Announcement: Concerning the Inspector Wolfe Tales

Friends! Readers! Bloggermen! Lend me your ears;

I come to bury Wolfe, not to praise him.

The evil that men do lives after them;

The good is often interred with their bones;

Let it be so with Wolfe.

-Adapted from Mark Antony's speech, Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare

It is true, readers. I am discontinuing the Inspector Wolfe Tales. I shall be supplementing my blog instead with poetry and writing. Inspector Wolfe will live on, but I will not be posting any more of his lore.

The reasoning behind this decision is simple: since the Inspector Wolfe Tales was so long, it was hard for new readers to be incoporated into the blog, when all they saw was "Part 64,000,000" on the very top post. So, I shall discontinue it. I will post stories, poetry, and thoughts of various types on here, and try to be more consistent in my posting, but the Wolfe will be no more, except in the tab above, where I will fill in all of his saga that has been posted for anyone who wants to read it. But there will be no new installments, no clues, no leads, no suspects, no cucumbers, no sporks or spork-hats.

Here lies our friend, the Inspector

James Hamilton Wolfe

(2012-2013)

May he ever rest in peace

The Fall of Marduk Thunderfist

ATTENTION YE READERS!

This is a poem I wrote a long time ago. I have a lot of nonsense words, interpret those as you will. Thus I am classifying it as nonsense poetry. It is to be read in an Irish or Scottish accent for best results.

The Fall of Marduk Thunderfist

By JW Ball

In Frockentime my dear

They slordeled our flocks of rode

They reigned in torible sneer

And the moniring banks had flowed.

Vendar Frockenschlammer

That iron fist of woe

Didst Marduk of amour

In battle fight and so

The florting cries aloud,

"My love, hast thou been strowned?"

But yet in shatter found,

The body of a king.

As Marduk Thunderfist

In torible torror stood,

From whence, yea, from berist!

That flongen traitor would

End good Marduk's short life.

Cry, "Banter and abroad,

Our bloodish fields didst nod,"

For Marduk swornen fell.

Dead he bled on the bulgy green,

The battle brought him dead,

His body still unseen,

Nor yet his scarlet head.

And forthwith the tumneys

Crowed, "Crockle and a fell,"

Marduk was in the dell,

And smitten lay he there.

The Prossian armies won;

The Flangish tide was beat,

And the battle, it was done.

A shepherd's sheep did bleat,

And so Marduk was found:

"Thou didst with ardor fight;

Carry him home tonight."

And the cock didst woery gow-bray.

In Frockentime my dear

They slordeled our flocks of rode

They reigned in torible sneer

O'er Marduk's old abode.

Broomstick - Part Sixteen (+ CONTEST WINNER)

Welcome to Inkweb! I have a few announcements to make before we begin.

FIRST, I have selected a winner for my contest (in the post below this)! I mulled over the choices, and the winner is.....HYPERLINKZER!!!! His blog is Livin' on the Edge and he came up with a fine character. I will use his character as a police officer in my Camp NaNoWriMo July novel! Congratulations, Hyper!

It has also come to my alarmed attention that the mobile template of my blog has a white background! All of my posts previous to changing the template of the computer version of my blog have been in white! Thus, on my mobile template, my blog was completely unreadable. Two days ago, this alarming fact came to my attention. I don't control my blog through a phone, so I didn't realize this problem until I had mulled over my new blog template. I realized in alarm what I had done, but I've fixed it. No longer are any of my posts written in white! They will now be readable on a phone. Anyway, I'm glad I caught that.

Now, on to Inspector Wolfe's investigation, and the Nether World!

---------

I strapped on my black helmet, protective vest, and belt, attaching a piton cord to the last item, just in case any of the readers was confused and thought I attached it to my vest or eyeball or something.

I looked around and saw a red pyramid-like creature trying to fit on a vest and a belt. Eventually Lox came over and told the little guy he could just have an arm strap with a cord attached to it.

We all processed into the portal room, a circular room lit with soft pulsing blue werelights from the floor. A man stood in the middle of the room, wearing a silver robe and holding a wand in his outstretched left hand.

We came in, and Lox locked the door tightly behind us. “Please tether yourselves to the wall.”

I went over to the wall and stuck my piton in a slot at eye level. Others did similarly.

“All right, please be patient,” Lox instructed, “Lenny’s going to perform the spell.”

I heard a low muttering emanating from the center of the room where Lenny the magician stood. It echoed around the room, a deep roiling tone that bounced around in the acoustics of the space while Lenny moved on to a higher tone in his chanting. This higher tone joined the echoes bouncing around the room, harmonizing in perfect synchronization to create a haunting effect of simultaneity.

Lenny’s arm moved, and the werelights changed colors, switching from soothing blue to unnatural emerald, brightness constantly shifting, shadows flitting about.

Then, we weren’t there in that room.

The landscape around me was desolate and dry, and white clouds sped past like unicorns through a purple sky. The clouds were going so fast I had a feeling of vertigo.

The land was flat for what seemed like miles around. I looked back and saw Lox, standing smugly with the others. I took a tentative step toward Lox, my tether dragging along the ground as I did so. Somehow it was still back at that wall in that room. Lenny was there, in front of me, as I took the step. But the room wasn't there.

My foot hit ground, and the landscape suddenly changed. I was on a tall snow-capped peak, the powdery snow falling sideways, driving into me. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky now, and the landscape was sharp and jagged, mountainous. My tether extended downward behind me.

I took another step, and I was suspended in motion, falling into the magma below in a volcano, but then my tether snapped taut and I stopped. As I swung, the molten liquid below turned into water, sea water, crashing on rocks, and I was clinging to a cliff face. I could still see Lox and Lenny and Spoonella and the others, moving around as well. Did they see the same thing as I did? Or did they experience shifting realities completely different?

I tried to yell up to Lox, who was making her way along a ledge farther up the cliff. But no sound came out of my mouth, except the faintest whisper.

I climbed higher, and the scene changed. I was in a dark cave, and there was a light ahead of me, and something rushed by me. I heard a rustle, and two green eyes peered out of the darkness. “I am the Raven,” rasped a voice. There was a rustle like the fluttering of wings, and suddenly the light was extinguished. I gasped and stumbled forward, and I tripped as my tether turned taut once more. The landscape changed.

I was underwater, but not drowning, instead borne along by a current. I could see the pyramid shape beside me, waving his red arms that protruded out of his triangle-like body. I peered into the water’s depths all around me, but could perceive nothing except the water around and the others on the tour.

I looked below me, but there was nothing except the eventual darkness below. Not even sand. I looked around me, but there was no light source. The water’s light became green, and then red, but it seemed to come from the water itself. I tried to shout to Lox, but only a few bubbles came out of my mouth. I cursed inwardly. How was I supposed to ask questions in this environment?

I stepped forward and was borne out of the current, taken onto the wing of a giant eagle. But it wasn’t an eagle; it was made of paper, which melted away into tiny scraps that became multiple shadows of myself, laughing and pointing at me. I stepped forward across white space and into a tawny canyon, and into a maze of blue columns with different designs, all of them rotating around the base of the structure. ∆˚∫çµΩ, was one of the patterns. Some of them were indistinguishable, and I didn’t think I fully perceived much of the symbols; they were too otherworldly.

I stepped to the side and was upside down walking along the bottom of a blade of grass. I saw Lox above, or rather, below me, and I jumped toward her. The world shifted, and I was pulled sideways into a crumbling house, away from her. I twisted in midair and changed directions, spinning slowly to the ground as I landed on a cubelike platform protruding from a blue plane that stretched ever on into the distance where a pink sun was setting. The others were on similar shapes. I saw Plate-O with eyes wide, groping forward.

I moved towards Lox but the land changed, and I was falling through a dark liquid, and music was playing, a soft music that was dark as well and didn’t make sense. Lox was in the distance. “I just want to ask you something,” I whispered, but she didn’t hear me. The Nether was a nightmare.

I moved forward, and the music turned into the twittering of birds, and I was atop a dandelion in a grassy field, and the other dandelions crowded around me. I saw the others bouncing along them, but I took a step and plunged straight down. My tether seemed to follow me, so I guessed I wasn’t actually moving, but it felt like it. Everyone moved with me, and I retained the same perspective.

Suddenly I passed through fire, and I ran forward. I crossed a desert in one step into a jungle with the next, bounded down a snowy hill into a valley full of cherries and then twisted directions and was falling sideways into a giant dark pit, climbing up out of it and into a mountain range, swimming upward and plunging into a forest of gray. Sometimes the tether tugged, others it bent and moved with me, but always it stayed, and I always saw the others. This was the Nether realm. It was amazingly complex. I hadn’t even gone more than a few feet judging by the length of my tether, and yet I had completely lost myself in the folds of this dimension. How could Alice Shipton even begin to fathom its complex structure? It was clear that she couldn’t have mapped it all, or solved all its mysteries. She may have explained a part of it, but most of it would remain a mystery forever. This realm was not merely that which transported magic; it was magic, the very essence and well of magic, the soul of magic. And Alice was within its depths. Of course she couldn’t survive for long in this, because this was pure magic. There was no way to live here for a prolonged period.

And then there was a shrill whistlelike sound, and it all disappeared, and I stumbled back into reality.

Lenny had brought us back from the Nether world. That sounded funny in my head.

“As you can see,” Lox announced, “the Nether is almost more complicated than one might have first imagined. Every step you take is a step through another world. The Nether’s movements are highly unpredictable, and even Alice Shipton herself once was lost on one of her famous explorations, but using her expertise she managed to relocate her tether and come back to reality. Her discoveries have helped, but the Nether realm is still far too complex for us to navigate without difficulty.”

I nodded and looked around the room, now lit in blue once more. The ducklings were looking around, starry-eyed, at their surroundings, dizzied by their recent experience.

            “All right!” Lox cheered. “Let’s go back to the other room, and I’ll take questions.”

Song 2

The title of this post will seem completely unconnected to anything I'm writing about hereafter, but trust me, it is. It's connected with how I got the inspiration for the plot of my July novel.

Yes, I am participating in the July session of Camp NaNoWriMo. I know I told T. Granger, one of my followers here on Inkweb and a good friend, and Z. Baner, also a good friend and follower of this blog through JTZ Baner, that I would be waiting until November to put into action my very first novel of this genre, but inspiration struck, and, well, when the muse takes hold, it can get very hard to wait for the right moment to put pen to paper, face to desk, fingers to keyboard, plot bunny to burrowing, brother to bed, and mind to the task. Not necessarily in that order.

So, I'm doing Camp NaNoWriMo. What's that? You looked up my blog, you can look up NaNoWriMo. So there. I've posted the links several times and I'm not going to do it this time. So open a new tab, look it up, and then read on.

Anyway, for my July 2013 project, I am going to write my very first science fiction novel. I believe the genre I will be writing in will not properly qualify as space opera, seeing as it only has a few main characters, a few not-necessarily-so-bad-after-all bad guys, no gigantic space armadas, and tons of nachos. Also, no Sith Lords. But it involves space travel, lots of planets throughout the galaxy, and stereotypically cannibalistic tribal warriors, as of my thoughts so far.

As a special sneak peek, I'll tell you a little bit of what I've thought out so far. It involves a man named (blank) who is on the run from (blank) and happens to find a young companion named (blank) on the way, who comes along with him to help on his quest to (blank), along the way being shot at, flung across the galaxy, trapped in the airlock, and declared the god of death by a bunch of stereotypically cannibalistic tribal warriors, not to mention flying through asteroid fields and all that good stuff. I've got a few details to sketch in, but I've got half a month to do it, and then the writing starts. So what am I telling you this for? You can help me along the way.

I need a character. This character is a galactic police officer and needs to be a compelling character. So, here's what I need:

• Name for said police officer (along with gender; plus, he/she has to be human, so make it reasonable)
• Planet of origin for said police officer
• Description of planet of origin for said police officer (he/she has to be human, though, so make it inhabitable)
• Description of said police officer (i.e. height, skin color, etc.)
• Quirky small fact about police officer's likes/dislikes

Got it? I'll pick my favorite and announce whose answer I've picked in an upcoming announcement. Get your answer to me by email: smiling_pint@yahoo.com

Joel out. *static crackles*

Broomstick - Part Fifteen

Everyone got up, and Lox motioned to a door, walking over and opening it for everyone. “If you’ll please step into this next room,” she remarked. I realized that she was the girl I had scried, whom I hadn’t seen. Very eager girl.

I went into the next room, which was filled with diagrams hanging on the walls, as well as protective vests and helmets that were meant to show the kind of gear that spelunkers and explorers wore.

“We’ll start,” Lox said, “with a brief explanation of the history of the Nether exploration trade. The Nether was discovered eighty years ago by a scientist named Victor E. Ismyne, a bear working in quantum magic theory and also the grandfather of Papa Ismyne, the manager of this company. Victor was the first to conjecture that magic did not travel through material means, through the air, but rather he theorized that magic existed in an entirely different dimension which was mostly closed off to normal people, but which affected everything in our lives.” Lox showed off a few old portraits of Victor E. Ismyne; he was a stately gray bear with large glasses on his head and a monogrammed cane in his hand.

“Let’s fast-forward about eight years. By this time Ismyne’s Theorem was largely accepted by the general scientific population,” Lox informed us, “but we had yet to cross dimensions and prove that the Nether realm existed. A man named Bert Norrell, a magician of high repute, worked out a spell that could enable magic to transport a human through the Nether realm. The theories that have developed concerning exploration of this new dimension have come to be known as Norrell’s Laws, and gateways to the Nether are sometimes called Norrell’s Doors.

“Norrell’s followers improved his spell and soon they came to have a sophisticated tool for travelling through the Nether. However, they did not know the effects of Nether travel quite yet, and so they preferred to sit back and ponder what little experience they had of the Nether realm.” Lox paused and smiled at the assembled guests. I heard the ducklings’ pencils scratching as they took notes for their field trip; the dish was simply staring at Spoonella and was not paying attention. I smiled back at Lox.

Lox continued. “Eh-hem. Anyway, an apprentice of Norrell thought that his master was too cautious with these new theories. He put on a helmet and some knee-pads and opened a gate and plunged through. He was never seen again.

“More cautious exploration was developed in his tradition, but with proper safety measures,” Lox explained. “Spelunkers took on the name Strangers, supposedly because the reckless apprentice was named Strange. That has never been confirmed. Anyway, slowly it was recognized that there was a pattern to the shifting of the Nether currents. Explorations were risky, though, because the pattern was never fully understood and often people were stranded in the Nether due to the uncontrollable effect of magic.

“However, just as Nether exploration was fading, and people stopped funding spelunkers, a young woman named Alice Shipton came along. She was a daring explorer, and eventually charted the flows of the Nether and how it moved.” Now this was the interesting part. She might contact me at any moment, and I needed to understand how the Nether worked. Lox continued, pointing to a diagram, “she figured out how magic is altered in the Nether dimension and how that same effect, called the Shipton Factor, could account for the seemingly unpredictable flow of the Nether. Now, thanks to her work, the Nether is safe for some tourism, so that even inexperienced beginners can see how it works.”

“Good for me,” I chuckled as Lox finished.

“Why’s that?” she asked, narrowing her eyes as she looked at me.

“Well, because I’m inexperienced...” I trailed off, then picked up again, “...and a beginner...”

“Oh.” Lox nodded and raised her voice to everyone in the room. “All right, let’s move to the preparation station!” I grimaced. Did everything rhyme around here?

Broomstick - Part Fourteen

I apologize for the delay in posting; I was preoccupied with other things yesterday and could not post on the last day of the month as usual.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I took a cab back to the Sleazy Fox and borrowed an address tome to look something up. I also rented out a scry bowl for about fifteen minutes. I found what I was looking for in the tome and scried “All-Weather Tethered Nether Tours, Inc.”

“Hello,” answered a frighteningly attentive young woman’s voice on the other line. “All-Weather Tethered Nether Tours, my name’s Lox, how can I help you?”

I peered into the bowl but only saw a chandelier and the back of an office chair. “Uh,” I faltered.

“Yes?” answered the very pert person on the other end.

“Uh, yes,” I said, “I’d like to go on a tour.”

“Oh, OF COURSE!” exclaimed the voice. She seemed ecstatic. “Of course, of course, of course, of course! Do prices bother you?”

“Yes,” I answered. “Just give me the cheapest full tour you have, I’ll pay when I get there.”

“Of course,” replied the voice with a sweet quality that made me think this girl didn’t quite understand the meaning of the word “reality.” She continued, “Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Uh,” I asked, “what time do I get there?”

“Oh!” she exclaimed, and there was a short silence as she, I presumed, looked through their tour schedule. “How early can you be here? We’ve got a reservation for fifteen minutes from now, it’s the full deal, if you can make it. Also half price!” She practically squealed this information at me, as if I had found her lost dog Foo-Foo. “But that might be too early. There’s one in three weeks, and there’s also one tomorrow. Those are your other options.”

“Actually,” I said, “I think I can make it to the one in fifteen minutes.”

“Ooh,” she said, “Papa bear. I would have taken the one tomorrow. All right, well, see you there!” Right before the line disconnected, I thought I heard another thump, and someone shouting awfully loudly, “SOMEONE’S BEEN USING MY DESK!!!!”

I shook my head, replaced the scry bowl and the address tome, and bade Woody goodbye before going up to my room and ransacking it of all the money I had on hand. I had a hunch that this tour would cost quite a lot and I would be eating bread and noodles for the next six weeks as I recovered financially. Oh well. After the investigation I would be getting paid for consulting, so that should hopefully cover expenses.

I went out to the street and hailed a cab. “All-Weather Tethered Nether Tours,” I ordered. “I’ll pay you double for speed.” The carriage scooted off as if hell’s minions were chasing it, insuring that I would get to the place on time for the tour.

We got there, and I paid the driver. “Keep the change,” I gasped as I raced out the door and onto the sidewalk. A bright orange sign, some clear orange tubing with werelights bouncing around inside, proclaimed, “ALL WEATHER TETHERED NETHER TOURS” in large capital letters. This was it.

I ran into the office and saw a huge bear behind the desk in the lobby. Her hair was light brown and fuzzy, a kindly smile lit her face, and perched on her long canine snout was a pair of wire-frame spectacles. “How may I help you, sir?” she asked. “Are you here for the tour?”

I looked around the lobby, nodding. “Yeah,” I said as I surveyed the occupants of the room. There was a spoon with four limbs and a face, sitting next to a similarly animated plate. They looked amorously into each other’s eyes, and I noticed they were holding hands. Next, I saw a large duck with her little toddler ducklings, all sitting attentively on a sofa. I guessed it was a field trip. I saw a few other people, a frog, a man, some sort of jumble of geometric shapes, and a mouse in the corner reading a newspaper.

I paid for the trip and then sat down in the waiting area, next to the dish and the spoon. Music came on that sounded so generic to a waiting room or an elevator that I wanted to kill myself, and then a minute or so after I sat down, the spoon and the plate started kissing. I looked the other way, feeling very awkward.

About three minutes in, some angry utensils burst into the room, and the plate and spoon hid behind the couch. A furious fork yelled, “Where’s Spoonella? I’ll get that rascal Plate-o!” They all ran out, and the dish and spoon came back to their seats. “I hope your parents don’t find out we ran away together,” Spoonella whispered to Plate-o. I concealed my derisive laughter with a well-timed sneeze and an arm over my mouth.

After about ten minutes of waiting, a young woman came out from the back hallway of the building. She was dressed in a black dress with an All-Weather Tethered Nether Tours logo embroidered on the shoulder, and her long curly hair was as bright golden blonde as I had ever seen on someone’s head before. “Hello, everyone, my name is Lox,” she smiled, “and I’ll be your tour guide.”