After quite a bit of work, I believe I have finally decided the specifics of what my Capstone project will be. I will be creating a Space Adventure Novel, and I will try and create as much of it as humanly possible between now and April. I have worked out most of the story by now, and I have enough ideas for it to make sure I won't run out of material. If it turns out the way I expect it to, I'll be able to explore a a lot of my favorite genre tropes and put my own spin on them, the way I personally want to.
The story will take place an undetermined amount of time in our future, in a much more chaotic galaxy. In it, I plan to focus on a small group of space pirates. In a Galaxy growing more dangerous every day, Captain Harris and his partner Claire are forced into hunting down an ancient alien artifact by the pirate guild they recently joined. Will they be able to survive the mission when dozens of other cutthroats are after the same prize? Harris and Claire will be pushed into learning the price of freedom, and the reasons others try to limit it, as well as the battling philosophies of individualism vs collectivism.
More specifically, I want to challenge Harris's love of freedom by slowly forcing him to accept more and more outside control of his life. The story starts with Harris explaining that the Galaxy has become so dangerous, he decided that the only way he could keep his ship safe was to give in and join a pirate guild, accepting that he will have to serve them to some degree, while benefiting from their full protection against other powerful galactic cutthroats. As the story goes on, I have other similar compromises he may have to make in order to continue to insure his crews safety; perhaps there are some dangers that one just cannot face alone.
Likewise, Claire's inner struggle is all about her robin hood esque desire to protect the weak from the strong, and the kind of self sacrifice she's willing to go through to protect others, even strangers, from harm. Throughout the narrative, I want to force her to into situations where she can't necessarily save everyone, and rather has to accept that she does the best she can.
There will also be aspects of trans-humanism, since I want there to be a focus on human cyborg technology. As humanity begins to feel as though it is losing control to the galaxy's chaos, the kind of cyborg enhancements presented to the readers will become more and more extreme. This chaos (represented in the forms of various alien predators and dangers that will slowly become more prevalent) is the same chaos that prompts Harris to join the pirate guild for safety. The story won't be about the end of the frontier, so much as an exploration of its dangers and a celebration of its escapism tropes
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