Archive | November 2014

Doomsday: Discussing the Student List (@inventrix, @skysailor99)

Nov21

I hope I got him right I hope I got him right

“Solon? Solon Dragon-Chaser?” Leo was leaning over Cya’s shoulder, looking at her list of parents-of-potential-students. “Solon Dragon-Chaser, hunh. Surprised he’s still alive.”

“The people in the town he’s in called him Scholar Solon.”

“Yeah. Heh.” Leo leaned back, smiling. “We called him that, too, or Doctor Solon. He had always read a book on something, whatever we were fighting.”

Cya resisted taking notes. “What happened to him?”

“He went off to one of those enclaves, you know, the ones in the middle of the old cities? Up north somewhere, I think. Something about a woman.” Leo trailed off, staring off into space.

Cya didn’t know what to do when he did that, had never known, so she did what had served her well for decades: ignored it. “The clerk in their town – it’s a farm town now, one of the ones that stayed out of the war and pretty much didn’t change except the walls?”

“Mmm.” Presumably, Leo had seen those, but, just as presumably, some place that bordered itself against gods and bandits alike had not been high on his visiting rota when he’d been monster-hunting. Cya didn’t like to ask, and so she didn’t.

“Well, the clerk was very helpful. I told him I was looking up family that had gotten scattered.” It was a story that served her well in some towns, the ones less scarred and thus less suspicious. “She’ll be ten in July.”

“Solon Dragon-Chaser’s daughter?” Leo grinned. “Yes!”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/852516.html. You can comment here or there.

Doomsday – Picking

Nov20

OKay, so far I have five intros:

The Birds, the Birds
Chaos & Madness
I’ll Take This One
Pick a Card
Leaving Home

Still taking character trait prompts Here.

I also have Sianna, Sweetbriar, and Austin the Samurai Catboy. (Sianna’s intro here).

2 and three might be the same character, in which case I still need one more. 4 is a boy, and also the trickster good with magic. 5 is probably dark-skinned and either blonde or blue-eyed.

I have these suggestions still:

Someone who was raised thinking Faeries Are Bad. – that is not 5 but could be 1-4
a purebred Mara Change. (those 2 @inventrix) (that could be almost any of them – later)
kid with some kind of special needs? Physcial handicap? (@dahob)

I need to put them all together.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/851990.html. You can comment here or there.

Doomsday Intro – The Birds, The Birds

Nov20

Nano project #5 is the first novella in a series of 8, following 8 students through their 8 years at Doomsday Academy.

That means, of course, I need to figure out 8 students. Three I had pregenerated: The Catboy Samurai and his best friends Sianna the dancer and Sweetbriar the prickly. The other five…

Here’s a little something about one.

I’m about to the point where I have to start deciding if these are 5 different characters or bits from the same people. Also, I could use more: http://aldersprig.livejournal.com/977386.html on LJ or http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/849230.html on DW.

The birds were following you.

The birds had always been following you, as long as you could remember.

But you were leaving home, now. You were leaving everything you’d ever known, and the birds – the birds were still following.

The loud ones were yelling at you, which wasn’t the most fun in the world, but it was worse because you were on a wagon with other people, all of them heading towards Boom Town, Cynopolis, and they were starting to look at you funny.

A sparrow landed on your shoulder. “Oh,” the nice lady next to you exclaimed, “he must be hungry.”

You didn’t have the heart to point out that the dull coloration meant that the little bird was a girl. “Just lonely,” you said instead. “There aren’t that many sparrows around here.”

From the look on her face, it may not have been the safer answer.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/851712.html. You can comment here or there.

Story Idea

Nov20

Okay, so this is what came to me in the shower this morning:

A technomancer Addergoole grad in school for/just graduated from college for rocket science is faced with the apoc.

Using her college roommate’s concept drawings for an FTL ship and substituting magic where human tech isn’t there yet, and pulling in the skills of a diverse team of misfits, she puts together an escape ship to bring a smallish population (1000 or so) away from the mess that is Earth.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/851490.html. You can comment here or there.

About Cy’Doomsday, another piece of Luke at Doomsday (@inventrix, @kissofjudas)

Nov19

after but without smooth transition from A fragment of Luke at Doomsday; another thought that was on my mind.

Luke noticed his tour guide was looking at him strangely. “What?” He stretched out his wings.

She cleared her throat thoughtfully. “I’m cy’Doomsday, sir, you know that.”

“I know that.” It finally sank in. “Why is a succubus under Cynara Doomsday?”

She laughed at him, a cheerful guffaw as if he’d just made the best joke. “What, should she only have minks who find things? Should Professor Inazuma only have antlered people who throw lightning? At least we’d have a chance of filling out a cy’ree with that qualification.” She shook her head, still grinning. “I’ve never understood that idea. We pick our Mentors by common interests.”

Luke coughed and forced his wings closed. “Succubus powers…”

“I’m sorry, sir, but it’s a power, like strength, or setting things on fire, or making trees grow.” She shrugged, managing to actually look apologetic.

Luke decided it was time to change the subject. “You were saying… you’re cy’Doomsday?”

“Do you know what our motto is, sir… no, I’m sorry. Of course you don’t.”

Luke hadn’t known cy’rees to have mottos, at least, not official ones. “No.”

“It’s ‘be prepared.'”

“Of course.” He meant it dryly. She smiled and dimpled at him.

“Exactly. And so, sir. When I knew you were visiting, and I was going to be your tour guide… I prepared.”

She paused; it reminded Luke of Mike just before dropping a bombshell. “You do know, sir, that your wife’s parent is a professor at this school… right?”

Next: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/867593.html

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/851434.html. You can comment here or there.

Doomsday Intro: Chaos and Madness (@lilfluff)

Nov19

Nano project #5 is the first novella in a series of 8, following 8 students through their 8 years at Doomsday Academy.

That means, of course, I need to figure out 8 students. Three I had pregenerated: The Catboy Samurai and his best friends Sianna the dancer and Sweetbriar the prickly. The other five…

Well, here’s a little something about one.

The school was big. It wasn’t big-big, not like the ruined city you’d seen once, but it was still big, and it was inside a city, a not-ruined city with walls and houses and animals.

And it was busy, everyone going here and there and everyone talking to everyone else. There didn’t seem to be any order. There didn’t seem to be anyone in charge.

There were people in collars, sure. Everywhere had people in collars. But you saw one of those people in collars telling someone not collared what to do – and the not-collared person went and did it!

You found a quiet place where you wouldn’t be in anyone’s way, a little platform up in a tree. It didn’t look like anyone had been using it recently, so you probably weren’t breaking any rules.

From here, you could watch the students and teachers – you assumed they were students and teachers, but it wasn’t like any school you’d ever seen – the strangers and the slaves, and try to figure out where everyone fit in.

It didn’t seem like anyone did, that was the thing. And, more than that, there didn’t seem to be any place for you to fit in.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/851113.html. You can comment here or there.

First and Last Words: Yesterday #nanowrimo

Nov19

First words: Marie steadied the lemonade pitcher with her free hand and ducked her head down, hiding her expression. (I know you were all wondering what happened to that lemonade!)

Last words: “Well, you did say I was supposed to be your assistant. I imagined that would require, mmm, a certain level of assisting you.”

I think I’m going to put aside the Despot of Santa Roux now. It’s at 13,608 now and it’s all over the place.

Time to move on to Slip Contact!

Total words: 36,798

I met [personal profile] clare_dragonfly last night!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/850752.html. You can comment here or there.

Similar Features, with longer hair (My favorite quote, also: Luke at Doomsday @inventrix)

Nov18

This isn’t in line with the other Luke/Doomsday stuff, coming, probably, after all that, but it was poking at my brain.

“I’m noticing,” Luke looked around the lunch hall, “a lot of familiar features.”

Cynara grinned back at him, clearly reading at least the subtext he’d meant and maybe some other text as well. “Of course. Where did you think I was getting my students?”

“I…” He coughed. “Well, you’re well known.” He hadn’t done enough research by half, had he?

“‘Oh, they’re Boom, good people to trust with your kids’ educations?'” She chuckled. “We’re on three generations now, Luke, of people having kids after school so they had children they didn’t have to give to Addergoole.”

“It’s not like we hold on to our students forever.”

She raised her eyebrows at him. He flapped his wings back at her.

She changed the subject without conceding or pressing her point. “The one you were looking at? The horned blonde? Not a Boom kid – nor Forest Manor, or any of our other close family.” She smirked. “I assume you’d know if they were yours.”

Luke coughed. “Aelfgar had a lot of children.”

“Yes, he did. And a lot of them went to Addergoole.” She flicked her fingers in the direction of the teenager. “That one’s grandmother had three more kids after school.”

She saw it sink in, Luke assumed, because she smirked at him in a manner far too much like her former Mentor.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/850574.html. You can comment here or there.

First and Last Words: Yesterday #nanowrimo

Nov18

First Line of Yesterday: She leaned back from his hand. Nobody had told her she had to obey him; then again, after a couple slaps from the slave factor’s crop, nobody had needed to tell her she was supposed to obey anyone. It was rather self-evident.

Technically, I’ve already posted the last line of last night; it was part of Pick a Card, one of the previews for Doomsday.

But the last line of The Despot of Santa Roux Finds Love is: They were, too. Marie steadied the lemonade…

A grand total of 35,456 words written, 2,482 yesterday. This keeps me at my one-day-ahead-of-par, which makes me happy.

58% done with my 60K word goal!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/850408.html. You can comment here or there.

Doomsday Intro: I’ll Take This One

Nov18

This one’s a bit darker than the otherones. Probably because I came up with it myself. <.<)

“I’ll take that one.”

The red-haired woman strode into the shop where you were working and pointed right at you.

The foreman coughed, stuttered, and, rather than throwing her out, ran and got the boss.

You weren’t stupid. You kept working. This could be a test.

The woman stood there, not watching you, but watching the place. Her nostrils flared and she rolled her weight back onto her heels. You glanced at the exit, at the other workers in the shop, and back at the exit. If she decided to bring this place down on your heads, you thought you might be able to get out, but the littler kids on the other side would have trouble.

Maybe it wouldn’t come to that this time; this angry visitor could be different than the last one. Maybe the foreman had learned.

The boss hurried in. “Ah. I hear-“

“I want to buy this slave from you.” She was pointing at you again. Why did she keep pointing at you?”

The boss coughed. “Ah. We don’t sell the children-“

“-away from their mothers, of course you don’t, that would be wrong. I’ll buy the mother and any other children, too.”

You flinched. Your mother was one of the boss’s favorites right now. Would he…?

Of course he would. “Of course. She’s right over here.”

Brittanny had the same coloration as you, at least if you squinted. But she was not your mom, and her kid looked nothing like you.

The redheaded woman frowned. “No. No, and you wouldn’t be trying to separate a mother from her children, now would you?” Something about her posture suggested violence, although she had no visible weapons. You considered hiding under your workstation. You weren’t stupid, though. This could be a test. You kept working.

The boss took a moment to consider whether or not he was stupid. Or, at least, that’s what it looked like to you. “No. Of course not. One moment.”

It took many moments, during which you worked and the woman glared at the place as it if had personally offended her. You didn’t bother wondering why she wanted you. It still could be some sort of test.

It was only when they had finished bickering over the price, only when she had said the words to your mother, your sister, and you, only when you were in her wagon and on the road, that you thought this might be real.

Whoops, note. “said the words.” The kid doesn’t really know quite what’s going on there, but that’s the transference of Belonging of zir mother to the redheaded lady.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/850110.html. You can comment here or there.