Across the Universe: A BFDI Oneshot Collection

A Writer's Problems

"Hey, Caike," Loo-Syrr greeted as he walked into the male quarters. "What you doin'?"

Caike-Fudg glanced up from his holo-screen and smiled. "Oh, hey, Syrr! I'm just practicing writing another story while we're waiting for lunch."

"Ooh." Syrr sat down beside Caike and looked on, noticing that there were barely any words on the screen so far. "How come there's not much written yet?"

"Well, I just started. I don't really know how to open it, though."

"Are you working on your main story?"

"Uh...no, actually?" Caike rubbed the back of his neck and chuckled sheepishly. "I know I told all my followers on Voltpad I'd have it soon, but I just can't find the motivation to work on it so far."

"What about that, uh...that other one?"

"Oh, yeah, uh...sorry, I just don't feel like writing for it right now."

"Well, then, what are you working on?"

"I, uh...I kinda started a new spin-off book entirely."

"You what?"

"Look, I don't have motivation to continue my other two stories right now, but I still want to write, so hopefully this will help me get back into it."

"...All right, whatever hovers your craft. So what's it about?"

Caike gestured animatedly with his hands. "It's a sort of outer-space anthology, kinda. You've read that one chapter in my main story, right?"

"Yeah. Oh, is it that AU?"

"Yeah, it's that one! I decided to expand on it a little bit. Give it a little mix of lore, story, and humor, you know?" He looked back at his holo-screen and hovered his hand over the holo-keyboard, but stopped and sighed. "I'm trying to make this chapter one of the more slice-of-life ones. Problem is, I don't really know how to do that. Right now, I've just got a bunch of dialogue."

"But didn't you say you already use too much dialogue in your stories?"

"Yeah, I know! I just...I don't know what to do. If you're not doing anything right now, could you help me out?"

"Sure, of course! Hmm...let's see..." Syrr read over what Caike had written so far and hummed to himself. "You might try throwing some setting description in there. I don't think the readers are too familiar with the room that this scene's taking place in."

"Oh! Good idea!"

Caike thought for a moment, then started rapidly typing on his holo-keyboard. Syrr smiled as his eyes darted over to the holo-screen for a second before wandering around the quarters. He took a moment to realize just how much he, Caike, and Ana-Logclok had turned this place from just a standard living space to a real sort of home.

The room itself wasn't too large—about the size of a college dorm room. The metallic gray walls wrapped uninterrupted around the room, save for a promotional poster of the Spy's Teir-Drop on the wall and the large window opposite the door with a clear view out to space. The single circular white light embedded into the light gray ceiling was buzzing softly but noticeably—a problem Syrr made a mental note to fix later.

The bunk bed across from the one Syrr and Caike were sitting on had been claimed by Clok all for himself. Syrr noticed that the top bunk's dull gray sheets were wrinkled and draped across the side, while on the bottom bunk lay some of Clok's personal belongings: a small blue backpack, a graphing calculator, a black electric guitar, and a T-shirt from Leastar. Three other T-shirts were plastered across Clok's side of the dark gray floor.