sunny's conception involving a mad scientist named Dr. Mabuse (who gets a prominent mention in this story). I ended up making her mother German and her "father" French, though I threw in a few other nationalities to mix up her genetic pool. I also kept their pet a cat, but I changed the breed and appearance, called her Snowshoe Kitty, and made her sentient in keeping with my fictional nature for cats in my story universe. Finally, I drastically changed the circumstances of how they meet and begin living together, while preserving the theme of Sunny's parents disappearing.
While using Otra and a Winter as a base, I nonetheless gave my imagination free reign as I developed Eile and Sunny's characters, and had a lot of fun doing so. Eile is a tomboy with a temper, who tends to react emotionally, usually with anger or outrage, even in scary situations. If she and Sunny were confronted by an indestructible slasher-killer like Michael Meyers or Jason Voorhees, she would most likely walk up to him, thump him in the chest, and tell him to stop being a butthead. Yet she is shy, and at first was embarrassed to make a public show of affection with Sunny. Speaking of whom, Sunny is a scatterbrained flibbertigibbet with the attention span of a kitten, but she is also very intelligent. Except that she could never finish the test, she would probably test out with a genius IQ. Her motto is ADVENTURE!; in fact, that could be her worldview and guiding philosophy: she can make a trip to the store for bread and milk seem like a quest for the Holy Grail. She is very warm and loving, and almost never gets upset or loses her cool. In fact, in situations that throw others into a panic she can remain icy calm. Her devotion to Eile is beyond question; she called her "partner" virtually from the moment they met. She never curses, using euphemisms like "oh my fabulous gravy", while Eile is more earthy (though she tends to limit himself to "cripes" and "geezus" and "friggin'"). Writing for Sunny is especially fun because she represents a hybrid of my id and inner child; I usually just type out the first silly thing that pops into my head.
Though lovers, they are not true lesbians. Sunny is at best bisexual, but Eile would have never thought twice about girls, and in fact she lost her virginity in college. Instead, I used the biological concept of the mated pair on which to model their relationship. In any species, a mated pair is two individuals, even of the same sex, who perform acts of procreation. What's important to keep in mind is that they would do the same with members of the opposite sex just as readily, if they were not already attached to each other.
This story takes place in February of 2009, about five weeks after they first meet and start living together. They already had a number of adventures, including a run-in with a giant supernatural rat, rescuing Snowshoe Kitty from Dr. Mabuse, and being arrested for vandalism and murder. Its purpose is to introduce a new character that will appear in several future stories, but unlike other Team Girl stories it has no action; in other words, it is character driven instead of plot driven. Rather it serves as an excuse on my part to engage in some "mental masturbation"; that is, some freeform speculation on the nature of sentience, sapience, and consciousness, not unlike that in "The Measure of a Man" from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Only, unlike Data, the subje
ct of this conversation denies she is sentient and accepts her lot as the property of humans.
Fortunately, the Girls have no intention of putting up with that!
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