Messages

[Reality?]

A swindling mythical being that lives in something it can not be. (14)

Spoiler

  All right.  So we definitely know that "a swindling" = con.  Which leaves "mythical being that lives in something it can not be."  So I'm guessing we're looking for a word-paradox of some kind.  Where can you live, but an imaginary thing can't "be"?  Hmmmmmm....  Reality?  You can live in reality, but you can't be real if you are mythical....  Non-fiction?  Many mythical beings live more in the serious discussions of scholars than the fragmented stories about them that survive from lost ages, but since they are mythical they can not actually be non-fiction.  Thought?  Mythical beings are just abstract constructs, and therefore live in the thoughts of others.  But they can not be thought, at least not in a Cartesian sense ("I think, therefore I am"), since they don't actually exist.  None of this satisfies the letter count, so hopefully all this speculation lays the ground work for someone else to solve the puzzle.

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I too would like to debate the immediacy of the word "now", which can refer to different periods depending on the scale of time conceptualized by the person uttering the word.  For example, Homer J. Simpson once marvelled that "they have the internet on computers now," clearly not referring to that exact instant but to a vaguely current-ish time period.  Likewise, Shakespeare's Richard III says in the opening lines "Now is the winter of my discontent / Made glorious summer by this son of York," referring again to a vaguely current state that began with their victory in battle before the play even began (that is, several hours or days before hand).  I think "My nose will grow presently" or "My nose will grow right......NOW!" would be more suitable answers.

Spoiler

I've got no guess, but I've been racking my brain for a "swindling mythical being".  So far I've thought of Puck, Odysseus (Ulysses), and the Loch Ness Monster.  At my most cynical I would list all deities, since they always seem to promise more than they can deliver, but let's keep this light and fun for now.

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[What did Pinoccio say about his nose to cause a paradox?]

What did Pinoccio say about his nose to cause a paradox?

Spoiler

"I went back in time and fathered my own nose."

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[Rosa Blackwell.]

Spoiler

Rosa Blackwell.  I'm not going to embarrass myself by publishing the mental gymnastics I went through to get to this answer, so I'll just call it a gut feeling.

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*Baron demands bolded clues, letter counts, and possibly even a bit of proofreading.

Or at least a new reboot of something begun long ago!

What about a sling-shot?  Or a crossbow?  Or a rubber band sniper?  Where is the line between "creative take" and "off-topic"?

[spam aisle]

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The spam aisle ship is sailing...ââ,,¢Â«

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Spoiler

All right, I'm not hearing a lot of support for spam aisle.  So let's see...  "tree" is moved, which means rearranging letters.  A "Nice enough" is apparently "un oeuf".  I don't see how an egg does an audition, except maybe when it's graded at the processing facility....  So my best guess is "tree + oeuf = etre oeuf", which means "to be egg".  Whatever that means.

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[Nice enough audition]

I would have gone with

Spoiler

Nice enough audition first, if possible, to conceal the double meaning of "Nice" (they do it in the crosswords all the time).

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Spoiler

Also, the closest thing I can find to a "Nice audition" would be "un essai".  I'm still going with my "palm" tree, so scrambling "palm" + "essai" = spam aisle, everyone's favourite hypermarket passage!

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Spoiler

"nice enough audition" = "ok try", which means I need a four letter tree, like "pine".  "Moves" implies a rearrangement of letters, which can only yield one thing:

Spoiler

Pinker Toy!

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Spoiler

Er.... he's crossing a busy street?  Daily pedestrian fatalities in major urban centres suggest he would be nonplussed by the velocity of the traffic heading towards him: otherwise, how can you account for their unnecessary risk taking?

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[Sinitrena]

....and that's it for voting!  Thank you everyone who read and voted: it's always more heartening for our authors when they see that their hard work has actually been read and appreciated.   Also, usually there are clear category winners, but I was happy to notice that every entrant got at least one vote in every category this time, making it the most evenly distributed vote I've ever seen.  This is indicative of just how close the competition was: a true battle of equals.

But, in the competitive world of competition, there are always some competitors who are more equal than others.  Now the results:

  The golden lifeboat of life-saving goes to Sinitrena with 11 votes.  Congratulations!  I immediately recognized the recurrent characters from your whodunnit submission, which was a happy surprise.  Had I been able to vote I would also have certainly given you my vote for most satisfying ending: I totally did not see them walking the boat in from the sea.   I was wondering why Ben pulled the gun on the inspector, though?  Was it just to develop his character as a trickster?  It seemed a bit ...rash for a cat burglar.  If the Inspector had no evidence against him before, now at least he'd have something to charge him with....

The silver lifeboat by a sliver goes to JudasFm with 10 votes.  This is what we in the business refer to as "runner-up by a whisker".   Two more votes would have pushed you over the top, and you certainly would have gotten one from me for the scenario category: I loved your shadowy, unrevealed creatures of the darkness held at bay only by a ring of lights.  I was completely enthralled with the Kheshen, telekinesis and all, right up to the the teleporting thing.  I think that was one ability too many to keep the story believable, and really wasn't necessary from a plot point of view (the drama in the "bedroom" could have just occurred later, like the ending did).  But overall very suspenseful and entertaining read.

  Finally, the bronze lifeboat of buoyancy goes to SilverSpook.  If I were not the contest administrator your piece would have certainly got some votes from me.  I'm not saying it was the best piece, but the word-play and concept were fantastically clever.  I don't have enough room to cite all my favourite excerpts, but a few include:

I missed competitive retro-gaming from my 8x10 coffin apartment in The Shelter...
The fuzz be crossin' our quanza streams and shit...
After being transcranial-magnetically-tortured for subjective millennia, his skull-chassis would be mounted on a skymansion wall, next to the taxadermied heads of Siberian tigers, cloned mammoths, and liberal senators.
...known thenceforth as ‘The Kill Shot War', for the technique of the resistance fighters who held their firearms sideways, gangsta style.

...and so on.  I also thought the character of Proto-J was funny enough, but the alternate reality where he becomes El-Presidente easily made him my favourite creation of the competition.  On the down side, the piece was hard to get into and I had to read the beginning twice to really understand the set-up.  It's not that the beginning was any more densely written than the rest, but it was a bit overwhelming right off the bat without the reader having any bearings to keep him involved in the story.  Also, the characters perceive the "bubble" that they are stuck in as more of a threat than a source of salvation, which doesn't quite jive with the theme of "lifeboat".  But I critique because I love: great work!

Actually, great work everyone!  Those were three really solid entries, and everyone should be proud of what they produced.  I now turn the the burden of contest administration over to Sinitrena, who by dint of winning must now come up with the next theme.  I hope to see everyone out again in the next exciting instalment of...

...The Fortnightly Writing Competition!!

One more day to vote!

Spoiler

Momresgatoe!

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Also, on the long-odd chance that this isn't correct, a word count would be nice.

[Alien Escapade]

Alien Escapade
This is NOT a matter of upside down but the open vent was opposite the tent.

I also thought that the double-triangle on the map was supposed to be the tent at first, but I think it was just an arrow supposed to indicate that the asteroid would move in that direction. An unlucky coincidence of similar shapes I think. Perhaps the double-triangle should be moved away a little from the surface of the asteroid? Or made more arrow-looking?

Yeah.  As the artist responsible, I have to say that this was a somewhat muddled but deliberate attempt to get the player turned around.  The arrows on the map are indeed just directional arrows, which happen to look a lot like the tent (which logically could be set up anywhere).  Our original concept called for the map to be upside-down, with the hint indicating that you needed to  flip it for it to make sense coming from the Crash Course game (which attentive players would see as linked through all the bread crumbs mentioned above).  So the idea was to pair that knowledge with the sequence of stacks in the map (they are in sets of threes and fives) to realise that you have to leave the left-most stack of the opposite cluster of five unplugged for propulsion.  In retrospect, I think you have a point that this probably turns the player around one too many times (it's a good thing in wasn't a Blind Man's Bluff simulator... ), but in the heat of the moment during our frantic design session it sounded like a good idea at the time.

Wait wait wait....  All you have to do to get some free time is cart off the wife and kids to Japan? 

How much do the tickets cost, again?

[Superposition]

All right, folks!  That's the deadline.  Our entries, in order of submission, are:

Superposition by SilverSpook
Inspector Coultry‘s Boat by Sinitrena, and
Green Lights by JudasFm

As advertised in the OP, your voting categories are as follows:

Best Character: Most believable or captivating or magnetic or unique: could be main character or supporting role
Best Scenario: Replacing our usual Background World/Setting category: who had the most creative scenario, or the most vividly described predicament?
Most Suspenseful: Replacing our Atmosphere category, which story left you at the edge of your seat, yearning and dreading to find out what happens next?
Best Writing Style: The technical art of combining words in clever or gripping ways.
Cleverest Ending: Sometimes the best suspense leads to a disappointing conclusion.  Which story had the most satisfying ending?

Please have all votes in by midnight September 11th, and I will tabulate and declare a winner whenever I get around to it on the 12th.  Good luck to all entrants, and as always, happy reading!

Spoiler

Damnit Ponch! Pull this station wagon over!! I'm gonna puke!

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Stockholm Syndrome, or Stock Car Syndrome?

Yep.  I don't ever end the contest until well into the next day.  Just in case.

So let's say 24 more hours, folks!