Kudos

By Conor Kostick

These are the tales of Eternal Voyager. Tales from a distant future in which all life is virtual. Everyone in the Metaverse takes for granted the ability to teleport; to change shape; to create entire planets for their playgrounds and to make backup copies of themselves, so they cannot permanently die. And what do these people who live beyond the conventional universe do with their powers? Mostly they party.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Conor Kostick
• Release date: Jul 16, 2015
• ISBN: 9780957632028

Conor Kostick

Conor Kostick is a writer and historian living in Dublin. As a novelist he was awarded the Farmleigh writer's residency for the summer of 2010 and a place on the nominees list for the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award 2012 and 2013. At their 2009 awards, the Reading Association of Ireland gave him the Special Merit Award ‘in recognition of his significant contribution to writing for children in Ireland’.   Epic is Conor’s most successful book, selling over 100,000 copies worldwide. It was awarded a place on the International Board on Books for Young People "White Ravens" list for 2006 and on the Booklist Best Fantasy Books for Youth list for 2007. As an historian, Conor Kostick's holds a PhD and a gold medal from Trinity College Dublin. He won first prize in the 2001 Dublinia Medieval Essay Competition, and has held fellowships from the Irish Research Council and the University of Nottingham. In 2013, he was awarded a Marie Curie research grant from the EU. Conor was twice chairperson of the Irish Writers' Union. His facebook readers page is here.

Book preview

Eternal Voyager

Kudos

Conor Kostick

First published 2015 by Curses & Magic, Dublin, Ireland

ISBN 978-0-9576320-2-8

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, scanning, or in any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

Cover image © Andersonrise / Dreamstime.com

Kudos

Curses & Magic, 2015

Contents

Preface

1. Bent Street

2. A Small Beginning

3. The Metaversal Kudos Chart

4. Beneath the Waves

5. Free From Kudos

6. Fashion

7. The Pleasuredome and the Waterfall

Preface

These are the tales of Eternal Voyager. They come to me from EV himself and I like to think these stories are largely true, but I have taken the liberty of amending them to adjust a certain self-congratulatory bias in the original versions.

It was around the middle of the sixth century AR (After Re-beginning) that we had the ‘kudos’ crisis and that is as good a place as any to start. For in the course of these events, Eternal Voyager passed through a defining test of character.

There are a lot of recordings and metacasts that can be used to illustrate exactly what happened, but this is my version, assisted by a lengthy conversation with his closest companion, Angel.

The Kudos Chart began in a small house, 13 Bent Street, a remote part of the Metaverse inhabited by slackers, star surfers, and philosophers. Various people claimed the credit for the idea, but my understanding is that it was probably Glitter Flame who got up the energy to implement the first chart.

1. Bent Street

Six avatars - three female, two male, and one an indeterminate feline - were lounging on comfortable couches in the front room of 13 Bent Street. In the centre of the room, a low glass table supported a giant hookah with arms like tentacles, arms long enough that you could lie full stretch on your back, look at the patterns in the ceiling and, from time to time, take a long suck of the pipe that connected you to the communal hookah. All six of the entities present were drawing down a slow-burning drug that filled the room with a bitter-sweet scent reminiscent of an intense dance party: a combination of perfume and sweat.

Of course the hookah was just for show, in this region of the Metaverse all avatars were free to access one of a thousand altered mind states as they pleased, but IWT-3 is best shared and a hookah is a popular way of doing this. The burning resin fills the top of the chamber with its fumes, which the imbiber draws in to their avatar with a happy burble after the smoke has passed over cooling water. The effect of IWT is to make you languorous, philosophical, and well-disposed towards your fellow entities. It has the negative effect, however, that one’s motivation to act upon the world suffers.

As a consequence of several years of IWT use, the gardens around this particular house were overgrown and full of the debris of abandoned games and projects. Half a dozen star-boards were rusting there, covered by a crop of dandelions, buttercups and bindweed. Almost hidden in the tall grass, the bright colours of a variety of semi-deflated plastic balls marked the end point of a number of long-forgotten sporting enterprises.

‘You know what?’ began Glitter.

Before she could continue, her question provoked a number of more or less simultaneous responses as the avatars sprawled across the ample cushions of their settees looked up from their musings.

‘Someone