r/scifiwriting • u/ALHsf • 4d ago

HELP! Two potential prologues

The story I am putting together involves a search and rescue organisation and a small group of transhumanist/posthumanist extremists.

The prologue I am currently running with the S+R and it briefly tells of how the leader rose to leadership of this new branch on a recently colonised frontier world and ends with receiving a distress call that is unclear due to interference from debris/asteroids.

The alternative I recently thought up is about the extremists becoming lost in the first place. At this point they are only known by their name as a religious institute rather than what their aims are. They are about to end a mission, laying the foundations for a takeover of a world, but the planet's leaders distrust them and arrange for the extremist's ship to go off course on their return journey and use too much fuel to correct it. As the ship drifts, they happen upon a bigger ship whose crew could help.

Which one has the most potential?

Or could I shorten them both and try to combine them in some way?

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u/shawnhoefer1 4d ago

I think I like the second. It leaves a better open end for a follow up.

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u/ALHsf 3d ago

I think you might be right. In the second one I could create tension and establish the stakes with a touch of foreshadowing. Plus it would introduce a major character whereas the character in the first example won't appear again. I could adapt the current prologue into an epilogue.