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As a writer, one of the things that fascinates me is forms. Structures. I enjoy playing with them, seeing what sort of different effects one can acheive with each. One form that’s always fascinated me is the epistolary novel - they seem like such a fun form to play in. But I’ve never really had an idea that suited the form, and didn’t really want to force it.
Until Tuesday the 12th of February, 2008, that is.
On that day, while I was bored at work, I had such an idea. A science fiction novel about a commercial genetic engineering project, where most the actual epistles making up the novel would be bug reports and the related chatter. (Hey, you’re supposed to write what you know, right?) The title, as you may suspect from its blandness, is a working title only. I have no idea what to call this one yet. Likewise, the dating at this point is yet to be fully resolved, so I’m dating things purely in terms of day 1 and so on…
This is definitely a Lokiverse story, although I’m not sure exactly where in the chronology it will fit, beyond the obvious “in the future somewhere, duh.” (It’s also going to be a challenging one to work crossovers into, although there’s one in the first installment, below.) Speaking of chronology, the individual posts that make up this story are displayed below in the correct reading order, rather than by publication date.
The Ducal Line has new posts three times a week, on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and can be subscribed to as a separate feed should you wish to do so.
| From: |
Hailey Vincent |
| To: |
Company Address Book |
| Date: |
1, 12:00 |
| Subject: |
We Got It! |
We got it!
We got it, we got it, we GOT IT!
I’m pleased to announce that the Kliest-Hargraeves Consortium has been awarded a prestigious new contract today. We’re going to be doing the Dristeen Ducal Line project! This is worth billions and billions, and the lion’s share of it is going to be ours.
For those of you who haven’t been following the news: Dristeen is a relatively new planet, out towards the spinwise edge of our galactic arm. The people there recently decided that democracy wasn’t working out for them, and have chosen, in a planet-wide plebiscite, to be ruled by a genetically perfect line of Dukes, who we are going to design and create for them.
I hope you can see why I’m so excited about this – my team and I have spent months working on getting this job for us, and at times, it looked like we’d wasted all that effort. I confess, until last night, I was still worrying that those assholes from Blue Sun would snake it out from under us, but in the end, we were just too good for them.
So, three cheers for us, and a big thank you to all the members of the sales team and everyone else who’s consulted for us in putting together the funkspek. Look for the formal announcement and the signed off version of the funkspek sometime tomorrow.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go take some of that holiday leave I’ve been building up in the three years we’ve been putting this together.
Seeya,
Hails.
| From: |
Greta Kliest |
| To: |
Hailey Vincent |
| Date: |
1, 12:03 |
| Subject: |
Re: We Got It! |
Hailey, much as I appreciate and understand your elation and enthusiasm, I really didn’t need you to spam the entire company with this.I recognise that there’s no real harm done, and you’re only anticipating the official announcement by a matter of hours, but please try to keep things a little quieter in future. There is such a thing as industrial espionage, you know.
Okay, now that I’ve got the stern boss bit out of the way, I want to congratulate and thank you for a job well done. Top notch work, and don’t think for a minute it won’t reflected in your Noodlemas bonus this year.
Regards,
Greta
PS – send me a vidcard from wherever you wind up going 
| From: |
Greta Kliest |
| To: |
Company Address Book |
| Date: |
1, 12:08 |
| Subject: |
Official Announcement: The Dristeen Ducal Line Project |
As most of you are probably already aware, earlier today we signed contracts for the Dristeen Ducal Line Project. We have committed to completing this project in the next 12 months. The final, accepted version of the Functional Specification was version 4.03, which will be distributed to you all later on today. Those of you wishing to work on the project should indicate your availability for it after reading the FS. The Project lead designers will be Frank Davis and William Monday, and I will be the Project Manager.
This project represents the single largest undertaking, both in terms of effort and income, that our company has ever undertaken. Let’s give it our absolute best, people.
Greta Kliest.
| From: |
William Monday |
| To: |
Frank Davis, Greta Kliest |
| Date: |
1, 12:11 |
| Subject: |
Re: We Got It! |
Okay, just to get it straight, this is not going to another one of those things like the Ruthvenia job is it? Because for all Hailey’s blather about consultation, I still think there’s a better than even chance that the funkspek makes promises we can’t keep.
It’s not at all comforting that the last version of it I saw was the 4.00. When are we going to get to see this new version?
Billy
| From: |
Frank Davis |
| To: |
Greta Kliest, William Monday |
| Date: |
1, 12:14 |
| Subject: |
Re: Re: We Got It! |
I’d like to echo Billy’s points, Greta. I know that after the Ruthvenia fiasco, you took action to bring sales a little more into line with reality, but Hailey has a tendancy to say whatever she has to say in order to get the deal she wants.
Frank
| From: |
William Monday |
| To: |
Frank Davis |
| Date: |
1, 12:15 |
| Subject: |
Re: Re: Re: We Got It! |
You know, that says absolutely frightening things about your homelife Frank 
Billy
| From: |
Greta Kliest |
| To: |
Frank Davis, William Monday |
| Date: |
1, 12:16 |
| Subject: |
Re: [3] We Got It! |
Guys, you worry too much. I’m sure that Hailey has done the right thing by the company.
Greta
| From: |
Hailey Vincent |
| To: |
Greta Kliest |
| Date: |
2, 12:00 |
| Subject: |
The Functional Specification |
| Attachment: |
Dristeen Ducal Line Functional Specification v4.03 |
As promised…
Really going on holiday this time,
Hailey
| From: |
Greta Kliest |
| To: |
Hailey Vincent |
| Date: |
2, 12:00 |
| Subject: |
The Functional Specification |
You really dropped me in it this time, Hailey…
Greta
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