The Tea Tree

Still migraine-y but I Made it to my mother's so whatever. Here's a scene from... Two NaNoWriMos ago? In which an unexpected person is a guest star. I actually thought up a second scene for her on the drive down so she'll get another chance to shine and terrify everyone.

( You've stepped into something bigger than you thought )

I hate when the weather abruptly warms or cools. We have been having beautiful winter weather the past few weeks, but this week it decided to go from 20s to 50s, and my body hates it. Joint and muscle pain, sinuses, the works. Come back to me, winter!

Anyway. I have for you a bonus scene I wrote two NaNoWriMos ago, when I once again got an idea and added an unnecessary plot point to AG. And this one was big enough that it required me to restart rewriting part II, as I need to properly incorporate it in. I think it'll be worth it, though -- it adds an overarching storyline that will lend a mystery-novel quality to the second part, and allows the telepaths to showcase their shit.

Title: None
Genre: Fantasy
The Troops: Nur, Mahli, Meander, Rose May
Status: Incomplete and rough
Summary: Sometimes, to fight a monster, you have to combine monstrosities.
Prompt: NA
Rating: PG-13 for disturbing implications, violence
Author's Notes: This scene can't appear in AG proper since it's told strictly from Rose May's POV, but I just had to write it as it is such a fun moment to miss. It's also a fantastic moment for Mahli, who gets to show off his telepathic powers for a good cause for once. Poor Rose May, though. She probably wishes she would die in that fire Tadhg set after living through this.

( Someday, people will learn to stop attacking Rose May )

Poor Nur, never gets to kill anyone. Maybe someday, love.

Tschuess.

( TW for mentions of war )

Just something I'm working on today.

My circadian rhythm has decided to fuck everything again, and after a few weeks of waking up at 7AM, then a few more weeks waking up at 6AM, this morning I woke up at 5-fucking-AM. NP recommended upping the trazadone and I'll be leaving work early tomorrow (did so today as well, or tried) to try and convince the dumbassery to go away, thanks.

Been trying to get back into writing regularly, but seems I'm at a rough point in AG. Here you all are anyway:

( TW for spousal abuse )

Rose May is a one-track record and she ain't gonna skip because you're going to Frenton.

On that sleep-deprived note, will try to get a bit more writing tonight. We shall see.

Tschuess.

I need to get into the shower and then off to the doctor's for a blood draw, but woke up with a better idea of how the second part of the Nur story would go, so figured I'd share. I want to keep writing, but there's this thing called WORK that I gotta do. LAME.

( No TWs; this is the happy part of the story )

I've never written about Nur and Rose May when they first meet, but needless to say, I imagine them as becoming instant BFFs. Also I hope my writing fails (instead instead of instant? Really brain?) clear up by the time I'm at work.

Tschuess.

First, health update: my knee is better. Today I may have accidentally undone a lot of the healing by trying to do too much at once, but once my laundry is dry in about thirty minutes I'll be forcing myself to flop my ass permanently at my computer or on the couch.

Second, for those of you considering publishing work or just having fail organizational skills, I highly recommend Scrivener. This neat little program allows you to keep all of your writing for projects in one place. It comes with a full trial for 30 NONCONSECUTIVE (!) days. It took me over a year to get through the trial and I couldn't imagine going back to using just WordPad, so I got it for the $40 license. Now when I write AG, I can have previous revision chapters right alongside what I'm working on, or the previous chapters, etc, without having four or five WordPad documents open. Overall a win-win.

And now, writing excerpt:

( Really, all Rose May and Co. do is drink tea and contemplate shit )

Hopefully more writing today, but I've been addicted to Sims again so we'll see.

Tschuess.

Ashes

It was supposed to be a normal trip down to Frenton, the closest major city to their farm. A simple trip of selling grains and produce...

( TW for violence (including against children) )

Okay, it isn't really. But with how I write him, sometimes I wonder.

( Hafstra's role at the moment is BE UTTERLY CRAZY MAN )

I'm not too pleased with this scene, mostly because I don't like using my vampires as deus ex machinas (Mahli would probably make more sense here, but I imagined Nur doing it, so there it is). In the last draft, this scene happened upon Rose May's first meeting with Hafstra, where Rheanna was there to provide the translation for "my wife". But somehow I forgot to have Rose May ask why Hafstra was in Welen in the first place; instead they just talked about him being arrested and boring shit like that.

So yeah, may end up rewriting those scenes so this can go in its proper place. Let me know what you think, though.

First the excerpt. Then I'll explain the subject.

( In which we learn about Mahli )

And now, the explanation! It's like behind-the-scenes, except Inception behind-the-scenes since this isn't published yet and... Yeah.

My issue ever since writing modern Mahli has been convincing the reader that, considering his attitude and power, that he still can't take over the world. THis is very difficult considering modern fantasy and just media in general. People who are super powerful compared to others invariably try to take over the world, pose a major safety hazard, whatever.

But the thing is, even with the ability to mind-control twelve people? That still leaves hundreds of thousands of people who could use that opportunity to go after Mahli. Twelve people also is assuming he is not using his telepathy to make up for his severe physical disabilities, which Mahli implies he does with the "manage eight" comment. Mahli's arrogance, stemmed from his special treatment and just growing up with mountain faeries, results in him tending to spy on people's thoughts freely, trying to get an advantage, impress people, etc. This uses up yet more of his power.

If Mahli wanted to get into a fight? He'd most likely pour a lot of energy into removing more of his physical disabilities than he does normally (he still uses a cane). This would be taxing enough that he'd be reduced to likely an average vampire in terms of telepathy, and human officials know how to deal with that kind of power. And as shown in this scene, any magic users would quickly sense shit going down and go in to subdue him.

So in conclusion: Mahli is extremely powerful, but still a human, and a significantly crippled human at that. He is also smart enough to know that even with his awesomeness, an attempt to truly skirt the law would end up with him severely injured or dead.

And so he deals with society and being regarded as a freak due to his physical deformities as best he can. For those who don't know:

( Severe physical deformities )

So yes. That's him using telepathy so he can walk more easily, and he still needs the cane. Multiple times in the story he gets sick of it and just floats around, freaking people out XD But to reserve power and not exhaust himself mentally, he usually just sticks with the cane and walking.

I should stop babbling and go to bed but yes. Mahli is one of my favourites for whatever reason. He's just interesting.

Tschuess.

Seriously, my ability to concentrate has been kind of shit, as has been my ability to keep myself entertained as a result. Regardless, today:

a) I bought eggs from some random guy in the next city over for $4, which is cheaper than Target's organic cagefree eggs. Somehow.

b) I got some writing done:

( It took me too long to write the latter half of this scene )

So yeah. Thursday night work had a social event at the Exploratorium in SF. I spent most of it traveling alone, which was honestly a way better way for me to enjoy that type of thing. The only issue is that ( TW for anxiety symptoms ) I think I missed a tragic amount of interesting things as a result.

( I get kind of judgmental when I talk about drunk people. )

Seriously. I've had to be gentle to too many hungover people, and combining that with my overall family's alcoholism, my tolerance for drunken shenanigans is extremely low. They are funny to watch, for me, only to a point, and then I just want to leave.

But yeah. Definitely a place I'll have to visit again.

I'm not really sure what else to talk about; my mother could only wrangle 30min out of me on the phone today, maybe because phones have been on the anxiety list lately as well. Or because she called me and not the other way around. Who knows.

Either way, I feel exhausted despite having no real reason to, so I'm going to try and relax a bit and not guilt myself over not writing enough.

Tschuess.