SEALAB IV: How a Vocal Challenge Loser Became My Most Prolific Reprint

Today, April 17, is a special day for me.

It marks the first time I’ve ever had one of my stories performed on someone else’s podcast (a distinction I’m forced to make because I’ve had plenty of my stories performed on my own podcast).

And not just any story, but one of my favorite horror stories to date.

A story with origins directly tied to Vocal.

And a story that has, by every Vocal standard, flopped.

But I refuse to let it die.

The Background

Back in November 2022, Vocal launched The Aquarium Challenge, whose premise was simply “Write a story that takes place in an aquarium.” This also happened to be a period where they would release challenges that closed in 7-10 days, so you had to be quick on the draw or miss out entirely.

Not like now where I’ve seen multiple sentient tree stories by the same creator, including an impressively ambitious showing by Donna Fox writing a seven-part “tr-extravangaza” (see below). If you had more than one submission back then, you were either riding the flash game or going to bed with your keyboard.

For my part, I wasn’t taken with the premise as presented. The lightning bolt of inspiration did not strike immediately. Instead, I mulled it over even as precious seconds ticked away.

And thank goodness I did, because I happened to learn of the U.S. Navy’s SEALAB experiments, a series of three underwater labs (SEALAB I, II, and III) that they used to test the ability of humans to live in isolation and undertake dives from the habitat at differing depths.

You might see where this is going from the title.

So I decided to create a fictional scenario where the Navy continued their research after SEALAB III with—you guessed it—SEALAB IV. Why haven’t we heard of this one when the other three are relatively well known? Let’s just say things didn’t exactly go to plan.

This time, the SEALAB habitat is larger, more sophisticated, and set at a farther depth than its predecessors. It has also been moved from the balmy waters off Bermuda to the frigid, unforgiving edge of the Pacific-Antarctic Trench, where its sensor arrays now probe the trench’s recesses for signs of life.

Little do the Navy divers know that they themselves will become objects of study.

The scare factor of this story is magnified immensely by the environment. The deep ocean is much like outer space: completely hostile to us air breathers. Instead of a vacuum, this time you have 2,000 meters of water over your head that would love nothing more than to crush your pressure suit and flood your lungs.

In space, the Unknown is always a factor, and the sea has its own version of Unknown. After all, we have scarcely plumbed its depths despite how long humans have lived in contact with our oceans. Even more so in remote locations like the Southern Ocean. That Unknown is less a mystery and more a threat because we know that the ocean supports life, including truly monstrous creatures. Giant squid. Killer whales.

What else could be lurking the depths waiting to be discovered?

A harrowing concept combined with a premise rooted in reality that resulted in some of my finest work to date.

A sentiment supported by my editor’s feedback: “…there wasn’t any part of your story that I felt needed to be cut. It all flowed well, and everything felt really intentional for building the suspense of it all.”

Should you wish to see it for yourself, by all means:

And yet, for all my pride and confidence in its execution, “SEALAB IV” didn’t exactly make it far.

The Results

Let’s not sugarcoat it: by all Vocal metrics, this story was a failure.

• Page reads: 12
• ❤️s: 4
• Comments: 2

And did it place in The Aquarium Challenge that heralded its creation?

That’s a solid no.

To be fair, it was a bit of an unconventional take on the idea of an aquarium. But I thought that would set it apart in the judges’ eyes.

And perhaps it did set it apart. Right into the “Pass” pile.

Oh well, hard to know what goes through the adjudicators’ minds. With hundreds of submissions, it’s inevitable that some hard decisions had to be made. Maybe “SEALAB IV” at least fought its way to “we have to pass on it, but we don’t feel good about it.”

The Uptake

Challenge losses are never fun. Especially when you are proud of the piece you submitted.

But that’s the thing, isn’t it? The intrinsic value you derived from the piece is still there, even if the extrinsic validation is lacking. All this challenge loss meant was that I hadn’t caught the eye of whoever was adjudicating. But humans are a funny bunch in that we can all look at the same thing and come away with different feelings. “One man’s trash” and all that jazz.

So, I said to myself right then and there, “I don’t care about its past. This is a good story, and I’m going to get it the attention it deserves.”

This new thrust included listing “SEALAB IV” as one of my top 5 best stories within my fairly expansive Vocal portfolio to try and drive more eyes to it from within the platform:

But the larger effort and the “meat and potatoes” of this retrospective is what happened outside of Vocal.

The Wild World Beyond Vocal

Unlike some on this platform, Vocal was not my first foray into the creative writing world. A fact that has always helped me maintain a holistic perspective on this platform, both good and bad.

When I came here, I had already published poems, a short story, and even had a play performed at a small theater. So, on top of everything else, that meant I had a working understanding of publishing rights. And the fact that I had to surrender first publish rights to enter the post-apocalyptic challenge nearly turned me off this platform before I even started.

But I sucked it up for $20,000, and here we are.

Which is all a long way of saying I also had a working understanding of reprints, and I set about applying that knowledge to get “SEALAB IV” out into the world.

If the term “reprints” isn’t ringing any bells, you can read up here:

And as is the universal narrative with short story submissions, I received four to five “no” emails for every “yes.” If anything, reprints are rejected more often than original stories because they’re considered less valuable by most publications.

But, slowly but surely, the yes’s started to trickle in.

The first to bite was the online publication MetaStellar:

Up next, I successfully pitched “SEALAB IV” for inclusion in The Pelagic Zone: Uncharted Waters, a collection from JayHenge Publishing. Though, unfortunately, that book is on hold while head editor Jessica Augustsson is on a medical hiatus. Pulling for you, Jessica!

Recently, I learned that it had been accepted for publication in Rogue Waves from Dragon Souls Press, scheduled to publish May 30, 2024. So soon I will be able to hold my pride and joy in my hand.

More recently (i.e. today, 4/26/24), I learned that this story has been accepted for publication in The Stygian Lepus Magazine Issue #13.

As exciting as all this was, each of these placements were not in themselves milestones. “SEALAB IV” was not the first Vocal story I had sold as a reprint, nor was it the first Vocal story to make it into book form (more on that in The Other Reprints section).

However, it was truly a special moment to learn it had been accepted for distribution on The Kaidankai Podcast. This is the first time I’ll hear someone else performing my prose—who wasn’t specifically recruited to do so across multiple seasons of the limited-run podcast Jon and Stephen Recorded Readings.

Not dissing Jon or my podcast here, but let’s just say the adjudication process for this show is a bit biased toward the works of Stephen A. Roddewig 😊

Instead, here’s someone who has no prior connection to me and/or isn’t at the mercy of my editorial direction saying this would make a great performance. And now you can listen for yourself!

You can also check out their website here for additional platforms if you’re not on the Spotify train:

The Other Reprints

I’ve recently come across several writers/authors publishing under pseudonyms and claiming they’ve had “great success” writing under names besides the one they’re currently using. How convenient since we readers have no way of backtracking and verifying any of these claims.

In the interest of transparency, I overcome my own bias against “linkfests” to avoid making claims that aren’t backed up.

So here’s the other Vocal stories I’ve placed as reprints beyond the platform:

• Beyond the Cape: Published in No One Should Kiss a Frog from MacKenzie Publishing
• Dash Point: Published in December Tales II from Curious Blue Press
• In Him, We Know Freedom: Published in It’s All In My Mind from Pulp Cult
• Lurking Shadows: Published in Memento Mori: Remember the Dead from Pulp Cult
• The Final Two Minutes: Published in Apocalyptales: The End is Nigh from Wicked Shadow Press
• King of the World: Published in Apocalyptales: Judgment Day from Wicked Shadow Press

In summary, I have a bit of expertise in this space.

The Takeaway

In another reality, I could have taken the challenge loss and lack of traction as a sign that “SEALAB IV” was inherently flawed and chalked it up to a failed experiment. After all, the price of experimentation is that you may not always like the outcome.

But I knew in my heart of hearts that I had something good here, and even if I was the only one who saw it, I wasn’t going to leave it to languish in obscurity without a fight.

Even so, there’s no guarantee that any of the publishers mentioned above would take it simply because I put it in front of them (though I do enjoy a great relationship with JayHenge Publishing thanks to previous book placements). But it was 100% guaranteed that “SEALAB IV” would go nowhere if I didn’t have the courage to try.

Often, I read other Vocal creators expressing remorse over how much effort they pour into pieces for this site only for them to be “forgotten.” Mackenzie summed it up nicely:

And I certainly understand the sentiment. Some of my finest stories are on this site, but challenge winners they are not.

So I submit the tale of “SEALAB IV” as an example of how you can escape that cycle and find new life outside this platform. How you can achieve new harmony between the online publishing world and the traditional publishing world. And, in some cases, even make a little cash off these reprints.

But if you’re looking for more inspiration as to how you can breathe new life into your old Vocal pieces, might I humbly submit the tale of how I took a series of short stories on this platform and converted it into a full-blown book:

Another tale that I believe could really help inspire fellow Vocal creators to think beyond the challenge loss and lack of engagement that seems to drive away more than a few Vocal+ subscribers.