It sits there in bright bold letters, staring at me from across the computer screen.

“Calling all writers. Seek the impossible. Battle your characters here. Totally free. Totally real.”

I hover close to it, tempted to open the forbidden window. My curiosity grows, I know its rubbish – but the challenge is made for me. But then it’s a pop-up and pop-ups are always too good to be true. You only live once. And what have I done in my life that’s extraordinary, that’s wild? That’s me?

I click.

And then the details come up. I scroll through quickly. It’s not real, no matter what they say.

To do battle with a character that much I get, but the rest is a bit confusing. I notice the bit where they say I will get my own dream power, but again that’s mixed in with all this jargon. I do wonder what my dream power would be. Every time I try, I come up with something different. All I know is that I don’t want to be able to control it. Does that make me strange? Maybe.

Then again, I can’t decide who I’d want to meet as a character so I might just be indecisive. Why don’t I think about the choices and I can go from there.

The possibilities:

I could start at the beginning, but then that would be a backwards way of doing things, so I’ll start with the easiest one to unravel.

Quinn Shadows. I’d first created him for the Love Parasite, or LP for short. It should have been my epic anti-romance romance, except I’d screwed up the plot creation and allowed too much scope creep. Scope creep… that’s where you let the boundary conditions expand enough that you can’t do your job. Then again, you don’t need me to get technical with you, especially when I should be studying for Thermo.

However, that’s one of the advantages of uni; if you get it done you don’t have to guilt yourself. Then again, I really should get back to it. Studying Chemical Engineering is harder than I originally thought it would be and yet…

Back to Quinn boy, though. White hair, purple eyes, I created him to be like me, only wilder more free. He was the subconscious of Joe, the original narrator for the piece, and was ripped out by God so that Love and Death could get together. When that story failed, I hauled him out of there and brought him to Psycho – the pre-book for my masterpiece. I assumed he’d succeeded in the storyline of the LP, despite the fact that I’d left it incomplete and wrote him in as Love’s apprentice in the pre-book to help the character of Keida grow. Instant success. Plus I didn’t really want to let him rot.

The problem would be… could I beat someone who would think like me.

The next choice would be Satan Embers – ultimate bad boy with a soft heart… the man who came through two stories to land himself in another one where he gets shot, blow up and chased over and over again. So I’ve only completed a part of one novel – Really Psycho Day, but he’s been with me for 4 years, all the way since year 10. THE only character to stay exactly the same in personality. Moreover, he has this scene… it just rocks my mind.
Would he be happy to meet me? No. Would I be able to beat him? No. His persona is one who trains to make everything about himself perfect, from his all black look, to his gun skills and his fire skills AND his ability to turn into a gargoyle. Would it be fun? Yep. And I always like a challenge. That’s why I chose a chemistry basis instead of a maths. That’s why I’m a part time writer when I got 39% in my overall English Lit mark.
Fighting him would be like Highway to Hell, it would be Elevation on drugs. But then there are still more choices.

Keida…. Too whiny.
Corlin… now that I’ve added voices too out of control.
Cara… Too hot. I mean she’s a stunner.
Viola, James, God…. I have way too many characters.

The Jack?

No. Not Andrew-Jack from my matchmaking piece but my fuzzy bit of code… The Jack – a hyped up AI who is so much fun to write. I mean taking him into that RP was fun… and I really don’t know what he’s capable of yet. Yes, another story altogether, but I shouldn’t really be telling you or myself this again. It just wastes time when I can be making a decision. All you need to know is that he’s not in contention.

But there would be a twist to this tale as there always is. And I don’t realise mine until I reach this point and I look down to find my feet dissolving into a small black portal that’s opened up beneath my feet. Is this strange, definitely. Can I stop it, probably not. Do I have everything I need? Yes. So why panic? It’s more oh well and here we go.

-----------------------------------------------:: )) -------------------------------------------------------

I suppose, as I fly through this void of nothingness, that I should introduce myself. It’s only manners, and I live for those. I mean I could make something up – go all Alice in Wonderland on you but that would be false. I see nothing, so I’ll do my regular thing and introduce myself to you – the God, reader or insane part of my brain that dares to care. It is better than going insane, panicking or boring myself senseless cause let’s be honest – who knows how long this is going to take?

So hello. My name is Steven, Stevo, Feral, Ferrett – just a few of my identities, and the list is not complete. I live in Perth, and have my whole life. My entire knowledgeable life I’ve lived in the one house – a nice one in Joondalup, right near my primary school and everything. I have no job, no lifelong friends (a fairly loyal high school one but that’s still 50% short of my whole life.), a dead cat that ignored me when it was alive, a functional family, dysfunctional extended family, B class bookworm, B class maths nerd. Basically I’m everything the AVERAGE 19 year old is not. I’m regular? Maybe from THAT description, yes, otherwise, no.  And yet that makes me happy.

Not that I’m not hypo 24/7, but being me is important to me. I once tried to be like someone else, to fit in with the crowd – didn’t work. I have to say that the crowd then opened their arms when I returned to normal. Sure, I know that there are things that make them snigger things behind my back – but that’s life.

Oooh look. A light. Let’s drop that way.

-------------------------------------------------Weeeeeeeeeeee!------------------------------------------------------------

So I land, and I’m looking around at this thoroughly depressing landscape. I mean its black sand intermingled with white sand to make a shade of grey so bland that it fits in with the aftermath of volcanoes, and apocalypses but you never want loaded into your washing machine with your whites. Not much to do but trek… at least I have with me my Rockit shoes. Hehe they survived being lost at Rockit, my first rock concert, and then being found at the top of the shoe pile plus two more years. They’re comfy and they are sturdy on this oddly spongy sand.

Now I’m going to skip past the walking and the talking to myself and the singing and the whistling AND the public rocking because lets face it, me plus MP3 player equals public rocking. Not that there’s much public here but….

By the time I reach the outskirts of No-wheres-ville the music machine is dead; my feet are full of sand. Ok so my shoes are full of sand but I was making a list. Shut up grammar check of the brain. As I was saying, machine dead, shoes sand, and I am parched. I didn’t manage to grab my bag before I was sucked through. Wow. That would mean the folks at home would think I’ve been kidnapped or ran away. Well once this is finished I have something else to attend to – making people realise I’m still alive.

But you – you person who somehow manages to read my brain, you want to know what No-wheres-ville looks like. Ok go towards a window… see that. That is NOT what I’m looking at. Picture a sheep – nope just joking. Picture a wreck – a car wreck. Now picture buildings made out of thousands of those. THAT’s what I’m looking at. Utterly depressing for someone who knows nothing about cars. I walk straight in, no doors on this car fortress, nod to the scantily clad guy, whistle at the reasonably hot peasant chick that walks past nude, and walk straight to the Tavern. Luckily it’s the first establishment within sight of the entrance.

-------------------------------------------------:: ))-----------------------------------------------------------------------

“Whisky please.” I say. (I want to drink all the traditional drinks before I die, but that’s a sidenote.)
“5 silvers.” He says.
“5 silvers?” I say.
“5 silvers” (If you can’t tell I have the drink to my lips, no silvers and he’s glaring at me.)
“0 silvers and 15 minutes washing up.” I counter getting desperate.
“2 hours washing up and I’ll follow your whisky with water and 1 silver.” He counters. He has himself a deal.

I take a sip of my whisky, pale, cough, cough again and then take the water. The guy next to me takes the whisky and hands me a copper coin which is about the size of my puny fist. For reference, my fist is about the size of an A5 pad. I skull the water, pocket the cash and then head to the back of the establishment.

And that’s when I meet my competitor who has suds up to his armpits and is struggling with a pot twice the size of us both. His black jacket lies on a grimy stool and he has water stains over his perfect pants. He turns, a scowl on his face.
“Stupid competition could’ve at least put us on some island that takes our money. I am so not cut out for this.” He says before cocking his head to a towel that’s hanging up on a shiny white hook.
“Hi I’m Steven. And you’re Satan.” I say, taking the sticky, icky towel that is really not hygienic.
“You’re stating the obvious, author boy.” He growls, plonking the large saucepan on the wooden countertop, before wrestling with an even bigger one.

“So where do you think we are?” I say starting to rub vigorously at the pot in front of me… I love dishes; I mean we only recently got a dishwasher so I’m expert at them.
“Does that matter.” He says continuing to growl and get himself wet. Oooh I’d forgotten that anger streak. I’ll have to include that in later chaps if I get back. Ok chapters, the crazy person might think that I have bad English. Being Australian of course I have bad English. I have flawless Australian though. Yes, score 2-0 for the lame joke party.
“Yes it matters; I can’t call this No-wheres-ville forever. And do you want me to take over washing?”
“Bugger you.”
“I take that as a no.” I say drifting off. Oddly enough, while here I’ve been going less daydreaming than I usually do. But that is beside the point. Waiiiiit. What is the point? Maybe the owner can tell me.
“Hey owner dude… What is the point?” I call out none too softly.
He bursts through towards us with a pile of grimy, originally white plate that hides everything of him but his flabby brown arms. “More.” He growls sloshing them into the water before rushing out. The water soaks Satan through before pooling on the floor.

….. Pooling on the floor…. Only hours ago had I been sitting at a computer writing about something else pooling on the floor, it was blood and what I was doing when the pop-up appeared more of the non-studying but that’s irrelevant now. At this moment, I am standing in a pot on the counter, using my own shirt to dry these dishes wondering if I’ll ever go back or if I’ll ever care.
Oh you want to know what I look like and how I got inside the pot. You’ll have to excuse me; I don’t describe myself when I’m thinking all that often. Anytime anything become too close in my daydreams I become a he. I third person myself. Then it’s HE kissing the girl, HE falling in love, HE saving the world. HE living. Steven as a character instead of Steven as a living breathing person.

I close my eyes at this thought. Maybe this is just another HE moment. Maybe I’ll open my eyes and I’ll be back, because this is too surreal.

All I do know is that this is the correct place to end this ‘chapter’ of my thoughts. This is the meet – author and agent. I do wonder what will happen next.