On Travels: Part Two

It’s starting to pull me under, I can feel it beneath my feet – Dead Swans, “Thinking of You”

When I was planning Foxing, and when I first pitched the story to friends, I was given plenty of suggestions, feedback, and comments on just about every aspect of my vision. One little nugget of wisdom from that period stood out to me, and has since then become my guiding north star for the thematic elements of writing this story:

“Learn to find beauty in negative spaces.”

– A good friend

Sounds like a platitude on first blush, but platitude or not, the literary notion of a small, desperate good standing in the face of a much larger evil has always appealed to me as a writer. I’m sure it appeals to many writers or readers. I decided that I would make this sort of thinking inherent to the story.

Here’s how I did that.

Incorporating Themes

The world of Foxing is purposefully morose, savage, and draconian. My aim was to create a macabre setting that is interpreted by its inhabitants as spiritual, political, or nonsensical. When the world around you is truly out to get you, it’s natural to fall back on some kind truth, or something you can trust in. In Foxing, those truths are humanity’s God/Church, and the corvid’s Ancestors/Quorum.

But it’s not fun to read about Zealots clashing swords, is it?

The scene in Travels: Part One, where a young Elia first encounters a Foxer and a Zealot in the wild, was written with these themes in mind — that structures of power, heuristics — can only go so far in resolving conflict.

>”If we let her go, she grows up a little and eventually she kills a Zealot or Lightbringer,” the other demon reasons. He draws his face close to Ben’s. “What about a Foxer? One of your order?”

>Ben never takes his eyes off you

>“What about this? She might be the one who drives a bayonet through Mary.”

>“Shut up, Rich-” Ben starts

>The Zealot cuts him off

>“Your future daughter, even.”

>And after that?

>Silence

>You watch Ben’s chest heave

>Hear the demons gasping for breath

>You have no idea what they’re saying. You only have one question:

>‘How am I still alive?’

>And yet

>After a few moments

>The Vulcada lowers his weapon

>Ben pulls back on the bolt-action and withdraws the round that was meant for you

>He draws heavy gulps of wet night air into his lungs as he tugs at his orange-and-white scarf, off-gassing heat from beneath his uniform

>You haven’t moved an inch since he started aiming that gun at you

>But now?

>You feel your muscles begin to thaw

>A trapped breath of air leaks out of you

>”I’m not gonna kill a kid,” the Vulcada says with finality

>The Zealot does not take kindly to this news

>“Are you INSANE!?” Richard barks, “Listen, Ben, I don’t want to kill a fledgling either, but it- it’s heresy to let her live! You know that as well as I!”

>”No,” Ben says as he pulls his arm through the strap of his weapon, slinging it against his back. “We’re not going to kill this one. I won’t do it.”

What you see in the above example is my attempt at humanizing the adversary (at least from Elia’s perspective). Ben can’t bring himself to shoot an unarmed little girl, even though he faces divine retribution should he falter in his duty. An impossible choice for a soldier like Ben entirely caught up in the machinery of the Church.

Unpacking Thematic Elements in Scenes

A scene where two deeply hated enemies come across one another in the wild like this is ripe for working thematic elements in. With Ben, I wanted to portray him as a young, aspiring father, though no stranger to doing the work of the Church. He’s devout, clever, but above all else: he’s patient, and kind. He’s all of this, and he’s the antagonist in the scene, at least to little Elia.

For Ben, he sees far too much of his future daughter in Elia to follow through with his duties, so he refuses. It’s not all good on his part — he then uses her to find her parents so they can steal their relics. What’s important here is the nuance. You can call it bad decisions on Ben’s part, but I call it a character with strengths and flaws.

Presenting the hardened military of the church — especially a Foxer who fervently seeks to do their Lord’s will with rifle and steel — as a small force of good, as people who see past the idea that a clueless child is a ‘heretic’ or that ‘they’ are nothing like ‘us’ is exactly what I was aiming for when I outlined this scene.

So Elia isn’t ran through with a bayonet, or shot dead. The people who terrorize her kin, set fire to her cities, and preach eradication of her kind? Turns out they aren’t a monolith. You’ll see more of that in upcoming chapters of Foxing.

Thematic World Elements

As I said, Purgatory is a dangerous, oppressive place, one that begets cooperation in order for anyone to survive. Cooperation and setting aside the proverbial differences are baked right into the story’s lore.

• Foxers have their service animals to lead them
• Ravens rely on crows
• Zealots, Lightbringers, and other branches of humanity’s military rely on each other conduct operations across Purgatory
• The people of Enclave have their Church

The ultimate idea behind outlining the story’s narrative and themes was to set up a world so oppressive and dark that it crushes people within it, smashing them between the rusted gears of a derelict machine.

And because people naturally seek to assimilate and protect themselves from danger, they fall in with the very power structures that are keeping them in check. They buy into the dream and dogma, and for them, the world makes sense that way.

Foxing is a story about two people’s pitted against each other by these forces. And it’s about the bits of light that shine through the cracks. The beauty in negative spaces.

The Fate of Travels: Part Two

Travels: Part Two is the next update in Foxing, and will release this week. I am working on it tirelessly to polish it and do justice to the conclusion of the “Travels” section of my story. Look for it out this week!