1,000 Words: The Coyotes of Silver Moon

Okay, a couple of things before we get started for my 1,000 words today.

1) I really don’t want to do this right now. I realize that not wanting to do it and doing it anyway is one of my rules, but still. I came home from work early because I wasn’t feeling well. I’m still not. When Carrie calls and asks what I’m doing, I tell her I’m reading, and she asks why I’m not writing. I tell her I’m not up for it and she gets all huffy. I wanted to write later on tonight, because that’s what I’m good at. But she’s getting the second season of Lost on DVD tonight and has already gotten that set in her head, so here I am, clacking away, when I’d rather be reading or playing poker (which, by the way, I was doing for a while when I got home—cleared 4,000 points, which ain’t bad).

2) I’ve missed my goal of 1,000 words by approximately… 1,000 words since last Thursday or Friday (I’d have to check to make sure, and maybe I’ll do that later, but I want to get these words out right now). Been busy around here. I figured out the math earlier today, and since Friday Mrs. Wesley and I have had 8 people and 4 dogs at one time or another during the weekend. Plus we were working on the barn all day Saturday AND Sunday, which almost never happens. But, Mrs. Wesley reminded me that even when we don’t ‘work’ on Sundays, she still has a lot to do and doesn’t get a day off, which she really wanted. The ultimate point is that the barn is finally clean and clear of almost all debris. The stuff that’s left needs to be kept there as late as possible because it’s either machinery, shelving, or something else that wouldn’t do well in wet, rainy weather.

3) Finally, I have given up on the original idea of Coyotes of the Silver Moon entirely. I liked the idea of the Fultons and the Coyote Trickster God, and was going to go back to the drawing board with the characters intact, but with a different way they’d interact, or a twist. But that didn’t come. What did come was something else entirely, something that is much closer to the original ‘pulpy’ feel I was going for. Hopefully I’ll get back to the Fultons in some other form, because, even in the rough outline form I had them, I thought they made for some nice interactions that I never got around to writing. In the meantime, the following idea came to me pretty much whole (up to a point), and I spent a little time jotting down notes that I want to dig into in a bit.

NOTES:
Three outlaws, one of them badly injured and dying, are making a getaway from a robbery gone wrong when they come across an old Indian hermit shaman with a belt and coat that can turn the person wearing it into a coyote. They kill the shaman, and then try to use the belt to get the upper hand on the Federal Marshal and posse that are chasing them down.

DIALOGUE:
“I thought it was supposed to heal you are something.”

“Where on earth did you get that idea?”

“I don’t know. It’s magic, ain’t it?”

Okay, maybe it isn’t much, but that’s what I have so far, and I think I like it. Stay away from the deeper elements or discovery, and keep it a straight adventure story with lots of suspense. That’s built in with the idea of the Federal Marshal chasing them down. I think it was Alfred Hitchcock who said something to the extent of: Suspense is putting a ticking timebomb at the feet of the characters, and having the audience (or reader, in this case) know it’s there, but not letting the characters themselves know it’s there. If I do this right, I could have them realize the Marshal is closing in on them, but not know how close. Or something, I don’t know. At first, I was thinking I don’t want to break up the viewpoint or split it between the outlaws and the Marshal, but now I’m not so sure. I think if I keep the Marshal’s scenes quick and purposeful, they could be very good.

Okay, the outlaws, and the robbery. What kind of robberies are there in the Old West? Train robberies, sure. Bank robberies. Stage coach robberies, home burglaries, what else? They could try to rob a US Fort. They could rob a riverboat. That’d be different, and pretty fun on it’s own, I mean as a story on it’s own. That might be something I want to keep in my hip pocket until later. They could try to rob a gold mine—that’d be different, too. Or silver mine. Copper, whatever.

The Marshal… he’s got to be 300 pounds of pure mean. Somebody that the outlaws DON’T want to tangle with, at least, not most of them. The kind of guy Terry Benedict was in Ocean’s Eleven. They kind of guy who’ll “kill you, and then go to work on you.” And if these guys steal something that belongs to him (or he believes belongs to him) he will stop at nothing to get it back.

A whorehouse robbery? Again, that’s something that’s pretty fun in it’s own right. I may keep that for something else.

What would the Marshal think is his enough to go after these guys… well, it’d be his job regardless, but they steal something he wants so badly that he’s willing to REALLY go after them, in a mean way. And is that even necessary to get the story rolling. All you have to know is that he’s a bastard and they’re scared of him. That’s what’s important, so it could be nothing more than a payroll check. A bill of claim on a mine—a plot of land or something, maybe he discovered gold on a tiny plot of land—but why would the paperwork have to travel by train or coach, when there was probably a small surveyor’s office nearby? Well, maybe he had to send an application off to a territorial office somewhere else.

Meh, I’m not liking it.

Okay, how about this? He could be dirty. I’m not sure I want him to be dirty, but there you go. He could be dirty and he’s got his own gang within the Army. He’s got a train scouted out that he wants to rob for his own purposes, but this other gang gets to the train first and makes away with whatever it is he wanted. Of course the three outlaws are the only survivors of the ensuing battle at the train.

I’m not sure. I don’t know how sympathetic I want these outlaws. They are outlaws, after all. I don’t know that I want the US military to be the bad guys here, that’s so overdone right now, especially in reference to the American West.

I have to think about this some more. Luckily, I have that opportunity because, hey, that’s my 1,000 words for the day!

Dream: Me & Christina

I’ve been holding onto this one for a few days now, at least since Friday, so my recollection may be a little off.

I’m living with my parents with a house that has played the part of my parents’ home before, but I don’t recognize during waking hours.

Christina Aguilera–whom I’ve grown up with and is my best friend and object of unrequited love–has just returned to visit her parents after a successful tour, and I try to convince her to let me go on tour with her. She gently but firmly tells me no and breaks my heart.

Now, the fact that I’m ten years older than Christina doesn’t bother me nearly as much as the fact that I’m married and terribly in love with my wife, but Mrs. Wesley is nowhere to be found in this dream.

Fact is, I’m pretty sure I know where this dream came from and what it means, but I’m not telling. So there.

One thing I do want to bring up is something that I saw in almost an ‘establishing shot’ sort of way: my parents were using little robot bees to water their flowers. They looked like toys, maybe 9 inches tall, made of brightly colored plastic. There were maybe a half-dozen or so, all different characters, each with a watering pail, who would hover over a large barrel (or fountain, I forget), fill their pails, then fly off to different flowers or hanging plants. They had no moving parts or hinges from what I could tell (including their wings), and they moved in the slightly drunken hover that TV shows and movies used to make things “fly.” They buzzed/spoke quietly to each other in some sort of digital language only they could understand.

Had nothing to do with the dream as a whole, but the image was so striking I wanted to make sure I put it down somewhere.