NANoWriMo Success 2005

Well, it was really hard work. I pushed the limits of tollerance with all of my friends, but I did it. I am a NaNoWriMo winner this year. Thank you to everyone who tolerated me, it means so much to me. Thank you to everyone who read what I wrote, no matter how bad it was. Thank you so much to everyone who said that I could do it and that they wanted me to do it. How many times can I say thank you to all the people who deserve it? Not possibly enough times. This means more to me than I thought would be possible from something that seemed so trivial when I picked it up for the first time last year. Only about 20% of the people who start end up finishing. With good reason too. It's not easy. It's not easy at all. I hope to do this again next year, it would be an honor and a privledge.

Words, My Head Hurts with Words!

Well, I finally got more words done today than I got all weekend, over 2000, only took me till 2 am to do it. It’s depressing being so far behind, but I’m feeling inspired again, and I want to do another 5000 day. I need to do another 5000 day or else I’ll have to maintain 2000 every single day, and I know I don’t work well with weekends.

I’ve kicked Mario Kart DS’s butt. That is such an incredibly fun game that I just keep playing it and playing it. I’ve beaten every single grand prix mode, and now I’m on to the missions. It’s go to be the only racing game with boss fights.

My dad told me that he isn’t doing so hot financially. I worry about my family. I care about them all. He told me that Christmas was going to be tight this year, and I told him it was okay. I need to think of something to bring with me to thanksgiving dinner. I want to make something interesting, but the only stuff no one else is bringing are side dishes, which means exploring a new culinary world that I haven’t really touched on before, especially a thanksgiving-centric one.

It’s late and I need a quick 150 words so I’m going to wrap this up, finish writing, play a round of Mario Kart online, and then sleep. Have a good night all.

15000 Words 3300 Today

Chapter Seven: The Blood Stained Pacifist

The celebration was in full swing, the members of the trading caravan were dancing side by side around a great fire. Stocks of wood that had been imported and purchased from far to the east were thrown into the great inferno. Not all danced, played, and drank. The fire, though a luxury, was not to be a complete waste and great stocks of food were smoked and stewed over it. The scant few that knew how played passionately on their instruments, others beat on skins stretched over pots to the time of the music, and still others danced, sang out from their hearts, and made love out of the sight of the ever-invasive light from the fire.
Among those brothers who played instruments there was a young man with a strong back and many bruises. His skin, visible as his cloak was cast aside in the night and in the passions of the music, was a dark shade of brown from the sun, though his hair was almost white from being bleached so blonde by the unforgiving sun during his broad travels. Dark on his back, even standing out from his dark skin was the black of his fading name, an empty circle, like a name that is not a name.
His fingers danced over the holes of the small pipe with a fury and the notes that flew from it were like pips and whistles that would lift the feat of every dancer. With cheeks puffed and eyes closed the light of the fire shone off his forehead in the glistening shimmer of the sweat from his passionate exertion. Women danced close to him and he opened his eyes and danced with them, singing when he would put his pipe to the side and drink with the rest of the tribe. Nameless though he was, he competed with the best of the tribe for the temporary affections and attention of the beautiful women and the notice of the elders and for the pure thrill of competition.
All through the day there had been sparing between the youth, games of strategy, games of strength, dexterity, wit, timing, and even good old-fashioned fighting. Though not present at the evening’s celebration, the young man’s teacher had been present all day long for both days advising and encouraging.
Not quite the best in every event, the young man was far superior to any in his age range, only being bested by the most experienced. Fighting was the one exception; none came close, not even to lay a single strike on him in armed combat. In unarmed combat he still far surpassed all who opposed him, though not by so wide a margin. The man was like a furious whirl of wind with his strikes, blocks, and dodges. All fell to him, one at a time, none more successful than the last until he faced the best of the Rae’Gno in unarmed combat and took a hard blow to the belly, winding him, before he subdued the competitor.
The Rae’Gno were having a time of rare good fortune, and they had not been alone, three neighboring tribes had worked hard together and none had been denied to participate in the jubilation. So it happened that the pair of wanderers, working with a caravan of traders and selling goods were allowed to take part and make an impression, though the whole caravan took the time to relax and participate in the rare event of unwinding from their harsh lives.
It was during the morning of the third day that the old man happened to be talking to an odd man. He was eating some of his dried meat from his pouch, chewing it carefully and making it last, rather than let the events around him prompt him to wasteful action. His student was young and was doing so well, as well as working so hard that it would be shameful to deny him the chance to be a little loose for a few days and enjoy the fruits of his labors.

Busy Bee

It's been a long but very good day in which I've accomplished quite a bit. I made an A on a test, which isn't official, but with some tests you just KNOW you got all the answers right. It was an awesome book that it was based on.

I got all my writing done, or almost, I'll be finished in just a bit, I also started making Apple Chips and Banana Chips in my dehydrator with Mike, we'd been planning to do it since sunday evening but it slipped my mind. Tomorrow I have a hot date with a beautiful girl.

On wednesday I'm going to play games with Jake, but not till late, I want some more time with Pattie than I've been getting lately so I'm going to wait till she's going to sleep for school the next day.

I got to talk with Chris, next time I talk with him he'll probably be on american soil again, which should be quite fun. I sent him my novel so far to hear what he thinks of it.

I also watched the movie that I missed last wednesday, which was actually pretty enjoyable, it gave me a taste for John Quincy Adams. I thought he was a pretty depressing character, but he certainly had some good ideals. I wonder if my teacher will give me credit for the day I missed?

I beat FEAR and I beat the campaign in Advance Wars: Dual strike and both games are giving me a taste of something I havent had in a long while: Replayability. Advance Wars is full of extra campaigns and other extremely awesome aspects, I only wish there were tunnel software that would let me play it with others online. I believe that one day soon that will be quite an awesome reality. Also not too long from now games that genuinely take advantage of wi-fi internet connectivity will be out, including Mario Kart DS.

I've been beating all my games lately, Mario and Luigi Superstar Saga, ummmm... you know what? That's the only three. Of the three of them, Advance Wars has probably given me the deepest most complext and longest lasting gaming experience. I'm not going to be buying any games or movies for a while even though I want them. I've done a good job in this respect, I've turned them down on sale, I've turned them down while holding them in my hand, I've turned them down again and again. I don't like doing it, I really want these things and other things, but I feel that it is invaluable experience to turn them down. I may, in effect, have to deny them to myself forever, even though I want them, just to prove that I am not a person of pure impulse and that I can let something go without buying it. If I do, then maybe I'll be able to afford a better computer sooner, because my next upgrade will require me to do everything but buy a brand new computer entirely. That's something I'm going to need. I'm looking at maybe an 80o dollar upgrade in order for it to be of any use at all.

9011 Words!

Okay, last night I reached 9000 words, only 3000 short of my goal, which I believe I might be able to make up for if I work extra hard. I'm not optomistic, but sure, anything is possible.

I just spent an hour gleaning my entire blog for spam comments, deleting every single one and turning on some anti spam measures. It's not enough for spammers to spam my blog but they have to litter it all over the place even way back in the archives, and I have a lot of archives, so this was a pretty determined action on my part. Blogger doesnt tell you where someone posted their spam, so I had to go over my entire blog with a fine toothed comb. I hope the anti spam measures prevent comment spam in the future. Sometimes people make me sick.

Chapter Four: The Usurper

Chapter Four: The Usurper

     The armor-clad warrior stepped out into the night, his hammer swinging with his easy stride. His great pain was hidden behind ash smeared and fire scored metal. The entrance to the building behind him, buried in the mountain’s side, unveiled him from the velvet shadows of an interior devoid of all life with each step. Once free from the embrace of the shaded gate he arched his arm above his head, grasping his helmet from its rear and cracking it off and removing it from his head.
     Behind the mask of the dinged helmet was a face singed, red and feverish. The hammer fell into the sand and the armor began to crack apart as he opened it up and allowed it to fall one way as he fell another, savoring the fresh air and the brief relief it brought to his raw and cooked flesh. Red flesh of his back glistened in the starlight shimmering around his inked name, Broken Spears. Several other marks were inked into his flesh, but these were by far the most prominent. Soon blisters started to form and so he spent little time relaxing and put the armor back on when his senses had fully returned from him, enduring the painful heat from his skin and the sand rubbing against the burn, each grain like a fiery spear.
     Broken Spears traveled quickly, the armor carrying his weight and moving him with superior speed and strength despite his injuries. For a the next day and the next night he walked, protected from the sun and cooled by his shell before he came to the nearest spring in the side of the mountain from which cool fresh water poured. Once again he dropped the armor about him, followed by his pack and began to wash his wounds, opening the pouch, he pulled salves and cloth which he tore into bandages for places where his blisters had begun to break and run.
He also drank deep and refilled the flasks that he carried with him. For two whole weeks he hid himself in the crack of the mountain treating his wounds with care, and suffering as scars spread across his skin. Healing was slow, and incomplete, but at that time he had rested too long. Dawning his armor, Broken Spears began the long journey home.

* * *

The evening was cool and bright with a half moon in the sky over the camp of the Clark tribe. Stars glistened across the sky and the wind blew cool, but calm, gentle enough to let the sand lay still. The Clarks were somewhat at rest, the hunters had returned and their shelters were complete for the evening, they had worked hard and all were enjoying a great feast, the greatest Clark hunters had killed well. The tribe indulged in burning a huge bonfire, despite the scarcity of fuel because they had done well at collecting and pillaging from other tribes.
The youthful tribe leader watched all and two prisoners of war were brought out and their blood was spilled at the great bonfire. Their necks were gashed and their bodies strung upside down till they drained empty, feeding the light with black pools ran into violent flames. The leader walked towards the corpses, his back to the fire and his name silhouetted against his brown skin depicting a man shackling many other men. This was a part of the name of every member of the Clark.
Other acts of violence were inscribed on there, though that was the most prominent. The name of the leader was quite long, for his acts were so diverse and he took so much pleasure in them. He was most often called Begetter of Violence. As Begetter stood before the dangling corpses he took his knife from its place on his belt and smashed the chest of the first one, striking and separating the rib cage before tearing it open, he then reached his fist into the gash and moved those hungry fingers through the soft flesh, tearing at the lungs and gripping the still heart with his fist, ripping it from its bondage within, severing it with his blade and then biting into it with a fierce passion, his lips smeared with the red of the pink flesh, as with his hands, the clear juice running down his chin.
Begetter of Violence then turned to the fire and plunged his hand into the heat before letting go, dropping the pink and red heart before stepping over to the second body, and repeating the process, though not as easily. The chest proved more difficult to shatter and separate to expose the tender organs within. Again he reached within, and tore at the dead flesh of the cadaver, letting bits run from the gaping hole before ripping what his soul desired, and once again biting deep into the strong flesh of the heart as though it were a golden red apple. His lips wrapped around it in warm embrace as his teeth pierced it before, the still warm flesh slipping down his gullet before he turned to the side and plunged this heart too into the fire with his other hand.
Reaching for the sky in celebration, all the Clark’s cheered their victory and their zealous dispatch of the prisoners. The bodies were cut down and burned, fueling the bright tongues.

A Taste of Chapter 3...

Chapter Three: Teachings

“Rocks will not be there for you every time. There will always be blows that you cannot dodge, and weapons that will break you like the surf against the shore.” The man preached openly as Learner followed. The young boy looked on, listened and paid careful attention. Always during the lessons he listened. Any other time he was free to ponder his own thoughts and wander with a blank expression, but when the old man taught a lesson he kept the boy’s attention with slow blows that a ready mind could easily dodge.
Lessons were tiring, physically and mentally. But the boy kept up with them, though every so often he caught a blow to the arm or to the ribs or in the back from a slow dodge. The old man never hit hard enough to hurt much, but the failures stung, in more ways than one. Learner wanted to succeed. He had taken after several days to calling the old man Teacher, and to hunting food for the both of them.
“You will need a proper weapon. Something with which you will be the shore against which the weapons of others will shatter against. For now though, you should find a stick. You will find your lessons less painful with one at hand.”
     Learner searched each night as he hunted. But found no weapon. For now his lessons would remain painful. But his skin toughened, and his pace quickened, and Teacher had to strike harder to make his mistakes felt, and faster to land them on Learner’s skin.
     Some days later, the pair were walking along when Teacher lashed out a fierce blow that Learner ducked, and rounded the stick, twisting his wrist giving it a second chance to land with half the strength, which Learner caught full on his forearm, flinching and falling to the ground, a great pain running through it. Teacher offered his hand to help his apprentice up.
     “I thought I told you to acquire a stick.”
     “I couldn’t find one. Suppose the wind wills me to learn without one.”
     Teacher turned and walked on, saying, “Then the wind wills you pain.”
     “Pain is the forge against which the mightiest warriors are fo-“
     A blow interrupted the retort as fast as lightning to the temple, though fast it was less powerful than the previous strike. Learner fell to the ground again and this time the old man did not offer his hand.
     “Mighty warriors die young, and do little with their short lives. It is the skilled, the quick, and the smart ones who change the world. A mighty warrior may be a rock, but I promise if you smash it against enough things it will crack and crumble and wear down to dust. Even the mountains are not immortal, only long lived because of their girth.”
     

A New Chapter

Chapter Two: A Dying Breathe

     Rebellious Child of Fear clutched his shield tight as he braced himself loosely for the blow he knew would strike hard enough to lift him off the ground as though he were only a pebble in its path.  He was not disappointed by the strike that came his arms shuddered despite their looseness and his body seemed to lose all its weight as the soles of his feet separated from the ground with a remarkable quickness. His shield smashed into his chest, the hammer behind it carrying him off and slinging him with ease into the far wall of the large room, knocking a table behind him and sending it spinning away before his shoulders struck the wall, which was, curiously, strong enough to withstand his crash.
     “Abba’Lien, I will tear your name off your back!”
     The giant rushed the wall, each crashing step resounding with metallic ring. The Abba’Lien’s vision blurred red around the edges and flickered with spots as he dropped to the ground and rolled to the left, stumbling as he stood up again backing away. He had been hit hard and did not feel that there was any length of time long enough to recover from that blow. His right arm felt separated from his shoulder and the pain was unbearable. The wall did not stand up so well against the hammer, though still better than the Child had, a spider web of cracks spread outward from behind where he had been standing a second before the sledge struck full force. Running had failed, and had been an unfitting resolution in the first place for the man who rebelled against all fear.
     No retort came from his lips as he continued to weave and roll, his whole body shuddering with pain and threatening unconsciousness with every pressure connecting against his bad shoulder. The next two blows followed through the spaces he had left with great haste, striking tables and shattering them even as flew away; toppling other identical tables out of their way as they did.
The Abba’Lien was backed against the cylindrical room build in the center of the cavernous space and nimbly rolled over the countertop at the edge of it, pulling down behind him a steel sliding door, closing the window as he moved through. It was bent inward tearing and contorting itself out of its socket before he even hit the floor. His vision left him and he screamed as he clutched at his shoulder. Like the youngest child he choked for breathe and tears poured from his eyes. He kicked backward pushing away from the counter as the enraged warrior smashed down his hammer, ripping the counter from the floor and shattering the bricks that supported it.
Rolling away onto his good arm and regaining what little energy he could, Child kicked up to his feet and ran through the tunnel of the tiny enclosed space, finding a door and running through, slamming it shut behind him.
His pursuer smashed his way through the wall with little effort. His full body armor shimmered in the dim light of the tiny windows high above. He laughed as he worked feeling stronger with each crashing impact of his weapon against a new wall as he tore through the inner ring, where the Abba’Lien had hidden. Nothing slowed his impossibly strong, and precise strikes.
“Are you ready to die, Abba’Lien?”
A wind from the nearby wall caused his cape of names to billow inward around that terrifying metal casing. It took a minute to clear his way through the cramped room smashing bits out of the way, crashing his hammer into the ceiling and smashing the ventilation pipes to the side, pinching them closed. Counters, stoves, cabinets, steel tables bolted to the ground all ripped like so many flecks of paper as he pushed them aside carefully, savoring his approach and his victim’s helplessness. The air seemed to thicken and smell of victory.
Rebellious Child of Fear looked up, a look of lucidness returning to his face as a rancid stench filled his nostrils. A look of recognition and mischief filled his blood-blinded eyes. He reached into his pouch, not even seeing the hammer swing coming and struck the floor the instant that it broke his body, a single spark flying. It was enough of a spark all the same; as the hammer smashed into his body, breaking him, fire erupted in the room exploding outward and exponentially multiplying the damage the assailant had caused, sending even the heavy suit of armor crashing to the ground outside the cylinder room.
Consciousness faded from the burning body of the Rebellious Child of Fear, and his last breath was filled with the acrid smell of his own smoldering flesh before he passed away. The armored tribesman lay in darkness as the light faded from the room with the setting sun. His cape of names burned away and the armor he wore pierced in many places with debris and in other places glowing red hot and cooking bits of the occupant in his sleep. Injured though he was, he did live, his armor also cooled, and in the darkest of the night, wake and crawl away.

Sand is Beautiful

Chapter 1: Moving Shadows

     As the sun moved across the sky, a few hours past a time once called noon, it came to pass that in the great dessert amid the remains of buildings long since worn away sat a very old man and a very young boy. The occasional roof remained, and the walls stood with ragged edges with the sun shining over them carpeting the ruins with a smattering of shadows. Like the dessert was often doing, the sands of the surrounding area were brushing over the remains, now revealing, and now hiding bits here and there with no rhyme or reason like the waves of an ocean.
     The young boy, with blonde hair that was almost white and tanned a raw dark skin that had a leathery quality almost the shade of the comfortable leggings he wore strapped about his waist with an ornamented belt, turned his bare back to the older man proudly displaying the open circle which was so recently inked upon his flesh that it was still healing.
     “My name’s still empty, “ he said in an almost comical way as he twisted his body in ways that children do so as to both converse and show off all at once.
     “You seem to have hardly had time to earn anything to put inside of it, your name hasn’t even healed.” The old man spoke with a slow deliberate tone that sounded like honey as his face changed with every word, his old lined cheeks stretching for each syllable. His eyes studied thoughtfully from a brow that was always furrowed, offering as much shade for his eyes as it could. A brief gust of wind caught at his robes billowing them a bit around them as he clutched the side where it wrapped around his shoulder. Beneath his robes was barely visible a pair of leggings similar to the boy’s though with a very plain strap and several strips of rawhide about his chest with various pouches tied loosely about them.
     “It can’t be long, though! We Re’nan are proud warriors!” As he spoke he stood up tall, straightening out his body in mimicry of a stance of battle, waving his arms about in a violent fashion.
     “Well then, in that case it certainly can’t be long at all.” The soft-spoken character stepped to the side, moving among the mottled patches of shade till he found a comfortable looking projection to rest on.
     “Why are you hiding your name?”
     “Hiding?”
     “Uh-huh…”
     “What traveler wouldn’t cover his backside from the harshness of the lady guarding the sky during their wandering?”
     “Okay, but I showed you mine!”
     The old man smiled at the youth with understanding.
     “Well then, young warrior of Re’nan, you should not be so free with showing off your name. It is foolish to trade with the expectation of returns that have not been agreed on in advance.” At this his smile twisted a little to the right while a twinkle shimmered from the eye shadowed by left side of his heavy brow.
     The boy responded with a wary but curious look, hardness in his features starting to show though the otherwise childlike mannerisms.
     “You talk funny, and I don’t know what you mean.”
     “Did you tell me that you would only show me your name if I showed you mine?”     “No…”
     “Did you hide your name that I could not see it by the light of the lady a dune away if I had wished?”
     The boyhood returned to the youth as he lowered his head as beast would and shook it, indicating he understood.
     “If you wanted to trade names, you should have asked first. It seems to me that you were more than happy to simply give yours out.”
     The young man stood up on some sandy rubble and began jumping from one tiny dune to the next, sometimes landing on fallen walls showing through the sand, sometimes exposing them with his dancing feet.
     “I know what you mean now, but it still isn’t fair.”
     The man nodded his hairless head affirmatively, though the child was facing away, lost somewhat in his play.