Thread: The Rise of Silph (SuBuWriMo; 16)

This is a fic that I'm working on for Bulbagarden's Summer Bulbagarden Writing Month (the SuBuWriMo, so they call it). It's kind of ironic, though, that posted it at Serebii first and then here, due to the server being overloaded.

And here I present the fruits of tonight's labour, the first chapter of said story. I wonder if I'll actually be able to reach 100,000 words, which is the gold medal standard. Don't expect it, though - it took me a whole year to reach 100,000 words on Generation 2021. (mostly because of lack of work >_>)

There's also a commentary, running parallel to the work, exposing my intentions of the work. You can find it here: http://bmgf.bulbagarden.net/f512/rise-silph-commentary-110760-new/

Without further ado!

Chapter 1 - The Monster in my Backyard

[Bayesia Town – June 16, 1967]

The summer breeze blew by the trees as the sun began to lower from the sky above Bayesia Town. The birds chirped, the dogs barked, and the leaves – of birch and elm and oak – blew in the air. People were gathering in their cars to leave work, and children were gathering around the schoolyards for the last time for the next two months.

Yes, it was that time of year – summer break. One by one, the children left school. Some left with thoughts of ice cream on hot days and rowing canoes at their summer cottages. Others had prospects of travelling to faraway areas with their parents like India or Egypt. Some lucky fellows from the high school would even find their first job, perhaps working at the wood mill, perhaps labouring at the farm, or perhaps even doing secretary work for a law firm.

Donovan was one of these people. A strapping young boy, he was set on becoming an apprentice at his father’s electrician business. As he walked out of school that day, he was thinking about the job he’d be starting in August, once all the paperwork had been finished, and was planning out what he’d be doing for the rest of June and July, when those rolled around.

“Hey, Don!” called a voice that snapped him out of his thoughts.

“What is it, Bel?” replied Donovan. Belinda was his girlfriend, and he had a reputation to protect now that he had her.

“C’mon, I just thought I’d walk home with you. You know,” her fingers crawled across his arm, “to protect me from all those strangers.”

“You’re scaring me, Bel,” said Donovan. Whenever Belinda had thoughts like that, it was sure to end in chaos. “Let’s just go.”

As they walked in silence, they saw an ice cream truck pass by, and the smaller children whom they knew were from the school next to them ran up eagerly, money jangling happily in their pockets to give to the ice cream man. A squirrel darted across the road from them, narrowly missing a car. A butterfly the size of a small dog fluttered by—wait a minute. Donovan rubbed his eyes, and looked again. There was nothing.

Donovan dismissed it as just a large leaf flying by from the wind, and kept walking with Belinda. They passed the house of Old Ernie, the town’s oldest living resident. He had been alive for both world wars – Donovan himself had been born a few years after the second one had ended. It was said Old Ernie knew what he had been in his past life – as if such a thing existed, thought Donovan when he first heard of it. People claimed that he had ridden on large animals, and fought with dragons with fire on their tails and machines that looked like magnets and psychic beings who held spoons that concentrated their power.

But none of that stuff could be true – after all, over the past few decades, they had already established that the geologic record contained no such thing, right?

He had become lost in thought again, and promptly bumped into a telephone pole, shaking off two large-looking crows from it. Except... one of them was wearing a hat?

Must be one of the hippies’ shenanigans, thought Donovan, as he got back up. Those hippies were all around the place nowadays. It was some sort of anti-war movement, but all they did all day was smoke marijuana and lay around advocating peace and weed for everybody. Hardly the kind of person that Donovan wanted to become.

“You okay, Don?” asked Belinda. “Even after crashing into a pole, you’re still your usual, absent-minded self.”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” said Donovan, rubbing his head, as Belinda helped him up.

“Well, here’s where I leave,” said Belinda, pointing to a road that branched to the left of the one that they were walking off of. “See you sometime.”

“Bye...” said Donovan, blushing slightly. He always had that tendency, to get all loose in front of her. One of these days, it would kill him.


* * *


As he continued walking home, the sky got darker, bit by bit. A few cars passed along the way, now that the evening rush hour had set in.

Finally, he saw his house – 144 Penrose Drive. It was as clean as any house on this line of houses, with a small garden of flowers arranged in a neat little row next to the concrete walkway to the front door.

As he opened the door, he announced his presence. “I’m home!”

“Donovan!” said his father, Josiah. “Welcome home. You got your report cards today, right?”

“Here you go, dad,” he said, reaching into his backpack and bringing out a piece of paper with the Bayesia High seal on it.

His father scanned the piece of paper – on every row was a small red “A”.

“I’m disappointed in you, son,” said his father, grinning in jest. “You should have gotten me at least one B, then I could say you aren’t unnaturally good at doing well at school.” He slapped him on the shoulder, and said, “We’ll have dinner in about an hour. How about you get yourself cleaned up a little. You look a bit roughed up.”

It was true, Donovan found – he looked at himself, and his shirt had been torn slightly by the fall, along with getting dirty.

He climbed upstairs and took a quick shower before coming back down to watch the news.

Their TV was in full colour – a luxury for a family in a neighbourhood such as theirs. The anchor was talking about how somebody’s prediction for the world’s end. “...and according to one Biblical scholar, the world is going to end on July 21, 1968.” The anchor chuckled. “But don’t worry, that’s more than a year away, right?”

The anchor’s partner said, “Yep. That’s more than enough time to get all your investments checked out and your jobs quit, I’d say.”

They both had a hearty laugh at that, and moved on the the next item about how the hippies were, once again, stirring up riots – not in Bayesia Town, but in Goldback City and Airdows Town, which were not too far from here. The world was becoming a much smaller place now – his quaint little town in the nowheres of America was slowly becoming connected – through things such as airplane-operated mail, telephones, and now even widespread broadcast television. You could know in an instant what was happening, at least much more quickly compared to when his parents were still his age. All you had to do was turn on the TV, and find out for yourself.

Having a father with connections to engineering, Donovan knew of an even more promising technology – the computer. Just to think about it – a machine that could perform tens of thousands of calculations every second. It was absolutely mind-boggling, and would be a device of salvation for accountants everywhere, who had to be trained in operating adding machines, some of which took more than thirty seconds to spit out a single calculation. With a device such as a computer, accountants could simply punch in their numbers, and out would come the results in the time that it would take to do just one calculation on an adding machine.

It wasn’t just the office where such a device could be useful – already, people were testing out putting computer terminals in the home, linked up to a central processing unit in a special building designed for it, and allowing it to manage people’s lives.

There were talks, both in the newspaper and the school that they were in, that in just thirty years, the computer would remove the need for massive amounts of paper in the office, as they could simply feed everything into a computer, and have it manage everything. The only paper needed would be to give it input and receive output from it. Donovan was certainly hopeful about this – being an environmental advocate himself, the reduced need for paper would certainly reduce their impact on the environment. He had heard from scientists that the massive amount of pollution that they were pumping into the air would eventually cover up the atmosphere and cool the whole Earth down. That would be no fun – having to wear coats to work every day in an eternal winter.

Suddenly, a rustling noise shook Donovan from his latest spiel of thought. It came from the backyard, but the sound stopped as quickly as it had started.

“Donovan?” said a voice. “It’s time for dinner!”

“Coming, ma!” said Donovan, as he turned off the television and headed for the dinner table.


* * *


After dinner, Donovan retreated to his room, where he read the newest Circuit magazine, about advances in the field of electrical engineering and technology in general. His family spent more than twenty dollars a month on these magazines, as Donovan gobbled up the information from every single one of these, which amounted to more than two hundred a year. Their family would then donate the old books to a university, who gladly paid them back for the chance to have an archive copy. It was money well spent, as he was well on his way to following in his father’s footsteps.

The theme of this month’s Circuit magazine was the home of the future, which centralized around the computer. This magazine gave him a good analysis of the suspicions that he had hereto only picked up from the newspapers and other media through which speculation such as this arrived. Now that there was an expert opinion on the issue, he would be sure to read everything about it.

First, he read that a whole year’s worth of daily schedules could be put into the computer system, to be read from at will. That he could believe. Then, the article talked about how computers could eventually be used to teach children. Donovan thought it was a little iffy; the computers that he knew now could barely understand their own language, let alone understand it well enough to teach it to somebody else.

As he read further, he noticed such things as the computer running the stock market. Now that was truly preposterous. A computer as it was already could perform ten thousand calculations per second, but to manage the stock market of such a hectic system of floor traders such as the New York Stock Exchange? That would require not only calculation, but more data than the computers he knew of today could handle at once. The ones they had now were already the size of a bank branch. How much larger would it have to be to manage such a complicated system of trades and transactions, all in perfect timing?

The magazine’s issue also included such things like space travel. The president of the time had challenged America to put a man on the moon before the turn of the 1970’s. The results of their labour so far didn’t seem promising – the only test they had put up at the time had exploded and the astronauts dead in the vehicle.

The rustling noise disturbed him again, and he turned off the light in his room, venturing out into the backyard to see what the fuss was all about.

This time, it was definitely there. Suddenly, some thing popped out of the grass. It looked like a mouse, but it had a yellow, zigzag-like tail, and small red pockets on its cheeks. It took one look at him, and screamed in fright. “Pikaaaa!” It then ran away, scurrying into a hole in his fence that he was sure wasn’t there that morning.

He returned inside. His father asked him, “Did you hear something out there?”

Donovan thought for a moment. What kind of a creature said “pika” instead of just squealing? He could distinctly make out those two sounds.

“Nothing, dad.” Whatever it was, it was probably just his mind making up sounds. He had to stop reading so many books about alien invasions.


* * *


As he tucked himself into bed, he couldn’t stop thinking about that little yellow creature. It couldn’t have been an auditory hallucination. He was sure he heard it say “pika”. The only thing he could think of was the pika, a rodent-like creature that lived in some regions of the Rockies. But none of those looked anything like the... monster that he had just seen, nor did they get their name from actually squealing out “pika”.

He went to sleep on that thought, dreaming of electric sheep and floating magnets.

Running total: 2,143 words [Small revision. Engineering isn't exactly a trade. >_>]

So, comments? Likes? Dislikes?

I'll still plod on with Generation 2021, don't you worry about that.

UPDATE 04/06/2011: Re-rated MATURE for descriptions of drug usage.

Nice story. i like it, definately reading. no errors i could see.

That was interesting. I get Pokémon weren't discovered yet?

I'm glad you cut out most of the boring parts in Donovan's life, and it seems like he is mostly kept to himself. Nothing much I can say really for a starting story but this: this could be interesting.

Here's chapter 2. A bit shorter than the previous one, but I'll try to make them more full-fledged later o3o

I've got one taker here, two at Bulbagarden. Let's continue!

Chapter 2 – Second Encounter

[June 17, 1967]

That morning, when Donovan woke up, he smelled the aroma of cooking bacon wafting up the stairway into his room. Some classical music was playing in the background.

“Oh, dear, you're going to work today?” said Hannah, from down below. “You'll miss the breakfast I've made for you!”

“I'm afraid so, honey, I just got a call from the mayor that the town hall has some fried outlets. I'll be back for dinner.” That was Josiah, alright. He used to brag that he worked both 4 and 7 days a week at the same time. In a way, that was true – he usually worked only four days in any given week, but when those four days were, he could never be sure.

He came downstairs, where the bacon and eggs were waiting. As he ate, he looked to the backyard again. The yellow mouse-like thing had disappeared completely.

It didn't matter – he had things he wanted to do today, on what was effectively the first day of his summer vacation.


* * *


His first order of business was to visit the library, which was a fifteen-minute walk away from his home. He had memorized the path there, and had taken to trying to make his steps follow certain rhythms as he walked. Had it been anybody else who did this, they would be shipped off straight to the psychiatrist; however, Donovan had a reputation for being slightly eccentric in this regard.

As he walked by, he passed an advertisement for an expensive white silk dress. That would look good on Belinda... he thought. He looked down at his own clothes – a blue plaid collared T-shirt and a pair of brown pants. Certainly not the kind of thing he’d wear to a party – if he could ever attend one.

He saw another ad – this time, for a special pill that would ensure that you never had a baby. Who would want to put that into their system? thought Donovan. If you didn’t want babies, why couldn’t you just... not have sex? But he knew that this kind of things would sell terribly well to sexually capricious couples everywhere.

Yet another ad was not posted on a billboard – somebody had applied spray paint to a wall and produced a giant marijuana leaf, writing right underneath it: “Toke, not coke!” Apparently, some uninformed people still used cocaine as a medicine, and others were just plain addicted to it. But would smoking marijuana really remove such an addiction...?

Finally, he arrived at the Bayesian Library. However, he did not come here simply to read – he was involved with the library's cataloguing program, and was helping the library to build up a computer-operated system. The computer for the cataloguing system would be used in order to manage the library's records. Being one of the only people in the town who was actually interested in computing and electricity and not just its uses, he had been popping in once every week to watch their maintenance work, and learn more about how the system worked, sometimes even giving valuable ideas as to how to program them.

Today, however, the librarian seemed quite grumpy. As Donovan walked into the library, he noticed that she was definitely not in a good mood. He walked past the front desk, and decided to go up to the second floor.

If there was one thing that Donovan loved besides reading about science, it was reading about science fiction. Although he came to the library every weekend to read books, it was still not unusual of him to be reading during the holidays as well, when other people were outside playing basketball or hiking in the woods.

This time around, he was reading a book about how a meteorite had crashed into earth, bearing an alien organism that could mutate animals at will into other animals. He did not like to check out books from the library, and so simply reserved them by placing a special bookmark in them that read, “This book currently being read by Donovan Silph – please do not check out.”
Donovan took the thick book out of the shelf, and sat down on a nearby chair to read.

He preferred to read his books relatively slowly – imagining in his head realistic images of the action that was occurring – for some books, this was more gruesome for others; the Journey to the Center of the Earth, by Jules Verne, certainly had many images which he would consider horrifying, if not only at a subliminal level. He would never consider such deep-earth spelunking for the sake of discovery... the very thought frightened him quite a lot.

The part of the novel he was now at was when the mutant animals started proliferating around the Earth. It was now up to the government to stop them, and the story revolved around one of the special operation members, named Donovan himself, and his exploits while trying to help control the ever-growing population of these “invasive species”.

...clearing was empty, save for a few of the remaining meta-pods and a lot of destroyed vegetation. Armed with a semi-automatic rifle and seventy titanium bullets, he shot each chrysalis out of its perch on a tree, straight through the heart. They all dropped dead on the ground, now powerless to reproduce and keep invading. Donovan blew some smoke off his gun, heading toward the next...

The outbreak that the story’s Donovan was now dealing with was with some insect-like species whose pupal stage was some very hard-to-break shell. They had named them “meta-pods” for the reason that they looked like pods of peas (albeit with military-grade armour), and they were a metastatic disease on the land.

As he continued reading, he hardly noticed the hours pass by. By the time it was time for him to leave, he had barely finished reading through another quarter of the book, and it was already lunchtime. He had read to the part where the story’s Donovan had found that they could safely coexist with these much more powerful creatures, and even put them to better work than some of the machines that they had.

He placed the bookmark back inside the book, and reshelved it. Then, he walked down to the library’s front door again, and left to look for a place to eat lunch.

As he walked by the main street, he decided he’d go to one of the fields on the edge of the town, and visit his uncle. While he walked off the street and away from the buildings, he looked in the tall grass surrounding his road. It was starting to grow high around this time of year, and some of it was actually a wheat crop that his uncle was growing.

He came up to his uncle’s house, and they exchanged greetings. “How’s my big little engineer doing?” he said, as they shook hands.

“You know I’m not going into engineering,” said Donovan. “I have my father’s business in electric work to carry on.”

“That’s a damn shame,” said his uncle. “With your mind, you’d do the whole world a service. I just know it.”

“The world can speak to my father,” sighed Donovan. He knew that it was a good thing that he was going into his father’s business, but his uncle’s words also rang true – he was more of that type.

Something whizzed by in the tall grass beside them. Donovan turned around, but his uncle barely bat an eye. “Something bothering you, son?”

“N—nothing,” said Donovan, still tense. “I’ll go walk around a bit more.”

As soon as his uncle went back inside his house, he ran into the grass. Something was there that shouldn’t be.


* * *


“Kreee!” Donovan heard a screeching sound that could not have come from any of the native wildlife. It was definitely coming close.

Suddenly, something popped out of the tall grass in front of him. It was a bug, as tall as Donovan was, standing on two legs and swinging its arms around like scythes.

Donovan quickly tried running away, but scythe-for-arms jumped up quickly and landed in front of Donovan, cutting off his escape.

Left with no backing, Donovan decided to try fighting it. He threw a punch at the giant bug, but it just jumped out of the way as it came back down and slashed him on the back. He fell down the ground, the giant gash on his back bleeding profusely.

The bug landed on the ground again, slowly walking towards its prize.

Suddenly, a gunshot fired, and scythe-for-arms fell to the ground, a gun wound square in its thorax.

Donovan’s uncle appeared, and Donovan looked up one more time, saying, “thank... you...”

Donovan heard another gunshot. All went black after that.


* * *


When Donovan woke up again, he was lying on an unfamiliar bed, and the sharp smell of alcohol hung in the air.

He tried sitting up, but a sharp pain in his back forced him back down. “Doctor!” cried the nurse who was sitting next to his bed. “He’s awake!”

As long as Donovan didn’t try to sit up again, he didn’t feel any pain, but he felt very weak. He felt what appeared to be bandages around his chest, and his back was padded in what must have been gauze.

“You gave us quite a scare there,” said Donovan’s uncle.

“What happened to scythe-for-arms?” asked Donovan weakly.

“I shot the little bugger twice in the chest,” said his uncle. “And then gave him over to the police. They’d like to have a word with you, actually, once you get better.”

“That thing... what is its name?” asked Donovan. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

“What name do you want to give it?” asked his uncle.

Donovan closed his eyes in fatigue before he could speak again.

“Rest easy, kid,” said his uncle, as he left the room. “Leave me to deal with the ‘scyther’.”

Chapter total: 1,682 words
Running total: 3,825 words

I like thi its pretty cool.
I like how you're naming the Pokemon so far, but why will people start calling them Pocket Monsters? They don't have Pokeballs so...
Anyways so far I'm liking it and Good luck!

Really interesting story here, Zek, I like it.

First of all, you say "moch more quickly" in the first chapter. You also refer to the "1970's" - it's a common mistake but you actually shouldn't use an apostrophe here since it's just a standard plural.

Anyway, you do a really good job of introducing the world that Donovan lives in. Obviously it's not a fictional world that he lives in but you do a really good job of painting what his society is like.

Your ever less subtle allusions to Pokemon is really great. My personal favourite was the fact that there were birch, elm and oak trees near the beginning, but the references to Murkrow, Mareep, Magnemite etc. were all really well done too.

I'm curious to see if Donovan's thoughts that his looseness around Belinda would kill him one of these days is foreshadowing...

You also did a really good job in finding that passage in Journey to the Center of the Earth. I assume that is where you take Donovan's name from rather than it being a massive coincidence? =P

Anyway, good job, I'll do my best to keep up with this.

Originally Posted by Gastly's Mama

Your ever less subtle allusions to Pokemon is really great. My personal favourite was the fact that there were birch, elm and oak trees near the beginning, but the references to Murkrow, Mareep, Magnemite etc. were all really well done too.

Haha, you saw those.

I'm curious to see if Donovan's thoughts that his looseness around Belinda would kill him one of these days is foreshadowing...

I'm curious too. We'll see.

You also did a really good job in finding that passage in Journey to the Center of the Earth. I assume that is where you take Donovan's name from rather than it being a massive coincidence? =P

Unfortunately, you'd be completely correct in saying that it was a massive coincidence. I didn't even remember there was a Donovan in Journey to the Center of the Earth.

Unless you're talking about that book that he's reading, in which case, it's actually not Journey to the Center of the Earth, but rather a fictional book that I made up.

Anyway, good job, I'll do my best to keep up with this.

I'll do my best too. A chapter a day for 30 days... this is going to be tough.

Originally Posted by Ƶekurom

Unfortunately, you'd be completely correct in saying that it was a massive coincidence. I didn't even remember there was a Donovan in Journey to the Center of the Earth.

Unless you're talking about that book that he's reading, in which case, it's actually not Journey to the Center of the Earth, but rather a fictional book that I made up.

Ah, it was just a misunderstanding then. I thought that was an extract from Journey to the Center of the Earth which I haven't read in such a long time that I can't remember a thing about it. =P

I like this a lot.

I loved how you slowly wove allusions to Pokémon into the real world.

Not to mention, Donovan was a pretty interesting character as well.

And finally, I like how you captured the counterculture and anti-war movement of the '60s and '70s.

If the next-to-abysmal chapter quality hadn’t tipped you off, it should be quite obvious, after this small announcement of mine, that I’m trying to write one chapter a day for this challenge. Who knows, maybe I might actually reach the gold standard of 100,000 words, regardless of the actual quality of the work.

Of course, that’ll be somewhat hard given that I have exams coming up in a short while. But this will be one of things that I do just to pass the time.

Chapter 3 – A Trip to the Expo

[June 18, 1967]

When Donovan woke up again, it was dark outside. He noticed that a monitor was running, keeping track of his heartbeat and body temperature.

He tried getting up again, and this time, the wound seemed to have healed – the pain was much duller now, and he could stand sitting up in bed.

He saw his parents, asleep in a few of the chairs in the room. He still had to wonder what all these weird animals were doing here. Without a doubt, he was not going to be the only person to have to deal with them.

* * *

[June 20, 1967]

“What happened when you were walking in the tall grass, Mr. Silph?” asked the police officer.

“I don’t know,” replied Donovan. “I heard something rustling in the grass, so I decided to check it out. When I went in, suddenly this thing just—it goes, ‘skreeee!’ and almost flies at me. I tried to run away, but it blocked me off, and then slashed me in the back once.”

“And then you said you heard two gunshots?”

“Yes. One of them was scythe-for-arms, and I have no idea where the other one went.”

“Well, we noticed later that the bug had two gunshot wounds, so your uncle probably just shot it again just to make sure it was dead.”

“Where will you take it?” asked Donovan, a lump forming in his throat.

The officer leaned in. “I can’t tell you that, because I don’t even know myself. I heard that the FBI was going to take it to their laboratories.”

* * *

[July 1, 1967]

“Did you hear?” said Karin, Donovan's friend. “Canada is turning 100 years old today!”

“I didn't know,” said Donovan. “Meanwhile, after another three days, America will be turning 191.”

“They're holding a festival here in America too, even in Bayesia Town. Come and celebrate!”

Donovan walked with Karin on the street. Everywhere, people were holding the new Canadian flag – a white flag with two red stripes and a red maple leaf in the middle. Even Donovan's high school was flying a Canadian flag below the stars and stripes. Somebody had even made a flag completely out of hemp – it sported green stripes and another marijuana leaf in the middle.

It was all new to Donovan – he had been taught, as a child, that Canada was still a British country, even though they had their own government. But their independence was slowly growing, and they were even getting close to America, considering they shared a border with them. It had been growing ever since the first World War.

Donovan’s back had healed completely by now – it was only a flesh wound; nothing terribly serious had happened, and after the cut had healed entirely, he was good to leave the hospital after only five days. There was a giant scab on his back that he feared would be there for the rest of his life, but he was thankful that he still had his life, scab or no scab.

The report of the wild bug-like animal, dubbed “The Scyther” by his uncle, had been left to the police, for them to do their work. Donovan had told them everything he knew, which wasn't a lot – at least not any evidence that they didn't already have. But worrying about that could wait – today, he would be a Canadian along with his compatriots.

* * *

“We’re going up north?” said Donovan excitedly, at the dinner table that night. His parents had decided that they would drive the car up to Canada to see the Expo ‘67.

“Why not,” said Josiah. “It’ll be your last time on a trip before you start working with me. Have as much fun as you can while you’re there.”

“When do we start packing?” he asked.

“Right now, if you want. We’ll be going tomorrow, first thing in the morning.”

* * *

[July 2, 1967]

“Welcome to Canada, the country that just turned a hundred,” said the customs guard. “Where are you guys from?”

“Bayesia Town, Michigan,” replied Josiah. “We’re going to see the Expo.”

“I heard it’s quite a sight,” said the guard. “My wife and kids are up there too. You missed all the fireworks. And you’re going to miss them again if you stay there for the Fourth.”

“We don’t mind,” said Josiah. “We’re taking Donovan here out for a spin.”

* * *

They settled in a hotel. Donovan had noticed that at the entrance of the hotel, there were two people there making love to each other, straight out in the open. Donovan ignored them as he walked in.

As he came in, he found a Bible in the main dresser. He was not particularly religious himself, but he did know that there were interesting stories to be had in here as well.

His parents had bought him a new diary for the trip. He opened it, and started writing, putting the Bible aside to read later.

Dear Diary,
It’s kind of hard to believe, that I’m missing the Fourth of July fireworks for the first time in fifteen years. But today, I’ve made it all the way up here in Canada! Unfortunately, I also missed their fireworks by three days.
We haven’t made it to Montreal yet, but from what I’ve seen already, Canada is a beautiful place. We’ve passed by so much of the untarnished natural landscape that it’s hard to believe such a place could exist. I’ve seen open fields, and there were rabbits leaping through them; and I saw some gorgeous rock formations. Those are the violent beauty that is nature.
It would really be a shame if Canada were to be ravaged like we’ve done to America. In the cities, especially in places like California, there are giant smog clouds that cover the entire city, making it essentially invisible from the point of view of a visitor looking from outside the city. But alas, I’ve heard accounts of people clear-cutting the forests and fields in order to be able to grow their grain and make their paper. I hope that the computer can put a stop to all this.

He stopped writing, and decided to turn to read the Bible. He turned to a random page, and found himself at the beginning of the book of Ezekiel. He started reading.

“...and in the fire was what looked like four living creatures. In appearance their form was human, but each of them had four faces and four wings. Their legs were straight; their feet were like those of a calf and gleamed like burnished bronze...”

Creatures with four faces? It certainly seemed like something only somebody on drugs would see.

* * *

[July 5, 1967]

“So this is the Expo,” said Donovan, when he finally arrived at the front gate. There were so many things he wanted to do while he was here; he even brought his Polaroid camera with him, and a whole duffel bag full of film, to last him the whole trip.

“You think you can handle yourself from here?” asked Josiah. “We’ll meet back at the hotel at six o’clock.” With that word, Donovan ran off, blending into the crowd.

He wandered around, taking in an initial look at the entire site. The whole world seemed to be represented at this fair – dotting the landspace were several sites dedicated to countries such as France, Japan, and Ethiopia, places that he would like to visit eventually. There were also many exhibits dedicated to the world of the future, including some based on technology that Donovan made a note that he would have to look at in detail later.

Then, something caught Donovan’s eye – a very strange building, the composition of which seemed to defy gravity itself. It was a stack of many cubelike structures, joined together at the corners and the edges, sticking out of each other at seemingly dangerous projections. There were windows plastered on the side of almost every wall, and floors where floors ought really not to be. The whole ordeal seemed to be more of a work of art than any house he could imagine living in.

As he walked toward this strange set of cubes that made up a building, he saw a poster, explaining the increased demand for space in the future, which would make a very cramped but efficient living space necessary. It was written in both English and French, a language that Donovan had some very limited knowledge of. Donovan himself had decided to study Spanish in school, and could hold a conversation with an office clerk in Mexico if he tried hard enough.

As he walked inside, he found that the hallways themselves were quite cramped, but made very efficient use of the space. The furniture was very simplistic but bright in its design, looking almost like the inside of a boat cabin, and it seemed that no detail was left unclipped. It looked nothing like the eloquently furnished house that Donovan lived in, a house that was built in the 1890s but still stood to this day due to continual renovations. It was joked in Donovan’s house that their house was like Theseus’ ship – every part of it had been replaced, so it wasn’t the same ship anymore.

Donovan decided that the house looked better from a distance, so he left the house and walked to the outside, passing by a couple who were looking with dismay at the almost extravagantly simple design of the rooms.
Donovan walked to the outside, where hundreds of tourists were also snapping pictures. He took out his camera, and snapped two photos of it. When the second one developed, he noticed that there was a purplish-black blur on the right-hand side of it. “What in the world?” He looked inside the camera to check for dirt in the camera, if only as a placebo.

He then shook the second photo a little bit, thinking that perhaps the film had not developed properly. Contrarily, the blur actually became much better defined. It seemed to be the tail end of some sort of ghost.

* * *

Next on the plan was the futuristic exhibits, which also happened to show technologies that were already present, as well as explaining how human populations were taking over the world.

One of the things in the pavilion was a show about antimatter, quantum mechanics, and the theory of relativity. This caught Donovan’s eye, so he went to see what all the fuss was about. The room had a giant mural, that read from left to right. First, a timeline on the discoveries of Einstein with the photoelectric effect and the theory of relativity – then, an exposition on the nature of black holes and how they could suck up anything, even light.
It was only then that Donovan noticed that this exhibit was relatively empty. While everywhere else was bustling with people who flowed in and out of the pavilions, this lone exhibit did not draw the attention of so many people.

This seemed good to Donovan, who used the extra breathing space to continue reading the mural. Einstein had died when Donovan was only three years old. It seemed that all the great discoveries had happened when Donovan had not even been born – everything in their textbooks now was discovered at least fifty, if not a hundred or even more than three hundred years ago.

Donovan looked up – he had reached the end of the mural while thinking quietly to himself. He opened the door and left the exhibit.

* * *

By now, it was almost two o’clock – it was lunchtime. Donovan decided to avoid the food being offered at the Expo itself, and wander the streets of Montreal in search of some local delicacies.

He came across a local store that was selling a dish that he had never heard of or seen before – it was a combination of French fries and some cheese curds along with what appeared to be gravy poured generously over the top.

As he walked to the counter, the server said, “Comment ça va?”

Donovan did not understand French, so he tried speaking in English. “How are you?”

The cashier’s eyes lit up in recognition, and he said, in somewhat fragmented English, “Oh, you are here for the Expo, is it not?”

Donovan replied, “Yes, I am. Say, what is that thing you have with French fries and cheese and gravy there?”

“Like you to try it?” asked the cashier. “We have a sale today – a large plate for fifty cents.”

“It looks good,” said Donovan, handing the cashier an American one-dollar bill.

“Right away, monsieur,” said the cashier, giving back fifty cents in Canadian change.

* * *

The combination was very unconventional, but was very delicious once Donovan tried it. He ate the whole plate, still beguiled at such a strange taste for French fries. The only things Donovan had ever eaten with French fries were ketchup, vinegar, and fish. And even then, it was only when his parents took him out to eat it – he had never wanted to buy those foods himself.

He looked at one of the two quarters that the cashier had given him – it was a silvery coin, with a wildcat on one side, and Queen Elizabeth on the other. He pocketed these, intending to keep them as souvenirs of his trip here.

Once he left the store, he checked the town clock – it was three in the afternoon. As he walked back to the Expo, he heard a voice calling out to him. “Psst. Hey.”

He turned around, to see a circle of seven hippies sitting down on the sidewalk, legs crossed, with what appeared to be a small animal in their midst. “Yeah, you. The consumerist.”

“What do you want with me?” asked Donovan, walking up to them.

“Have a joint,” said one of the hippies, scootching over to make a spot for him.

“No thanks,” said Donovan, turning to walk away. Suddenly, one of the hippies reached out and grabbed his arm, easing him down. “You need to take a break from all your hustling, man. Don’t you know that just following your life the way it is is submitting yourself to the government?”

One of the hippies then rolled a joint for him, and handed him some matches. “Just one. It’ll be good for you.”

Donovan hardly saw how a drug could be good for him, but he had heard reports that marijuana was not harmful to your system like cocaine or tobacco was; he decided to humour them this once and take a drag.

Once he breathed out, he felt no different – however, he did not feel the impulse to cough up the smoke, either. “So... that was it?” he said. “Hardly anything happened.”

“It takes a while.”

Donovan took this time to have a closer look at the creature – it was a saurian creature, with what appeared to be a budding plant attached to its back.

“Oh, that thing? We found it off the street,” said the hippie three spaces to his right. “It looked like a dinosaur with a bulb on its back, so we named it a ‘bulbasaur’. It makes some sweet-smelling stuff, man.”

“So... what do you guys do besides smoke pot all day?” asked Donovan.

“We also play cards.” The hippie straight to his left took out a deck of cards. “Do you know how to play poker?”

“Mm hmm,” said Donovan, who started feeling... a bit happy. “Let’s play.”

They dealt out the cards, and started bluffing about what cards they had. “I’ll bet ten beads that I have a better hand than you,” said the hippie three spaces to Donovan’s left.

“I’ll return the favour,” replied Donovan. He felt like he could be floating in heaven now... he placed a quarter in the pot, and the hippies immediately returned it to him. “No money here,” they said.

Donovan looked at his hand – a full house. How lucky is that, he thought.

“Let’s show our hands,” he said, finally, laying down his hand on the ground. “I have a full house. What about you?”

“My house is empty right now,” drawled the hippie straight across from him, laying down his hand. Donovan thought his voice felt a little detached from his self. “I’ve got a pair.”

One by one, the hippies all showed their hands, and inevitably, Donovan won.

“Since you’re the new guy, you get a prize from us,” said the hippie to his left. He pulled a small square tablet out of his pocket, and handed it to Donovan. “Place it on your tongue,” he said. “And have a nice trip.”

Donovan placed the mystery substance on his tongue, now oblivious to his conscience. Almost immediately, he noticed that it tasted sour, like a strong acid.

Suddenly, the hippies’ faces blurred, as Donovan felt like he was shooting out of his body. He saw the creature that he had read about in the book of Ezekiel – with four faces and four wings. But each face was the face of a snake instead. He moved around it, and the faces grew in size as he moved behind them. He turned around, and they were normal size again. Strange.

Then, the faces melted away into what appeared to be that yellow mouse that he had seen just three weeks ago. “Pi-ka!” It cried.

Suddenly, the colours brightened, and a white circle of light was in front of his eyes, growing in size. He tried to look away, but his eyes were glued to that mesmerizing, pulsing light. It was reaching out to him, looking to envelop him in its warm, loving embrace...

It finally surrounded him completely, and the sheer euphoria that he felt could not be described in words. It was as if he was dead already, floating away to heaven...

...but then the darkness came. His thoughts about what his parents must think, and what his uncle and all the people in Bayesia Town must think about his taking a psychoactive drug... a spot of darkness appeared in the light, and it magnified upon itself – ten, twenty, thirty times over in a second, until he plummeted out of that light. No, he thought. No, I must get back there—

He suddenly woke up in a cold sweat. “Whoa, man,” said one of the hippies. “You were out for like four hours.”

He sat up and watched. The bulb-a-saur, as the hippies had called it, was still sitting there, watching the ring of people intently.

“I know I didn’t give you that much,” said the hippie to his left. “Sorry about that, man.”

Donovan then heard seven chimes of the clock. Seven? He was late!

“It’s been nice meeting you guys,” he said. “My name’s Donovan. Donovan Silph.”

“Just Donovan,” said the hippie who had been sitting to his left. “My name’s Armin.”

“Take care, Armin,” said Donovan, as he got back up. Armin just flashed the peace sign as he walked away.

Disclaimer: I've never taken LSD before; Donovan's trip is based on other accounts.

Chapter length: 3,225 words
Running total: 7,050 words

Hippies named Bulbasaur... really?
The LSD bit was pretty good but I wouldn't know if it was accurate.
Did Canada turn 100 years old July 1st 1967? I'll go check. Anyway why Cananda?

Originally Posted by Fireheart

Hippies named Bulbasaur... really?
The LSD bit was pretty good but I wouldn't know if it was accurate.

Neither would I. I've never taken it myself, and everybody's trip is different with some elements being the same. Donovan actually has something of a near-death experience.

Did Canada turn 100 years old July 1st 1967? I'll go check. Anyway why Cananda?

'Cause I'm Canadian, and I thought it should get a cameo :P

Ohhh I just saw your location.Hmmm near-death experience... interesting
I didn't know everybodys trip was differen. You learn something new everyday!

Ohhh I just saw your location.Hmmm near-death experience... interesting
I didn't know everybodys trip was differen. You learn something new everyday!

Here's a relatively short chapter, in preparation for tomorrow:

Chapter 4 - Spreading Out

[July 5, 1967]

When Donovan got back to the hotel, his parents were worried sick. “Where were you, Donovan? Didn’t I tell you to get back by six o’clock?” asked Josiah.

“I got... sidetracked,” said Donovan, not wanting to reveal what he had done.

“Well, I think we’re going back to Michigan,” said Josiah firmly. “We don’t want to lose you all the way up here in Canada while you’re still young, and today, we came pretty damn close.”

“I’m sorry,” said Donovan, holding his head down.

* * *

[July 8, 1967]

When Donovan’s family returned to Bayesia Town, they noticed that the streets were less crowded than before – specifically, that most of the teenagers had up and left. There were still children playing in the parks and streets, but almost nobody who was anywhere from 13 to 22 was there.

Then, he checked the local newspaper, the Bayesian Filter. It had been named such because the original editors had claimed, in jest, that they “filtered out all the bullshit”.

The headline read: GIANT BUG THAT ATTACKED TEENAGER FOUND TO BE A HOAX.

He kept reading down the line.

Three weeks ago, a human-sized bug-like creature attacked Donovan Silph, a fifteen-year-old boy living here in Bayesia Town. Now, the Federal Bureau of Investigations has claimed that they have found no evidence that the creature was ever present, and that Donovan was perhaps attacked an ax-crazy farmer instead. They are now looking for the culprit of the crime.
Dubbed “The Scyther” by Donovan’s uncle, the rumor has spread around that it was a mutant from outer space; however, there is no evidence that such a claim is true.

Well, thought Donovan after turning to the next page, it seemed that their filter wasn’t very effective.

He knew what he saw, and the police could back him up, too. But the Bureau had their evidence, and it was first-hand, too. Why were they so eager to cover it up? And why, oh why did people think that that bug was a mutant from outer space?

* * *

[July 15, 1967]

More news passed by, now about an extremely large gathering of hippies at San Francisco. It became clear to Donovan that most of those missing teenagers had probably gone on a mass trek to a large, urban city in search for some cheap thrills.

It was nothing that he was interested in, although he now understood their sentiment.

* * *

[August 7, 1967]

“Welcome to my trade, son,” said Josiah that morning, when Donovan finished eating breakfast and presented himself to him. “Well, really,” said Josiah, rubbing his back, “you’re not going to be doing much yet. You’ll be helping me do secretary work most of the time, actually.”

That was a bummer to Donovan. “Couldn’t I help you get equipment and things like that?”

“Certainly. But you’ll also help me handle calls and things like that.”

* * *

[September 19, 1967]

Donovan was walking down the main street again. He was now working at his apprenticeship at full steam, and learned more and more about the trade. However, he soon realized that he had a severe dislike for the fact that he was only called in to fix problems with the old, and that nothing new was ever going to come out of this job. He wanted to create – to innovate. He decided that he’d have to bring this up with his father later.

Most of the teenagers who were AWOL had come back by now. But that was of no consequence – what really had the adults worried was what they had brought back with them. In what the Bayesian Filter had called “poisonous”, these hipsters preaching the language of peace and love were the bane of the regular man’s existence. They had no order in their lives, and absolutely no respect for authority. Nothing good could come of that.

Suddenly, Donovan heard a shrill cry. “Help!”

Donovan looked in the direction of the cry. The florist’s garden had been torn up by something. Donovan looked around inside the store, and noticed that the culprit was a familiar yellow mouse-like creature. “Don’t worry,” said Donovan, “I’ll take care of this.”

He held his arms out to the little critter, who looked at him, growling.

“Here, kitty, kitty, kitty,” he called to it.

The yellow mouse would have nothing of it – it immediately sent out a powerful electric shock to Donovan, who started convulsing, and fell to the ground. The mouse ran away, out of the florist’s door, leaving her crying over her destroyed flowers. Sob after sob came as she slowly dialed the number to call the town police.

* * *

“You’ve been in the hospital quite a lot now, haven’t you,” said Josiah, as Donovan walked out of the building with him.

“Yeah, and by an electric accident, no less,” replied Donovan. “I know what it feels like now to be in an accident when you’re replacing a wire,” he added, feigning dizziness.

“You know, I’ve been wondering,” said Donovan, as they got into the car. “I’m not even sure I want to be an electrician.”

“Thought so,” replied Josiah. “It’s not too late to decide to finish high school and go to college. You’ve only been at this for a month.”

They drove away, not noticing the purple rats that were going through the garbage.

* * *

[October 19, 1967]

“MUTANT ANIMALS ARE EVERYWHERE,” proclaimed the headline on the Bayesian Filter.

“You know what I think?” said one of the people in the town hall. “It’s those damn hippies. They brought these things in, and now they’re expecting us to take them back out again.”

“These things are ruining our environment!” cried another. “We should exterminate those creeps.” A lot of silent, concerned glances followed. “The animals, not the hippies,” added the man sheepishly.

Just four months ago, Donovan would have agreed with him. However, after his experience at the Expo, he decided that he couldn’t come to kill another being, even the tiniest of bugs. He understood that these creatures were just doing the best they could in their environment, and did not want to harm them.

But there had to be some way to control them. Otherwise, nobody would be able to stand these creatures rampaging through their civilization like nobody’s business.

Chapter length: 1,055 words
Running total: 8,105 words (16.21% to the goal)
Time left: 26/30 days (86.66%; as long as the two percentages add up to more than 100%, I'm safe.)

I decided to change my goal from 100,000 down to the regular 50,000 of the NaNoWriMo. Sosumi.

Remember, if anything bugs you about how I'm portraying the time period (factual inaccuracies; stuff that didn't exist at that time), please tell me. I tried to do as much research as possible, but I might miss quite a few things. I won't be able to correct it in time for the SuBuWriMo, but I can promise that your corrections will make it into a potential rewrite.

P.S.: Hang on baby, the next chapter rockets us to 1968!