Escape From Rochester (Camp Nano July’14 project) Character Profile 4

May16

This is the fourth in a series of character profiles for my upcoming July Camp Nano Project.

The story follows a group’s flight from Rochester and the challenges they meet along the road to someplace safe, although, in the midst of the apocalypse, where “safe” may be might be the hardest question.

There would have been easier career choices, but Jordan (Taylor) has been into computers since her first-grade class was introduced to them.

She could have gotten into M.I.T. – she did get into M.I.T., as well as R.P.I. – but R.I.T. was a lot closer to home (her family lives in Greece, a suburb of Rochester), and with her maternal grandparents aging, she felt it important to stay near her family.

Near, but not with. She lived in the dorms for the first two years, and then moved to the apartments with a handful of newfound friends, two from her major and one from an elective, Anelle.

She didn’t really mind Anelle’s parties, since she helpfully kept them to non-study weekends, but the people that showed up were a stranger mix than she was used to. It meant that she found herself drinking with a guy who claimed he was really an elf, and playing Strip Jenga with a girl who pretended to be a vampire on the weekends, discussing philosophy with neo-nords… and kissing two lesbians under a full moon.

It was the lesbians that really did it, but it was Anelle’s fault that Jordan ended up visiting Raven’s little drinking parties in the swamp, and it was Anelle’s fault that she tried one – and only one – D&D game.

Sometimes all it takes is one game.

Jordan is tall, 5’8″, and built round in the chest and the butt, slender most other places. She wears her hair short and natural, but platinum blonde, liking the way it contrasts against her dark, near-ebony skin.

Her eyes are grey and slightly canted at the sides, her lips are full and her nose is long and aristocratic.

She has a fascination with the physics of time (as well as the psychology of such) and takes as many electives on the subject as she can.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/715357.html. You can comment here or there.

But Why, a vignette

May16

This takes place sometime during the “sign-up” phase of the Addergoole project – ~mid-to-late 1970’s. It was written in response to [personal profile] clare_dragonfly‘s comments here and here

Addergoole has a landing page here

There were very few pure-bloods in Regine’s Addergoole Project. She had very little interest in finding out what happened when you bred two pure bloods, for one – they had been finding that out, over and over again, since the gods first arrived. She wanted to know what you could get from paired half-breeds.

For another, she knew that the pure bloods would eventually become distressed, when they learned of her project. It had not been all that long that half-breeds were in any way considered part of Shenera Endraae, and to go about deliberately making hundreds more half-breeds – all with the aim of educating and arming them – she had not needed Michael and Luca to tell her that somebody would be angry when they found out.

She had, however, not entirely anticipated the screaming, shouting rage or a Mara and a Daeva struggling through her wards and forcing their way to her office.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” The shout was loud enough to rattle the windows.

“Come out here and talk to us or we’ll burn this forsaken place to the ground!”

Regine pushed three buttons on her wall – not that she believed anyone would need a call to inform them they had guests – and stepped out onto her porch. “How can I help you?”

The Mara was the woman, a tall, angry Mara – if that was not redundant – with her blue wings spread wide. “My son told me about your little ‘project.’ What exactly do you think you’re doing?”

Regine thought back along the list of names she had seen. Blue wings, probably, or something like it, and the Daeva had horns that resembled an antelope’s. “Silvestre.” He’s been one of the ones who’d turned down her offer. “A handsome man, and very bright.”

“And a half-breed.“

“And wouldn’t you be interested in knowing why?” Regine had been given more than a little opportunity to practice this speech. She watched the steam bleed off of the woman’s anger.

“…what?”

“Your son was born half-breed, when you two are clearly full-bloods. Wouldn’t you like to know why?”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/715132.html. You can comment here or there.

A Deletion (@korionfray)

May16

So, the writer in my attic, K Orion Fray, sends out a weekly writing inspiration e-mail, which includes a writing prompt.

A prompt from many weeks ago:

Last time, we introduced a secondary element into our story. So you should have two characters, or a character and a setting (or some other organization of elements). Now take something away: a memory, a loved one, anything.

This story comes after
A Scene Description and
A Place Description

The Mayflower scene had been horrible on the projection scene. In real life, it was nauseating.

The glass eye in the front of the building should not exist; the pac-man style bite out of the back of it was physically impossible.

The impossibility, of course, stopped neither those nor any of the other horrors from existing – the stench of flesh already rotting, the more terrifying smell of cooking meat. Kara put a handkerchief up over her nose and breathed in deeply, once, twice, three times.

“I used to live here.” It wasn’t the first time Ket Vasquez had said that. It wasn’t even the first time since they’d arrived on scene, and they’d barely been there long enough to pull out the equipment. “Right up there.” His hand pointed, shaky.

Kara did what she was supposed to. She shouldered the piece of equipment that most closely resembled an expensive camera, attached the item that mostly looked like a telephoto lens, and plugged in the attachment that looked mostly like a USB drive. She pulled out the small, flat, shiny piece that could be mistaken for a smart phone, and tucked it where the lens would show, out of her jacket pocket. And she began taking… “pictures.”

Her movements seemed to fascinate Ket. He stared at her hands as she shifted the pieces around, finally falling silent. “Is that…”

“It’s the ‘C.A.M.E.R.A.'” She didn’t so much cut him of as preempt any suggestion of a question. “Could you hold up the ‘light meter?’ please?”

“I… the.” She could hear his swallow, although he wasn’t that close to her. “Kira, do you…”

“I need the light meter, Ket.” Where was Sergeant Allise? Kira wasn’t paid enough to deal with… “Ket! Tentacle under the sewers, Ket, what are you doing?”

What he was doing was running into the building. Kira bit her lip and took ‘pictures,’ her finger moving as fast on the shutter release as the button would push.

She saw him move in flashes of otherworldly-octarine-on-black: Running towards the door. Stepping inside the door, itself a portal of acid blue and blood dripping-red. His colors shifting from green to yellow to purple as he hit the few stairs that still worked.

She saw the moment his colors vanished: a tentacle of shadow ripped out of the seared edges of the hole and wrapped around Ket’s shining beacon of violet. The shadows squeezed, and then he was gone.

She kept taking ‘pictures’ until the screaming stopped.

A Scene Description and
A Place Description
A Deletion
A Conversation

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Five Recent Happy Things

May16

* Tulips. I have tulips all over the front of my house and I love them. Warm fuzzies every time I look at them.

* Darling husband helped me wake up in nice ways yesterday.

* We bought a couch! Well, it will be here in 3 weeks but WE GOT IT!
– (The pillow fabric name is “wild rose wineberry,” which makes me giggle more than the fabric itself, which looks more like chive flowers)

* Mint, mint mint mint mint (plants make me very happy)

* I jogged with Rion the other day! That was new, and oddly fun. Also, hanging out with Rion, which is fun in and of itself.

* Kitty! Kitties. Merit makes me very happy. They all make me happy, but Merit is an adorable spring wrapped in sleek black fur.

* Happyfun RP

* And I have a new project, and that always pleases me.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/714544.html. You can comment here or there.

The Destruction of the Gods, a story-bit of the FaeApoc

May15

This is a continuation of a piece chosen by random-date-choice.

It follows Mourning Lost Gods.

February, 2012

We thought the fights had died down.

There were twelve of us, now, refugees every one of us from a world that simply did not exist anymore. We had found a building near the river that still had walls, still had a roof, still had doors that shut and locked, and we had turned it into what we could of a home.

There hadn’t been any GodFights in weeks, not since the last major brawl, but it was February in the Mid-West; maybe even those that would call themselves gods didn’t want to be out in the cold.

From what we could gather – from the radio, from the one tv station that still came through, from the refugees that came and stayed, or came and left – it was the same everywhere. The fights had died down.

They said someone had nuked a god; someone else said they had nuked the doorways. We didn’t care, not as much as we should have. I know I, at least, felt like all my caring had been seared off like burned nerve endings, somewhere in the collapse of everything I’d ever known.

We were like trauma victims, like refugees, like unwilling colonists starting over in the ruins of a civilization. If we thought about the gods at all, we thought to be glad that they had stopped, be glad that, maybe, this building might stand, be glad that we could breathe, and be warm, and move on.

We had found a way to make a proper chimney, and we had pulled together a wood-burning stove. We had found food – you don’t want to know some of what we ate, but there was enough that what we were eating wasn’t each other – and we were beginning to find community.

And then a half-dead god limped into our little haven, muttering words of magic and bleeding on our doorstep.

next: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/768781.html

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/714468.html. You can comment here or there.

The Collar Job, Part XIII

May14

Part I (and on LJ), Part II (and on LJ), Part III (and on LJ), Part IV (and on LJ), Part V (and on LJ), Part VI (and on LJ), Part VII (and on LJ), Part VIII (and on LJ), Part IX (and on LJ), Part X (and on LJ), Part XI (and on LJ), Deleted Scene (and on LJ)
Part XII (and on LJ)

This is … *cough* Tír na Cali/Leverage fanfiction crossover.

It’s been over a month since I wrote on this, but now it’s back!!

Fade in from commercial. Eliot and the lady Anastasia are naked in bed; Eliot is in the process of untying himself and Ana appears to be asleep.

It doesn’t take long, longer than it would normally because he’s trying not to wake her. She stirs at one point; he freezes. She moans quietly and rolls over, and Eliot waits, counting silently but his lips moving, for a count of twenty.

When she makes no more noise, he finishes getting his last ankle and then, moving very slowly and a bit unevenly, he hurries to the bathroom.

Ana’s eyes open as the bathroom door shuts. She stays where she is, as if she hasn’t woken. When the bathroom door opens again, she closes her eyes and stirs, just a bit.

Eliot pauses at the door. He looks at the “sleeping” Lady, and then at the exit. His hand goes to the collar, just brushing it. His sigh is a full-body thing, frustrated and sad.

He lays back in bed as carefully as he got out of it, and begins tying his ankles as they had been.

“Don’t bother.”

Ana’s voice freezes Eliot. “How long have you been awake?”

“Woke up while you were in the bathroom. You could’ve gotten out of the ropes at any point?”

“Well, not during…” He lays down, carefully, next to her, not quite touching her. “Not when you were watching.”

“Not a very good restraint system then, is it?” She rolls over to look at him; if he was looking at her, he’d see that she was smiling.

His eyes are closed, though, and his body tense. “You could use steel.”

“I could. But you came back. Why?”

He touches the collar, carefully, as if afraid it will bite him. “There’s a tracker in here, and I don’t know how to get the thing off without killing myself.”

“A good reason,” she agrees, although her voice is rather flat. “Well, then. If you’re not going to run away – or kill me – and I’m not going to tie you up, we might as well do something entertaining.”

Now, Eliot turns to look at her. “Like what?”

Duchess Charlotte Prentiss’s rooms

“It’s going to take us a few days. This Barony – Baronessy? – they’re not exactly known for being friendly. Not surprising, with the way they’re dropping like flies. I’m working on building everything we need, but it’s not like we can slip in as slaves. They do everything in-house.” Hardison runs a hand over his short-cropped hair. “Still working, Nate.”

“Anything I can help with?” Lord Lorcan walks into the room, all five foot six and one hundred three exquisitely-dressed pounds of him. “It seems like you’re having some trouble with the Alpha Sisters.”

Cut to commercial.

XiV

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/714105.html. You can comment here or there.

“12 days of writing: a subplot” – a writing exercise in Escape from Rochester setting

May13

This is written from an exercise from Writer’s Greenhouse: Why did the protagonist fake those maps?

It is, I believe, a piece of background for Escape from Rochester.

It shouldn’t have been all that important. It was a school project. A project in Civil Engineering; this wasn’t exactly the stuff adventure novels were made of.

But there was something about the way Mr. Cecchini had asked that made Amber nervous. And the more she found in the old records, the more she wanted to hide what she’d found.

Mr. Cecchini wasn’t a proper professor anyway; he was an adjunct, and nobody was quite sure what had happened to Dr. Estrada. That was more than a little problematic for Amber, since Dr. Estrada was her adviser, and Mr. Cecchini seemed to be more than a bit distracted and not very good at the whole advising thing.

Amber thought it was probably the kids. His office was covered in pictures of kids and, while some of them seemed kind of unlikely, genetically, to be his, there was something to be said for adoption, after all. And when he looked at the pictures, he smiled. So, probably his, one way or another, even if there was no mother – or second father – pictured anywhere.

“So, for your project, you’re studying the layout of the entire University,” he said, every time she sat down. “With an eye to, to…”

And, every time, she would remind him, “to both see how it could be improved now, and how I would do differently if I were rebuilding from scratch.”

“And the sources you’re using are…”

And so on, every time. At first, Amber thought he was just a bit scattered, but as he began to pore over her notes, as he began to demand copies of her primary sources, she began to think something was up.

It didn’t seem like a good idea, faking documents for her final project, but, on the other hand, the rooms that she’d found on the oldest maps were kind of terrifying, and the underground roadways were even more so. There was swamp over there, and a river. Why was there a road there?

Was that what Mr. Cecchini was looking for?

And, if so, why?

Amber laid out the maps on her drafting board and, very carefully, began creating edited copies. Nobody needed to know about that road.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/713980.html. You can comment here or there.

Escape From Rochester (Camp Nano July’14 project) Character Profile 3

May13

This is the third in a series of character profiles for my upcoming July Camp Nano Project.

The story follows a group of friends and acquaintances as the faerie apocalypse destroys Rochester, NY – their flight from Rochester and the challenges they meet along the road to someplace safe.

It isn’t like Jennifer Walker likes fights. They just seem to happen around her.

Of course, sometimes she started them on purpose – or sort of suggested that they start and let things take their course. But, like the time where her nose got broken, sometimes she just said something and then all of a sudden there was punching.

Puns can be made about volatile tempers and Chemical Engineering majors.

Jennifer isn’t the sort to end up hanging out with gamers, not really – her hobbies include cooking, casual sports, and poker – but she ended up in a three-way fight with two frat boys on the quarter mile one night, and it was Rob and Lewis on the way to one of Raven’s parties who caught her, helped her staunch the bleeding, and got her out of the scene before Campus Safety came. Since the frat party was clearly a no-go, she ended up drinking with Raven’s friends in the swamp.

Jennifer is cute, though she’d be a lot cuter without the perma-broken nose. She’s got a round and curvy build that she covers with some level of fashion skill, blonde hair in improbable curls to her hips, green eyes, and skin a nice deep honey-brown; she’s been called California Barbie a time or two, although, at a mid-range 5’6″, she doesn’t really have the legs for Barbie.

There is a tiny bit of fae way back in her bloodline, somewhere. She has an uncanny knack for finding clean fluids and people have stopped trying to drug her drinks at parties. It’s what ended up first interesting her in chemistry, back in Jr. High.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/713554.html. You can comment here or there.

Lastborn, a very short story

May12

I asked for prompts to the theme of genesis. This is [personal profile] kelkyag‘s result.

Oshana liked children, or, as her family joked, she liked babies and the having of them. Mostly her oldest two – Jesh and Cory – handled the actual child-rearing parts, with aid from the next two down and so on.

She was one of those women who had a new baby every year, one of those mothers who liked to preside over her ranch of children. By the time Jesh and Cory were old enough to understand that their mother was unusual, they were still young enough to assume that she would go on with a baby a year forever.

When the war came, Oshana was, of course, pregnant. The birth was hard, hiding in a back room while the soldiers prowled the hospital. The child that was born was small, too soon, and very weak.

“Adam,” Oshana whispered. She passed the boy to Jesh. “The lastborn. The genesis.”

It would take them quite some time to understand what she meant.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/713082.html. You can comment here or there.

Filthy, a story(beginning)

May12

I asked for fun Addergoole-related prompts here; this riffed off of [personal profile] wyld_dandelyon‘s prompt.

Year 19 of the Addergoole School

“Look at you, you’re filthy.”

Antonia flinched. She was filthy; she hadn’t had a shower since the gods attacked, unless you counted rainstorms, and hadn’t had a bath in over a year, unless you counted dipping in creeks.

Her clothes were so grimy they stood on their own, but they had held up against weather and road damage, enough that she thought the dirt might be a layer of protection all on its own. Her hair, she’d finally chopped short as the summer came – with a knife, because that’s what she’d had.

They had run when the gods attacked her hometown, ten of them on a school trip. There had only been three when the terrifying winged man had found her; she didn’t know what he’d done with Mella or Steve, and she was scared to ask.

He’d dropped her here, in the halls of what appeared to be the plushest underground bunker ever, and taken off with barely a word. She’d been fighting him the whole time, but now, sitting here with her duffle bag and nothing else, she didn’t have anything to fight.

“You’ve been out in it this whole time, haven’t you?”

She peeked up. That was still the same voice. “Out in… the war?” she offered. “Yeah. I mean, not in the combat. But out there. You haven’t?”

He was clean. Clean the way she hadn’t seen anyone since the gods attacked; his hair fell in perfect red-orange curls around his ears, his skin looked brown, not because of sunburn or dirt, but just because it was his skin tone, and his pants even looked pressed.

Some small part of her mind thought he was also rather handsome, but she ignored that part; she was checking for weapons.

He could be carrying something in the pocket of the khakis, or under the madras-plaid shirt, but his hands were open and empty in front of him.

“I got lucky.” He shrugged, as if to apologize. “I was in a safe place when it hit, and then it wasn’t long before I was supposed to come here. So I never got the worst of it – but over half the students who actually make it here come in looking like you or worse. I’m Raleigh, by the way.”

“Tony… Antonia.” She held out a hand, and then looked at it. “Sorry, I’m filthy.”

“I noticed. Look, come with me. I’m gonna get you a bath, a nice warm meal, and some clean clothes, okay?”

It’s a trap. Her skin itched, reminding her how long it had been since rain, even. “I’ll take it.”

He grabbed the hand she’d offered and pulled her to her feet. “Awesome. My room’s this way.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/712762.html. You can comment here or there.