#MyElectromagneticRomance🧲💕
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#WIPsnips "local"

P.I. Lu Volasko gets to know her new client-slash-employee, Pen Duffy, as the head off to follow some leads in Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance."

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[Excerpt from Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Uh...your sister,” Lu awkwardly introduced the subject. “Were you close?” Duffy nodded, her eyes drifting away across the tracks. “She was four years ahead of me. So I was supposed to...you know, just do all the same things she did. Like I was Ramona Duffy, Part Two—The Sequel.” The girl smirked, her freckles darkening. “Dance classes and theatre and all that stuff. I mean, it was okay while I was there, I guess. You think being a private detective in New York’s badass, you should try taking on the girls at Ballister’s in Peoria.” Duffy grinned viciously. “Those ballerina bitches’ll *pas de chat* on your freaking *corpse* if it means one less anorexic in line for Odette.” “You were a ballerina?” Lu made no effort to rein in her incredulous expression. “Eleven years at Ballister’s,” Duffy scoffed. She raised her arms and shifted her feet. “Second, first, third,” she called off, repositioning her feet on each count. She spun once, her arms curved in a graceful equator in front of her chest, then instantly dropped the act and went back to her more comfortable cynical slouch. “Easier without the boots, but yeah. If you grow up with a vagina in the Midwest, it’s kinda just what you *do*.” She laughed—it was an unexpectedly lilting trill, as if the nightingale she’d trapped in the thorny cage in her throat peeked through the bars for just a second. “It was okay, I guess. Ramona loved it. She wanted to be Clara so bad. In the *Nutcracker*,” Duffy explained to Lu Volasko’s baffled look. “It’s a thing, every year, like *all* the local dance companies do *Nutcracker*. Clara’s the lead. Ramona never got it—she wasn’t bitchy enough.” Duffy’s face twisted deviously. “You know how many ballerinas it takes to change a light bulb?” Lu shook her head, waiting for the punchline with a sly smile. “All of ’em,” said Duffy. “One to change it, and the rest to say they could’ve done it better.”
November 10, 2025 at 11:32 PM
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#WIPsnips "steel"

Lu Volasko doesn't know WHY her newest prospective client is important, only that she IS, and that she can't afford Lu. In Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance," she tries to find a compromise.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Maybe we could work out a trade,” explained Lu. “I don’t have anybody helping me out—my father had a...a secretary. But she was close to retirement when he died, even if I could’ve afforded to keep her on. If you want to trade—barter services? You could work for me, I could work your case.” Pen Duffy looked like somebody had dropped a snail in her corn flakes. “I don’t do office shit.” “Well,” Lu looked for a way in, “is there anything you *can* do? You know, like...” She didn’t have any helpful examples in reach. She didn’t really need somebody who could type—she took care of what little paperwork she had with a couple of automated spreadsheet templates and a mail merge she’d set up in her word processor so long ago that she’d completely forgotten how she did it. “I could be your muscle,” Duffy suggested. After Lu stared silently for four full seconds, the girl specified: “You know, like your bodyguard?” Lu did an astounding job of not laughing out loud. Even so, her cheeks got sore clamping her jaw shut on involuntary giggles. “That’s...” She looked for a diplomatic response. “That’s one idea, yeah.” [Continued excerpt from Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Maybe we could work out a trade,” explained Lu. “I don’t have anybody helping me out—my father had a...a secretary. But she was close to retirement when he died, even if I could’ve afforded to keep her on. If you want to trade—barter services? You could work for me, I could work your case.” Pen Duffy looked like somebody had dropped a snail in her corn flakes. “I don’t do office shit.” “Well,” Lu looked for a way in, “is there anything you *can* do? You know, like...” She didn’t have any helpful examples in reach. She didn’t really need somebody who could type—she took care of what little paperwork she had with a couple of automated spreadsheet templates and a mail merge she’d set up in her word processor so long ago that she’d completely forgotten how she did it. “I could be your muscle,” Duffy suggested. After Lu stared silently for four full seconds, the girl specified: “You know, like your bodyguard?” Lu did an astounding job of not laughing out loud. Even so, her cheeks got sore clamping her jaw shut on involuntary giggles. “That’s...” She looked for a diplomatic response. “That’s one idea, yeah.” [Excerpt from Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “I’m tougher than I look,” Duffy said, like some kid in a sandlot declaring he could hit one out of Yankee Stadium with his makeshift broom-handle bat. “You look pretty tough already, Pen,” Lu said, only half patronizing her—the girl *did* have a spark of steel behind her stony blue eyes. What she lacked in actual power she probably made up for in sheer tenacity, like a loyal pit bull puppy clamped to a cat burglar’s ankle, not necessarily preventing a theft or escape, but surely making both a hell of a lot more inconvenient. She’d been through some fire already, that much was clear, and it looked like she was ready to see this thing through to the end with or without Lu Volasko. An idea struck the blonde detective. …
November 4, 2025 at 10:15 PM
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#WIPsnips "second"

The stakes are high in Chapter 1 of "My Electromagnetic Romance," as the mysterious Rocker Chick explains to her even more mysterious boss just exactly how fucked they are.Turns out: quite fucked.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 1 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Reverse it!” the Fucking Zombie repeated wildly, staring up at the expanding, swimming blur. He had no eyebrows and his eyes were hidden behind his black mirrored glasses, but his mouth gaped in what looked like a bad case of pure horror. “See that?” the Rocker Chick snapped, jabbing a thick gloved finger at the readout. “The cycle’s getting more’n *three hundred percent* efficiency! That’s not something that *happens*, man! Power doesn’t come from *nowhere*! And it’s only getting *bigger*!” She set herself and clenched her jaw, making her naturally sharp features even sharper. “If we don’t shut it down *now*, we won’t get a second chance! We’d need even *more* power just to trip the whole system...like an EM pulse, like...like a nuclear fucking *bomb* going off, like *every* nuclear bomb ever fucking *built* going off!”
October 21, 2025 at 1:44 PM
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#WIPsnips "push"

In Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance," P.I. Lu Volasko shares a surprisingly personal moment with physicist Greer Bean, who works for Lu's newly acquired—and Very Impressive—client.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “If you don’t mind my saying...” Lu gently prodded for an opening. Doctor Bean nodded her consent. “I don’t see a lot of relationships work out when they start off...well, under the circumstances....” Bean chuckled, slipping her glasses down in front of her eyes and blinking as the world came back into focus. “When we met, he was just a boy. Well, not *just* a boy—he’s one of the most advanced minds of his or *any* generation. Really—I’ve worked with Alan Doubleday himself, and Judah could give him a run for his money! He’s a genuine genius—Judah—but he was still a boy. That’s how I thought of him. He was a joy to teach—because he understood so much, so easily.” She ran a finger past her ear, unsuccessfully scolding a frayed strand into place. “He grew into a man who’s just as much a joy to be with, for very much the same reasons. Professionally, personally, intellectually...romantically.” Her face flushed. “When you find someone who *gets* you that way,” she said like she was back at her desk explaining simpler subjects, like particle physics, “it would be crazy *not* to give it a shot. Somebody who sees the best in you, and pushes you—just enough, just the push you need—to reach that best. And somebody who *you* see the best in *him*, and give him the push *he* needs.” She smiled down the hall at her own memories in the distance. “We keep each other going.” [Continued excerpt from Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Sounds like your Berenbaum-Bean Field,” said Lu. Bean nodded, her smile widening. “In principle, sure,” she agreed. “Why not? That’s what makes it so important. When you find someone like that—somebody who you can...you can *exchange energy* with, and you find that when you’re done, you *both* got back more energy than you gave...well. You can’t beat that. That’s bigger than physics, bigger than wormholes, bigger than unlimited energy...it’s bigger than *anything*.” She gave Lu a stern, decisive look. “When you find someone you can do that with, nothing else matters. Not their *age*, or *yours*...or all the gossip in Pupin Hall.” She lifted her chin proudly, rising above the rabble. “Not the color of their skin, or their religion, or what language they speak. Not looks or gender or...or anything. When you find someone like that, you hold tight and see what happens.”
October 14, 2025 at 2:16 AM
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#WIPsnips "coffee"

In Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance," P.I. Lu Volasko gets the lowdown—plus a mindbending physics lesson and some startling new developments—from her latest clients.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “In a word...” Bean’s eyes went wide. “Free energy,” she said. “That’s two words,” Lu quipped automatically. Then she paused. “Wait. Free energy?” “Well, not *really*,” Bean amended quickly. “But it *seems* like it, when it happens.” “Free...?” Lu scrunched her eyelids in deep thought. “You mean—something for nothing?” “Well, we know it’s not a free lunch,” Berenbaum joked, “but it looks like somebody else is picking up the tab.” “What do you mean?” “It was a necessary part of our equations,” said Bean. “We thought we were fudging them a bit, first...” “Like Einstein’s cosmological constant,” Berenbaum remarked. [Continued excerpt from Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “...but the numbers held up.” Bean pointed meaningfully at a chart on the wall. Lu couldn’t make head or tail of it, let alone assess their body of work. “It made sense,” Doctor Bean continued. “If our particles are sharing more energy than they’re losing, collectively speaking, then that energy has to come from *somewhere*.” Lu said nothing, trying to connect the dots. “If you’re sitting at home,” Berenbaum tried, “and you want some coffee...what do you do?” Lu stared blankly. “I make coffee.” “Right!” Before she could point out the pointlessness, Berenbaum pushed forward: “But if you’re out of coffee, what do you do *then*?” “Go to the store and buy some more,” said Lu, hoping he’d be rounding third base sometime soon. “And if they’re out?” he asked, but he saved her the trouble. “You have to go to another store in town. And if *all* the stores in town are out, you go to the next town, and so on.” [Continued excerpt from Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “And...?” “And what do you do if all the stores,” he posited, “in all the towns, in all the countries in all the *world*...are out of coffee?” Berenbaum and Bean watched Lu eagerly. She shrugged. “Switch to decaf?” They laughed. Bean brought it home. “The thing is,” she said, “the universe is a really big place.” “I’ve heard.” “And there are developments in both theoretical *and* experimental physics that back up what we’ve observed in the Ball and Chain.” “Those particles have to take energy from each other,” Berenbaum explained, “to give each other those energy boosts. But if everybody’s taking everybody else’s coffee, then you should end up with the same amount of coffee when you’re done...just redistributed. You shouldn’t end up,” he smiled suggestively, “with *more* coffee. Especially if everybody’s taking sips.” [Continued excerpt from Chapter 5 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] Lu tapped her fingers on the desk. “You’re saying that you end up with more energy than you started with?” she asked incredulously. “No, no,” Berenbaum waved that off. “Not more than we started with,” said Bean. “Not *yet*, anyway. But more than we *should* have. We should be losing more momentum than we do...but in the Ball and Chain, that loss is mitigated by extra energy.” Lu was no physicist, but she knew that kind of thing wasn’t supposed to happen. “From *where*?” The brainy pair exchanged a look, one that meant everything on both a personal and professional level. This was a couple that got to explore the meaning of existence together; figuring out the comparatively mundane meanings of each other’s more subtle expressions must have been a snap. It was Berenbaum who answered Lu. “We think they’re going a *long* way out of town,” he said, “to pick up their coffee.”
September 4, 2025 at 5:28 PM
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#WIPsnips "power"

Chapter 8 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" opens with P.I. Lu Volasko remembering one of her dad's typical "lessons" when he would bring her on a job as a kid.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 8 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Bullies ain’t the biggest guy in the room,” Joe Volasko had told his daughter as they drove his crappy old El Camino through a relentless downpour. “They ain’t the strongest or the toughest. They could be big—they could be strong, or tough—but that ain’t the point. That ain’t why they’re bullies.” He snapped his fingers twice, not impolitely. Lucija handed over the can of beer she was holding for him, and he chugged some down, smacking his lips happily as he handed the can back and manufactured a loud belch that would easily have won the gold in an elementary school cafeteria. His daughter was a bit past the age where she’d found it amusing, but she obediently returned a tight-lipped smile and paid attention as the lesson continued. The wipers scraped a funky beat back and forth across the windshield—one of them was sorely in need of replacement. “Bullies are the ones *in charge*. The ones who *like* it that way.” Joe scratched absently at his three-day stubble and sniffed, keeping an eye on the cross streets as they went. “Somebody said to ’em: hey, *you* get to call the shots. Everybody’s gotta do things *your* way.” He shrugged. “Sometimes God says it. He makes ’em the biggest and strongest, and they think big and strong’s all there is. They figure if you’re worth a damn, you’ll be big enough and strong enough to knock ’em down a peg. And if you can’t do *that*, well...you *ain’t* worth a damn. They figure.” He leaned forward and squinted through the windshield as their headlights flashed on a street sign, but he shook it off like a cocky pitcher vetoing the catcher’s suggestion. “Sometimes it’s a company man—the *company* says they’re in charge. Like some guy at the post office. Or a bank or something. Bureaucrats, right? He’s gonna trip you up in all the red tape he’s got, and if you’re not the guy with the right pair of scissors, well, you ain’t worth a damn. *He* figures. And [continued…] [Continued excerpt from Chapter 8 of "My Electromagnetic Romance (by me):] […] sometimes, it’s the guy at the top. He gets voted in, or he gets chosen, or he gets lucky, or his pop croaks and he gets the job—y’know, whatever, if you’re American or in some other damn place. And it’s the *law*, or maybe just a hell of a lot of *money*, says *he’s* in charge. Politicians. The mayor, the governor, the president. Celebrities. *Cops*. If you can’t change those laws, or you ain’t got that money, then you’re nobody. You ain’t worth a damn. He figures.” Lucija squirmed in her seat and stuck the beer can between her knees. Her finger roamed over the passenger’s side window, tracing squiggly trails through the mist condensing on the glass. Joe Volasko grinned at her. His speech was blunt and crude, like every cop and fireman and construction worker in their neighborhood, but his habit of spouting home-brewed philosophy often gave him away. “The thing is,” he said, “bullies can only push you around if they think they’re in charge. Soon as you show ’em you’re worth a damn—even if you’re *not*—they fold like your Uncle Boz when I go all in with a pair of threes. Yeah? Bullies think they got power. But there’s really only two kinds of power, Lu.” He patted the dashboard. “There’s *horsepower*.” Then he pounded his chest. [continued…] [Continued excerpt from Chapter 8 of "My Electromagnetic Romance (by me):] Lucija almost gagged, worried he was going to invoke the Power of Love or something cartoonishly sappy like that. She was past the age where she’d found *that* amusing, too. But he narrowed his eyes fiendishly, saying: “And there’s pure fuckin’ guts.” His daughter perked up, interest rekindled. Whenever her father dropped an F-bomb, she knew it was more than just a meandering fairy tale. “You don’t gotta be the five hundred pound gorilla in the room,” Joe Volasko explained, flicking a look at Lucija out of the corner of his eye. “But if you walk in on a two hundred pound gorilla throwin’ his weight around, just make sure you’re packin’ enough to hit two-oh-*one*.” He stopped to think, checking the road ahead. “Reminds me—I oughta teach you to shoot. You’re, what—fourteen? Fifteen, now?” Lu Volasko shook her head, remembering—she’d actually been thirteen at the time. That conversation took place three years before her mother died. Despite Rose Volasko’s flatly stated and poorly timed “Over my dead body, Joe,” he *did* take their daughter out to the firing range a few weeks later.
May 16, 2025 at 5:51 PM
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#WIPsnips "smart"

(Another triple threat!)

P.I. Lu Volasko—in Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance"—ponders the case with her new driver (or partner?) Pen Duffy. (Fans of "Jackrabbit Messiah" might recognize her!)

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[Excerpt from Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] Duffy peered at the image as if she could read a rap sheet off the Goth girl’s face. “What’d she steal?” Lu gave her a look. “Right, sorry,” Duffy threw her an apology, then went back to examining the picture. “She’s kinda hot. If she’s not a poser.” She put the paper down on the desk decisively and looked up at Lu. “Any other clues?” The girl had a habit of getting right to the point. Lu chuckled, then pulled the roll of electrical tape out of her briefcase—she left the vial of pink slime inside, deciding that wasn’t a clue Penelope Duffy needed to know about. “It was found at...the scene,” she explained, handing the tape to Duffy. “Where the theft happened. The letters there...?” She put a finger inside the circle. “Empire Technical Institute. She might be a student there.” [Continued excerpt from Chapter 6 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] Duffy looked at the tape, then the screen shot, then back at the tape. “Huh. Maybe she’s *not* a poser. Or she’s really, really *stupid*.” She pointed at the dark band across the Goth girl’s neck. “That’s the tape. This shit would hurt like hell coming off. Chick’s either so stupid she didn’t think of it, or she’s hardcore.” Lu leaned over and looked at the picture. Duffy was right—the dark band was just about the right width. “I don’t think she’s stupid,” she told Duffy. “Actually, I think she’s very smart. At least technically. *Technologically*, I mean.” “The tech institute,” Duffy said, following Lu’s train of thought. “Right. So she’s, like, industrial strength hardcore, then.” Lu scanned Pen Duffy with an expert eye. “Makes sense,” she agreed. “You want to help me find out who she is?” “Shit, yeah,” said Duffy, sliding quickly off her chair. “Sounds cool.”
March 28, 2025 at 5:29 PM
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#WIPsnips "idea"

(Triple threat today! Common word, I guess…)

A bit right from page one (!) of "My Electromagnetic Romance"—a motley crew in a secret lab meddling with stuff motley crews were not meant to meddle with.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 1 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] She looked up sharply as a throbbing hum began to rise beneath the scratching and crashing electromagnetic symphony. She yanked her industrial goggles from her eyes and left them hanging around her neck, over a choker made of black gaffer tape. There was something visible in the space in the center of the room. Near the exact center of the big room, in fact, several yards above the floor. It was a pulsing, rippling ball of blur, the kind of thing you would feverishly hope was an oasis if you were a hundred miles out in the desert. The Rocker Chick squinted at it suspiciously. Around them, half a dozen other people in dark clothes shouted and called out. The ramrod straight man in the dark glasses raised a hand sharply. “That is nothing to be alarmed about!” he proclaimed imperiously. “Do your jobs! Maintain your positions!” “If that’s what I think it is—” the Rocker Chick started hotly. “It isn’t!” the man assured her. “You literally have *no* idea what that is!” He smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile—his tiny teeth squirmed like baby mice lining up for a prime spot at the teat. He leaned over the girl and pointed at the machines in front of her. “Continue!” he yelled in her ear. Even an inch away, she could barely hear him. She could smell him well enough, though. He smelled like Jergens on a corpse. “Is it going the right way?” [Continued excerpt from Chapter 1 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Fucking zombie,” she muttered inaudibly. She looked down at the digital readouts. Numbers shifted and spun, and her expression indicated she was not at all happy with what she saw. “This doesn’t make sense!” she insisted. “There’s more power coming *out* of the goddamn system than going *into* it!” That shook the Fucking Zombie’s icy composure, finally. He shook his head. “Out?” he shouted. “No, no—it’s going the wrong way!” His gloved hand clamped down on her shoulder. “Reverse it! Reverse it!” The Rocker Chick violently shrugged him off. “No touchie!” she spat. “And no fucking way I can turn this around with this kind of power running through it!” She scowled at the numbers on the readout. “It’d be like doing a hundred and fifty on the highway and chuckin’ it in reverse!” Her eyes widened as the numbers kept spinning. “Only a *whole* lot worse!”
March 23, 2025 at 7:17 PM
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#WIPsnips "ego"

More from Chapter 4 of "My Electromagnetic Romance," with P.I. Lu Volasko getting a little more background on her new clients. THIS stuff she totally gets.

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[Excerpt from Chapter 4 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me:)] “So the two of you are the brains behind the Ball and Chain?” Lu asked, her voice knocking out funny echoes around the corners of the stairwell like a basket of tennis balls released in a water tower. “We defined the properties of the reciprocation resonance together—the Berenbaum-Bean Field,” Greer Bean specified. “During Judah’s post-graduate work.” She blushed, her tight smile sheepishly covering a tinge of impropriety. “I was his thesis advisor.” Lu glanced back at Judah Berenbaum. “Post-grad? How long ago was that?” She cast a calculating eye over his clean-shaven face and skinny frame. “I did my dissertation twelve years ago, thanks,” he said, ego bruised and jaw fixed. “What were you...ten?” Berenbaum snorted good-naturedly at her assumption. “Fourteen.” He smiled like a cat still picking canary feathers out of its teeth. [Continued excerpt from Chapter 4 of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] Bean reasserted herself to keep the peace. With her glasses on, she no longer had to squint—her eyes were sparkling green, like bottles of bubbling mineral water. “Judah’s work combined particle physics and exotic topologies. It meshed really well with my own work, getting Doubleday shoes from hypothesis to reality.” “So you got your chocolate in his peanut butter,” Lu glibly guessed, “and he got his peanut butter in your chocolate.” The young scientist two steps behind them laughed like a cartoon character shooting milk out of his nose. “You could say that,” he replied gleefully. Bean shook her head urgently. “No, no,” she protested. “Nothing—uh, nothing like that. Not...then. It was purely academic. We developed our theories together and explored the properties of the field we...” “Is that what the kids are calling it these days?” Lu joked. When Doctor Bean turned beet red, she relented. “Relax, Greer—I’m not a cop, and you’re not under arrest. You’re both adults now.” She sent another wry glance Berenbaum’s way. “Legally, anyway.” He grinned back mischievously, fully self-aware.
March 19, 2025 at 11:10 PM
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#WIPsnips "share" (A #SilhouetteUniverse👤 twofer!)

P.I. Lu Volasko—in Chapter 4 of "My Electromagnetic Romance"—gets a little hyperadvanced physics lesson from her new clients. She kinda understands the important bits.

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[Excerpt from Chapter Four of "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “So...this Berenbaum-Bean Field,” Lu tactfully changed subjects, “what is it—what does it do? The ‘reciprocating resonance’? You said you can get...fast particles to go even faster. Right?” Berenbaum waffled. “It’s not really speed. We actually measure—” “Basically, yes,” Bean cut in diplomatically. “The Berenbaum-Bean Field is sort of a...pull between particles that exist within a specific subset—like a group or...or family of particles. At extremely high energies—very high speeds, but specific ones—the particles kind of ‘encourage’ each other to keep up. One particle imparts energy to all the rest, but also receives energy from all the rest. The overall quantity of energy is conserved, of course, but the quality of the energy is altered...it takes on different properties.” Berenbaum jumped in, finally getting into the less jargonistic spirit of The Berenbaum-Bean Field for Dummies: “They exchange energy in a new way, so instead of losing momentum, they all keep each other going. All the particles in the subset keep pulling each other along to keep up their...you know, their ‘speed.’ They, like...support each other, so none of them slows down. If you speed one up, they all go with it. So if you speed all of them up, the energy—the speed, I mean, gets pretty fast, pretty quick.” Lu thought about it as they neared an intimidating door at the end of the corridor. “So all the particles in that ‘family’ kind of share their energy with each other?” “Right!” Bean nodded brightly. “Basically. And the Berenbaum-Bean Field is defined by the equations we derive from those observations. It’s sort of the ‘glue’ that keeps the family together.” “So it’s like the subatomic equivalent of ‘love’?” Lu mused cynically. Judah Berenbaum scoffed, but very quietly and unconvincingly. Greer Bean’s face flickered with a strange, distant smile. “You know,” she answered softly, “I suppose maybe it is.”
March 11, 2025 at 11:40 AM
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#WIPsnips "super"

This actually picks up only eleven paragraphs after a previous snip from Chapter 3 of "My Electromagnetic Romance"—private investigator Lu Volasko finds out what her new clients hired her for.

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[Excerpt from "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “You know what we do here, right?” Bart Minetti asked Lu. “Scientific research,” she replied. “Lasers, particle physics, the supercollider. Cutting edge stuff, right?” “Right.” Minetti cleared his throat noisily. “It’s the supercollider—our particle accelerator—that brings you into the picture. The Ball and Chain,” he threw a perfunctory nod at Berenbaum, “which was the source of this morning’s event.” Lu loved how corporate insiders phrased things so carefully. *Crisis*, *disaster*, or *accident* sounded like things that were out of their control. An “event” was just something that *happened*, like a coffee break or a company picnic. “One thing I don’t get,” she said, “is why that kind of equipment would be hooked into the regional grid at all.” Minetti frowned. “It isn’t.” “We are completely independent of the power grid,” said Mistry. “Aside from the offices in this administration building, and other non-experimental parts of the facility, we generate all of the power we use in our own private system. Very advanced, very efficient, and very green.” [Continued excerpt from "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “Then how did your...*event*...make the leap from your grid to theirs?” Lu asked calmly. “How did your equipment overload the grid, if it’s not connected?” “It didn’t overload the grid,” Berenbaum jumped in like a bored squirrel on a three-day cocaine binge. “It knocked it out. See, if you generate a powerful enough—” “An ‘overload’ is the official explanation,” Mistry cut in decisively. “And one that is easier for the layman to understand. What happened here was more like...” He paused and examined her expression. “Do you know what an electromagnetic pulse is?” “Like when a nuclear bomb goes off,” Lu guessed, drawing on faint memories of high school and college science courses and a few too many lonely nights with a bag of chips and a late night action flick. “Like a burst of electricity...knocking out electrical devices and—that sort of thing?” Mistry nodded. “Yes, very much like that.” “Well,” Berenbaum scoffed, shaking his head, “kind of. I mean, we’re talking a finely controlled spectrum, here—this sucker had a rectangular waveform with an amplitude higher—” [Continued excerpt from "My Electromagnetic Romance" (by me):] “For our purposes,” Mistry chided the young scientist kindly, “it was, indeed, very much like that.” Berenbaum conceded with a jerk of his shoulders and a roll of his eyes. Lu pegged him as the typical boy genius—too valuable to keep on a leash, so he could get away with ignoring corporate protocol or even basic manners. Lu tapped the top of the table absently as she thought. “And that explains all the crashed cell phones and networks and...so on. Your ‘kind of’ EMP knocking out any active electronics. So,” she went on, trying to sift through the discussion and find her mark, “what do you need me to do, exactly? I’m certainly not qualified to help you find the fault in your particle accelerator, or fix it even if I could.” “No, that’s not our dilemma here, Lu,” Mistry said carefully. His black eyes flicked at Minetti, then back to Lu with a grave look. “We don’t need you to *fix* our particle accelerator.” He paused as Berenbaum and Bean shifted uncomfortably in their seats. “We need you to *find* it.”
February 11, 2025 at 12:20 AM
semperbufo.bsky.social
#WIPsnips "ground"

A bit from Chapter 3 of "My Electromagnetic Romance"—private investigator Lu Volasko meets her new and unusual clients at the government-subsidized particle physics lab where they do their work.

#MyElectromagneticRomance🧲💕

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[Excerpt from "My Electromagnetic Romance" (WIP by me), abridged for character limit:] … His accent was British, with a mere zest of Mumbai by way of a serious Oxbridge education. He even said her name correctly, the traditional Slovene pronunciation rolling off his cultured tongue. It wasn’t often that Lu heard her full name, and that was usually by a bored motor vehicles employee who gave up and asked for “Lucy Jah” without bothering to put a politely dubious question mark on the end of it. “Miz Volasko,” Ted Bellow conducted the official introduction, “may I present Doctor Chirag Mistry, director of the institute.” “Doctor,” she greeted in kind, shaking his hand firmly. Mistry’s skin was a deep, weathered brown that glowed with vibrant golden undertones. In an aggressively attractive contrast, his thick hair was stark white, combed back in a luxurious and authoritative pompadour. His gray suit was unmistakably tailored by experts, but he left the top buttons of his white shirt undone, with no tie around his collar. Everything about the man, Lu observed, advertised uncompromising brilliance and easy command. Mistry would be just as at home hosting a brainy game show as he was heading a center for scientific research. She turned to meet the others as Bellow introduced them one by one. “Doctor Judah Berenbaum, the head of the Ball and Chain project.” Unlike Mistry, Berenbaum looked like he would be more at home in a junior high school, and not as somebody with access to the teachers’ lounge. The young man’s curly explosion of hair bounced as he nodded to the beat of an unheard drum circle and shook Lu’s hand. “Hey, cool,” he said informally and eagerly. He was a guy who preferred the lightning speeds of subatomic particles to the snail’s pace of human interaction. He wore a black T-shirt with some cartoon character printed on it in white, but had thrown a nice tweed jacket over it as a concession to the academic environment around them. [Continuation of excerpt from "My Electromagnetic Romance" (WIP by me):] Lu smiled at him like she would a little boy lost in the mall. “Doctor.” That felt weird, directed at this kid. Bellow introduced “Doctor Greer Bean, research and development.” Bean looked solid in the middle and a little frayed around the edges, probably about Lu’s age—or maybe a few years farther along the road to forty. An uncapped pen was stuck through the loose knot of hair on top of her head. Her perpetual squint and the pale ridges on either side of her nose made it obvious that the glasses tangled in her bangs were frequently forgotten there. “Doctor,” Lu repeated, starting to feel like she was in a Marx Brothers routine. “So happy you could see us,” said Bean, squinting harder to return the favor. It sounded like she spoke through her nose. Her baggy pants and wide knit sweater wouldn’t have looked out of place in an aromatherapy shop. The heavyset man in a dark blue suit was last. “Bart Minetti, operations,” said Bellow. “Not Doctor Minetti?” Lu smiled collegially, shaking his hand. “Somebody’s gotta do the real work around here,” Minetti joked. His skewed Bronx accent, graying combover, and pockmarked face fit the clean lines and mathematically precise curves of the conference room about as well as a dusty woodchuck at a débutante’s cotillion. Mistry beamed a dazzling smile at them as he waved everybody back to the table. His perfect white teeth were either a gift of good fortune, or cost an actual fortune. “Bart keeps our feet on the ground,” the director said, “while we reach for the stars. Ted...?” “Yes, doctor,” Ted Bellow said instantly, slipping quietly out of the conference room.
February 6, 2025 at 9:28 PM