#emeraldmew is writing tonight

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Last Line Tag

Thank you for the tag @blind-the-winds

The last bit I wrote today:

“You guys are really planning to poke around this planet? You’re going to get lost. For nothing. This planet makes Earth look advanced. They haven’t even put so much as a rock into orbit.” I turned to Kevor. “Oh? I thought you said you didn’t know much about this planet because you’d only been to the station.”

Tagging: @andrewbelindo, @autumnalwalker, @drippingmoon, @athensoddcollections, @written-in-starlight, and anyone else who'd like to participate

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Heads Up, 7 Up Tag

Thanks for the tag, @blind-the-winds!

Looks like the last thing I wrote (the opening of a chapter!) was seven sentences exactly.

Alma was right about me and I hated it. I might have had all the adults on Earth fooled into thinking I was the responsible one but in truth I was a flake. Even I had to admit I felt relief when she turned down the offer. Back when Mahroa’s ship crashed I just froze even though I’d been the first to run to check it out. It wasn’t until Rebecca went aboard that I regained the will to move. I’d told Rebecca I trusted her and instead I [end of book 1 spoilers redacted]. I didn’t even have the nerve to begin to help [redacted].

Tagging (if you want): @thestorywitch, @that-chibi-writer, @copper-dragon-in-disguise, @akindofmagictoo, @dumbthunder, @andrewbelindo, and @bluefox4

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Oops. Adding another scene means I have to now name another minor antagonist.

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There. Got through the chase scene I've been stalling on writing or the last week or so.

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I’m finally almost to the end of this accursed fight scene!

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When you finally make progress on the action scene you’ve been procrastinating on but then you realize you have to sleep in order to drive to work in the morning...

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*changes minor antagonist’s name for the fifth time*

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Back to working on Shardkeeper. I’m definitely in territory that’s going to be different in this draft, so the scene here is going to involve a technological replacement for the ladybug plan that’s no longer viable since I changed some worldbuilding rules after draft one.

I also cut out an extraneous character. Those things combined mean I will have to rewrite this next scene from scratch. It’s an action scene, too.

Wish me luck.

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so I named this blog for Shardkeeper as a way to make myself focus on one WIP at a time

Now Shardkeeper's competing for my attention span with three or four other ideas.

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Anxiety brain is under control today at least (honestly, I think the heat actually did have something to do with it somehow or other). Might delete the other post.

But this does tie into Shardkeeper, I swear. While none of the cast are direct self-inserts, I have given Rebecca a big ole dose of my anxiety (as in, anxiety largely as I experience it, it's not meant to be representative of how everyone feels it, etc. so your millage may vary from the character as I write her).

Partly it's to have a character with anxiety for readers to see as a protagonist. Partly because I know dealing with anxiety is partly about pushing myself to do things scared and, well, maybe pushing my character into much scarier situations than I'd experience in real life can help me be braver too.

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Here

Here

A short horror story. 595 words.

Warnings for death, blood.

An event of sorts happens here every day. Each day someone dies.

People come here anyway.

You come here too, of course. It isn’t like you have to be here. No one’s holding a gun to your head and forcing you. You’re not a prisoner. It’s just more convenient to be here than not. You have things you need to do here.

You’ve never actually seen it happen yourself. You’ve heard stories like everyone has. Your friend’s cousin knew someone who witnessed it happen. An uncle you’ve never met in person said he lost a friend one day. You know it could be you as easily as it could be anyone. Still, you don’t let it bother you most days.

You’d almost allow yourself to believe it doesn’t really happen, but you’ve seen the news. Each day the chosen person’s face is on the screen and their life story sobbed about by the people who knew them. You remember watching the news in a sort of half-calm panic on days when you hadn’t seen a friend for hours, hoping to see whether it was one of them. It never has been. Your own friends come back to you in a day or two explaining they’d been busy or had had a cold. They didn’t mean to worry you.

After a while you stop paying attention to that section of the daily news. It’s just depressing after a while and you have other things on your mind.

No one is entirely sure why the event happens. They all have their guesses but in the end it doesn’t really matter. It happens. It happens at different times of day and different locations around here. It’s always just one person. Some unlucky soul is selected and they die. There is no criteria for who. It’s sad. It’s shocking to their loved ones. But life has to go on, and so people continue to come here day after day.

You wonder what prompted you to think of it today of all days. You feel a chill as you consider the old superstitions that thinking about it draws your number. Or is it that when its your turn something in you senses it and conjures it to mind? You try not to let yourself be bothered by wives’ tales. It was just a passing thought. You’ve thought about it before when you’ve come here and you’re still breathing. Statistically, you’ll be fine.

You shrug off the thought and continue through your routine.

Until you hear it. It’s louder than you ever imagined a scream could be and you find yourself breaking into sweat when you hear it. You track movement with your eyes. People are running. You always used to wonder why the people around the victim ran. It only ever selected the one person. But hearing the scream you begin to understand.

You aren’t close enough to see well, but you see enough. The figure writhes, suspended in the air by their own shadow made solid. Fear and pain shriek through the empty air as the life drains out, too fast to stop, to slow to ignore.

You cannot look away.

The corpse falls to the ground with a wet, solid thud. Blood pools around the body. You notice your mouth has gone dry and your hands are clammy.

You breathe again. It wasn’t your turn. You can continue your day. You’re not sure you can today, though. Not after that sound. You have to get away for now. Get some fresh air.

You’ll come back here again tomorrow.

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Shardkeeper (Intro)

Hello! I’m making a sideblog for my sci-fi adventure WIP Shardkeeper!

Earth is just entering the interstellar stage after a failed alien invasion and now must deal with the fact that not only are aliens real, they can visit the planet once thought to be so alone.

Still, life goes on. People adjust to strange new realities. Humans have always been adaptable. Rebecca Tarver has grown up in a world where this is the norm. She’s a shy kid dealing with normal issues like “figuring out how to talk to people without seeming too weird.”

But then Rebecca bonds with a strange creature: a fragment of a dangerous alien. She wants nothing more than to send this Shard on their way and get back to her normal life. Unfortunately, Shard is being hunted. As Rebecca learns more about the various groups seeking her new companion, she discovers that “getting back to normal” might well be impossible.

Themes/vibes: adaptation (and resistance) to change, the interplay between characters’ “mundane” trauma and sci-fi nonsense, growing up and self-discovery, the aforementioned sci-fi nonsense (aliens, wormholes, spaceships, all that fun stuff).

Other WIPs: Cursebreaker, unnamed Vampire story (details to come)

main blog is @emeraldmew

[emeraldmew]

Heads Up, Seven Up Writing Tag

Thanks for the tag, @bayalexison!

If I understand correctly, I’m supposed to share the last seven lines I wrote for this game? Or is it last seven sentences? Oh, well, I’ll just post these:

“You mean Shard jumping me from roof to roof like a ninja?” I asked. “If Shard’s an All-spawn, then I guess that’s what you would think. But I’m the one in charge right now and I don’t know how to do any of this.”

“What do you mean you’re the one in charge?” the antphibian asked slowly. “That’s not how All-spawn work.”

“I think you knocked Shard out when you grabbed me because I haven’t felt anything but a low hum from them since I woke up. I think they’re still unconscious.” It was probably a mistake, letting them know I didn’t have their “All-spawn” to back me up. Would it be better to bluff? Too late for that.

The antphibian continued to stare as the ship shook beneath us.

“Look, if I could do what Shard does, I’d be out of this rope by now,” I said. I took a deep breath and asked, “Who are you?”

“Tol-Ekve – wait. No, I’m not telling you my name. Just what do you think this is? A meet and greet?”

“Honestly, it looks more like a kidnapping to me,” I said, surprised by the venom in my own tone. The room jerked again.

Rebecca’s finally getting to meet Ekver in draft 2! It’s... going well, I think.

[emeraldmew]

honestly one of the reasons Animorphs is an inspiration for Shardkeeper is because the justified paranoia of Animorphs is really a great way to explore feeling about modern levels of surveillance.

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Thirty Days, Thirty Lines Day 1:

Well I did actually manage to write today, so here we go under the cut! (From Draft 2 of Shardkeeper).

“All right. I think we need a plan,” said Paige. “Regardless of who’s after Shard, we know we don’t need it camping out in Rebecca. And anyway, if those guys are still poking around at our troop it’s only a matter of time before they get some sort of lead. So what we need is a new body for Shard. Once it’s out of our hair, it can figure out its own plans.”

“We were thinking of a shell,” said Shard. They lifted my right arm to gesture to Alma. “Like yours.” Alma recoiled.

“I’m using mine, thanks.”

“I’m sure Reb – Shard was just using yours as an example,” said Paige. “We were kind of hoping you’d know how we might find a spare?”

Alma sighed. Once again I thought about how her shell didn’t actually breathe.

“Do you two need me for everything?”

[emeraldmew]

the struggle