Day 12

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Here's today's prompt for you to post your updates and any excerpts and thoughts etc in comments.

Comments

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I managed to write some more, but I think I'll have to increase my output if I'm going to finish this story in November. An excerpt:

"Vila and Soolin, we're putting you down just behind the maintenance stores building." He looked at them both, ready on the teleport pad, dressed in the dull brown overalls worn by the Cassiona facility's maintenance force.

Vila had said that no one ever really noticed workers, especially if they looked as if they were involved in a dirty job like plumbing; they just wanted them to do their work and disappear. He'd grinned and said it had never failed for him, and Avon, who had had exactly that attitude about maintenance and service grades, had felt somewhat chagrined.

Vila, Avon now noted, had an artfully applied smudge on his face, and his and Soolin's overalls were stained. He nodded at Vila's large tool kit. "It will be your back luck if they ask you to do some plumbing."

"No." Vila shook his head. "It'll be theirs!"

[azdak.livejournal.com]

Vila knows the importance of attention to detail! And he's quite right about no one ever paying attention to maintenance-type people.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

and Avon, who had had exactly that attitude about maintenance and service grades, had felt somewhat chagrined

I love this line - it certainly tells me a lot about Avon.

[akane42me.livejournal.com]

Mainteance workers - a classic way to blend in!

Fingers crossed that you'll finish the story in November. If you don't, please be sure to let us know where to find it when it's done.
But I bet you'll finish it.

[kalinda001.livejournal.com]

I hope you finish it or at least leave a link where we can read the rest of it.

What's Soolin's reaction to Vila's statement? Does she not really care or is she the exception to the rule who notices maintenance people?

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

An excellent snippet, and very true.

One typo, though your back luck: 'your bad luck', surely?

[spiralsheep.livejournal.com]

I love that extract and, with that punchline, it even works as a mini-fic.

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

You have Vila's voice so effortlessly right...

[azdak.livejournal.com]

Music II:

"And what would your advice be?" said Hardy. "Shall I buy a gun and charge at the German army all by myself? I'd be shot in the back by my fellow countrymen before I got within a hundred metres of them. This is what people want, you know. They may be misguided, they may be desperate, or they may be just plain stupid, but they want unification. You heard them on the radio. All those cries of 'Heil Hitler'. That was the vox populi."

"That doesn't mean you have to join them, though."

"I'm not joining them," said Hardy patiently. "I am merely conveying the appearance of joining them. If there's one thing I've noticed about Mr Hitler, it's that he's a trifle paranoid about whether everybody really loves him. And people who don't love him find that nasty things happen to them. I'd rather not have anything nasty happen to me, and given the choice, I'd rather nothing happened to you, either. It would be rather a blow to your career if that pretty face got smashed in with an iron bar."



I've finished the first draft of BPE, so I now I can get cracking on the rewriting. In the meantime, have a snippet (Tommy has realised that Zoe, the teenage runaway, is bonkers enough that he might be able to talk her into committing suicide on his show)

BPE:

TOMMY: Listen, Zoe, why don't you call me Tommy?

ZOE: Really? Wow!

TOMMY: Well, we're friends, aren't we? Okay, Zoe, I'll just shut this door, okay? You always get such a draft in a room when the door's open, don't you think? Now then, Zoe, what's your story?

ZOE: Story?

TOMMY: Yeah, your story. Why do you want to come on the show?

ZOE: Oh. Well, um.

TOMMY: Come on, everyone's got a story. Everyone's got a secret. What makes you special, Zoe? You can tell your Uncle Tommy.

ZOE: (leans forward confidingly) I'm a zombie.

TOMMY: (Pause) Well, that's a new one. So, er, how long have you been thinking you're a zombie?

ZOE: I don't think I'm a zombie. I am a zombie.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Hardy sounds like he intends to be a survivor. I await with interest whether this is actually the case (and what he survives as).

Congratulations on finishing the first draft of the Blue Peter Elephant! And Zoe does indeed sound bonkers.

[akane42me.livejournal.com]

Careful there, Hardy. Mr Hitler's got eyes everywhere! Are you making some good progress on Music II? (It seems like you are!)

You've finished the first draft of BPE! Excellent! Pico's revived it, I'm happy for you. Will need to see the entire thing, really.

[kalinda001.livejournal.com]

I'm getting to really like Music II. Such a cynical attitude but I can see that being very real.

And Elephant..."I'm a zombie."...LOL! Love it!

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

I liked both of those.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Hardy can still appear to go along with it without actually joining. I doubt Arthur's got any choices but leaving though. It's what I'd have done, and fast.

A zombie! Hmm. How do you get one to suicide? By proving they're really alive?

[spiralsheep.livejournal.com]

That extract of Music II is rly good and makes me want to read more (as usual).

You have two "rather"s in close proximity though:

"I'd rather not have anything nasty happen to me, and given the choice, I'd rather nothing happened to you, either."

If you intended deliberate repetitive emphasis then you might want to use a stronger word?

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

Draft finished? Goood on you!

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

I missed yesterday (workwise, as I said, November is not a good month) but managed to get a bit more of the Sentinel WIP (the one with the Book with the bullet wounds) done today, here (http://sallymn.livejournal.com/432672.html)... only about 460 words, but with any luck one more pull will finish it, and I'll have the draft done :)

The bit player OC needs some more work - I know what I want, but getting it on paper...

[akane42me.livejournal.com]

one more pull will finish it, and I'll have the draft done
Great! I've read the bits, and will love to read it all together!

[kalinda001.livejournal.com]

460 words, that's good progress. Love the tone of your Sentinel piece.

[kalinda001.livejournal.com]

This story is rolling along nicely. A snippet of a scene.



"Do you think I fear death?"

A cynical female voice said from behind him, "Adrian isn't afraid of death. He welcomes it."

Adrian's back stiffened as the harsh voice chilled the room.

"He's only afraid of life. Isn't that right?"

Without turning to look at her, Adrian could already see the steely black pupils and jet-black hair in his mind's memory. There was no reaction in his voice, only a passive acknowledgement of her arrival. "Professor Boudreaux."

"We weren't that formal with each other once upon a time." She came around to face him eye-to-eye, another figure in a tech-white lab coat but one possessed of an icy beauty, almost like a colder, female version of him. Her coat was pristine, with no markings, designating her as a civilian.

Tamara Boudreaux was a brilliant woman in her field of Wave Dynamics. A ruthless, ambitious climber. They had got on well and the sparks between them had provided for some spirited discussions. Adrian always appreciated people who didn't waste his time.

"Times have changed."

"So I've noticed." She ran a finger sensually along his collar as he stood passively, like a statue that had no feeling about it one way or the other, but inside him where primal urges were encouraged by biological reactions, was a different matter. He never expected to see this icy beauty again, a woman who stirred sensations in his body but not the warmth associated with the positive, complex impressions that came from Kali.

Boudreaux's chuckle sent ripples of excitement and apprehension down his spine. "You haven't changed."

"We're working together?" He kicked himself for such an obvious question.

"Does that displease you? Or make you uncomfortable? I hope it does…you bastard." Her eyes flashed with fury. "You destroyed my career until they found out what you did."

"I warned you to leave."

"Yes, but you didn't tell me why!"

"Then you are after revenge as well?"

"I will get my revenge one way or another." She came close, her voice an icy whisper only the two of them could hear. "I'm not a fool like Kegan. I know how to make you squirm." Her voice was seductive in its menace. "You have a consort now, don't you?"

"No," he reacted before he could control himself.

[akane42me.livejournal.com]

"I will get my revenge one way or another." She came close, her voice an icy whisper only the two of them could hear.

Brrrrr! It just gets better and better!

[akane42me.livejournal.com]

No writing yesterday. I felt out of it all morning and decided to wait until evening to write, then after school got knocked on my kiester with a migrane. Slept 14 hours. Huh. Today the head still hurts, but I absolutely refused to delay working on the story.
Fuzzy brain, *shrugs* but Here's today's 397:

It rushed back to her while she dreamed of other things, and she woke. How long she’d slept she didn’t know, but she thought it had not been for long. Her body was made of clay. When thoughts and words formed in her mind she shut them off.

It’s time. She watched her hand pick up the phone, her finger press the first nine. Beep. That wasn’t so bad. Beep, beep. Then phone spoke to her, and she talked to it, and hung up. The room hummed faintly. Somewhere, something ticked off the passing seconds, a clock. She sat in his chair and rocked, small comfortless motions, faster than the clock. She looked at the things in his office, the paneled walls, the bookcases, the books, the filing cabinets, the desk.

Two sirens, and the doorbell, and pounding. She stood. She walked up the stairs, through the kitchen, through the living room, to the door, and let them in.

- - -

The detective filled many pages by the time they were done talking. They would talk again in the morning. Can you stay with relatives, he asked her. It’s okay, I’m okay here, she said. He shook his head. Oh. How long, she asked him. Indefinitely. They are all out east, she said. He waited in the living room while she put her things in the overnight bag. Tonight she would stay at the Best Western off the interstate. Tonight she could make some calls. Her people at the gallery. She carried the bag out to the kitchen. The Hobbit lay on the table. She picked it up, to take it along, to have it, to touch it. Don’t cry, don’t cry. She riffled the pages. A bookmark, a white card, business card. TransGlobal Investments. His company card. A telephone number. That’s not his number. He owns his company, he works alone.

The wrong number. In the wrong book. In a secret room. She took the book and the card back into the bedroom. The detective, on his own phone, glanced up at her, then back to his notebook while he spoke. She sat on the edge of the bed because her legs and arms and hands were trembling, and referring carefully to each digit, one at a time, she pressed them into the keypad.

A voice, harsh, out of breath, spat out one word.

“Case.”

[kalinda001.livejournal.com]

Interesting mystery. Can't wait to see more of this.

A question, did you mean to have the dialogue without the quote marks?

[kerravonsen]

continuing fail on my part

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Hey, I don't write each day. I just don't comment unless I have. :-)

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Home late, and far too tired to write (especially after signing up for Yuletide, which maybe this year my attempt at good habits mean I won't write at the last minute), so I shall re-post a bit of a post on my LJ today:

"This year I decided to participate in [info]picowrimo as a means of trying to get myself tackling some writing again - any writing that required a commitment. I meant to do some fanfic and some original fic. Due to being fairly busy over the last fortnight, I’ve done less than I had hoped because I haven’t managed any at the weekends, so its been evenings only and often short ones at that. Nonetheless, I am feeling pleased with my progress, which I am sure I wouldn’t have made had it not been for the challenge of the comm. I’ve been intending to write the fic I’m working on at present for about two years, and now I not only have nearly 4000 words of it*, but I made myself work through the tricky bits. Moreover, instead of thinking “Oh, I haven’t time to write much now and I’m tired” I have made myself start writing and discovered that in fact I have got time, and that though I didn’t completely feel in the mood when I started, I soon got stuck in. One of the reasons I’d put off writing it, thinking “I need lots of time” was the issue of structure; the fic has quite a few shifts in time and POV (so that, for example, Harriet remembers kissing Peter in the punt before the narrative reaches it) so how to structure it avoiding the twin perils of one damn scene after another and too much shifting about. Ironically, it was a problem that only came to be solved when I sat down and thought “I don’t know what bit to put next. Try this”. It’s a reminder that there is more than one potential right way for something to come out. I think I have got the rest of the structure more or less worked out, thought there’s room for movement. The next scene, according to my jottings on the bus this morning is “Punt – sit down. Initial snogging.” I am just about managing not to stuff it with my interpretations of particular bits of canon, although there's still quite a bit in there."

[spiralsheep.livejournal.com]

Congratulations!

[spiralsheep.livejournal.com]

I wrote a poem, 82 not especially notable words. I'm not going to post it anywhere.

310 words (2 pieces) total

My inspiration and desire to communicate seems to have reached an unusually low point. ::wryface::

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I know how you feel. I seem to write only for ficathons or other challenges like this these days. I need to find my drive again.

Still, great going! I find that forcing myself to do it does get the ideas flowing. :-)

[six-old-cars.livejournal.com]

I made a decent 200+ words at lunch time, but today was a CWIL evening so I turned up at our venue... during the tail end of a local NaNoWriMo group's write-in. I'd taken my baby laptop with me so I joined in, bringing today's word count to 667. Yay!

So the weirdness continues:
The scene around Gibbs disappeared and he found himself once again staring out of that cage, waiting for the next bout of torture at the hands of the faceless men in white coats. The one Gibbs could see turned around, and he was not faceless, he was O'Connor the excise agent.
O'Connor raised a scalpel and moved toward Gibbs. The memory of their first encounter came back to Gibbs, and he recalled the excise man pointing his gun at two dead pirates. Anger flared in Gibbs's heart and he leapt at O'Connor, swinging a fist at his throat.
The punch never connected. O'Connor vanished into thin air, and Gibbs found himself holding the scalpel, about to cut a slice off a mutant cauliflower. But even a momentary glance showed it not to be a vegetable at all, but some form of tentacled animal. He stared in horror as his hand moved against his will to begin a dissection. The blade came down on a writhing appendage, and he noticed the clamps restraining the creature. His gut wrenched at what he was about to do, but his hand would not withdraw.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Eep. How horrible! That's very vivid writing there.