SCHRIJFWERK

Pale Blue Eye gaat over Cole. Co-piloot van de Yama, een intergalactisch vrachtship. Alles lijkt soepel te verlopen tot Cole en de overige crew langs het oog van neptunus gaan. wat de crew, voor onverklaarbare redenen gek maakt. Het is aan Cole om uit te zoeken wat er aan de hand is, voordat hij zelf ook zijn grip op de realiteit verliest.

Chapter one:

Calm before the storm

The quiet always gets to me in the first week. it gets so bad that I try to find noises. I walk around the halls to hear my own footsteps. I lay my head against the ventilation shafts to hear the turbines turn. Or sit in the control room hoping for an alarm to go off, but eventually I have to go to my chamber. And then it’s quiet again. The agonizing silence tearing me apart. It makes me realize how loud earth is. The trees, the wind, the animals everything made noise.

I lay still on my bed. Staring at the ceiling. I look at my watch, it’s been 4 hours since I tried to fall asleep. Suddenly, I hear a faint scream. Its Rachel, she’s having another nightmare. I slowly get up and put on my slippers. The door slides open, and I knock on the cold metal door across the hallway. “Rachel?” I softly ask. I hear her footsteps nearing the door. She opens the door, her eyes are red and teary, and she has wrapped a blanket around herself. “Are you okay?” She shakes her head. “Do you want to talk about it?” she looks up to me for a split second and wipes her tears away “yeah”. I hold her by the shoulder and guide her to the bed.

I sit her down and walk to her bathroom to grab her a glass of water. I hear her sniffing and come sit beside her, handing her the glass and holding her. “Did you have the nightmare again?” she started to breathe restlessly “I closed my eyes, and I was there again, drifting, nothing to hold onto” she grips her blanket and the glass in her hand starts to shake. I gently take it from her. “Remember that you’re safe in this room, and that there are people that will hold on to you” Rachel grabs my hand and squeezes it, it hurts, but after a few seconds, I hear her breathing calm down. I sit next to her for another hour until she fell asleep on my shoulder. After I put her to bed the silence attacked me again.

I quietly walked to the bridge and knocked on the door opening. Immediately a raspy voice responded, “how’s Rachel?” I walk towards the large command chair in the middle of the room. “Still having nightmares?” the old voice asked. “Yes, but I calmed her down. She’s sleeping now” in the large chair covered in buttons and screens sat a small frail man, Captain Riku Watanabe. He had a well-kept grey beard and was wearing his uniform. In his left hand was a glass with whiskey. The captain was staring out the window “Good, good” he responded. I stood next to him, he turned his chair and looked at my face “and you?” I didn’t understand “what about me sir?” he took a sip from his glass “how are you dealing with the silence?” I sighed “barley” I sat down on a command chair across the captain.

He smirked. I saw the glass bottle of whiskey next to him on the ground. It was vintage, some would say ancient, a relic. “Does that help” I nod to the bottle. The captain sinks in his chair and looks at the thin layer of amber fluid in his glass. “No” he said “But it keeps the mind calm” he holds the glass out to me, and I take a sip. It stings but when it slides down my throat it feels warm, even with the unbearable taste it feels slightly comfortable. I give the glass back to him and sit in silence. the captain sighed, a smile forms on his face as blue light fills the room “ahhh, Neptune” the gigantic blue titan emerged out of nowhere. “I’ve seen many places beyond the stars, and yet, here in our system, is the most beautiful planet in the galaxy” the once cold dark bridge turned bright blue. The eye of the planet stared through the window. As I looked into the eye, I felt fear deep in my stomach. The captain looked at me and smirked “you see it too, don’t you? ‘The oceans eye’” I kept my eyes on Neptune “first time I saw it, I felt it, as if it were a living thing, watching me” I tried not to show it, but I was frozen in fear. The captain kept on taking, maybe he didn’t notice I was paralyzed in fear or maybe he tried to calm me down “maybe it is a living thing, truly noticing us” but his words where not calming me down at all. We passed the eye, and I could breathe again.

He looked at me, noticing that I was inches away from having a full-blown panic attack. “And this is why Triton was shut down.” I was sitting with my head facing down, until I saw the captain holding out his glass in the corner of my eye. “Drink Cole” I sit back up and try to swallow the whiskey. When I calmed down, I realized what he said. “What do you mean?” the captain didn’t understand “about what you said about Triton”. “We’ll talk tomorrow, Cole, go back to sleep” the captain spoke to me in a commanding voice. This was an order, I got of and walked drunkenly to my room. The whiskey wasn’t great, but it got me to sleep in seconds.

For the first time I wasn’t woken up by an alarm, but by loud knocking on my door. When I got up, I realized the room was dark and blue light was shining through my window. Neptune? We passed Neptune. The knocking got louder and more violent. So violent that I hesitated to open the door. Until I heard Rachel scream, “Cole! It has seen us! Cole, please open the door!” I ran to the lock and opened it. Only to see the giant blue eye of Neptune looking at me screaming a hellish scream. I woke up drenched in sweat the alarm was going off and I heard the crew walking down the hallway. My room was a mess the blanket was thrown across the room and my pillows were stacked to cover the window.

When I walked down the hallway, I heard the crew talking, laughing, and yelling in the cantina. Everybody was there. The captain, Martin the mechanic, Ava the navigator, Tahir our medic and Rachel, my co-pilot. She was smiling as if nothing had happened the night before, but I can’t blame her, I was doing the same. “Good morning team! How are we doing?” “Trying to ignore the fact that we’re eating shit, but fine thank you” said Tahir as he took the jar with sambal from Martin. “Yeah, same here. Skipping breakfast is your best option Cole” the loud raspy voice made himself known at the table “nobody is skipping any meal! Sit down Cole” the captain said. I took place across Rachel and looked her in the eyes, her smile quickly faded, and she looked away. I’ll talk to her later. Then I took a large scoop of grey goop on my plate and tried to eat. “you babies shouldn’t be complaining” said the captain “back in my day the food looked like tar, smelled like it too” the crew had a visceral reaction to his comment and continued eating. “gross” Rachel whispered to me. I smiled and took another spoonful in my mouth.

After we did the dishes together Tahir walked up to me “What happened last night man? I heard screaming” he whispered. “Yeah, Rachel had another nightmare but its ok, don’t worry about it.” “Okay, but I will. Next time you bring her to the med bay, alright? Cause she’s never going to do it on her own.” I nodded and walked off. Later that day I went to visit Rachel in the Hangar. She was working on the jet, I wanted to knock on the doorway, but Rachel already knew I was there “you don’t have to knock every time Cole” I smirked and walked up to her “how’s it going?” she got up from the cockpit and took off her gloves.

“The coolant tank had a leak, and the navigation system had an error” she took a quick look at the Jet “it’s fixed now, nothing to worry about…” I smile “I meant ‘how are you doing?” she turned to me “fine” “Rachel you have to talk about it” the calm look she had this morning disappeared “Cole, I don’t want to talk about it now. And I don’t let Tahir convince you that medicine will help. I just need some time”. It’s no use pushing her “I’ll let it go. But I’ll be there if you need me. just like last night” “cool, can you check the bridge? I’ll be there in a sec” I nodded and walked off.

On the bridge I took place on my chair. The leather fit my body perfectly and the view was stunning as always. This was what the job consisted of mostly. Sitting in my chair enjoying the view and maybe, if I really had to, I had to get up to grab something to drink. Usually, I had Rachel to play card games with, but lately showing up in a sec, turned into minutes, hours, or not showing up at all. I put my legs on the control panel and looked at Neptune’s twin in the distance. Neptune crossed my mind again, suddenly, without warning and for a split second I saw the eye and felt a hand on my shoulder. I almost jumped up and yelled. “Jesus Cole!” It was Rachel “looks like you need help as well” she said jokingly.

I didn’t know what to say since I didn’t want to talk about our mental health. Then she threw a pack of cards in my lap and dropped into her chair. We played cards for a while until a faint beeping distracted us. Rachel turned her chair to the control panel “it’s a distress call” “from who?” she tried to figure it out “it doesn’t say, we’re too far away to register the sender but its near Neptune” Fuck, the last place I’d want to go to right now. “I’ll call Riku”

within seconds everyone was gathered in the control room. “Thorsen, did the distress call contain a message?” The captain always uses last names when on the bridge. “it’s faint but I’ll try to play it" Rachel said. “Put it on the speakers please” “yes sir”. It was quiet until a loud bang shook the crew an alarm went off and someone spoke. “軍艦「くじら」の碇艦長が至急の救援を求めています。 対応するすべての非軍用船はトリトンで合流し、残りの死傷者を収容し、その地域のすべての軍用船はナイアドと遭遇する” followed up by another loud bang and someone else Yelling in the background. The captain looked frustrated out the window and let out a deep sigh. “I’m betting none of you understood any of that. Davis, please translate the call,” I copied the text from the recording and projected the text onto a large screen in the middle of the bridge. “This is Captain Ikari of the warship ‘Kujira’ If this message fins you… do not come for us, do not save us”

Pale Blue Eye is een ruw concept dat ik kortgeleden ben begonnen met schijven. ik hoop het uit te werken zodat het een kort verhaal van 40 - 50 pagina's wordt. 

Het verhaal valt onder het genre van cosmic horror en is gebaseerd op de boeken van H. P. Lovecraft en de film Event Horizon.

Marine/Animal volgt de elitesoldaat Hal Morrison 70 jaar in de toekomst, op de planeet Emathope. Hij is een scherpschutter midden in een oorlog tegen de "Freebirds", een buitenaardse rebellengroep van die na jaren van menselijke opressie terugvechten.  

Hal is er volkomen van overtuigt dat de organisatie waar hij tegen vecht terroristen zijn en is loyaal aan de verenigde staten. maar door het verhaal heen realiseert hij met de hulp van een van de buitenaardse "terroristen" dat het systeem waar hij voor vecht hem zou executeren de seconde dat hij dreigt over te stappen.

We volgen Hal, en hoe hij van ideologie veranderd en zelf leert te bepalen voor wie hij vecht. 

Marine / Animal 

The moons shined bright, the sky was clear, and there was no wind. The worst weather possible when trying not to be seen. My scope reflecting the moonlight, but most importantly, no wind to carry away my smell. I should move, but if I do they’ll see me. A leaf stuck on my helmet irritated my eye.

“How many sharks Hal?” a voice whispered from behind a thin palm tree. I sigh and open the cap on my scope, taking the risk. My rifle had been aimed toward the camp so I didn’t have to move. I saw a few walking around, they were talking. couldn’t see what it was about, it’s always hard to read emotions from their faces. “Hal, how many?” He whispered again. I slowly put the cap back on my scope and held up 3 fingers. 4 other voices sighed “fuck…”. Fuck indeed, not even our squad could handle 3. Not with the equipment we have.

A sudden loud ringing stinging in my ear, the rising turned into white noise, and the white noise turned into a voice. “Blue company, do you read? Over.” I hear a voice behind me picking up. “This is blue 4, I read over.” “blue 4 report to blue 1, mission objective has changed over.” the man behind the thin palmtree responds “this is blue 2, blue 1 has a broken comms device” somebody steps over me and hides next to the man behind the palmtree. his raspy voice responds to the call “this is blue 1, what the hell do you mean mission objective has changed? Over”

It’s quiet, I hear some whispers in the back, and then “Blue 1, Blue, star and alpha company are ordered back to site 9. over” blue 1 sighs, he stands up slowly and taps my back 3 times. Behind me I hear the rustling of leaves and the whisperings of men. I try to get up, moving for the first time in 9 hours. The bed of leaves on my back is heavy and my rifle even heavier. I get up slowly, and try to move my joints. Blue 1, Carpenter, sticks out his hand and pulls me up slowly, then he moves out into the dark ruins and we all follow.

After an hour of walking through the ruined megastructures we arrive at the city wall. I don’t show it, but every time I feel a sense of unease when approaching it. The wall is enormous, and about a half a mile wide. What it meant to keep out is an unanswered question. we went though a crater in the wall where it split in two. And beyond the thick concrete barrier the moonlight shined no more, it was now pitch black and a strong gush of wind made me forget how bad I smell for just a second.

We walk a bit further alongside the wall until we reach site 9. The camp has grown exponentially since we went on this mission, Telamon has been dropping troops and vehicles every day since the bombings. It’s even getting so low that you can see the ship shine with your naked eye. We arrived at the gates and went straight to the briefing room. We were the first squad to return, and nest to the presentation board stood a man in a tight, clean uniform and tiny round glasses.

Carpenter went right for him, the leaves still hanging from his gear and his face covered in mud. “Who on gods green earth ordered us to pull out!” The uniformed man was a bit shocked by the rugged and dirty lieutenant. he took a step closer to carpenter and said into his ear.  “It was colonel Samson sir, he will send Tanya to make a task force” then he continued to talk normally “you are allowed to rest in the barracks, eat. Report in 7 hours” Carpenter saluted and the rest took the example.

After food and a shower I overheard carpenter talk to the other squad leaders. They were even more angry than he was “carpenter what the fuck is going on, why are we back here?” Carpenter looked a lot less angry and more, tense. “Samson’s orders, he’s sending Tanya to make a task force from guys in our squads.” The anger in the two squad leaders was immediately gone “oh” it was replaced by fear.

Dit verhaal vind plaats in een redelijk uigedachte wereld waar ik al een paar jaar mee bezig ben. pas sinds 2024 heb ik het verhaal gevonden om deze wereld in te laten zien. 

Mijn doel met dit concept is om de lezer midden in een conflit te gooien waar hij/zij niks vanaf weet. ze weten niet welke kant goed of slecht is en weten ook niet waar de hoofdpersoon tegen vecht. 

Pas als je het verhaal langer leest kom je erachter dat Hal vecht tegen aliens die ooit slaven waren van de mensheid en gebruikt reden vanwege hun inmense kracht. 


Het is een soort zoektocht voor de lezer waar hij/zij steeds meer ondecht over deze complexe wereld.