Originally planned to pen this on February 29, 2024 - the real launch date of On Their Territory, but I’m swamped with actually writing and other life projects, so this will have to do, rip.
What is this?
So here’s the thing, I wrote Blue Days as a first part of a larger story, but it’s its own little story, so I finished that with the expectation I’m writing a sequel.
Well, the scope just got larger, and larger… until I have an entire epic drafted out. This happened slowly, built itself slowly over the process of four years. I started thinking immediately as the Blue Days final draft was sent into print. And now we are here, another leap year, another big project. The world that ended up being pictured was just giant. So we are gonna need some time.
And I have to re-configure Blue Days to do it, including some edits.
So here’s that’s happening - Blue Days will ascend as only Part 1 of a major series called On Their Territory.
Free to read on my site. I just wanna share this around.
I wrote a blurb for this series:
”Over this series, witness the unrest caused by the political, social, and economical struggles in an evolved future California in the late-21st century, marred by high unemployment, eminent domain, and gradual erosion of rights on a national level.
See the rise of the pro-localist, pro-independence, and pro-citizens’ rights and welfare Bearist Association of California in the public’s consciousness, against the aggressive and terroristic actions by a loose pro-federal group of Unionists as they try to force the state to remain in the Union.
Experience the rapid changes in Californian society as the United States nears the presidential election to decide whether to re-elect the hardline nationalist Johnson Administration.
Live through the comprehensive revolution of the lives of ordinary Californians — from the eyes of a handful of working-class Californians simply trying to survive in their rapidly-changing home state.”
So how will this work?
As a result, we are gonna tell this story as a timeline. As a chronological sequence of events that gives it almost a documentary timeline quality. Because I want to give it a realistic feel.
The story of Blue Days, with some key adjustments to make this concept work, will be SPLIT into two parts - June and the first half of July 2096, as is the time setting of the original story. Chapters are further broken up into scenes - about a third of a chapter long, or 1000 words each - so while June is 16 scenes long, it’s really about 5 or 6 original Blue Days chapters long.
The sequel, as it was originally planned, would encompass the second half of July, and the rest of the year of 2096. This will be Act One.
Yep. Just Act One. I project a word count in the six digits. Any fewer and the world I want to create and build simply wouldn’t work. Not detailed enough otherwise.
I have already uploaded June on the On Their Territory page, so go there and read that.
July is MASSIVE, encompassing easily 33,000 words, and will need some time just to upload. Probably going up in the Month of May. It’s 33 different scenes all with their own subset, and formatting, and all that.
Thank the website builder for this weird arrangement.
And then as I go further, each timescale (not always per month), will be uploaded as a batch.
So these batches will go up here on the Yellow Optic website first, and then maybe on some writing sites a little later that I squatted my name with. Cool.
What about Kayla and Miles?
Bruh, literally my last major project was a visual novel called Ferrule Instincts I put up on Steam. We will be fine.
But seriously, I’m hoping to finish off the year 2096 of On Their Territory, aka Act One, and then freshen up Fool Me Twice. You may notice Fool Me Twice is a little different from Ferrule Instincts, so some tweaks to that as well. I wrote that back in 2015, holy cow. Some of it I want written slightly differently, and that was what is in Ferrule Instincts.
Probably will do the “Scenes instead of Chapters” idea, because I like my story points finer. I’ve always loved Kayla and Miles, they are both very cute and wholesome and I do take vacations from Yellow Optic California — even though I’m just consumed by California under Bearism for the past four years and I can’t wait to realize it all.
But yes, probably the same re-adjustment of Fool Me Twice, and the sequel I have in mind. Probably end of this year, most likely early to mid-2025? I do have graduate school to take care of, and I hope to finish off On Their Territory Act One this summer, and slowly upload them over the year. Because I’m lazy and this website builder is weird and tough to use at times.
Anything else?
Nah, as I’m writing this very very long blog post, all I’m thinking was how much I wanted to return to Yellow Optic work. Well, I guess this IS Yellow Optic work, but you know what I really meant.
I’m behind on uploading July 2096 of the series as it is, it’s all done but i’m just lazy, so I actually will have to go do that now, rip.
Anyway, here’s another On Their Territory link for your convenience. Talk soon.