The man with the one golden eye smiled at her. His cheek puckered around the scars surrounding the golden orb implanted in his eye socket. "You have juice on your chin," he told her. She glared at him. "It's hard to drink tidily when you're tied to a chair and a goon is pouring juice down your throat." He whisked out his handkerchief and approached. "May I?" She bared her teeth at him. "And be careful how you speak of my employees. I believe that Roderick, the goon in question, has very delicate sensibilities. I retrieved him from a South African jail where he resided because someone called him a thug and he took exception." She felt a chill go through her, but she forced bravado. "I'll keep that in mind. Do you want to go straight to the torturing, or shall we banter some more first?" "I really would appreciate being able to clean your chin, dear," he said. "I do hate to see things out of place. As for the torture, there will be none of that. I don't even require you to talk, and I'm not going to gloat about my master plan. I simply wished to make sure that you were as comfortable as possible under the circumstances before I left for--a meeting."


Inspiration: "Frontier Psychiatrist" - The Avalanches
Story potential: Medium-high
Notes: A bit corny, and the speech about not gloating about the master plan is now as much of a cliche as gloating about the master plan, but I do like the not-a-villain villain.

The small boy stumbled out into the street. She gasped, seeing it. He shouldn't ought to be here. All the children had been taken away to the countryside weeks ago, when they realized the war would stretch as far as this. He should have been safe. Had some loving parent not been able to bear being separated from their child? Had a neglectful relative not even realized the boy should be taken to safety? Just around the corner, she could hear the cold, metallic tromping of the mechanical army approaching. She felt herself full to overflowing with the bubbling essence that she would pour out in one great wave to destroy the army. Which was good. And herself. Which she had become resigned to. And the little boy. Which was unacceptable.


Inspiration: This poster from the vintage ads LJ community. http://vintage-ads.livejournal.com/3176648.html
Story Potential: Low.
Notes: Eh. Also, geez, can you tell I'm a new mother much?

We're going to take a little stroll out West, he said to me, his arm around me, hiding the pistol he pressed against my corset. My corset stays might be iron, and effective in almost all situations, but I did not think I could rely upon them to turn a bullet. "Very well," I said calmly, for a lady must always maintain her calm or gentlemen use the slightest emotional reaction to write her off as hysterical, something I was most determined not to have done to me. "But first I must write a brief note to my acquaintances with whom I have social engagements, excusing myself." "What?" He gaped at me. "Lady, I have a *pistol* pressed to your side!" "And *I* have certain responsibilities!"


Inspiration: "Way Out West" - Andrew Bird's Bowl of Fire
Story Potential: High
Notes: This character would be fun to write! My main concern is that steampunk/Victoriana might be glutted right now.

It was her turn at the wheel, and so she snapped the synapse leads into her temples, slipped her hands into the gauntlets that would keep the gears from crushing her tender bones as they rotated around (but wouldn't keep her fresh from bruising), and put on her game face, a silvery blank surface that would shine from among the black greased gears like the Madonna hanging down from the sky. Wouldn't do to have the normals see the contortions of her face as she fought down the screams. It wasn't as if she was even suffering, not precisely, it was just a matter of extreme discomfort and widening and that the human brain wasn't designed to expand that wide--though it could. And it must.

Inspiration: Was thinking about "Girl in the Gears," the steampunk, Vicesteed-world, nano-fic that I'm going to tweet this month for Nano WriMo (*not* NaNoWriMo)
Story Potential: Medium
Notes: Some nice imagery, but nothing special here. Can tell my mind was elsewhere!

They met in the bowels of the print shop, while the steam golems labored above them, racking the letters and pounding the print upon the papers for tomorrow's broadsheets. It was not the safest place, maybe, but Her Imperial Majesty's policemen might believe that they kept such close watch upon the printers and other potentially dangerous agitators that no true agitators would dare congregate in such a place, and certainly not in such numbers. It had been easy to reach the shop by traveling over the inkstained sewer waters into the basement, crawling up through the drain. They'd only had to avoid the jewel-eyed rats with brass goggles until the clock tower chimed and--

Inspiration: Thinking about the whole steampunk surge of late.
Story Potential: Low.
Notes: Don't get me wrong, this is pretty and all, and it could be a neat, fairly standard steampunk setting, but there's not an actual interesting story in here.

Terra firma was in the distance--they saw the snout of the mountain protruding from the cloud bank they floated above. They got out the telescope and shot the bolts that held the grappling lines in place.

"I see no ground mites," the second-in-command told the captain.

"No, nor buzzards, neither," said the cabin boy.

"Humph," said the captain, who had seen enough supposedly simple missions go awry to not get his hopes up. "That cloud bank is high enough to conceal anything. For all I know, they could have a dragon waiting to shred any trespassers."

"I see dirt," the second-in-command said excitedly. "Not just rock. And there are trees. Not fruit trees, probably, but there could be other--"

Inspiration: "terra firma"
Story Potential: Low.
Notes: Meh. Somebody else might find something interesting in this, but I don't, not really. It's a bit steampunky, a bit dirigibles and airships, maybe post-climate-change, and there's probably pirates involved somewhere, but still...meh. It feels a bit like "Around the World in 80 Days," and maybe that's the problem. Not that I didn't enjoy that story, but it just isn't my style.

The suite began, the musicians shifting effortlessly from tuning up to playing the first waltz. The little figurines glided out from their recesses in the walls of the dance hall and moved through their paces like the clockwork that ran them. Their faces were pulled back in macabre grins of joy, their heads tilted at angles indicating wild abandon entirely unfamiliar to those who knew human anatomy, angles that would have been impossible if, one and all, their necks had not been snapped before the clockwork mechanisms were slid under their skins like morbid bones. There was only one living girl in the mix, and she was nearly dead of exhaustion and fear. If she could keep up, she could live. This--

Inspiration: "suite", as a musical term for a set of instrumental dances.
Story Potential: High? Low?
Notes: Yes, I've a macabre mind. I sort of like this as some sort of steampunk/dark fantasy/horror invention. She can live, but only if she can dance as much as the clockwork figures. And somehow, she does. How? Why? Through what intervention? And what does that do to her for the rest of her life?

The factory whistle went off, and the dwarves groaned. Their pockets were empty of their pay, their bellies were full of their beer, and their beards reeked of cheap perfume. It was time to get back to work. They sauntered up to the bar and attempted to wheedle another round fro free from the comely barmaid (who wore cheap perfume), but she'd seen enough shifts of off-work dwarves to not be cozened by their sweet words, their big eyes as they stared wistfully up at her, and the promises they made of paying her back twice no three times as much when next they got paid, except only that their great-great uncle had died this day and so they were mourning him the dwarven way.

Inspiration: A silly factory game.
Story Potential: Medium.
Notes: One of those steampunk fantasy humor type stories, like some Pratchett or Glen Cook. Could be fun, but hardly mind-blowing.