PC461, ARTEMIS RISING: Fated Ink

[Ocicat]

PodCastle 461, ARTEMIS RISING: Fated Ink

by Siobhan Gallegher

read by Setsu Uzume

hosted by Isabel Yap

A PodCastle Original!

Rated PG.

The front door goes ding-a-ling and in walks a young woman, with bouncing blonde curls, bright blue eyes, blemish-free skin. The picture of perfection, some would say.

But I know better. I’ve seen girls like her, and I’ll see a million more, all optimistic hope-filled bags of flesh. Then they come to me and that changes everything.

The young woman points to the sign in the window, says something about wanting a tattoo above the crack of her little ass. Charming.

Siobhan Gallagher is a wannabe zombie slayer, currently residing in the Forever City. Her fiction has appeared in over thirty publications, including AE – The Canadian Science Fiction Review, On Spec, Abyss & Apex, Unidentified Funny Objects anthology, and Grimdark Magazine.

Setsu Uzume spent her formative years in and out of dojos. She also trained in a monastery in rural China, studying Daoism and swordplay. She is a member of Codex and SFWA. While she has dabbled in many arts, only writing and martial arts seem to have stuck. Find her on Twitter @KatanaPen.

Listen to this week’s PodCastle!

[Dwango]

This was somewhat confusing until the post story where the Illustrated Man is mentioned.  I've not read that and now want to pick it up and find out more.  The viewpoint from the character as a narrative conceit was better when I knew it.  As it stood, it was a sad story and the main character felt somewhat tragic and lost, not even knowing where she was.  It feels a lot that way as you get older and see the changes in the world and places you knew are removed and changed.  It's like having your memories holding on to a lost world, knowing once you lose the memory, the place and a bit of yourself is lost.  She has to deal with losing herself completely with the memory.  At the end the hope of the illustrated man keeps her going which gives a brighter ending to a somewhat sad piece.

[Frank Evans]

I've been waiting to see if anyone else was going to chime in on this story because, quite frankly, I'm not quite sure what I thought of it. I liked the writing and the narration, and I thought the through story of the young man and his abusive father was well done. I just didn't realize that that particular story was meant to be the main plot point, if that makes sense. The result was that I was a bit confused when the story ended with the MC helping the young man and his mother escape as opposed to her finding the tattoed man she was so interested in.  

I've never read Bradbury's The Illustrated Man, and I don't know if having a prior knowledge of that might have helped with my appreciation of this story. Had I known the connection maybe I wouldn't have been as confused by the ending.

[Frank Evans]

This was somewhat confusing until the post story where the Illustrated Man is mentioned.  I've not read that and now want to pick it up and find out more.  The viewpoint from the character as a narrative conceit was better when I knew it.  As it stood, it was a sad story and the main character felt somewhat tragic and lost, not even knowing where she was.  It feels a lot that way as you get older and see the changes in the world and places you knew are removed and changed.  It's like having your memories holding on to a lost world, knowing once you lose the memory, the place and a bit of yourself is lost.  She has to deal with losing herself completely with the memory.  At the end the hope of the illustrated man keeps her going which gives a brighter ending to a somewhat sad piece.

Ha, as I was writing my post this one came out as well. Glad to see I wasn't the only one a bit confused.

[Ichneumon]

I have read The Illustrated Man, and I really enjoyed it. This story, not as much. Bradbury's writing feels crisp and visual to me, whereas this one felt fuzzy around the edges. It was kind of confusing, I'm still not sure about some of the elements. Also, this is not how I would have pictured the tattooist that inked the Illustated Man, but that's just my opinion. Also, the Illustrated man is not the protagonist of Bradbury's story, more like an antagonist. Maybe I would have liked this story more if the author hadn't set it so clearly up next to a classic.