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Post by icon on Oct 6, 2011 22:46:27 GMT -5
Throughout his entire life, the young Crick P. Fudge has always known about HubCorp. As one of the largest companies in the Inner system, it has become an integral part of his daily life- purchases, deliveries, all run by the organization. And now he has a job there.
It’s not a particularly impressive job, mind you- only dashing about Warehouse Complex 5C and delivering forms for up to eight hours a day. Info-runners have never been considered particularly prestigious, but they certainly are an important part of the company. Somebody’s got to do it.
Although something about the place seems a bit… off. For starters, his coworkers are… well, calling them eccentric would be a grave understatement. And then there’s that whole incident with the paradoxes that happened. Except that it hasn’t actually happened yet. Time travel can be horrible sometimes.
Then again, coming from a company with a name as redundant as it is, what more can you honestly really expect?
Nonetheless, a job is a job, and Crick is determined to do the best he can with it. HubCorp, Inc. is a collection of all the shenanigans that happen in Warehouse Complex 5C and beyond.
Obscure references. Horrible puns. Incredibly flawed logic.
Welcome to HubCorp.
...So. I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing but I'm certain I will find out at some point. =D More details will come later at a point when I can actually bother to write them up.
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Post by Kathleen on Oct 6, 2011 23:03:30 GMT -5
... this sounds like it ought to be brilliant, and hilarious. xD And having absolutely no idea can actually be a very good thing because then there is so much to discover, so you can have so much fun. =D
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Post by Robyn on Oct 8, 2011 2:09:22 GMT -5
Oh wow.
I want drawings of Crick immediately and oh my goodness I'm laughing already. Because knowing you, I might as well prepare myself. 8D
SO EXCITED ICON. SO EXCITED.
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Post by icon on Oct 8, 2011 18:44:34 GMT -5
... this sounds like it ought to be brilliant, and hilarious. xD And having absolutely no idea can actually be a very good thing because then there is so much to discover, so you can have so much fun. =D Thanks, Kath! I figure that I'm going to challenge myself to only start with the bare minimum of ideas and sort everything out as I go, so that I don't end up writing everything out beforehand on accident. xD Oh wow. I want drawings of Crick immediately and oh my goodness I'm laughing already. Because knowing you, I might as well prepare myself. 8D SO EXCITED ICON. SO EXCITED. Ask and ye shall receive! I've been working on making a few doodles of my characters so far for their profiles. I've finished Crick's but I'll put that right below this now.
So, I've been working on writing some blurbs regarding the story and I figured I might as well shape them into some description thingies I guess? HubCorporation Incorporated has been described as “Aperture Science meets Buy-N-Large, if Dr. Seuss were the CEO”. The company is divided into a joyous balance of order and chaos—organized but in complete discord at the same time. Each warehouse complex, as they are called, is located in a different part of the galaxy. These are sort of the “hubs” of HubCorp- most people working here stay on the planet for work (unless their job is to deliver items). The complexes end up making deliveries mostly to nearby planets.
Each complex is divided up into several warehouses, as the name suggests, but they often contain several varying departments and offices as well. Many of these vary from system to system—Complex 5C is mostly focused on scientific divisions, working on innovations that will make deliveries even more efficient. They are… still working on this part. It’ll be a while.
Now, you may be wondering, “That’s nice, but what is it that HubCorp actually does?” A better question might be, what doesn’t HubCorp do? They’ll package your inventory, deliver across galaxies, categorize and organize, they manufacture, they purchase old items, they sell new items, you get the idea. Half the motivation for their actions is “because we can”, and the other half is getting paid.
Basically, if you need to get it done, they can do it. As long as they get paid.  (Sorry, it's kinda small) Crick is short, sprightly, and energetic. His full name is Cricket; he hates it with a passion and insists everyone call him Crick. Relatively young, HubCorp is his first real employer and as a result he’s attempting to take his job seriously. Which. Is kind of hard to do when you’re shorter than most of the other species there. But anyways. As an InfoRunner, Crick basically just dashes around the Complex delivering forms, notes, and other assorted pieces of information that are of relevance to whoever may need them. While there’s no “files arrive in thirty minutes or less or your next notice is completely free” guarantee, the majority of the company needs InfoRunners to be as efficient as possible. (Doesn’t mean they can’t laze around every once in a while, though.) Fortunately, Crick is competent enough to get messages around on time without having to slack off. Or getting crushed by a forklift. Not getting crushed by a forklift is also a good thing. More bios may or may not be up later if I remember. |
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Post by Zylaa on Oct 8, 2011 21:35:10 GMT -5
This sounds absolutely brilliant. XDD I laughed aloud at "HubCorp, Inc.
HubCorporation Incorporated has been described as “Aperture Science meets Buy-N-Large, if Dr. Seuss were the CEO”" and chuckled inwardly at most everything else. <3
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Post by icon on Oct 12, 2011 20:03:11 GMT -5
This sounds absolutely brilliant. XDD I laughed aloud at "HubCorp, Inc. HubCorporation Incorporated has been described as “Aperture Science meets Buy-N-Large, if Dr. Seuss were the CEO”" and chuckled inwardly at most everything else. <3 Thanks! =D I figure I want it to be more of a humorous story, so I'll be trying to work on some more witty comments about HubCorp to add in.
So, I've been planning. I've decided I'm going to have this be more of a series of shorter, but definitely related stories rather than a single, overarching plot that ties everything together. That way I can focus more on the environment of HubCorp itself as opposed to just plot progression or something like that. I dunno. I figure that breaking the story up into smaller subplots might also be useful for adding other quirky things to the story. More spontaneous writing means that I can more easily adapt to adding an amusing dare, or sticking a shout-out into a short scene. =D ...Also I figure if I get stuck on one story I can just say "screw it" and start on a completely different part of it. >.>;With that said, have another writing. Ever since the delivery scandal of Tortus XVI, HubCorp has done its very best to get orders and deliveries to its customers as efficiently as possible. Over time, this has led to the introduction of a new division, devoted solely to finding better, faster ways to get from point A to point B. The Innovation Division, or “Innovision” as they insist on calling themselves, is constantly researching and discovering new ways to keep the system running smoothly (and keep any more delivery scandals under the hat).
Recently, a new technological breakthrough has been implemented into HubCorp’s list of delivery tools: time travel. Who needs to get from point A to point B when you can work backwards? Better yet, why not just scrap point A from the start! Simple, effective, and time saving.
Sadly, this idea worked best on paper, and since it was introduced has slowly taken a turn for the worse. Sloppy workers who want to get done quicker and scheming customers attempting to cheat the system have even gone so far as to have items delivered before they decided to order them, scamming HubCorp out of precious inventory and funds. As you would assume, this is an incredibly serious problem for the company (and the whole “thousands of paradoxes” thing isn’t good for the fabric of the universe either).
Therefore, HubCorp has introduced to the company the Paradox Department- a subgroup within the Innovation Division devoted to solving these problems related to temporal scams and trickery. Those who are part of the Paradox Department are generally shifty, mysterious, and rarely seen—often busy traveling through the timelines to solve paradoxes, or else browsing through past (and future) customer service reports in order to determine those attempting to swindle the company out of its hard-earned cash. The cryptic ways of the department are best left unexplained.
Oh, and their department is headed by a giant frog. It’s... better not to ask about that. Every time they get questioned about it there’s mutterings of stable time loops and universal constants. And goodness knows we don't need to get into all of that.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 14, 2011 13:02:00 GMT -5
HubCorp sounds like the most fascinating place a story could be set in. Ever. And puns!  I can't wait to see the puns you come up with. |
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Post by Rikku on Oct 24, 2011 2:27:28 GMT -5
A corporation! <3 A big, ridiculous, interstellar, riddled-with-time-paradoxes corporation! That. That is super fantastic awesomesauce, is what it is. (It's hilarious already. ALREADY.) And, and you had better have puns like anything.
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Post by icon on Oct 28, 2011 13:32:35 GMT -5
*Incredibly late reply* Gah, thank you both so much! I'm so stoked that people actually want to read something I'm writing? I mean, I've never done any pieces of writing at a scale this large, so I'm sort of flipping out over it. xD --- So! I have been messing around with ideas that I want to include within this collection of shorter stories, with one-shot characters and amusing plot devices and such. I have no idea which ones I want to stick in specifically, but I assume that I'll figure it out at some point along the way. And if not, then hey, good opportunity to practice writing by the seat of my pants. But anyways. Possible ideas that I want to include- *The Masked Ones- a mysterious, cult-like group with mysterious origins that make up the bulk of HubCorp's accounting services. Well-intentioned, but always slightly unnerving with the faintest traces of malevolence. Not sure how much I want to use these guys- I might scrap them at some point. *At some point along the way, Crick gets a portable scooter-like vehicle to help him scoot around the Complex. Of course, said vehicle happens to be... upgraded by another worker to be more efficient. Yes. That's it, more efficient. *cough* *Army of miniature robots that malfunction and rebel against the Complex like some sort of cheesy B-grade sci-fi horror movie! *Slightly insane ex-employee who, after being fired, has fled into the deepest recesses of HubCorp's warehouses and taken to graffiti. Nobody has ever seen the guy, but they know he exists by the signs which he leaves all over the abandoned rooms. I'm thinking a mixture between Doug Rattman and Chet Flash for this guy. *Giant snarky talking insect-like alien as a character. Because why not. *Small, slightly manic character who is also an InfoRunner, like Crick. Considering making her part Imp, but she clearly denies it all the time. Because imps are fakey-fake creatures from folktales and do not exist in real life. Honest. *Corporate conspiracies! Blackmail, espionage, and all that jazz. HubCorp is probably going to have at least a few skeletons in the warehouse, I figure. For some reason I can imagine them having an entire division reserved for company conspiracies. xD; *I want a bumbling scientist in here somewhere. A clumsy, but well-meaning scientist who ends up accidentally destroying half the Innovation division on a weekly basis with all his accidents. Possibly the kind of guy who would try to make a get-rich quick scheme? I kind of want to stick a get-rich quick scheme in here. Also, it occurs to me that while I may have given information about my story I haven't actually described the inspirations for it! I feel like I should do that. A lot of the story is inspired by snippets and quotes from Portal and Portal 2, with all of Aperture Science's crazy SCIENCE shenanigans. I figure that HubCorp, while primarily focused on delivering and selling items, would probably also work on scientific advances as well. For the business side of it, I picture the company to be like Buy-N-Large from Wall-e: large, prevalent in most of the Inner System, and with flashy advertising for products that you don't actually need. :U Now, for an inspiration I haven't really mentioned before, Galactic Handling and Logistics, or GHL for short. This is a group of people who have made a fictional space company which is really much everything that I would imagine HubCorp to be, only they've made it using Lego pieces. Which is pretty cool. 'Cause come on. Lego. ((I would highly recommend browsing through the photostream and just looking at some of the creations made, especially of these two guys. They have a lot of ideas that I might end up shamelessly stealing adapting into my NaNo.)) |
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Post by icon on Nov 2, 2011 23:32:21 GMT -5
So. Somehow I manage to write 6000 words in two days. I. How does this. How does that even? Uh. Okay then. xD; Anyways. Excerpt time? Excerpt time. The first thing Crick noticed was that he was completely lost as to what to do.
Actually, that’s a lie. The first thing Crick noticed was that he had absolutely no idea what the heck just happened how did he get this job so quickly and then the second thing he noticed was that he was completely lost as to what to do.
Having received his ticket dictating that he was officially working at HubCorp, Inc, he had decided that he had absolutely nothing better to do than to wander around the main office until someone pointed him in the right direction. At this specific point he was leaning against one of the back walls boredly, trying to find amusing ways to pass the time.
He had contemplated spinning around in the massive revolving door entrance over and over again, only to walk over himself and see that there were already a few people doing just that. Once he realized that, he kept his eyes open and it occurred to him that there were several people just walking around looking busy, giving the illusion of forced productivity.
He stopped glancing around as another person walked up to him. Crick eyed the guy; he was a human, like Crick, but much taller, and had a better build. The man, sporting spiky hair and a bright yellow long-sleeved shirt, sauntered over casually. “Hey, you new here?”
Crick’s eyebrows shot up. “Um, yes, that’s me. How’d you know?”
The guy grinned. “Lucky guess, I suppose. I spend my break around here, you looked like the kind of kid who’s stuck.” He extended his hand.
Grasping the hand eagerly, Crick shook with awkward enthusiasm. “Haha, yeah, I’m kind of lost as to what to do. The name’s Crick… um, what’s with all the people milling around, pretending to be busy?”
The other man looked around the entrance. “Oh, you mean the Productivinducers? They’re set up to make us look like we know what we’re doing. Most of them are just hired to make the company look busier than we actually are. They move boxes from one place to another, then back again; They’ll open empty crates just to close them back up. Most of them carry around clipboards so that you know that they’re official.” The man chuckled, then glanced to Crick. “So, Kid, what’s your job here? Hope you didn’t get a Productivinducer…”
As he fumbled to pull the paper out again, Crick gave a bit of an awkward grin. “Um, no, actually, I’m supposed to be a… let me see… I’m an ‘InfoRunner’ whatever that’s supposed to mean-”
Here the man with the long-sleeved shirt interjected, speaking eagerly. “Oh, hey, you’re an InfoRunner. That’s great- they’re a pretty neat job, I’m head of a group of them myself. What sector?”
“Um, Warehouse Complex 5C, wherever that is.” Crick looked over the man some more- he realized that the shirt was actually covered by a bright yellow vest, which reminded him of some of the spaceship repairmen he’d seen throughout the system.
Here, the man broke into a grin. “Wait, 5C? You’re kidding, right? That’s some sort of crazy coincidence!” He laughed, then patted Crick on the back. “Just my luck, today we end up getting another worker at 5C! Ha ha!”
Crick started to laugh along with the guy. “Heh, what are the odds? You work as an Inforunner there too or something?”
The guy looked back at him and chuckled again. “Work there? Heck, I’m in charge of the Inforunners in 5C. What a lucky day!” He patted Crick on the back again. “Call me Poker, kid. Come on, then, lemme give you the official of HubCorp, on me.” |
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Post by icon on Nov 5, 2011 23:10:03 GMT -5
Alright, doing pretty well all things considered. =D Going to try and see if I can get to 18k by the end of the weekend- I feel like I've been on a roll so far with this.
That's not to say that things are going perfectly. xD; I feel like I've run into a few problems.
The thing is, I've got a general idea of what I want to stick in the story. It's just that I look over all the ideas I have, and I'm concerned that it's not going to be enough? I don't want to introduce certain parts of the plot until specific points, and I'm mostly concerned that I don't have anything to fill in those points until that happens. If all else, I can probably do a POV switch and change to a different character for a while? I dunno.
Which is a second problem- I feel like I haven't been planning out characters very well. Or anything, for that matter- a lot of this feels like I'm just taking half-baked ideas and concepts and trying to mash them together. Which. Is not necessarily a bad thing, but I'm just sort of being messy with it. I figure that come December, I can either edit this thing to my heart's content or shove it into a closet as that thing which I will never speak of ever again. Probably bits of both.
I'm not really writing a novel as much as I am a bunch of ideas packed together into a series of smaller stories. Whatever.
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Post by icon on Nov 6, 2011 18:41:00 GMT -5
Passed 15k earlier! =D I am excited. Gonna see if maybe, just maybe, I can pass 20k today- and if not today, then I'll probably pass it tomorrow. In the meantime, have an excerpt. When Crick got back, there were several robot suits starting to unload something nearby. Several boxes were being lifted out of a shuttle and being carried into a nearby warehouse. James was nowhere in sight. Poker had taken over, and was lounging in James’s seat with his feet on the desk top. He glanced up when Crick rode up in the Scoot. “Hey.”
“Hey.” Crick turned off the Scoot, and then clicked it closed. “You know Xrankk Aloprea, in the Notices and Information department? He asked me to give this to you. Looks like some sort of note about today.”
“Whatever,” Poker said boredly.
Crick glanced at the paper. “Judging from the looks of it, seems some guy is supposed to be coming in to see the Double Shipping order.”
“And why are you telling me this?” Poker asked.
Crick ignored him and went on reading. “Can’t tell what his name is, the hand writing is a bit hard to tell… Looks like he’s ‘Chet…’ Chet something-or-other.”
At this, Poker glanced up. “Chet? Would that happen to be Chet Flash?”
Crick squinted at the notice. “I can’t really tell, but yeah, it looks like it could be 'Chet Fla-'”
Crick was cut off from his reply by a loud splintering noise. “Hey!” One of the nearby robots unloading boxes yelled out. “What’s the big idea, who messed with these packages?”
Poker practically jumped out of his chair and grabbed Crick by the arm, practically dragging him as he dashed along. “Oh god… oh god oh god oh god this better not be him,” Poker muttered. Walking up to the man piloting the suit, he asked, “What’s up with the boxes?”
“Look at them yourself,” the pilot complained. “Some sort of vandal messed with them. The punks! I swear, kids these days…”
Poker crossed over, looked at the side of the box and swore. Painted on the side of the now partially-broken box in a clear, distinct red color were four words that seemed to make Poker tense up, even though Crick had no idea what they meant:
CHET FLASH WUZ HERE
...So. I understand that actually referencing Chet Flash and making him, y'know, actually plot relevant sort of goes against the whole idea of what Chet Flash is supposed to be- he's supposed to be a cameo, a funny background moment that you actually have to look to find, rather than have it told up front, which is really sort of challenging in writing. In art, you can stick anything you want in and people will have to hunt for it themselves. In writing, you can't really have that sort of thing in there unless you outright state it. >.>;
But honestly, I felt like this idea was too good to pass up. I would have done it with some new character instead, but I also sort of wanted to try and stick that reference in there just so I could say that I did. ^^; So yeah, don't mind me.
Also, contemplating making Epic Equipment be his weakness. >.>; I feel like I should probably stop making so many references.
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Post by PFA on Nov 6, 2011 18:47:17 GMT -5
Actually, I seem to remember making this mysterious character who called himself Chet Flash way back in my first NaNo. XD I was considering renaming him in the off chance I ever go back and edit that thing.
The answer is obvious. Chet Flash is many people. Chet Flash is no one.
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Post by icon on Nov 6, 2011 19:23:58 GMT -5
Actually, I seem to remember making this mysterious character who called himself Chet Flash way back in my first NaNo. XD I was considering renaming him in the off chance I ever go back and edit that thing. The answer is obvious. Chet Flash is many people. Chet Flash is no one. I suppose that makes sense. xD I dunno, it's one of those things that's sort of open to multiple interpretations. ...And now I have the mental image of some sort of cross-dimensional conspiracy of people who are all Chet Flash. I. What. xD; |
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Post by Birdy on Nov 6, 2011 19:42:09 GMT -5
Actually, I seem to remember making this mysterious character who called himself Chet Flash way back in my first NaNo. XD I was considering renaming him in the off chance I ever go back and edit that thing. The answer is obvious. Chet Flash is many people. Chet Flash is no one. I suppose that makes sense. xD I dunno, it's one of those things that's sort of open to multiple interpretations. ...And now I have the mental image of some sort of cross-dimensional conspiracy of people who are all Chet Flash. I. What. xD; You're both wrong. Chet Flash is obviously a Time Lord. *brick'd* |
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I can't wait to see the puns you come up with.
