Some notes on a new story idea

First posted 11-29-04

I want to jot down a few notes on a story idea I had the other night. It's called "Pebblemen". It occurred to me while I was watching the Lord of the Rings. I've always been intrigued by wizards in Tolkiens fantasy world. How they worked. Magic there was very subtle. But there were multiple wizards. We see Gandalf running around doing his thing, we see Saruman as well. But we know there were others, like Radagast the Brown. So what in the hell were they doing during this whole war of the ring? Surely they had to be doing something? Then I thought, maybe they were. Maybe they were helping, but not in an obvious way. Maybe they were around their home bases taken care of business by manipulating things around them. Cause that's the way I see the wizards in LOTR working, not by flashy magic, but by subtly manipulating the events around them, shifting things every so slightly but still changing the outcome.

That's were I came up with idea for the Pebblemen. They are people trained to recognize all forces, physical and non-physical in a situation and manipulate them as they see fit. Trained to open themselves and immerse themselves in data. Sort of like quantum car mechanics. Actually, that's how I always imagined magic worked. It's simply knowledge and understanding of a higher order, and the manipulation of that knowledge makes perfect rational sense to the user, but it appears like magic to the observer.

So that's Pebblemen. They appear like wizards to most people, but to them they are just observing the universe in finite detail and shifting things. Immersion in data. Of course, a certain amount of this become equivalent to "predicting the future" which, as Herbert has so deftly tackled, actually changes the future. But to Pebblemen, the changes they are able to effect have a temporal limit. They are masters of probability. They are able to shift events to happen with knowledge it will happen in a certain probability. They dwell in the realm of statistics, ergo their abilities to alter events decreases with the length of time, distances, and overall amount of variable input. They may change the course of a town election, or the course of a river, but not the course of the planet in a cosmos or depose an evil king 300 years in the future.

Anyways, total immersion in data. Here's a few notes and ideas.

The setting should be a place completely distinct from past, present or future Earth. A mythical land of my own creation. Probably involving some strange melange of mythological bric-a-brac (small village hamlet, kings and such) and modern convenience (electricity in the village, neon lights, motorized carts). I just like to fuck with settings like that.

Pebblemen should be feared. Misunderstanding=fear. They are mainly travelers, meddlers, people without root and no specific purpose but to make things better, dispite their public approval.

Pebblemen are trained. Starting very young. They are first taught physics (vectors and forces) and philosophy (rhetoric and logic) then branching into higher order scholarship (statistics, quantum physics, mental training). Sort of kung fu/Jedi like training.

Test: a pile of pebbles are arranged on a slope. The removal of one pebble, and only this one specific pebble, will cause the stones to fall down the slope. It is up to the student to identify that pebble and remove it, thereby causing the stones to fall. Part one of name of Pebblemen, the action of one small pebble can cause a landslide.

Test: I haven't decided if this will be the general final test, or just the final test of the specific "hero". The student is presented with a rainfall. They are tested to see if they can get from one porch to another through the rain without getting wet. The answer of the test is that it can't be done. They should be able to see every raindrop and see its path, but then realize that there is no path through the rain without getting wet. Sort of a kung fu/philosophy test. Teaches the student that full understanding of a situation does not mean they can change it. Some things are just beyond their control.

Property: Pebblemen aren't philosophers. They don't know if there is a god or what happens when you die or what the meaning of life is (though many assume they do). They are more like scientists. Where others see them as wizards performing magic, they see data. Total immersion in data. It is a very rational philosophy.

Wardrobe: all Pebblemen carry a pouch of pebbles with them. Part two of the name: this serves as a constant reminder of Part one and the overriding philosophy of the sect, in addition to providing a defensive mechanism. A Pebbleman can flick a pebble from his thumb and kill several people. The understanding of forces is a powerful weapon.

Wardrobe: the hero carries an umbrella. Partially defensive and partially a reminder of that final test. Whether or not all Pebblemen carry umbrellas is dependent on my decision of who gets that final test, as described above.

Wardrobe: Pebblemen do NOT dress like wizards. They don't wander around in flowing black robes or such nonsense. They are wanderers and dress as such. Sort of hobo-ish. Utilitarian.

Property: a Pebbleman, when immersing himself in the "data stream" as it were, takes on a peculiar stance. His body should acheive near-to-total stillness. This is prevent the movement of his body from clouding the perception of forces and give him a solid base from to make objective observations. His eyes will open as wide as they possibly can and his pupils will fluctuate wildly and independently, as if his eyes are trying to focus on things both near and far all at once. This "trance" (for lack of a better word, though I imagine to have some specialized term for it eventually) can be turned on in an instant (say barfight, as the story absolutely must have one of these) and can last as long as it takes for the Pebbleman to weigh all alternatives against probability and time the appropriate action to effect the outcome (like taking the right fork instead of left to make it rain tomorrow, or saying "hello" to a woman instead of "hi" to make her fall in love with her neighbor). Of course, in instantaneous actions (like said barfight), predicting can be done on the fly without stillness and still remain relatively effective (like banking a pebble off a bar rafter to knock 5 men unconcious) because the statistics and probability involved are fairly light. But more complex predictions (like changing the course of a river) will require more stillness and meditation.

In other words, Pebblemen are badass.

Obviously, some stuff here is not entirely realistic. I mean, being able to observe all forces on a riverbed or seeing what effects are needed to alter the mentality of a person requires more then just careful observation. It requires a fair bit of empathy, and frankly, some magic.

But I'm just going to ignore that.

I'm saying that part of the training involves mental training of an advanced discipline that allows them to do these things, and this training is completely foreign from our frame of reality. Sort of like the Weirding Way from Dune, but to the nth degree. Hell, it's the Kwisatz Haderacht to the nth degree.

Well, I think that's all I've come up with so far. I'm still lacking a plot, which the major weakness of my writing. I come up with ideas of worlds and realities, but I never have plots. This is why I haven't worked on my novel seriously. I have the entire world conceived in my mind, and it's really freaking cool. I have technology, characters, props, everything but a plot. But I think this story idea has more promise to become an actual story than any other idea I've come up with. I'll have to meditate on it some more and see what I come up with. I kind of like this idea. It's got some (not a lot) originality and promise to be unique.