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Subject: "The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem" Archived thread - Read only
 
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Gryphonadmin
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Feb-16-11, 01:17 AM (EDT)
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"The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
 
   Here are a couple of fragmentary scenes that were cut from Requiem for a Lensman. In both cases I toyed with the idea of using them as the seeds for separate stories, but in neither case did that turn out to be necessary. Between the released form of Requiem and the coverage these events got in Correspondence, it's not really something that needs a lot more exposure (beyond what it will inevitably get when the time comes to tell it from the other side in flashback form, sometime in New Frontier, if all goes well).

The first would have gone in before the scene in Truss and Nanami's office on B6. There's nothing wrong with it, but I cut it because I wanted to do the reveal on board the Valiant, so that the first time the readers knew what was going on, they were finding out at the same time as Kaitlyn and the gang. It's supposed to be their story, after all.


                        WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2409
2:19 AM
IPS CHALLENGER, PATROLLING EPSILON ERIDANI SYSTEM

Suddenly, Gryphon was awake, and he wasn't entirely sure why.
He lurched up on one elbow, looking around in puzzlement, but
there was nothing to see; his stateroom was pitch-dark. Down at the
foot of the bed, Wolfgang stirred, his Lens gleaming in the dark as he
sat up.
"(Did you hear that too?)" Gryphon asked the Lensbeagle
softly.
"Wha?" a voice replied - not that of the dog, naturally,
though Gryphon's puzzled, sleep-fogged mind momentarily entertained
the idea. If Wolfgang had a voice, though, he tended to doubt it
would sound like that. It wouldn't've come from right next to him,
anyway, with the dog down at the foot of the bed.
A soft nightlight, built into the bulkhead by the head of the
bed, came on a moment later. It revealed the speaker, a pretty young
woman with mussed black hair, chalk-white skin, and a black spot
around one sleepy eye.
One of the lesser-known members of what Gryphon sometimes
jokingly referred to as the "grave feminine conspiracy" that
occasionally seemed to surround him, Beatrice Watanabe, the Expert of
Justice called Domino, had just stopped by on a whim to see him for a
couple of days. She liked to do that from time to time; their
physical relationship was no more serious than that, and sometimes a
good deal less.
Their friendship, however, was not, and there was real concern
on her face as she saw the pensive, vaguely unsettled look on his
face. "Hey," she said, putting a hand on his forearm. "What's the
matter?"
The First Lensman frowned. "I'm not sure, Bea," he murmured.
"I feel... strange."
A second later, the doorchime sounded. Gryphon sat up,
feeling his unidentifiable foreboding getting deeper, and said, "Yes?"
The door slid open, casting a faint rectangle of light across
the floor from the night-dim corridor and silhouetting a slim shape in
the gloom.
"Admiral?"
"What is it?"
"You'd better come to the bridge, sir."

"Five minutes ago we lost contact with the Z'ha'dum
expedition," Worlds Welfare Work Association Chief Wilton Goulet
informed Gryphon from the Challenger's main viewer, less than 30
seconds later. "Lt. Morden's last transmission was incomplete, but it
sounded like they were under attack, enemy unknown. Then we lost the
signal, carrier and all. We're not even hearing the ship's
transponder."
Gryphon seemed calm, considering; the only outward sign of
agitation he showed, sitting in his conn, was a slow tapping of the
vambrace computer on his right forearm against the arm of the chair.
He regarded Goulet for a few seconds, seemingly lost in thought, and
then said in a tone which conveyed nothing so much as a sense of great
surprise,
"I can't raise Kei either."
Goulet blinked. "You can't?" he blurted. "But you - "
Gryphon nodded. "Exactly," he said. Then he got up from the
conn and said in a brisker tone, "We'll check it out. Thanks for
letting us know so promptly."

Goulet would probably have liked to discuss matters further,
but the First Lensman was in no mood to discuss anything as he strode
through the corridors of his flagship with his yeoman trotting at his
side.
"Who have we got on SA1 or equivalent here at Bajor?" he asked.
"No other Experts in the system," Lu replied, not needing to
consult the datapad she carried. "Master Windu is at Babylon 6; so is
Jean. Do you want them for the first team?"
"Yes. Nobody else?"
Lu shook her head. "Everybody else is either on assignment or
in New Avalon."
"Start rousting them," Gryphon said. " Call everyone on the A
list and get them headed out there as fast as they can travel. The
special list too. There's a good chance we four will be getting in
over our heads."
"Maybe I should go with you," she suggested, but he shook his
head.
"I need you here," he said. "You'll be my proxy in the
command structure while I'm occupied out there."
There was a soft, indistinct noise, and abruptly there were
three of Lu, all still trotting to keep up with the Chief.
"At least take -one- of me," said the one whose eyes were both
amber.
Gryphon shook his head again. "Too dangerous."
"I was trained for Tac Div," Luornu shot back. "I can take
care of myself. You'll need me out there to coordinate everything."
The First Lensman paused, looking into her angry amber eyes;
then he relented, cracking the first faint hint of a smile she'd seen
on him since going to rouse him for Goulet's call.
He sighed. "God knows how I'll ever explain it to you if I
get you killed," he said. "OK, suit up. Full HEV. We don't know
what we're going to run into out there."
Amber Lu grinned, saluted, and ran to get the appropriate
equipment.
Gryphon turned to the other two, who he identified by the
mental labels "Purple" and "Middle".
"Look," he said, "don't worry. I'll look after her. You.
However that works."
Middle chuckled. "I've worked for you -three years-," she
observed, "and you still don't know the forms of address for when I'm
triplicated."
Gryphon gave her a put-upon look. "There is," he said, "a
shocking dearth of reference material."
Luornu knew he was kidding with her to keep his mind off what
was happening, and she appreciated that.


The second would have gone between the last Valiant scene and the end titles. I like it - it gives some more screen time to a couple of characters we don't see much of (the Windu brothers) and introduces two new characters - but it was clearly heading somewhere that had nothing to do with Requiem, and broke up the flow between the movement's dénouement (particularly the scene at Mathews Memorial) and the post-credits epilogue, so I reluctantly 86ed it.


                        MONDAY, JULY 20, 2409
NAR SHADDAA, OUTER RIM TERRITORIES

The crowd at Reelo's was pretty thin that night, and the few
regulars who were hanging around that particular member of Nar
Shaddaa's burgeoning fraternity of scuzzy bars were giving the back
corner booth a wide berth. The denizens of this particular corner of
the Vertical City knew there was no percentage in tangling with a Jedi
Master, and on this particular afternoon there were -two- of them in
that booth.
Both were dark-skinned, completely bald humans, within a few
years of each other in age. One was slightly taller than the other,
the other slightly wider, but they bore a distinct resemblance all the
same - and well they should, since they were brothers.
For all that, there were marked contrasts between the brothers
Windu, too. Morpheus, the elder, was impeccably dressed in a
custom-tailored dark suit that had cost him hundreds of credits,
including a royal-purple vest and a steel-grey silk tie. His black
overcoat of krayt dragon hide lay neatly folded on the seat beside
him.
Morpheus regarded his younger brother Mace through mirrored
pince-nez with a small, indulgent smile, took a sip of his tea, and
said, "You aren't getting enough rest."
"The galaxy's like that sometimes," Mace Windu replied, and he
did indeed sound tired. The younger Jedi Master, in contrast to his
elder brother, wore the simple, traditional robes of his order,
adorned himself with no jewelry or shades, and was drinking water.
"At any rate, to answer your question," said Morpheus, "no, I
didn't sense anything unusual in the Force last Wednesday. At least,
not until the agitation of the news started sweeping through the Jedi
who knew her."
Mace sighed, nodding resignedly. It had been the answer he
expected, but not the one he wanted. It seemed impossible to him that
one of the top Experts of Justice, one of the founders, could be
eliminated without the thing that did it making at least a ripple in
the Force, but none of the Jedi Mace had tracked down so far had felt
a thing.
"Of course," said Morpheus, "we'll keep our eyes and ears
open. One picks up all sorts of interesting information out here on
the Rim."
"All right. If you hear anything, let us know."
Morpheus nodded graciously. "Of course," he repeated.
They sat in silence for a moment; then Mace started to get
up.
"Going so soon?" Morpheus asked. "We see each other, what,
twice a year? We might as well at least talk for a while."
Mace looked mildly puzzled, as though the concept of social
interaction hadn't occurred to him. Then he sat back down and folded
his hands in front of him.
"All right," he said. "How's your new padawan coming along?"

In an alley behind the bar, two equally contrasting people
were waiting, a pastime for which some are better suited than others.
One was a young man dressed, like Mace Windu, in the robes of
a Jedi Knight, though his were of a somewhat darker color than the
Jedi Master's. He had a short ruff of thick brown hair and intense
eyes, and moved with the contained grace of an athlete as he walked
from the bar's back door to the Dumpster and back - not exactly
pacing, but not immobile, either.
The other was a woman of about the same age, dressed so
differently that it hardly seemed possible they could know each other,
let alone be there together. Her slim body was wrapped up tightly in
black plastic from neck to toes, complete with gloves which lacked
pinky and index fingers. She stood leaning against the foamcrete wall
next to the doorway, legs crossed at the ankles, arms folded across
her chest, the tails of her black PVC trenchcoat hanging down behind
her.
She leaned and watched the man in Jedi robes not-quite-pace, a
slight smile on her rather narrow face, then reached under her coat,
drew out a metal cylinder about eighteen inches long, and balanced it
on the open palm of her left hand. It sat there inert for a moment,
studded with controls and vanes, a dark opening at each end. Then it
levitated to about an inch above her hand and started slowly spinning.
The man in Jedi robes saw this when he turned around again,
stopped not-quite-pacing, and chuckled.
"Are ye tha' bored, Trinity?" he asked in a thick Scots burr.
Trinity stopped spinning her lightsaber and let it drop back
into her hand. "Just practicing my fine telekinesis," she replied
with an ironic smile. "Why would I be bored, Ray? Morpheus has only
left me standing around in this alley for - " She checked her watch.
" - an hour and ten minutes now."
Ray laughed. "Aye, I know wha' ye mean," he said. "It's one
o' their standard tricks, though, innit? Master Mace once left me
hangin' round the roof of an apartment buildin' in New Glasgow for two
days. Apparently jus' tae see if I'd really hang round tha' long
wi'ou' runnin' off in search o' adventure."
It was Trinity's turn to laugh. "Lucky for me, Morpheus
doesn't believe in that kind of lesson," she said. "I'm still working
on the whole 'patience and serenity' thing," she admitted, flipping
the saber body over her hand and catching it again.
"Aye, well, who isn't?" Ray asked rhetorically. He tilted his
head. "Is tha' a double saber?"
Trinity nodded. "Uh-huh. I just finished it. Haven't even
used it in a real fight yet."
"Sweet," said Ray appreciatively. "I've seen 'em before, bu'
never in action. Always wanted tae try i'. I did some staff fightin'
back in me kung fu days."
Trinity arched an eyebrow. "Kung fu days?" she said.
"I was the planet'ry Wu Shu champ o' New Caledonia before I
heard th' call o'th' Force," Ray explained.
Trinity nodded, impressed. "I know some Wing Chun and some
kempo - Morpheus knows all kinds of martial arts, and he's taught me
bits and pieces along with my Jedi training."
"Versatile fella, Master Morpheus," said Ray with an
appreciative nod. "Although he does tend tae, eh... go on a bi'."
Trinity chuckled. "Sometimes," she allowed.


Ray would later make his first appearance instead in the Mini-Story Wish You Were Here. We still haven't actually seen Trinity, but she's out there. These sequences were cut for pacing and flow, and the events they depict can still be assumed to have happened.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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  Subject     Author     Message Date     ID  
  RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem CGWolfgang Feb-16-11 1
     RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem pjmoyermoderator Feb-16-11 3
     RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Gryphonadmin Feb-16-11 4
         RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem CGWolfgang Feb-16-11 9
  RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Bushido Feb-16-11 2
     RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Gryphonadmin Feb-16-11 5
         RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Bushido Feb-16-11 6
         RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Bushido Feb-16-11 7
             RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Gryphonadmin Feb-16-11 10
                 RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Bushido Feb-16-11 11
  RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem Offsides Feb-16-11 8

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CGWolfgang
Member since Jun-11-09
135 posts
Feb-16-11, 02:19 AM (EDT)
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1. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #0
 
   Just out of curiosity is Ray-the-Jedi Ray Park? I didn't pick it up from the mini but a kick ass guy named Ray that speaks with a Scottish Burr and comes from a martial art background sounds like him.

------------
~If you want my input the red explosions are really pretty and if you did enough you might live for a few more excrutiating seconds

My not so humble contribution to cyberspace

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pjmoyermoderator
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1856 posts
Feb-16-11, 10:09 AM (EDT)
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3. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #1
 
   >Just out of curiosity is Ray-the-Jedi Ray Park? I didn't pick it up
>from the mini but a kick ass guy named Ray that speaks with a Scottish
>Burr and comes from a martial art background sounds like him.

Yep, that is Ray Park the Jedi. He had his first "official" appearance in Wish You Were Here, helping Boba Fett with a Rescue.

--- Philip





Philip J. Moyer
Contributing Writer, Editor and Artist (and Moderator) -- Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
CEO of MTS, High Poobah Of Artwork, and High Priest Of the Church Of Aerianne -- Magnetic Terrapin Studios
"Insert Pithy Comment Here"


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Gryphonadmin
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Feb-16-11, 01:51 PM (EDT)
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4. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #1
 
   >Just out of curiosity is Ray-the-Jedi Ray Park? I didn't pick it up
>from the mini but a kick ass guy named Ray that speaks with a Scottish
>Burr and comes from a martial art background sounds like him.

Indeed. The character's name is Ray Ross, but the intention was always for him to be "played" by Ray Park - the gag evolved out of a studio joke about how it was too bad they dubbed Darth Maul's lines in Phantom Menace, because he would have been hilarious as a Scotsman. ("Ross" is the name of the character Park plays in the somewhat regrettable but entertaining Ballistic; he's a bad guy and doesn't have a first name, but it can safely be assumed that Ray Ross, Jedi padawan, looks like him.)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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CGWolfgang
Member since Jun-11-09
135 posts
Feb-16-11, 07:15 PM (EDT)
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9. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #4
 
   Thanks for the confirm gryph and phil. It brings a big SEG to my face to see a version of him running around UF.

------------
~If you want my input the red explosions are really pretty and if you did enough you might live for a few more excrutiating seconds

My not so humble contribution to cyberspace

http://cgwolfgang.deviantart.com/


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Bushido
Member since Apr-8-10
377 posts
Feb-16-11, 09:45 AM (EDT)
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2. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #0
 
   LAST EDITED ON Feb-16-11 AT 11:59 AM (EST)
 
The relevant scenes may have just faded from memory, but as far as I can recall, this is the first time we've Luornu Durgo split on camera and the first time we've seen all three at once. That said, what is the proper form of address for her aspects? Also, in her source material, her aspects only shared memories after rejoining, does having a Lens change that at all for her?

PS. This is eerily timed as I'm on a SOS read-through right now and happen to be right in the middle of Requiem For a Lensman.

--------
Wedge Defense Force General
Order 12: "Try to avoid
freaking the mundanes."


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Gryphonadmin
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Feb-16-11, 01:56 PM (EDT)
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5. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #2
 
   >The relevant scenes may have just faded from memory, but as far as I
>can recall, this is the first time we've Luornu Durgo split on camera
>and the first time we've seen all three at once.

You may be right about the latter - it's at least the first time we've seen them all in the same place. They're all in the big Lens conversation during the crisis scene of Last Transport, but they're scattered around the city at the time. I'm more certain you're right about the first part. I've never known entirely how Lu in the actual act of triplicating or detriplicating should be portrayed, since in the comics it tends to happen between panels, so I just kind of glossed over it here; Gryphon wasn't looking, so it still more or less happened between panels. :)

>That said, what is
>the proper form of address for her aspects?

Haven't the slightest.

>Also, in her source
>material, her aspects only shared memories after rejoining, does
>having a Lens change that at all for her?

The others probably don't get a full resync until they're all together again, but the Lens does at least make it possible for them all to keep more or less abreast of what the others are doing, which makes for pretty handy field communications - even more so than a regular team of Lensmen comm officers. The innermost details of how they felt about it may have to wait for later.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Bushido
Member since Apr-8-10
377 posts
Feb-16-11, 02:24 PM (EDT)
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6. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #5
 
   Just found a brief mention of "all three of Lu Durgo" showing up at the Hellfire Club in the latter parts of Requiem.

As far as how to portray her powers in action, check out this clip from the Legion of Super Heroes cartoon http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qspvAqCvNcc

--------
Wedge Defense Force General
Order 12: "Try to avoid
freaking the mundanes."


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Bushido
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377 posts
Feb-16-11, 02:43 PM (EDT)
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7. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #5
 
   One more thing caught my eye in Requiem, "Old girlfriends of her father's in enough quantity to make her want to giggle a bit. Skuld, Lafiel Abriel, Bea Watanabe, Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran, a cheerfully drunk Jamie Finney kalKesek, Rahne Sinclair, Sumire Kanzaki all the way here from Ishiyama..." Requiem takes place at approximately the same time as Raven: Blood Ties 1: A Dream of Darkness (Raven sees Gryphon step outside the club for a breather after the concert). In Raven: Blood Ties 2: Alternative Learning, when Starfire meets Raven at the cabin on Ishiyama, she says that she's only meet Gryphon on official occasions.

--------
Wedge Defense Force General
Order 12: "Try to avoid
freaking the mundanes."


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Gryphonadmin
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Feb-16-11, 07:39 PM (EDT)
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10. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #7
 
   Indeed, one or the other of those is a mistake, unless Kori considers the Hellfire Club Jam an official occasion - which, knowing Kori, she might.

--G.
"Good job I'm not a brain surgeon." - Jeremy Clarkson, after being caught clipping a double white line by a viewer
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Bushido
Member since Apr-8-10
377 posts
Feb-16-11, 09:09 PM (EDT)
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11. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #10
 
   "(Kori,)" Raven murmured to her Tamaranian friend while he was gone, "(you are -sitting-... at -attention-.)"
"(Proper posture is important!)" Koriand'r protested unconvincingly.
"(That just looks -painful-,)" Raven noted.

--------
Wedge Defense Force General
Order 12: "Try to avoid
freaking the mundanes."


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Offsides
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Feb-16-11, 04:42 PM (EDT)
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8. "RE: The Cutting Room Floor: Requiem"
In response to message #0
 
   This is one of the things I really like about UF. Even though these scenes didn't work in the final product (and I totally see why you did what you did), they stand on their own rather well AND provide some good additional details on what's been going on in the background of this HUGE universe without making everyones' head spin.

I think that had you given these to us too soon after Requiem was released, it might have detracted from the story and sidetracked things in ways that you obviously didn't want. But handing them out now, something like 5 years later (give or take), they just fill in the gaps without derailing anything, because the story has already moved beyond them enough that they aren't more than small branches sticking out halfway down the tree (so to speak).

I hope you give us more stuff that landed on the cutting room floor (at least that is no longer likely to end up in a yet-to-be written story), but I'm content to wait a while for them to age like these two scenes before you do :)

Offsides

[...] in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
-- David Ben Gurion
EPU RCW #π
#include <stdsig.h>


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