Hiding

The air caught in Moriah's throat as she saw the bear appear in the moonlight glow. She had been joking with her friends earlier in the night about bears, and how if any came she would defend the rest of the girls from it - she was the tomboy of the group, having grown up taking martial arts lessons and having a very conservative father teach her how to shoot guns. But now that she was actually looking at one, and it was looking back at her, the terror was shooting through her system like wildfire. There was no way she could take on a bear. She would be lucky if she could get away from it. Hell, she would have been better off in its presence if she were still sleeping in her tent - then at least she wouldn't be viewed as a threat.

But now that she had been seen, what was she supposed to do? She was frozen in place, but the bear did not have such a fear. It was already beginning to stalk toward her, and no matter how innocent its intentions may have been, she couldn't help but imagine it tearing her apart. She hoped desperately that she wasn't in between a mama bear and her cub. She would be doomed if that was the case.

In the back of her mind, she could hear her father telling her that in this kind of situation, the best thing that she could do was to pretend to be dead. Just lay down, close your eyes, and don't move. But the bear had already seen her up and moving. Would that really work? If she bolted, the bear would likely be scared by the abrupt movement and chase her down, and there was no way in hell that she was going to be able to out run a bear. She couldn't out climb it, either. She couldn't out anything it. It was a bear.

Slowly she laid down on the ground and closed her eyes, doing her best to be still and not curl up into a ball. She needed to be prone. It made her more vulnerable, and in that way, made her appear more dead. If the bear for some reason decided it wanted to claw her or bite her to check if she was actually still alive... There really wasn't anything that she could do about it.

She could feel and hear the bear getting closer to her, and when she thought it was close enough, she held her breath. If she was breathing, it might give her away. She could feel the bear leaning over her and sniffing her up and down, moving agonizingly slowly. The longer it sniffed at her, the more she could feel her lungs straining to hold onto the air it was so tentatively holding. If the bear didn't decide to move on soon...

Just when she didn't think she could her breath anymore, she heard the bear start to make its way away from her. It gave her the strength to hold on just a few seconds longer, to make some space between them, before she gasped and felt the life returning to her body. She sat up as she breathed in and out hard, thankful that she was still alive, and watched the bear move away.

And right towards their campsite.

Storming

The boat rocked as the waters began to turn and break around them. The crew had felt the oncoming storm some hours earlier, as unkind winds began to blow and the air grew heavy, and had prepared well in advance for it. They had tied down crates full of supplies both above and below deck, and only a skeleton crew remained above in order to man the ship. Each was strapped with a rope and hook to be attached to the main mast should the storm break too heavily, ensuring that they would not be tossed into the unforgiving waters - though, should worse come to worst, they also had a knife on their person to slash through that very rope.

They were slow building things, sea storms, but you were so far away from any sort of land that there was nothing you could do but prepare and hope for the best once you saw them coming. It took a skilled crew to survive a storm, but even the most skilled could only do so much if the waves became too tall and powerful. They rarely counted on it happening, but they were always ready for the possibility - better safe than sorry when there were no second chances.

But as this particular storm came in, and the skies grew dark, it quickly became apparent that this would be a bad one. The boat went from rocking to nearly tipping from side to side, and the ropes that had been used to tie down all of the supplies strained with the effort. The clouds were swirling directly over head, and the wind blew hard in every direction around them. The skeleton crew was quick to respond, hooking themselves to the mast and tightening every knot they could get their hands on. Frigid rain slammed against them like stones being carried in the wind, but they pushed onward to do everything they could to keep the ship afloat.

When they realized what they were up against, it was too late to do anything about it. Too late to pray to their gods for forgiveness.

The clouds continued to swirl and were pulled down by the turning wind. And as they descended upon the ship, a face appeared amongst them, with gnashing teeth and burning eyes. The crew could do nothing but stare back as the beast at the eye of the storm descended upon them, ready to consume.

Wealth

Thomas had though it ironic that he was the one to receive the ring labeled wealth. Yes, Angelo had lost his job a few months before the funeral, but Thomas had been unemployed for two years. He lived more or less on the streets. His family permitted him to stay with them, but he did not want to be a burden upon them, and spent the little time he did spend in their houses constantly working to clean and to cook so that he would not seem like as much of a burden that they had to carry. But he spent most of his life out on the streets, wondering from place to place, just looking for work. He had lost count of how many times he had slept on public benches or hard concrete. He was pretty sure his back was misaligned - not that he could afford the doctor's visit to even find out, much less fix the problem.

He was staying with his aunt when the funeral happened, which was pretty much the only reason he had even heard about it. He didn't have a phone for people to contact him with, so if he hadn't been staying with family at the time, he never would have heard. Which meant that he never would have received the ring. Which meant that his life would have continued on in the madness and desperation that it was.

It was the following day that things started to change however. The ring had made him laugh - it was such a stupid thing for him to be attributed with. But when he wore it, he almost felt like he should open a bank account. Just so that it might eventually mean something. Hell, maybe the ring itself was worth something. But when he went in and gave them his name, he was informed that there was already an account opened in his name. He took a blind guess at what the passcode for it was, the first numbers that popped into his head. And they were right.

In the account was well over a million dollars, with an incredible interest rate. If he left the money alone, it would only take a few years for it to nearly double. With this much money, he could more than easily afford an actual home to stay in. He had no idea where it had come from, but it was there, and it was locked behind information that was only accessible to him.

And then Jonathan won the lottery of ten million dollars, and gave half of the money to Thomas in goodwill. Thomas put it away immediately - a boost like that, and with his interest rate...

He'd never need a job in the first place.

Charm

Angelo had barely sat down at the bar when he felt the eyes of half the ladies in the club beginning to land on him. He tried not to let the smile creep on to his face when it happened, but it was hard not to enjoy being the center of attention. He'd only have to be at the bar until he found someone that he thoroughly wanted to take home with him, and then he'd get to enjoy the rest of the night at his own pace. He barely even had time to drink anymore - but when you were getting the results he was, who was he to complain?

Not to mention the solid job he had landed. Shortly before the funeral he had been let go, which was a harsh blow to take, but it had taken almost no time at all to get an interview, and he'd practically been hired on the spot when he went in. Not only had he nailed the interview, but the new place was paying nearly ten times as much as his old job, meaning he no longer had to worry about bills or food. It hadn't been an uncomfortable living situation before, but at times there had certainly been some close calls. Now there was nothing to fear.

He knew it wasn't his own doing. He never would have been able to get by with any of this just a few months earlier. But it was easy to tell what had happened when every girl who approached him couldn't help but tell him how charming he was, and giggle over how appropriate it was that it said so on the ring he wore. And when he told them that it came from his dead grandmother? He could practically hear the swooning. That only had to happen a handful of times before you got the picture.

Not that he could complain about any of it. He wasn't above obtaining the gains he was getting by wearing an apparently magical piece of jewelry. After all, it had very specifically been gifted to him by a dying relative - who could say no to that? Certainly not him. His grandmother had wanted him to succeed, and that was precisely what he was now doing, thanks to a gift she had given him. To say no to that just because he could not have done so on his own - why, that would be madness. That would be ungrateful. He would take these new advancements in his life in stride, and with his head held high. After all, no one had to know that it was the ring that was doing it.

Not that anyone would have believed that in the first place.

Brawn

Bart had found that he didn't need to wear the ring on his finger to feel its affects, but merely have it touching against his skin, which was fortunate because his ring wasn't all that useful to him if he had to wear it on his finger all the time. He wore the strength ring on a short necklace under a tight undershirt, just tight enough to keep the ring pressed against his skin at all times. He put the ring on first thing in the morning and pulled the shirt over it to keep it in place before heading out to the gym.

His gains had been exponential - he'd gone from barely being able to bench press the bar to benching two hundred pounds in a matter of days. And from there he had kept getting stronger. His body wasn't becoming the huge, almost disgusting mass that some bodybuilders would become as they got to lifting at what he was lifting. But it was growing. His muscles were becoming strong, getting incredibly solid, and his fat was burning away. He was starting to look like the strong cartoon characters that no one could feasibly look like. It got him more attention from the ladies than he would have thought.

It hadn't taken long to notice the increase in strength thanks to the ring - when he got home that first day, he'd nearly pulled his door off of its hinges because of it. Then his refrigerator door. Several doors, in fact. In a bout of frustration at it all, he had thrown his tv remote at the wall - the remote almost completely punched a hole in the hole, and slowly fell out in pieces. The fact that that shouldn't have even been possible, much less by him, made it obvious something was going on. But the moment he slipped off the ring, things returned to normal.

It was actually useful, knowing that removing the ring would then restrict his strength. It kept him from breaking things when he didn't want to. And while he wasn't nearly as powerful without it, he had still gained a considerable amount of strength from working out using it. He was far from useless without it. He was fairly easily capable of carrying a woman in his arms without it, which had proven quite useful on a number of occasions since getting the ring.

He had a feeling that if this was happening to him, it was happening with his siblings as well with theirs. But if his was strength, he was pretty sure the others had lost out on this competition.

Lucky

At their grandmother's funeral, Jonathan had been the one to receive the ring with word Luck etched into its front. It was a strange thing to have - advertising that one was lucky generally didn't bring one much luck. But it had been a gift from his dying grandmother, and he would feel rude if he did not wear the gift that she had given him, so he had slipped it onto his ring just like all the others. He was surprised to find that it fit him perfectly - he wondered if she had perhaps had the rings specially designed for each of them, and if so, why she had chosen to title them in the way that she had. He had never considered himself much of a lucky person. Sure, he had his lucky moments, but everyone did. There were certainly many people who were much luckier than him.

In the days following the funeral, he didn't notice much changing in his life. He had requested some time off following the funeral in order to recover from the shock - in truth he just saw it as a good opportunity to kick back and relax for a while. He could use a vacation. The funeral, in a way, had been good timing.

Would he ever admit that? Hell no. Did he feel bad about thinking that way? A little bit, sure. But it was what it was, and he knew that grandma wouldn't want him to go getting stressed out needlessly.

He spent a lot of that free time playing some games that he had been neglecting as his hours had increased at work. He enjoyed the extra payment, but it made it harder to find time for the things that he enjoyed doing at home - primarily playing rpgs. With the massive number of hours that went into those, they weren't something that you could sit down and play for a few minutes at a time. You really need at least a couple hours to dedicate to them, and with where he was in them, he'd need some more than that. He was grinding for rare weapon drops off of end game enemies - had been working on it on and off in the various games for a few months.

Within a couple days of getting back, he'd actually managed to get them, too. It was amazing what some persistence and time could do for him. And it was about time. But as he pushed forward, the drops seemed to be happening faster, with less effort. The one time he headed out of the house for a walk, he found a hundred dollar bill on the ground. His luck was going through the roof.

Which was when he remembered the ring. And wondered if he should take a trip to Vegas.

Intelligence

Their grandmother's will was a unique one to put it mildly. To her immediate family, she had left more or less the usual things - some money, assorted possessions, the deed to her house. To her grandchildren, however, she had left each a specific one of five rings, each inscribed with a word. Intelligence. Luck. Strength. Charm. And Wealth. Other than the word, the rings didn't look like anything special - they were just golden bands with some letters engraved into the top. They didn't even look like they were all that valuable. But her will was very insistent on which ring go to which grandchild, and that those were the possessions that be passed on to them.

Arianna was the one who got the ring inscribed with Intelligence. Like her siblings, she had been surprised not only by the seeming lack of compassion by their grandmother, but by the fact that the ring had fit her perfectly. It had been a smooth, comfortable fit, and she hadn't taken it off since she'd gotten it. But more than that, she had felt differently since her grandmother's death. It wasn't some kind of grief - she had never been that close with her grandmother, and she had felt largely unaffected by her passing. Mostly just confused by the will. But since putting on the ring, she had felt as though she could think more clearly. Things that had once confounded her in her everyday life had become clear and concise. Her writing became neater, her grammar better, and her vocabulary more expansive.

It took her only a couple of weeks to realize that it was the ring that was doing it. She couldn't explain how, even with her increased mental capacity, but the ring was increasing her intelligence. And as soon as she realized that, she realized that it must be true for the others as well. Something about the rings were amplifying their capabilities, and it was an incredible feeling. To no longer feel as though she was constrained by her inability to understand certain situations or problems. She never wanted to take the ring off again.

She wondered for a time what it would feel like to wear all of the rings. But as she thought about it, she realized that if she did not want to forfeit her ring, her siblings certainly would not either. In fact, they were likely to want to do so even less than she, for while she was wiser, the others had been given gifts that could make them more successful without having to work. Trying to convince them to forfeit their rings, even for a moment, would likely cause fighting. And if the group were to fight, it was obvious which of them would win.

It was best things ddid not come to that. She only hoped that the others realized that as well.

Coronation

Prince Fernan paced back and forth between the walls of his bedroom, the adrenaline running through his system making it impossible to sit still. This was the day. This was the day that he would no longer be a prince, at the beck and call of his mother and father, but the king, with the whole country under his finger. The thought left him with a mixture of elation and fear - it would be good to finally be in control of his own life, but he would be in control of the lives of every man, woman, and child in his kingdom as well. Eyes would be on him at all times. But it was worth the freedom.

He had been advised not to eat before the ceremony, as the anxiety that he was going through may have caused his stomach to turn, and if he were to vomit on the way to his coronation, it would not be a good sign for his rule. He had spent a large amount of time drinking water, which correspondingly meant that he spent a lot of time at the toilet as well. As time drew close to his crowning, he drank less water as well - having to pee in the middle of the ceremony would surely not make things any easier or better looking than vomiting would.

By the time he was finally called to the throne room, his legs were weak from the amount of pacing he had done, and his throat was starting to feel dry. He had miscalculated the amount of time he had left before the ceremony would call on him, and had stopped drinking far too early - but he had not wanted to take another, for he was sure that the moment he did he would be called on. But still, he raised his head high and kept his chin pointed up as he walked down the halls to the throne. In a few short moment it would no longer be what was promised to him, but what belonged to him. He would be given the crown. And his reign would begin.

There were dozens of royalty collected together around the edges of the throne room as he entered, a blaze of trumpets announcing his arrival, and bringing the nobles' chatting to a cease. He stood just inside the doorway for a moment, eyeing his audience, seeing those who had elected to come and take witness, and those who had not. He also noted the way that they looked at him - he had always had a talent for being able to see whether or not someone had ill intentions from the look in their eyes. It had gotten him out of trouble more than once in his youth.

And then he strode forward, to where his father was standing, crown in hand. In silence, he knelt before the now former king, and felt the crown placed on his own head. He stood, turned. Looked over the crowd, as they took him in, and he took them in. And then there was cheering. And he was king.

Hearing

Sarah stood by the edge of the river, the only sounds being the trickling of the water and the gentle breeze blowing through the trees. It was peaceful. Serene. Something that she had not experienced nearly enough in recent memory. It was early enough in the morning that the sky was blue with the sun's light, but just above the horizon, she could still see the falling moon, its color faded. This spot, this place, was hers, and hers alone. The fish and mammals had abandoned it some time ago, for though it was beautiful, there was very little there for them to substantiate themselves off of. But Sarah did not have such requirements, and was more than happy to live surrounded by so little.

And yet, as she looked up at the sky, she heard footsteps approaching her from behind. They came from a distance away, and she knew that if she so desired, she had more than enough time to hide from their source. But if she hid, they would only continue to search for her, and the sound of their footsteps would persist. It may be more painful, but it would be better in the long run for her to just interact with the person. At least then it would end quickly.

What a shut-in. "Hey, you always so-"

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I am." She didn't let him finish the question. She didn't need to. "Is there something I can help you with, or did you just come to antagonize me?"

Touchy. Better come at this carefully. She's clearly heard it all before. But the king was very explicit in that he wanted me to retrieve her, or he was going to have my head. Whatever her deal is, it must be important. Start with kindness. "It's a pleasant-"

"It's a bit late for the pleasantries, don't you think?" She could see the look on his face as he went to speak again. "Don't even. I don't know who your king is, and I don't care. I'm not going with you back to him. This is my home. I am not leaving it. He can come and try to find me, bring his army. I will be long gone before he can take me. I am not returning to civilization of any kind, and there is nothing you can say to me to change my mind."

What a pretentious little bitch. He went to open his mouth again, but Sarah didn't give him the chance to say another word. "Leave my home," she ordered. "You come here with evil intentions, and you can't even be damned to consider the feelings of who you speak to. You are too self-centered to be worth my time. Enjoy being beheaded. Your thoughts will not be missed in this world."

Castles

I love medieval history, and I love the idea of being there and experiencing it. I'm the kind of person who, if I'm going to know about something, I want that to be a real, physical thing to me - partially because I learn best through muscle memory, I suppose. And that seems really hard to do when it comes to history, but there are tons of pieces from the middle ages that you can easily go and find, and touch, and become intimately familiar with. Paintings, weapons, armors, tapestries. Most of those are stuck behind chains and glass, sure. But then you can go and find still standing medieval castles and cities. And that's where history can really come alive.

I just got home from being out in Prague, where I spent a lot of time in medieval castles and villages, though this was not the first time I have done this. I absolutely love being in places like this. Feeling the uneven stone streets beneath my feet, running my fingers along the walls and feeling the roughness of their world. Seeing how weak and poor their architectural structure appears to be, and yet remembering that it's been standing there for hundreds of years against the test of time. And so often in these places, the people and stores that remain have embraced their history. They remain small, focused, and quiet. You can walk up and down the streets, the only sound being that of other people walking around, the sounds of cars and the modern world left outside the city walls.

These were the things that I missed out on in history classes in school. We'd see small little pictures of things every once in a while, but that doesn't really give you a feeling for what things were like. But you go to an old cathedral or castle, and you look at the way they constructed things, where they put artwork and what kinds of art they put up. The amount of detail they put into their work. The craftsmanship they put into their weapons - both good and bad. It all says stuff about what people thought, what they valued, how they lived.

It amazed me the first time that I visited a castle, and I felt like I had been transported backwards in time to the days of old - to the time that I had always been fascinated by and wanted to be a part of. I wanted to know why we didn't actually talk about these kinds of things, and why history class was always a boring string of shifting borders and essays - both our own, and those of the time. Yes, they helped define our world in the long run. They should be studied. But why completely ignore the life that had been at the time? I don't want to be remembered by the actions of people hundreds of miles away who have nothing to do with me. I want to be remembered by what is here, what I interact with, how I live. It's not like that becomes irrelevant because someone signed a piece of paper.

Struggle

I've been having a rough few days working on my Nano novel - I think the creative drain has been showing through in my log posts as well. I have these really interesting questions I want to both pose and answer, fascinating scenes I want to explore, character depth I want to dive into - but no drive to actually get into them. It's been getting ever harder just to put words down on paper.

I'm worried that the story just isn't good. I made a decision early on to split the narrative between the four different characters, but having certain events happen with characters at the same time in different locations I worry has made the plot too scrambled to follow. I also worry that I've made too much repetition of information, thanks to the different characters relating to the events and knowledge. I've never been much of one for having more than one perspective, but I feel like the way the story is told, it's pretty important. Especially later on, when the characters begin to enter each other's dreams - it would be difficult to have only one perspective when there are four characters, each experiencing four vastly different worlds, fears, and actions. Each having to do their own thing to save one each other.

I can't exactly take a break from writing the novel if I want to finish it - which I do. I've failed to complete three Nanos in the seven years that I've been participating, and I can easily tell you that I have never once been happy about not finishing. I always feel like I have failed in one way or another, and I feel as though that failure is not to my story, but to myself. This is what I want to do, after all. I want to write. I want to share my stories with the world.

But I am going to be traveling for roughly a week starting tomorrow, heading out of country, spending almost an entire day each way on a plane. I hope to be able to spend a good chunk of that flying time working on my novel - we'll see how well that actually works out. But because of the combination of being up in the sky, wanting to actually take some time to relax, and knowing that I will be out and about being a tourist most of the time, I've decided I want to take that time as a break from the blog.

I've said before this isn't something I want to do, but with circumstances being as they are, I feel that if there was ever a time to take a break, now is it. Ideally I won't stop writing - I should be working on my novel - but I hope that not feeling the need to find something new every day to write about will help give my brain some much needed space. I've already asked a friend of mine (who I'm pretty sure is the only one who actually reads this crap - hey, how's it going?) to make sure I get back to writing the blog when I get back, so I feel reasonably certain that this won't be the end of the blog for me. Which is good. While it's been stressful and a challenge at time, I feel that this has all been good for me over the last almost two years, and I'd hate to let it go now.

Outside

It's been a long time since I've spent a considerable amount of time outside. I was in boy scouts, and my troop - specifically a small segment of my troop, in which my dad and I were the effective leaders - loved going outdoors. We took backpacking trips nearly every other week, we went to two summer camps a year, we went to all three of the high adventure camps. We did just about everything. We were fast, and strong. We were crazy. But in time, those things started to slow down, and we got to a point where we were only really doing any trips like once a year. And I don't think any of us were really happy about that, but we had things we needed to do, and we struggled to organize and time things, and some of us forgot about our passion for the outdoors because it had just been so long.

That last one really applies to me. I love being outdoors. As much of a gamer and an introvert and a nerd as I am, I love surrounding myself in nature and pushing my body to its limits and being able to see the world from unique places, far from civilization. I love standing on the top of a mountain, the wind blowing through my hair, just looking out over the land and seeing how far I have come and what I have accomplished. It's one of my favorite feelings.

Working at REI now, which is an outdoor recreational equipment store if you don't know, has really helped to revitalize that passion in me. Granted, I still haven't spent much time going out, but I think about it all the time now, and I really want to get back out there. It's silly of me not to - I have hundreds of good opportunities to. My job encourages me to. I'm surrounded by the equipment nearly every day, and actually going out and using the stuff actually makes my job easier, because I then know more about the things that I am selling and can better recommend them.

It's a good feeling working at a place like this. To be around things that I'm passionate about, but also to be encouraged to help other people do the things that they're passionate about. REI is a very people focused business, rather than money. We want people to be happy. We want people to do things. We don't want them to buy our merchandise - we want them to use it. We want them to come into the store, ready to make new stories, and ready to share the stories that they have gained since the last time they have come into the store. Hell, we chose to say fuck Black Friday, and are opting to go outside instead. I remember Black Friday at Target. I remember what a hellhole that was, and how much money we made because of it. And REI chose to say no to that, because it cares more about the happiness of its employees and its customers. There are so many good things about it. And all based on a love of the outdoors.

Protection

Jessica watched through her window as the river a few streets down from her house began to shake and rise. The water was rippling and making waves that lapped up over the guard rails that had been placed along the sidewalk over the river, and the pedestrians walking along side it were pushed to the side, forced to run if they wished to keep dry. And still it continued to rise, a vague form visible through the falling water, until it finally split and crashed down, running into the streets and pushing the cars to the sides. A giant woman made of stone stood in the river, her eyes two balls of burning fire as she looked down on the people. Jessica watched as the people panic and ran, though she was not afraid. She had been warned that this was coming.

She opened her door and walked out into the street as the people ran past her, away from the monster. She had had time - she could have prepared some kind of costume to hide her identity for when this happened, worn it under her clothes at all times so that she would be prepared. But instead she walked out into the street in a size too large tank top and her favorite panties, in which she had been relaxing at home. She knew she would probably regret this down the line. But she had a monster to fight.

The stone beast stepped into the street, her massive foot crushing the concrete and two cars that happened to be underneath. She didn't even react, not recognizing them as an obstacle, or even an unpleasant object to step on. She lifted herself out of the water and gripped a building for support as she did so, crushing its upper two floors like paper, a few pained screams escaping for an instant before the were silenced forever. She looked around at the fleeing people, until she saw Jessica approaching her, and leaned down for a closer look.

Jessica looked back at it, no fear in her eyes - only frustration. "This my home, you piece of shit," she called out without hesitation. "Would you kindly fuck off?"

The monster stood up straight and raised its foot in response, ready to crush Jessica underneath.

But it never got the chance.

With a flick of her wrist, Jessica sent a ripple through the air which seized the beast's foot and held it in place as an orange glow came from her back. Slowly a hunk of the concrete beneath her own feet cracked and came loose, lifting her into the air to be on level with the beast's face, who could only stare back at her in anger, unable to move.

"I tried to warn you."

And she punched the air hard, her power rushing forward and crushing into the beast's chest, leaving a fist shaped imprint in her chest as she was flung back, over the other side of the city, and into the sea on the far shore.

Exploration

Mark curved his snowboard sharply to the right and lifted his toes, pushing up the snow beneath him to slow himself down to a stop. He was maybe two thirds of the way down the mountain, but he had seen something on the way down that he wanted to take a closer look at. Slowly, he lowered his toes and settled his snowboard into the snow, ensuring that it would slip out from under him and send him careening down the mountain while he wasn't in control, before he pulled his pack off of his back. It was filled with a few essentials - first aid supplies, board wax, an extra pair of gloves and goggles, and most importantly for the moment, a pair of binoculars.

Mark was a backroad boarder, as he liked to call it. He wasn't a fan of taking the predetermined paths that ski resorts supplied him - even the double black diamonds had long since lost his interest. They were too... compact. Formed. He wanted something more natural, something wilder. He'd been a great boarder, competed in a few competitions that had earned him some rep and money, but even knowing that he had beaten other boarders in both speed and technique wasn't satisfying him. He wasn't interested in being the best. He just wanted to get out there.

It had started after he had accidentally taken a wrong turn on one of his runs, which had sent him deep into the wilds of the mountain, with uncontrolled drops and incredibly soft, powdery snow, that was only able to support him as he carved over it thanks to the speed with which he did so. He had weaved in between trees and over rocks, feeling his life expectancy dropping with the danger he was navigating, but reaching the bottom of the mountain he was still able to find a safe place to get back to the base. And when he looked back at where he had come from, he felt a thrill in his chest that he'd never experienced before.

Looking up the mountain he had come down with his binoculars, Mark searched for the spot he had thought he'd seen. Riding mountains like this was not only dangerous business for himself, but for those who helped him - without lift chairs to carry him, Mark needed to be helicoptered up to safe drop points. He was sponsored for the rides, and he knew the transport was paid well, but he wasn't satisfied with being dropped at the same point over and over again. So when he was out riding, he kept an eye out for new drop points - places that would be both exciting, and safe.

He pulled his phone out of his jacket pocket when he spotted it again, and made a note of its location. He'd had practice - he was pretty good at taking notes so that he would later be able to find the spot on the map. It wouldn't be a long drop, but it would be exciting. And sometimes, that was all he needed.

Writing thoughts

I kind of glazed over it the other day, but I think pretty differently when I'm in the middle of a book that I'm writing than I do when I'm not working on a piece. They're thoughts that come and go unprompted throughout the day. The thought of words and stories just kind of pass through my brain, and I think about where I am in my story and what questions remain to be answered or even asked, and I'll make these decisions unconsciously. It's this really cool feeling of building without exactly trying to build that I've never experienced anywhere else in my life. It's inspiring, but it's also scary, because it can make it hard to want to write without having had the thoughts first. But the thoughts don't come unless I've spent time writing. It's almost a vicious cycle, but if I've ever been in one that I wanted to stay in, this would be it.

But it's not necessarily just focused on the story itself. It's subtle, but I look at the world differently as well. I look at the people around me, the places I spend time, the things that I do, and I pay more attention. I pick and choose things, both carefully and precariously. I mix them together. I take this person's name, that person's hobby, that room, this house, his way of speaking, her way of thinking. I put it all together in one brand new person. I take from me the most, because I know myself the best, but the more characters I make, the more inspiration I need. And sometimes I'll take one real life thing and split it up amongst several characters. Little habits. Strange talents. Everything that makes a person who they are, and then I tear it apart and make a dozen new people out of it.

Sometimes it's intentional, and sometimes it's not. Sometimes I make all of those different people at once, and sometimes it's a slow process that happens one at a time, over and over as I continue to create and build and expand. But no matter what you're doing, where you are, where you're going, the story continues to exist in the back of your head as long as you work on it every day. And so the thoughts never stop. You learn more about your characters, their goals, their desires, who they are and who they're going to be. Sometimes you realize that they're destined to die, and sometimes that's scary, and sometimes that's exciting. Because just because they're one of your characters doesn't mean that they're one of the good guys.

It really probably doesn't come as any surprise to anyone that a writer would think this way, and it doesn't come as a surprise to me. I just want to put the feeling into words, because that's kind of how I do. I wish it was something that more people could experience. That shock and awe you get when watching a really good movie or reading a really good book, only it's coming from your own head and coming from your own stories, and it's coming completely at random. That constant feeling of learning. It's exhilarating. It helps me remember sometimes why I enjoy writing in the first place.

Knuckles

He knew it wasn't much, and that it was still going to hurt like hell, but he felt fairly confident that this would at least serve the purpose that he needed it for. Mike had taken one of the old, abused pillows that his mom kept as a spare in the garage, folded it over a couple times to try and centralize the remaining cushioning, and taped it up by the top and bottom to the large tree in the backyard. Even with the boxing gloves on, even with the heavy wrappings over his hand underneath the gloves, he knew that it would still hurt to punch. But he really needed to hit something.

The sun was hot and he was already sweating just bouncing lightly on his toes in front of the tree, staring at the pillow, his hands raised in front of his face in a defensive pose, ready both to strike and to block. He had the pillow placed at head level, so that the part just above the tape was level with his his chin, and the part just below was where his forehead was. He could see a face in that pillow, staring back at him, bobbing up and down and back and forth, sizing him up the way that he was sizing that man up.

And then his fists were shooting forward, slamming through the pillow and into the tree behind it. Single jabs, one after the other, coming from the weaker hand that was placed in front. One. One. One.

Then powerful jabs thrown in between them, coming from behind, the power of his stronger side combined with the extra distance and the twisting of his torso, he could feel the shockwave bouncing back through him, could hear the shaking of the tree. The pace of the punches increased as he added in the second punch, the twisting torsion of his body back and forth creating a controllable motion, the pulling back of one hand adding into the motion of throwing out the other. One. One two. One two one. One two one.

A third throw, his leading hand pulled to the side as the straight flew forward. His body twisting harder in the opposite direction of the straight, he pulled his fist in from the side, slamming it vertically into the very side of the pillow. He could see his opponent's face rocking, the hook slipping in past their guard, making it drop to open up space for the second straight. One. One two. One two one. One two three. One two three two. One two three two. One.

He could feel the sweat sliding down his back when his foot fell flat on the grass, his breath heavy but even. He wasn't sure how long he had been punching that tree. Part of the pillow had split from the effort, and feathers were falling on the ground around it. His knuckles hurt to the point where they were numb. He walked away, flicking his wrists toward the ground, the gloves sliding easily off of his hands and hitting the ground. He could see the red through his wrappings. His knuckles were bleeding.

But he felt better.

Free Write 11

I'm not a political person. I don't want to be involved in politics, I don't want to deal with the arguments, I don't want to hear people shouting opinions back and forth about things that are almost entirely out of their control anyway. I'm the kind of person who wants to focus on me, and how to better myself, and what I'm doing wrong. I don't even want to think about the idiots running my country, and the fact that we've enabled them to fuck over the rest of us so that they can make a pretty penny. I don't care what side you're from - it's best you recognize that's what they're all out for. Everyone has their own agenda. Big or small, you recognize that and it'll help you recognize who you want to be around.

I wouldn't be happy with America's election cycle tonight regardless of which way it goes, nor have I ever been. All it ever leads to is more arguments and a steeper downhill slope for the country as a whole. People always argue. People always fight. It would take one hell of a change to make that any different these days, and it sure as hell wasn't going to come with this election. I think most people can agree with that.

But I don't want to talk about politics any more. I'm sick and tired of it. I haven't heard anyone stop talking about it for months, and with the way tonight is going, it sure as hell isn't going to stop any time soon either. I'd rather spend that time focusing on my writing, my weight, my mental stability. I'd rather play games, and get back out into the wilderness, and find myself. I don't feel like I've been finding that anywhere in civilization. I've been finding a lot of things that I'm uncomfortable with, and that I know I shouldn't be, and that I need to work on improving. But I don't feel like any of those things are helping me find who I am.

I've missed writing. Even though I've been struggling with getting myself to do the writing for Nano this year, I've missed the thoughts that go through my mind when I'm working on a real book. The kinds of strange, out there thoughts that if anyone heard you speak aloud, they'd think you were insane. The thrill I get when I realized that something was going to happen, or that it already happened and I just didn't realize. The wonder of learning why things are happening, or how they are happening, or how they are going to happen. It's such a bizarre feeling, but I've forgotten what it feels like. And I always forget, year after year.

I really need to write more.

Nightmare

It was the first day of school, and Jeremiah was already late. His parents dropped him off at the front of the school, which was desolate and eerie in the early morning fog. His backpack was stuffed to the brim with textbooks, pencils, pens, papers, rulers, crayons, colored pencils, erasers, folders, binders, his pet gerbil, and three pencil cases. It was probably more than he needed, but he wanted to make sure he was ready, and he was certain that if he had left any of it behind, he was going to end up needing it after all. The weight of the pack was straining against its own straps, to say nothing of his back and shoulders. It weighed easily fifty pounds. Possibly a hundred.

He was worried that the moment he would walk into class, his professor would stop everything in order to yell and lecture him about why he should have been on time and how being so late was detrimental not only to him, but to his classmates as well. What kind of employee would he be in the real world if he couldn't be bothered to show up on time to his own education? But by the time he was getting to class, recess was starting, and the other students were rushing out the doors towards the playground, nearly trampling him along the way.

He dropped off his bag at his desk and ran after the others. He found a group of them playing war on the field and decided to join them. He was handed an M-16 and told to get to work mowing down the scum on the other side. He pointed and pulled the trigger without asking twice. Bullets flew from the muzzle like wildfire, falling down on unsuspecting victims, painting the ground left and right red with their blood. The ammo belt around his shoulders ran endlessly through the chamber. And then he watched as one of the bullets ricocheted off of one of the storage containers out in the field and flew back at him, piercing himself in the chest.

His father was kneeling over him as he lay dying in the grass. He was trying to speak, but the child could hear no words. Only the beating of his own heart in his eardrums, threatening to deafen him and sending careening into the ravine with each pounding smack against his ribs. Jeremiah looked down at the child in his arms, filled with remorse and regret for all of the things that he had not yet taught him. To have his child stripped away from him before the boy had ever had a chance to grow. To see that blood spilling down and staining the snow as it fell around them.

And then the doorbell rang, and he answered it to see his friends there waiting with smiles on their faces, ready for the party. He invited the six of them in, excited for the fun that the five would have. He had laid out four seats at the dining table so that no one would go without. And after dinner, the three proceeded into the bathroom, where there were two tvs, so that it would be easy to play the single player game.

The dark was abrupt and intense. It felt like it was trying to consume him. And then it did.

Nurse

The tent had been raised hastily, but it was serving its purpose well enough. Even just approaching, Samantha could hear the groans of easily over two dozen men coming from within, each in pain and calling for help. The battlefield was brutal, even in smaller conflicts such as this one. Men on both sides were brutally injured if they were lucky - they would have to have the hand of god on their side to leave the field untouched. Assuming they actually participated, of course. It was no secret that some of the soldiers were too scared to actually fight. The more times they escaped the field uninjured, the easier it was to tell if they were that kind of man.

Samantha slipped into the tent and her eyes were immediately zipping back and forth, taking in information about her patients. She saw broken and missing limbs, excessive amounts of blood, and people who were newly missing one of their five senses. She had a lot of work ahead of her. Carefully, she pulled her necklace out from under her robe, a small bottle of glowing blue mist tied to its end. She muttered a prayer under her breath and carefully removed its lid.

Dozens of ethereal blue hands soared out of the bottle, swirling around the room, bringing with them a cool breeze that permeated the air. The groans of the men fell quiet as the hands presence eased them into a gentle sleep. And as the last injured man closed his eyes, the hands descended down, tending to the many wounds present. As they worked, Samantha walked amongst them, keeping an eye on their progress, whispering quiet words of peace to the sleeping men, and encouragement and thanks to the hands. They were not under her direct control - she had worked for many moons to collect them and gain their trust, so that they might help her keep the men whom she cared for alive at the end of their battles.

The hands were undoubtedly magic, which was why she kept them concealed under her robe. This war had started over the use of magic, and she stood on the side that was for the liberation of man from the very force that she was using. But she needed the power to keep her men alive - it was not something she could do alone, but there were very few who were willing to work in the medicine business these days. But they could not bring people back to life, or rebuild lost limbs or other extremities. They could only ease the pain, and work to close wounds and keep them from reopening.

And that was really all she needed from them.

Cozy

Johnson took a hard swing at the log, splitting it clean in two before wiping at his forehead, trying to keep the sweat out of his eyes. He'd spent a good fifteen minutes splitting logs for the fire. He'd had to do it in the backyard, of course - Susan would never let him do shit like that in the house. Not even in the garage. It was freezing cold outside, but the task was hard work, and he'd already worked up enough of a sweat to discard his shirt. He knew she liked to watch from the window, inside where it was warmer. He also knew she thought he liked putting on a show, seeming so strong and resilient, showing off the muscles that he'd worked so long to build for her. He'd been doing it for himself all along, of course, but he wasn't one to argue with her.

He lifted the basket that he had been putting the cut wood into and carried it back into the house. With a heave, he lifted it into its place next to the fireplace and began building the shape for a fire. Susan watched silently from her spot on the couch, artbook in her lap and a smile on her face. She loved watching Johnson be all manly. He didn't do it very often - he was a big goof, and a gamer - but every once in a while he reminded people of just what an intimidating figure he had, and that he was a force to be reckoned with if you got on his bad side. There had not been a single block of wood that had taken more than two swings for him to cleave in two.

When he was done, Johnson grabbed a towel and wiped himself off of sweat before pulling his hoodie back on. He lit a match and tossed it into the fireplace before shutting the pane, which was designed to continue to let air in, but keep it from escaping so as to circulate the air better within the space and build the fire faster. He walked over to Susan and lifted her up slightly, sliding into his spot behind her and resting her back down with her head against his chest. She snuggled into him for a moment before turning back to her notebook and starting to draw.

With the fire starting to burn, Johnson picked up his controller and turned the tv on, resting his hands in Susan's lap as his game booted up. She giggled. "You're gonna go and ruin a perfectly romantic moment by playing your games?" she asked.

"I'm not ruining anything that you aren't already ignoring," he said calmly, his eyes already glued to the screen. "You already stopped snuggling. You draw and I play. That's what I love you for."

Susan laughed out loud at that. "Oh, is that all?" she asked teasingly.

"Yes. Now get on it so I can love you."

Making shit up

It sounds weird when you say it like this, but when you're a writer, you have to have the unique ability to make shit up. I mean, in a way that's kind of a given. For the most part, in writing a story you're trying to create something from nothing, and you're just taking these words from the aether and putting them together until they mean something. But I think the thing that people don't realize or think about a lot of the time, even when they've been writing for a while, is that you don't always know what's coming next. Sometimes you only know what's coming after the next scene, or what's coming further on down the line, but where you are right now, how you're getting to that part that you do know, you really have no idea what's going on.

And some people can skip around to the parts of the story they do know, and they can keep it straight what happens when and where and how, and that's awesome. But sooner or alter they have to come back to that scene that they skipped over because they weren't quite sure how it was going to go. Sooner or later they have to face something that they aren't already intimately familiar with. And by the time they get around to some of those scenes, maybe they have figured out some of what was happening. But they probably haven't figured it out entirely. And that's when they have to just start making shit up.

And that's not necessarily a bad thing. If you ask me, it's both the most exciting and scariest part of telling a story. When you don't know exactly what's going to happen, and so you're figuring it out as you go. You just start throwing words at the screen hoping they make sense, and sometimes when you look back on them they really don't. They make absolutely no sense. And then sometimes you look back and you're utterly amazed because there's no way that you wrote that, and there's definitely no way that when you were in such a bad spot. It's utterly incredible what you just read.

Nanowrimo is made for these kinds of moments, and reading about other people experiencing them is kind of this big thrill for me when November rolls around. Just a few days ago, I read this great line from a budding author who said that "a few minutes ago, my main character and I both realized that he had been dead for five minutes." And that sounds so utterly bizarre, but it's absolutely a thing that happens to writers all the time, and it's the kind of feeling I strive to experience when writing - especially during Nano. That feeling of "Did that really just happen? Did I really come up with that?"

I love making shit up. It's literally what I live for. And man, I have been doing it for four days now, and I could not feel better about it.

Snowboarding

Jacob looked down over the mountain as the ski lift slowly lifted up the steep cliff face that he would soon be making his way down. This was his least favorite part about snowboarding. Sure, it was a nice view, but seeing the other people already making their way down, and the slow pace of it all made him feel skitchy. He wanted to be carving. He wanted to be zipping down the mountain, weaving back and forth between the trees, feeling the icy wind rushing around his face with nothing to keep him safe but the board beneath his feet and his own skill. It was an exhilirating ride - it never lasted long enough.

He had been snowboarding every season since he was ten. It had taken a long time before he had been able to move up to the black diamond level, and he'd never wanted to go back. He'd tried a time or two, mostly with friends who weren't quite as high leveled as he was, but it just didn't give him the same thrill that he got riding down a black diamond - or better yet, a double black diamond. Knowing that if he made a mistake he could end up off trail and out in the middle of nowhere alone, or that a fall could send him tumbling down hundreds of feet over ice and rock, and yet having the control and the skill to make it safely back down to base. He'd yet to find anything that gave him that same feeling.

The other problem with the ski lift was that his foot was getting tired. He had to keep the board on one foot so that he could safely ride off when he got to the top, but that meant having an extra 12 pounds hanging off of that one foot, and the fact that it was lopsided and dangling below him certainly wasn't helping. He tried on occasion to prop the other end of the board up on his free foot, but to be honest, it didn't help all that much. Sure, it made it feel a little lighter, but the way he had to position it was painful on his ankle, and it really just meant that he had extra weight on both feet instead of just one.

Sliding off the seat when he reached the top and sitting in the snow, looking down over the mountain as he bound his free foot into its position on his board, though. Knowing what he was about to do. Getting the pre-game adrenaline running through his blood.

That ski lift ride was worth it every time.

Side characters

I've talked before about how I'm bad with having multiple characters in a story, and how I tend to keep my number of main characters down because it makes it easier for me to keep track of what's going on. The problem that arises out of that is that I'm not particularly great at making side characters to exist around them, either. Like, I can say that a character is in a crowd of people, but if they had to pick one character to focus on for whatever reason or another, and that character wasn't integral to the plot, I would struggle. I'd want that character to have a purpose to being in the scene, to have a name, to have a history. All of which are things that I struggle with keeping straight in my head as I add more and more to a story. And if I add a character into a scene, well, why wouldn't I bring them back in a later one? I went to the trouble of giving them a name. What's the point of just letting them go after that?

There probably is one. It's probably the fact that it makes the world feel more alive, and like it exists for more than the express purpose of giving the main characters a plane in which to have their story told. I can't really argue with that, because it's true, and the more real the world is, the easier it is to get engaged in the story. But that doesn't make it any easier to make myself do it.

The simple fact that I'm not good at coming up with names is probably a huge part of it. It would be easier to make side characters if I could just pull names out of my ass that didn't sound samey, generic, or completely batshit insane. Those are my three modes when it comes to story writing. Which is why lately I've started to resort to stealing names from people I know, but that's another story.

This became increasingly obvious to me as I started working on my Nano novel this year, which started in a bar. There are all kinds of people in a bar, doing all kinds of things, and who did I name in it? The main character and the bartender, who I have full intentions of making into a secondary character. I could have named a bouncer, or some regulars, or the DJ, or any number of people who were there in passing, but I didn't. I talked very generically about other people to make it seem like there were people around, and then I went on to focus on the main character like I always do.

I suppose that's something that might be easier to fix in editing, to be fair. But it's probably something that I should think about more often.

Impurity

Daria made her way down the winding cave passage way, her long robes dragging lightly across the ground as she used her long, wooden staff as a walking stick. She was getting too old to make these kinds of journeys, but if she wished for her kingdom to remain as prosperous as it currently was, she knew this trip would have to be made a number of times more. It wasn't the trip down that was so bad - it was coming back up, after draining herself of nearly all the energy she had to complete the task that had been left to her. She was in desperate need of an assistant and a successor, but she had yet to come across anyone who was powerful enough to serve as such. They needed magic beyond the capabilities of the average mage, or even of the higher ranked sages. She needed another archsage. But those were difficult to come across.

The passageways lead into a massive cavern, with magic fueled torches placed all around that burned unendingly. The floor gave way in the center to a hole that went deeper than the light could reach, though it little mattered whether one could see to the bottom of it. It was more important that one could see the enormous beast that was trapped within the hole. Its body stretched up from the depths, twisting and contorting, covered in dirt and moss from decades of imprisonment. Where its torso should have been was a face with a gaping mouth, dull flames burning within. Arms stretched out on either side, though they had long since been frozen in place, reaching out to grip the walls for support. Its head was but a mass, covered in vines and stones, though one lump of the mass in the center looked almost as though it could have been an eyeball.

Daria approached the ledge before the hole and looked up at the massive monster in disgust. It was not the first time she had seen it, nor would it likely be the last, and yet every time she approached it she could not help but reel away from its hideous form. Once, many centuries prior, it had been a king of her fair kingdom, who had searched too heavily for power and wealth. He had sold himself to demons, who had given him everything he wanted - for the price of the lives of his people. His lust for power was so great that he accepted these turns. It was only thanks to the court wizard at the time that the people were saved. He captured the raging, hateful king in this very cave, preventing him from consuming his own subjects.

Daria had been tasked with making sure that the seals went unbroken and unweakened. Once a year she traveled into the depths for this task. Once a year she came face to face with the demon who had once been a man. And once a year she strained every ounce of magic in her body to make sure that he would never complete the task he had been given, and never grow to his full power. For as large and powerful and terrifying as he was now, it was only a fraction of what he was supposed to become.

She was getting too old for this.