With a new month, I curled up in front of my laptop and started tinkering with potential storylines for my upcoming Ko-Fi posts. A few executive decisions later, I settled on the genres and the characters for the upcoming micro-tales. Up first is a fantasy featuring Tiatha. Despite an initial idea popping into my mind, I ultimately had to put it aside, since the core idea ballooned in scope. Once I banished that concept from the forefront of my mind, my imagination shifted to a conversation with the student she humiliated in Subtle Defense...

The danger of going on vacation is the backlog of work that waits for you upon your return. Fortunately, there are certain places that can keep that dread at bay. And while my family is such a rock, the sights I saw at Niagara Falls bolstered that defense. Here are a few images from the beginning of my trip through the Falls...

After completing Relentless Will and Conclusions, my focus shifted toward my patrons’ last story for March, a suspense tale. However, ever since I’ve delved into Tiatha’s life, a connection to Darren was planted and over time, the seed grew. While I kept half an eye on the fledgling concept, it wasn’t until I sat down to craft this narrative that I plucked on the binding thread between these characters. As a result, I dropped Darren into the middle of a forest alone and on the run from a Hunter...

It has been a long time since I’ve spun a tale based upon an image. In fact, it was Hidden Exchange back in July 2022. Unfortunately, there’s been a lot of obligations tugging me in every direction. Thankfully, those demands on my time have lessened. As a result, I thumbed through my Magic favorites on DeviantArt and isolated the image that sparked a story. This time it was a piece, with an unusual name, published by EinsteinWarrior...

When I finished Relentless Will, my attention whirled to the next story for my patrons, a mystery. Over the years, I’ve developed a couple of investigators. And when I sat down behind my laptop to craft the backing crime, my mind kept bouncing back and forth between them. While I was having trouble picking my detective, the crime began to crystalize. With the rough shape of my tale clutched between my mental fingers, I gave this investigation to Kyle Rickman of Insight Investigations...

While It’s been a while since I’ve visited any of my continuing stories over on Wattpad, they’ve continued to churn through my mental landscape. Fortunately, with most of my writing in place for March, I could spend some cycles to finish the latest installment in the story behind the search for what happened to Tarian’s expedition...

As the month winds down, I turned my attention to the month’s last stories for all my supporters. While I’m almost done with the next piece for my patrons, I needed a little more time to wrap it up, so I grabbed the final bit of micro-fiction. When I first sat down in front of the keyboard, I didn’t know how I was going to blend the story cube prompts into a finished story. Thankfully, after staring at my screen for several painfully unproductive seconds, a thought thundered through my mind. A simple way to inject drama into any tale is to play on familial ties...

As I conclude the collection of photos from my scuba trip, I searched through my collected proof of others. After a brief examination of photos, I’d settled on my jaunt to Niagara Falls. Thankfully, after the trip, I was quick to organize them so I could focus on each segment of the trip. Up first, I’ll be highlighting the campground we used while we were exploring the falls...

While I’ve done better with the stories this month, I haven’t quite kept up with my schedule for my patrons. Despite the delay, my patrons will get their stories. With Ramas’ recent tales swirling about my mind, it didn’t take long for this narrative’s skeleton to emerge from the depths of my imagination. While the rough idea was ready to explore, my fingers refused to work on it while I was down in Roanoke...

I’ve only played craps on a couple of occasions, and both were with play money during a holiday party. Despite the lack of risk to my wallet, the people working the tables ran them like we were at a casino. As a result, winning all the tickets was a fun and educational experience. With that experience firmly entrenched in my mind, when I saw the picture of a die on the cube, the connection with the craps table was established...

Over the last week, I’ve been bringing highlights of my last dive from my Blackbeard’s Cruise back in 2005. The site was a partially submerged wreck, and on the surface, it appeared rather simple. However, once I delved into the shallow waters, the teeming life bloomed. While I’d encountered plenty of fish during the weeklong trip, it paled compared to the sea life that was whipping about the coral reef encrusted hull...

There is something special about meandering along a forest trail. The way the branches sway in the wind, how the sunlight pierces through the canopy, and to the rocks protruding from the ground. The simple beauty of those landscapes is a remarkable thing. In fact, I’ve recently grabbed my camera and marched through a couple of trails near my house to catalogue the beauty despite the season. With each picture captured, the connection between nature and Tiatha coalesced...

Typically I seek to see the beauty everywhere, my mind took that challenge and ran with it. While I fundamentally understand that there are stretches of the world that truly are inhospitable and lack the beauty I envision to be had everywhere. However, my stubborn streak prevents me from accepting it. Unfortunately, the inner workings of my imagination created an image of a wasteland that contained zero beauty in any aspect. With that ugly slice of earth tucked away in my mind and the Rory’s story cube thrown, the skeleton of a story flooded into my mind...

Unfortunately, when I was scheduling my last batch of images on DeviantArt, I accidentally published Sapona’s Ribs in early February. If I hadn’t made that mistake, it would have been added to this post. As it is, I only published three pieces to my Natural Desygns gallery. While all of them are from my scuba diving cruise, they span two different dives. Please enjoy these snapshots from my past...

What do you think of when you hear new beginnings? Whenever it flows though my ears, my mind presents me with an alternate term, fresh start. Whatever term you cling to, the important thing is how and why you’re seeking that clean slate. For me, I wanted to get back on a schedule for publishing my stories to my supporters. And while I’ve already missed the publication cadence I’d defined, I’m still on pace to perform better than the last couple of months...