KZINE MAGAZINE
Issue 9
Edited by Graeme Hurry
Kzine Issue 9 © May 2014 by Kimota Publishing
cover © Dave Windett, 2014
Perspective (Editorial) © Stephen Gallagher, 2014
Time To Play © Vaughan Stanger, 2014
Dear Sweet Rosie © Danielle Gales, 2014
Connections © J. Thomas, 2014
Shattered © Rhonda Parrish, 2014
Escape © Michael Haynes, 2014
Heads © Jez Patterson, 2014
Seventeen Year Itch © Paul Hamilton, 2014
Teller © Maureen Bowden, 2014
Witchcraft 2.0 © Dusty Wallace, 2014
The Obligation © R. Marquez, 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of the copyright holder. For editorial content this is Graeme Hurry, for stories it is the individual author, for artwork it is the artist.
CONTENTS
Guest Editorial by Stephen Gallagher
TIME TO PLAY by Vaughan Stanger (9)
DEAR SWEET ROSIE by Danielle N. Gales (8)
CONNECTIONS by J. Thomas (4)
SHATTERED by Rhonda Parrish (5)
ESCAPE by Michael Haynes (6)
HEADS by Jez Patterson (5)
SEVENTEEN YEAR SWITCH by Paul Hamilton (9)
TELLER by Maureen Bower (3)
WITCHCRAFT 2.0 by Dusty Wallace (23)
THE OBLIGATION by R. Marquez (9)
Contributor Notes
The number in brackets indicates the approximate printed page length of the story.
GUEST EDITORIAL
by Stephen Gallagher
As I have run out of things to say in an editorial I thought I’d invite guests to do the job for me. This time I have managed to persuade author, screenwriter, director and showrunner Stephen Gallagher to do the honours.
Graeme Hurry
PERSPECTIVE
I couldn’t be an editor. There are so many stories.
I don’t mean the kind of stories an editor actually looks for. I mean some of the stuff they have to deal with. Stories of writers, invariably new to the game, demanding that you sign an NDA before reading. Of writers believing that the act of submission entitles them to free feedback. Writers who argue with feedback when they get it. Writers whose angry response to rejection is to point out all those excellent qualities in the work that you, the stupid editor, clearly missed.
If you write, you’re going to get more passes than prizes. Fact of life. Being rejected calls for a thick skin, while creation is a business for the thin-skinned… I don’t know how you can ever successfully reconcile the two. I’ve been in this game for a while, and I can’t say I’ve ever managed it.
I suppose I’ve learned a little perspective, though. An inexperienced producer who optioned one of my early novels taught me a lesson that he surely never intended. Every time the script came back from a distributor or production company with a polite pass, he’d take their reason as a signal to tweak and resubmit. Thirteen drafts later, the once-tight script was a shapeless mess. And I dare say that everyone in town had him marked down as an idiot.
So that’s not how you do it.
And feedback – it’s not an editor’s job to be a writing coach although some, Kimota’s Graeme Hurry amongst them, go beyond the call of duty. In such cases, take it with grace.
But those writers and their NDA letters. Non-disclosure agreements, legally binding documents that swear the signer to secrecy. Paranoid over their copyright and convinced that the world is out to steal their ideas. They’re the reason so many publishers and production companies won’t look at unagented submissions. They’ve learned the hard way.
I once complained to my agent that the premise of an ITV drama was the same as that of a project I’d written on spec and submitted a couple of years before. There were enough detailed coincidences to fuel suspicion that someone in the notes process had at least helped to steer it with my story in mind.
My agent talked me through the unlikelihood of this. She knew many of the people involved. She knew something of the deals and the gestation of the project. I won’t rehash her advice but I’ll summarise the overall lesson, which was, in essence, “Grow up, Steve.”
The fact is, no-one’s out to steal your ideas. They’re not that great a commodity. Any value in them is execution-dependent. An idea can’t be copyrighted, only the form that you put it into. That’s why plagiarism lawsuits have to be so closely-argued, showing the conscious reproduction of detail after defining detail, and why they so rarely succeed. Mostly they’re settled out of court, to save the expense of dragging out the arguments.
There’s one going on as I write. If you’re not familiar with Orphan Black, a Canadian series made for BBC America, you’re missing one of the better pieces of TVSF of recent years. It made a breakout star of Tatiana Maslany, who plays several cloned versions of a single biological entity with dazzling technique. The springboard for the story is an incident in which streetwise lowlife Sarah Manning witnesses a train suicide by a woman who resembles her exactly; after opportunistically stepping into the woman’s identity, she finds herself to be one of a number of human clones in the process of trying to connect and uncover the secret behind their existence.
The lawsuit – the full legal submission for which can be found online – is from Stephen Hendricks, writer of a spec screenplay called Double Double that he submitted to Canadian producers Temple Films a decade ago. The suit now alleges a systematic conspiracy to exploit his material while depriving him of copyright, asserting that the show contains “the same, unusual core copyrightable expression as (his) Screenplay; i.e. the clandestine development of clones and the resulting journey of the protagonist to discover her origins.”
I can sympathise with Hendricks. I can imagine what it must feel like to pitch a show about clones to a company, have them pass on it, and then see them make a successful show about clones in which you see so much of your own thinking reflected. I’d feel an inevitable sense of outrage too. I might even be moved to sue.
But I suspect a struggle lies ahead. That “core copyrightable expression” – the clandestine development of clones and the resulting journey of the protagonist to discover her origins – is little more than a common SF trope framed in a classic hero’s-journey story arc. It’ll need some pretty damning evidence from the execution to make the case for stolen originality stick.
The list of examples is impressively long. But reading them – “both protagonists begin the story not realizing they are anything other than who they are told and therefore think they are… both protagonists become resourceful… both protagonists become capable detectives” – it’s hard not to think that this pretty much the way anyone would develop the same premise in a science-based conspiracy thriller.
I’ve done a few of those in my time, from Chimera to Silent Witness. So I tried a bit of a thought experiment.
In the 80s I wrote a novel called Oktober, adapted for TV in the late 90s. No cloning, but an unwitting hero who finds himself to be the human subject in a clandestine science project and embarks on an investigation into the truth behind it. He discovers that some of those close to him are actually agents of the organisation behind his plight. He has to go on the run. In the process he’s transformed from an inoffensive schoolteacher into a fast-thinking survivor. The organisation behind the conspiracy, headed by the cold-hearted and ambitious Rochelle Genoud, sees him as valuable property to be captured and exploited. There’s extra danger in the form of a rogue apparatchik, doing the boss’s bidding but going steadily out of control,
who’ll strike down anyone in his way.
Here’s what I found. Take out the cloning and about 80% of the lawsuit’s “wholly original elements and key ideas” apply equally to Oktober, including:
“Both Double Double and Orphan Black are dark. Both protagonists go through plot and character points that are bewildering, restless, determined, horrific and sad. There is a general mood of fear and dread in both. The element of solitude is present in both – being alone against it all, despite having friends, family and mentors. Both Double Double and Orphan Black are fast paced action thrillers that quickly become a frantic race for survival and search for the truth while avoiding the pursuing authorities and antagonists.”
Am I reaching for a lawyer? Of course not. Because all this stuff is common craft and not the unique DNA of any one piece. I feel Stephen Hendricks’ pain but I don’t much rate his chances.
Writing’s hard enough. We can lay the paranoia aside. The industry is not out to steal your ideas. Why steal your work when they can buy it cheap, kick you off the project, and go on to trash it with impunity?
That’s the Hollywood way.
TIME TO PLAY
by Vaughan Stanger
If anything could have made Patrick Doyle spit, the noise pouring forth from the basement level of MegaMedia’s Oxford Street store should have succeeded. But his paralysed lungs permitted only a gurgle as Reef wheeled him to a table near the edge of the store’s GearZone, where a roomful of guitars, keyboards, drum-kits and amplifiers had tempted dozens of wannabes to show off their skills, or lack thereof.
Until his life dived into the dumpster, Doyle had been a GearZone devotee too. Returning now reminded him of everything he’d lost since a car crash transformed him into a quadriplegic.
Not that his injuries had caused the Music Industry to weep. Patrick who?
He glared at Reef. “If you think… this is a treat… you’re wrong.”
Six months after the accident, his voice remained infuriatingly feeble, but at least the chip implanted in his diaphragm usually allowed him to remain “off pipe” for an hour or so. Which wasn’t bad, all things considered.
Reef grinned, exposing teeth like tiny porcelain shields, which perfectly set off his milk-chocolate complexion and fashionista cheekbones.
“Seemed like a suitable choice to me.” He inclined his head towards the counter. “Fancy a latte?”
Doyle nodded. Drinking coffee from a spill-proof beaker held by Reef could feel undignified, but it beat sucking water from a chair-mounted dispenser. Annoyingly, he’d yet to persuade Reef to fill his Drink Helper with anything alcoholic.
After dumping his daysack on an empty chair, Reef swept the empties to the edge of the table and sauntered off to the counter. Good luck, thought Doyle. From memory, the server would be surly to the point of rudeness, the coffee bitter. Still, at least he could swallow the stuff while “off pipe”, which felt like progress after months of helplessness. Now, if only some inventor could fix things so he didn’t need a helper to wipe his arse after the laxatives had done their work…
Quite why Sarah had assigned the role to a complete stranger was a mystery to Doyle. His sister had not even bothered to check Reef’s credentials with the hospital. Yet he had proved himself fully able to look after a quadriplegic. And while Doyle found Reef’s chirpy demeanour infuriating, he preferred it to Sarah’s doleful take on his situation.
“Hey dude, caught a smile there,” said Reef, returning with the drinks rather quicker than Doyle had expected. “I knew you’d like it here.” After tipping latte into Doyle’s beaker and then holding it so he could swallow a mouthful, Reef casually surveyed the room. His inspection ended with a growl. “Wow, check out that babe playing the keyboards!”
Doyle gritted his teeth while he fought to turn his head. Ever helpful, Reef tugged Doyle’s wheelchair round. Now he could see her. A floppy blonde fringe covered eyes he guessed were baby blue, a tufted pink sweater-dress hinted at a slender physique. A year ago, he would have chatted her up.
Lousy keyboard player though, he concluded, on hearing the squonks and squelches emitted by the Roland G-70.
Something made the woman look up. She swept back her fringe, noticed Doyle staring at her and blushed.
Yep, blue eyes.
Doyle turned his head further. Though the tendons in his neck protested, he felt grateful to feel anything at all. He noticed a gangling youth dressed all in black, his face a lava-field of acne, noodling almost-tunes on a cherry-red Stratocaster.
Yeah mate, dream on!
“What’s your favourite song?”
Doyle’s gaze ratcheted back towards Reef.
“It used to be… Flat-Line Fiancée.”
His helper’s eyebrows twitched upwards. “What’s that, some hip-hop thing I ain’t heard of?” He frowned at Doyle. “And why ‘used to be’?”
Given his relative youth, Reef could be forgiven for not recognising a song title from 1987. That he didn’t understand its significance confirmed Doyle’s suspicion that Sarah hadn’t talked to him for long. In which case Reef was overdue hearing some recent history.
“My fiancée… Anna… never regained consciousness… after the crash…. Which is why… that song… isn’t my favourite… any more.”
Yet however hard Doyle tried he couldn’t wipe Flat-Line Fiancée from his mental jukebox. The Plebs had been his favourite band since he’d first heard Stephen Valentine’s doleful tones on The John Peel show, back in 1983.
Tears pricked his eyes, but before he could ask Reef to wipe them away, the pretty Roland player created a fusillade of discordant sounds. For the second time that day, Doyle felt like spitting; but just considering the act made his chest seize up. His eyes bugged in terror. Ever practical, Reef reached round the back of the wheelchair and switched on the ventilator fitted beneath the seat.
Doyle felt so helpless whenever the machine took over. Air surged into his lungs, piped through the tube a surgeon had inserted into his throat. He detested his lack of involvement in the process.
Reef reached over the table and patted his arm. “Time to go, eh?”
Doyle nodded. Get me out of this hell, he thought.
As the elevator doors opened, he heard the guitarist play the opening to Flat-Line Fiancée.
The song’s chorus was still looping in Doyle’s head as Reef pushed him through MegaMedia’s foyer.
Such a weird coincidence!
“Want to go ‘off pipe’ for a bit?” Reef asked. “I reckon you could manage a little longer.” He bent down to switch off the ventilator before Doyle could nod his assent.
Helper knows best, thought Doyle. Anyway, why not maintain the illusion that he controlled his own breathing for as long as possible? Most other physical aspects of his life remained intractable, as the pressure in his bladder confirmed.
Reef grinned at him. “So, what do you fancy?”
“Don’t mind,” he gasped. “No more music… okay?”
Reef’s forehead wrinkled. “Who are you trying to kid? Music’s your reason for living— always has been. Realised that when I heard your demos on MySpace.” He whistled a melody. “Which one’s that?”
“Behind… Smiling… Eyes.”
“That’s the one!”
Unlike Doyle’s other MySpace “friends”, who were more interested in promoting their music than commenting on his, Reef had left a supportive message, which Sarah had noticed. But that still didn’t explain why she had let Reef become his helper.
You need help to make the best of things, she had told Doyle when he demanded an explanation.
People were always telling him how to “make the best of things”. Think of Superman, his consultant had advised. You know, Christopher Reeve. Think how he lived his life to the full after he broke his neck falling off a horse.
The consultant’s advice hadn’t comforted Doyle one bit, not least because Reeve had died of a coronary nine years after his accident. Given his own family’s hi
story of heart disease, Doyle reckoned he’d do well to survive half that long. Assuming he wanted to.
Reef’s chuckle jolted him out of his despair.
“You do still want to make music, right?”
Doyle nodded. “Since I watched… The Buzzcocks play… ‘Ever Fallen in Love’… on Top of the Pops.”
“Tell me more.”
Doyle gasped out his life story.
He had formed his first band at Manchester University, but The Action Men broke up before playing a single gig. Three more bands came and went before he graduated with a Third in History. Tired of compromising, he moved to London and taught himself to play electric guitar, piano and drums, but by then the Music Industry was more interested in the burgeoning Rave scene. Stephen Valentine knock-offs, particularly those equipped with underwhelming voices, were considered an irrelevance. He’d soldiered on, releasing a handful of homemade CDs that only his friends bought. Facing the reality of his insignificance resulted in knuckle-shaped indentations in the walls of more than one bedsit.
Then real life had delivered its coup de grace.
He looked down at his useless hands. “Not going to… happen now… is it?”
“What about the guy who wrote ‘The Butterfly and the Diving Bell’ using eye-blinks? He didn’t give up!”
Doyle groaned. If it wasn’t Christopher-bloody-Reeve it was Jean-Dominique-frigging-Bauby! Everyone he met mentioned one or the other of these paragons as a source of inspiration. Yet again, Doyle wanted to hawk up spittle, but his chest failed to deliver.
“Oh please… just shut the—”
Seeing the pretty keyboardist from GearZone walk past stopped Doyle mid-tirade. Reef noticed her too. He pulled hard on the wheelchair’s handles, as if trying to shake Doyle out of his self-pity.
“Do you want her?”
Doyle turned his head slightly, desperate to break eye contact with Reef. The suggestion was absurd, insulting even.
Kzine Issue 9 Page 1