Contra Deka

Almost all of my work on the Fabulae storyline took place in front of the computer. When I had spare time at school or church and didn't have my computer with me, I would sometimes just sketch out short stories in the Fabulae universe, but unrelated to the main storyline. (See "The Assassin").

Eventually I got the idea of connecting all of these short stories into one story arc. I thought that the writing I did at school and at camp, etc, I could funnel into a seperate story line, and thus create a new batch of characters I could carry from one short story to another. Kind of like a comic book.

And so I got the idea for Contra-Deka.

The premis behind Contra-Deka is that it takes place in the country of Fera. Deka is deliberately working in Fera to create an atmosphere of chaos and violence, as sort of like an experimentation which would extend to the rest of Fabulae if successful.

At this time The Renegades are returning to Fabulae. Their main focus is on defeating the gods in full battle, and so they don't have time to concern themselves with Fera. On the other hand they don't want to concede it to the gods entirely, so they create sort of a super-hero team in Fera that, once started, can carry on independently the fight for truth, justice, et cetera. The reference to this occurs in "The New Era 8", during a discussion by The Renegades.

I felt like I had not been making use of the full potential of a world with talking animals, so I wanted the Contra Deka team to be composed primarily of animals.

In the first chapter, "Origins", a wolf named Lupa is saved from death by a Renegade. The same Renegade gives Lupa the power of super strength, super speed, and the ability to fly. The Renegade then disappears, leaving Lupa to fight for herself.

In the next chapter, "The New Member" the rest of the team is assembled. Cursus, a rabbitt. Also according to my notes, a tiger, a fox, and a black panther were also part of the team, although I don't remember if I ever got around to creating names for the later three.

There were a lot of problems with Contra Deka. One problem is that I had difficulty thinking small. I always imagined long involved adventures for the members of Contra-Deka, and these weren't the kind of stories that could be written in 20 minutes in study hall.

I remembered in 3rd and 4th grade I used to be able to write whole stories in one evening, and I tried to emulate this, but the stories I used to write in 3rd and 4th grade were very primitive, and in high school it felt like a waste of time to return to this type of writing. Even though I was only writing for myself, I knew I wasn't working on something I cared about, so I decided to just drop it.

At first I tried to bring the series to a natural end. I imagined two more Contra Deka adventures "The First Assignment". (I wanted to at least establish them and give them some enemies before they met their demise. They had to complete at least one assignment, otherwise the whole thing would have been pointless.) But this was to be followed abruptly by "The Death of Contra Deka" in which all the characters would be killed off.

But once I lost enthusiasm for the project, it was agony to keep on plodding ahead even a couple more chapters. In the end I decided it was just easier to throw everything away and pretend it never happened rather than work out the last two chapters.

All I have left now are my notes. I have the titles of the Contra Deka series
Origins
New Members
First Assignment
Death of Contra Deka

All of these take place after "The New Era 8".

Also my notes on the characters.
Lupa--Female Wolf. 21 years old. The leader. Organized and thoughtful
Cursus- Male Rabbit. 20 Years old. Fast. Daring and rash.
The Black Panther, Tiger and fox are listed in my notes, but not given names or descriptions. I don't think I ever finished "New Members" so I probably didn't get around to creating them.

(One quick note: I had decided in the world of Fabulae that if animals were going to interact with human beings and be treated as equals, than they should have lifespans equivalent to humans. Thus, a 21 year old Wolf and a 20 year old rabbit, both young and still in their prime.
Also, to avoid the problem of the members eating each other, I had also decided that no natural carnivores existed in the world of Fabulae. All the animals are vegitarians.)

And finally, after I threw away the Contra Deka stories, I joted down a few notes to myself under the heading of "Lessons of Contra Deka." 10 plus years later, I'm not sure I agree with myself anymore, but this is what I though at the time.
1. Never write solely for the purpose of killing time. Have a purpose for writing, otherwise it gets boring.
2. Never limit yourself to a certain length. Let the story evolve naturally.
3. Work carefully in your writing. Don't rush yourself.
4. My strength is probably not in short stories.
5. Underdeveloped characters are boring
6. Writing like a 4th grader was okay in 4th grade. Expect more from myself now.