Imagine a desolate, arid plane, relentless sun overhead, and a dirt road stretching on to the horizon. Wherever you look, it’s just dry shrubs and dust. No movement anywhere. No warthogs. Not even a zombie.

This is the setting. The story is simple: just two people driving through this scorched landscape with a rather vague purpose. They’re hot and tired. Humor is their way to cope — sarcasm for one, playacting for the other.

“I need a gin and tonic.”
“Ha ha.”
“I wasn’t kidding.”

This is a scene that’s been playing on my mind for a while now. I’ve been trying to develop it into a story, but it kept falling flat. It was supposed to be a very simple tale relying mostly on it’s atmosphere, but as I was planning it out I got bogged down in character backstories. As I pushed the plot forward I kept loosing the specific mood of the story, which, in my mind, was its core. Frustrating time.

And then I saw it — simplistic black-and-white drawings, laconic dialogues and one-liners — and the story started coming together. So maybe it isn’t a short story? Maybe it’ll work better as a graphic novel?

Now, I’m not much of a comic reader and I’ve certainly never done one, so it’s a bit of an adventure. It might be a giant flop. I guess I’ll take the risk.

Here’s a couple of frames: