RMWJ Opening Teaser

“Fuck you!”
Enter Ree Adelaide Majors, trainer of exactly forty-seven minutes, brand new owner of a snivy, lover of foul language, possessor of delusions of grandeur, and general ass.
“Sni!”
Enter Mister Snivy Whiplash, her somewhat imaginatively named starter. She would swear up and down she thought he looked like the villain from her favorite old cartoon. He simply went with it because it made him feel fanciful.
These are the creations of a twisted world, fighting against time and fate and that very same world to achieve eight shiny, senseless little gems. Their goal is not unique, and is in fact shared by most of the training population of Unova—those bright-eyed, idealistic young children, the future of the region. What sets these characters apart is their journey, their strenuous, teary, joyful, heavy, lighthearted, and fantastic journey. It will have ups, it will have downs, it will shed blood, it will shed tears, and very possibly, it will touch your heart.
So, submitted for your consideration, this is

Ree Majors' Wonderful Journey

Why yes, I do want to have Rod Serling's children, why do you ask?

a wolf with an apple in one hand "are you what's fallen down?" he asks

So I'm still gonna do the character stuffs for WHIPLASH!, rest assured, but I just wanted to drop in to say that I haven't actually really started on writing such things. XD; If any of you have read that book, you know that there's a TON of character exercises in it. It's sort of a project to take on and I haven't had the time yet to sit down and go through it...

Anyway, I am working on The Ram again! Rejoice! So far, too, it's been fun and a half. Here's an excerpt because I love this sort of thing.

And then there was that niggling little voice in the back of his mind that reminded him too strongly of the Owl, telling him not to do that, that he'd regret it in the future.
The Ram selected a dagger and pulled it out of its leather sheath, examining it in the half-light. He caught the Rook looking at it, too, and smiled for the first time. He held it up by the blade between two fingers. “Like it?” he asked politely. As if they were discussing the weather or a fresh kill. The Rook snorted in response and dropped his scowl.
The dagger was suddenly buried in his eye.
The Rook screamed and flapped his wings in vain, arms struggling against his bindings, leaping to his feet and knocking over his chair in the process. The Ram watched him in amusement. He walked over and ignored the screeching, delicately pinning the Rook against the wall as if he weren't fighting with all his strength.
He pulled the knife out and wiped it on the Rook's leg. The Rook snarled something garbled and tried to turn against him, but the Ram kept him pinned with one hand. “You'll regret this!” he said hoarsely, chest heaving, wings still struggling in vain.
The Ram chuckled. “My dear Rook, I've regretted the day I met you for some time now.”
“Yeah, well—fuck you.”
“You'd like that, wouldn't you,” he replied thinly, letting the other go. The Rook sagged to the floor, wings immediately curling tightly around him. “If you want to play defensive, I could simply break through those precious little feathery twigs—” He hadn't finished the threat before the Rook was shielding his wings with his body, keeping them folded protectively behind him, glaring up at the Ram with his one good eye. The other was a mess of blood and flesh and who knew what else. The Ram couldn't help but laugh at the sight of it.

EDITEDITEDIT:

Apparently this is my 100th post! /joy and happiness abound

so kiss me goodbye honey i'm gonna make it out alive

So I'm (finally) working on the newest chapter of WHIPLASH!, and goddamn, this shit's depressing. Not in the fact that it'll bring tears or anything, or it probably won't even sound all that depressing when read because it reads pretty quick and doesn't dwell (unlike actual tear-jerkers), but still. imagine this.

I decided to open up with some Lenore goodness. Because really, she doesn't get enough writing time yet. This'll change once the plot picks up, but as of now, she's pretty side-character-ish.

So we get major posttraumatic stress disorder and a good glimpse of what she goes through on a nearly daily basis.

“Nora, wake up.”
Flashes of memories, bits and pieces, frames of smiles, of kisses, of tears, were in her mind’s eye before she could stop it. Lenore screwed her eyes shut tighter and dragged her arms down to her stomach with a sleepy groan. Allen’s snoring jarred her completely out of her slumber. Lenore opened her eyes, unsurprised to find that Thomas wasn’t beaming down at her with his usual wakeup.
He never was.
She shut her eyes again and pushed herself up onto her elbows. It wasn’t even light out yet, but she knew she wouldn’t be getting any more sleep. It was happening more and more often, too, she noted with no small amount of irritation.
Lenore ran her fingers over the nivedidus on her arm, contrasting the smoothness to that of her skin. It may as well be part of her skin, but even after years of service, it felt so alien. Especially in the real world, out of the wastes. She looked over at Allen, still snoring quite loudly, and couldn't help a small smile. She silently got up, untied her hair, and knelt down beside his bed. “Allen,” she whispered as softly as her voice would allow, although he immediately cracked an eye open, “I'm going to go take the shower first. Go back to sleep.”
“What time is it...?” he whispered back, settling back into his pillow with a sigh.
“Early. Go back to sleep.”
He didn't need to be told again. He was snoring once more by the time she had the water running. Lenore moved her long hair behind her shoulders and tried to concentrate on the shower, she really did. All that came to mind, however, was Thomas. She could practically hear him complaining about her taking too long in the bathroom. Lenore shook her head, biting her lip, trying to stop the tears. It was much too early in the morning for such things.
“Thomas, I miss you.”
The scalding water didn't answer her. Lenore slowly sunk down to the floor, nudged the drain shut, and let the water and her hair flow around her until she stopped crying.

That's right. She actually, canonly wakes up every morning to "Nora, wake up" as her mental alarm clock. If she lets it happen, she would completely zone out and get lost in memories. Also, the stomach thing - in case people had forgotten, she was pregnant in the prologue. If she ever wraps her arms around her stomach, it's either damn cold or she's trying not to dwell.

And then, surprisingly, we get a dose of helpless angst from Nathan of all people. Imagine this one: You're nineteen, twenty in a couple months. Almost fresh out of school. Oh, you've had training. Graduated (nearly) top of the class and whatnot. Feeling pretty cocky about everything. Sure, the first mission was a bit of a surprise, but everyone came out more or less okay. At least on their team.

Then this mission. (Minor spoilers, but it's implied in the end of the last chapter and it's in the beginning of this one, so...) You meet this family. Adorable kids, beautiful wife. Cue monster the second you leave them alone for five minutes. You come back, manage to kill the thing, only to find one child mercilessly and literally ripped to pieces, the mother dead, the father wounded and breaking down, and the other kids and your goddamn Inven missing. You have two dead bodies and a dead monster lying at your feet and a man sobbing over it all and your literal link to life is hiding somewhere. It's dark out, the smell of blood and death hangs in the air, and your heart is about to explode. What do you do in this situation. Do you go out looking and leave the man alone? Do you lead children back to where their sister and mother are brutally murdered and still laying in their own guts and blood? Do you dare hope there aren't any more creatures roaming the wastes around you this very second?

The Lannish man took all of two steps before collapsing to his knees. Nathan started forward—only to be halted when he heard a sob.
I... I don't know what to do. He had never felt so helpless before. Training didn't prepare him for this. It didn't teach him to shoot monsters or what to do with attacks or how to comfort a man who had just lost a wife and child. Nathan looked, almost unwillingly, at Seraphine and the other body. It—she—was one of the girls. He wished desperately he could have remembered her name.

I think helplessness is one of the worst feelings in fiction, but when conveyed properly, is worse than almost everything else. It's incredibly powerful. Nathan has NO IDEA what to do, regardless of his class rank, regardless of his gun, regardless of his training, regardless of everything. He's just thrown into this and wasn't prepared in the least.

(I'm also reminded tragically of an episode of Adventure Time. Yes, it's a kid's show (but it's kickass). But in the episode The Jiggler, amongst catchy tunes and goofing around and an adorable little whistling creature they call the Jiggler, they nearly kill it and without anything else to do, the main character (a young boy) starts kissing it. "Why are you doing that?" his partner asks, alarmed. "Because--I don't know what else to do," he replies in the most heartbreaking little voice imaginable. It's short and sweet and that's how these things should be, lest they completely overpower the reader/viewer and break them/the character. A key element of tragedy is the helplessness, but mostly it's implied. When attention is drawn to it, well... Well maybe I'm just tired, I don't know. But I enjoy this.)

i wonder why my heart feels dead inside it feels cold and hard and petrified

OH MY GOD GUYS I JUST REACHED 50k. Admittedly, I was sitting at 49k for the past three days, but hey, life gets in the way sometimes. STILL. GREEN BAR. GONNA GET PURPLE ONCE I'M DONE WITH THIS PASSAGE.

Here's the last paragraph I wrote:

Oh my God—Stephen. With that, her train of thought finally derailed. He had been poking and prodding at her the entire time she’d known him for this sort of thing, although admittedly because he thought she was still seeing them as hallucinations. If he found out that the Rabbit was more or less real, he would immediately become suspicious of the rest. Even more so because she had never mentioned it to him before. And with his overactive imagination…

quand il se penche quand il se penche mes nuits sont blanches et pour toujours

So Pedestal passed DK as my most favorited (by a fair amount, too, hmm...) but I still have no idea what to do for it. D: HELP GAIZ.

And I had twenty minutes free time in French, so I outlined the next arc or two in WHIPLASH!. Which is good, since, you know, I have no idea where that story is going. I almost miss(?) writing blind. |D

So here's a WHIPLASH! excerpt (I would use a Pedestal one, but the next chapter is going up later today, so I figure it would be redundant).

“What was that about?” Allen asked cluelessly.
“There will always be things between a Tego and Inven that simply will not be understood by any other pair,” Lenore replied, tone curt. He bowed his head, cowed, and didn’t reply. She sat down in the chair Sonya had claimed before, crossed her legs, and folded her hands neatly in her lap. “I’m going to talk to you boys about a few things now.”
“Is it really the best time?” Nathan inquired, eyes narrowed.
“Sonya’s asleep and I have you both as a captive audience. I see no better time,” she said with a beam.
“In that case, by all means, continue.”
“Nathan,” Allen scolded. Nathan only shrugged, coughed, and turned back to Lenore.
“Right now, Allen and I have been stealing a lot of the attention,” she started right in. Nathan huffed and crossed his arms. “It’s true. You and Sonya wouldn’t have even appeared on Leland’s radar for another couple of months, save for the fact that you brought in the little Lannish boy. This is both a blessing and a curse for you two. Emil now serves as Leland’s new distraction, but you two are now known to him.”
“Why are you saying this?”
“Because Leland Aminov is not someone you want to get too comfortable with. Especially Sonya,” Lenore surmised grimly. “Eventually, he will either try to recruit her for one of his special projects, or you could luck out and be too important to the Tego half for him to interfere much. I hope that is your case.”
“It will be his case,” Allen broke in with a look down at his friend, “Nathan and Sara Grace are the favorites. They’re both safe.”
“Leland is gaining more power over this project. The Inven are what drive this effort—let’s not try and pretend it’s any different. Without us, you would simply be fodder on the front lines.”
“Lenore!” Nathan snapped, sitting up with a glower. She glared right back at him. Allen pushed Nathan back down and turned to give his Inven a look that told her to plainly back off as well. Not that she noticed or respected it.
“I’m trying to give you a warning, Nathan Loar. I have years of experience on you and I’ve seen the darker side of this war.”
“It’s a war. It’s all dark. And if you badmouth our soldiers one more time—”
“Nathan, kindly shut up.” Lenore pinched the bridge of her nose, head tilted away from him. “You can be patriotic later. I’m only giving you this warning because you are a friend of Allen’s, but if you’re not going to take me seriously, then I’ll stop here and let you die out there.”
“Lenore, he doesn’t—well, you both don’t—Lenore, be nice. Nathan, listen to her.” Allen had to physically keep Nathan pinned to the couch.
“You’re on her side?” he asked, falling back with a betrayed look.
“She’s my Inven, and in this case, she’s right,” he admitted, though he couldn’t meet his friend’s eye. Allen fidgeted nervously and looked at Lenore. “I… I’ve seen the front lines. They’re not pretty, Nathan. I haven’t seen a Prissy yet or any of the monsters, or found any dead refugees, or what have you, but I’ve seen Sovinian soldiers get shot up and killed, and we had to bring them back. I’ve seen Aminov argue with Lenore, try to push his research forward through intimidation and enticement.”
“That reminds me. If you see a Prissy, for the sake of anything you hold precious or holy, run,” Lenore interrupted briskly. Nathan coughed again but didn’t say anything in argument. “I don’t care if you want to try to be a hero. You can play hero all you’d like with the regulars and Paronese and soldiers.”
“What are Prissies?” Nathan deadpanned.
“It’s slang for Pristines. They’re those monstrous things you’ll see out in the wastes, except they still look human. They won’t be broken or bloody or hurt. They’ll look, well, pristine. And that’s why you have to run like hell,” she explained, ducking her head so her hair covered her eyes. “They stayed clean and whole for a reason—because they’re dangerous. I’ve only seen one myself once before and it ripped apart three soldiers, two Tego, and an Inven before someone managed to stop it. So if you see one, run. I‘d like to avoid as many funerals as possible in the near future.”

no dawn no day i'm always in this twilight in the shadow of your heart

The boy was pinned up against the wall before he could finish. Nick held him with one hand at his throat, the other reaching down to where Byron’s shovel was leaning against the wall. He picked it up and held the flat side against the boy’s cheek. “Do you know what this is?”

“B-Byron’s shovel?”

“Yes. It is. He’s hit me twice with it. He also nearly knocked out Chase when we challenged him. Byron was very animated with this shovel of his. And you know what?”

“What…?” the boy squeaked.

“He will never be able to do that again, will he? Byron will never be able to lift his shovel again and smack sense into younger trainers. He won’t be able to hand out badges. He won’t be able to give advice on continuing on with a training journey. He won’t be able to admire the up-and-coming young trainers. He won’t be able to challenge the next generation. He won’t be able to test trainers to see if they deserve their Pokemon. Are you seeing what I’m getting at here?”

The boy only stared at him, eyes rolling in terror.

“You, who are using Pokemon to bully others—no, it’s not even that tame anymore is it?! You are all using your own Pokemon to kill others! Do you know how stupid that is?! You don’t do that! You don’t have the right to pass judgment on anyone! You are the ones who don’t deserve the Pokemon that follow you!” Nick roared, dropping the boy and turning to the room. He swung Byron’s shovel against the nearest window, shattering it. Glass rained over the fallen Gym leader’s body. “You all claim to be my followers, right?! So you should know what’s coming next!”

Nick grinned at them all, arms spread, waiting for someone to answer him. The other two trainers in the room didn’t dare speak, and the Pokemon cowered before him. Nick stomped over to them, still swinging the shovel beside him, and beamed at them all.

“You don’t deserve these Pokemon, so that’s why I’m going to take them away from you! Chase, Flamethrower.”

He didn’t kill anyone himself until he found the burning warehouse with thousands of lives trapped inside and two starry-eyed girls responsible for it. For the first time, it wasn’t his Pokemon doing the dirty work; Nick still had Byron’s shovel, and was beating their faces in until the blood soaked the ground around them. They deserved it. They deserved it so much and so much more for doing what they were doing. They were killing not only innocents, but all in the name of their twisted judgment call on all of Sinnoh. They were trying to imitate him and decide who deserved what—so he just gave them a hand with a shovel and a parting Flamethrower just to make sure they got the message.

So what if he was screaming at them, too. “You don’t do that! You don’t attack other trainers, you’re stupid for trying to follow me! You’re as bad as I am! Why are you doing this?! Why did you try this? Why, why?!”

-------THIS IS A BREAK-------

“Is he always this shy?” Lenore asked, still trying to coax Emil toward her.

“Oh yes. Terribly timid. Though he’s got a nasty streak if—”

“Bevriedera ors,” Emil said with a fierce pout.

Aminov sighed. “If you happen to be from northern Lanne. And I know that you’re not, but with the dark hair and eyes, you could pass for it.”

“Technically I’m a quarter Lannish. On my mother’s side.” Lenore straightened up and smoothed out her dress, looking severely put-out. “Still, what has that have to do with anything? What did he say?” Allen had been wondering exactly the same thing.

“I’m currently teaching him more of our language. He knows the basics, and he’s picking it up quickly, but these daily meetings with him are still a bit of a pet project of mine. He’s the only southerner we have right now in the program, and I haven’t spoken to one in years, anyway…” he trailed off wistfully.

“…He’s in the Inven project?” Lenore asked brightly. Allen rolled his eyes. And just like that, child-loving Lenore was back.

“Yes. Actually, the accelerated program. Within a year, he should be out in the field on his own. I hope to use him as a key to further missions and negotiations with the southern half of Lanne,” Aminov explained, patting the boy on the head. Emil flushed at the attention and ducked out of it rather hastily. He completely scooted around the scientist in an effort to further evade Lenore—though eventually she got fed up and chased after him, much to Aminov’s amusement. By the time Emil figured out he was being pursued, she had caught up and had her arms around him, picked him up, and carried him rather awkwardly back towards Allen. He was reminded very strongly of a child with a puppy. Complete with pathetic whining and squirming.

“So a little Lannish Inven. Look at his hair, though…” she crooned, setting him back on the floor—though not allowing the poor boy to escape her grasp—and ran her fingers through his wavy hair. “Look, Allen. It’s even paler than yours is.”

“Doesn’t mean I’m Lannish, though I always thought they had dark hair and eyes. Like you or Maria,” Allen replied, eyeing Emil with equal parts curiosity and pity. The boy looked ready to burst into flames, judging by the redness of his face. “So, he looks new. He acts new. Who brought him in?”

“B-Be-Bevridera ors,” Emil stammered, repeating the same odd phrase as before. It didn’t elicit any sort of response from Lenore, however, much to his obvious confusion and irritation.

“One of the new pairs. Actually, a Tego from your graduating class, unless I’m gravely mistaken,” Aminov said, chin in hand. Lenore and Allen exchanged a look. Allen, for his part, figured it was one of two people. “Loar, I believe his name was. Your age, with orange hair and brown eyes. He also had this spicy little Inven with silver and brown hair, oh, and glasses. Do you know them? I think they mentioned you…”

“Yeah, we know them,” Allen replied with a sigh. Nathan had been his first guess, anyway. It wasn’t as if he expected anything less. “Nathan Loar and Sonya Karahalios.”

“They’re good friends of ours,” Lenore added, still petting Emil.

He perked up at the name, however. “Shachelle? Capelleau halon, beli oei lilietta na?” he asked, gesturing vaguely. Allen literally felt the words fly over his head once more. Thankfully, risking an embarrassed glance to the side, he found that his Inven was in the same boat; she stared down at the child in her arms blankly, as if he had just spoken another language—oh wait.

you don't know me you don't know me at all

snohshine (9:52:24 PM): “Day, darling, I know you don’t have a cell, and it’s great because it means I never have to worry about you texting or calling anyone during your work. And I know you’re a big shot author and your book is selling well and that’s great. But tell that goddamn James of yours that if he calls this number looking for you once more time I’ll chop his balls off, okay?”
snohshine (9:52:27 PM): This makes me happy.
tomigewithlove (9:52:51 PM): ...what.
snohshine (9:53:12 PM): .w. I've been looking forward to introducing this character for ages and that turned out to be her first line.
snohshine (9:53:28 PM): And any character that introduces herself into the story threatening to chop someone's balls off is a winner.

And here Tuesday's boss in The Ram rears her ugly head. Metaphorically, of course. I imagine her to be pretty in a really aggressive way, actually. Still, I'm exciting. (I'm also almost done with chapter two, woo~ then after that I'm back to WHIPLASH! for awhile.)

close your eyes clear your heart cut the cord are we human or are we dancer

Finally, finally made some more progress on WHIPLASH!. Got about a page, but more importantly, I got past the stuck part. XD; Thank god for Sonya's... personality.

“You’re so cool.”
He nearly choked on his breath. Recovering, he looked away and covered his mouth with his hand, feigning another drag. She had been rather quiet on the mission up until that point—no, she had been calming down in general. “What brought this up again?” he asked carefully, blowing smoke at her across the fire.
She giggled girlishly (never a good sign) and smiled at him. “I can’t help it. Just seeing you like this. I mean, I know smoking is terrible for your health and everything, but you look so much like a bad boy when you do it. It’s highly attractive. Nathan, have you ever had a girlfriend before?” The smile dimmed enough for him to notice.
Still, after a brief internal debate, he decided honesty was the best policy. “Of course I have. Why do you ask?” As if he couldn’t guess.
“Oh… Then I guess you’ve already had your first kiss, huh.” She didn’t have to sound so disappointed about it.
“Sonya, if you were my age, would you expect anything less?”
“No, but—I guess I hadn’t been expecting much, anyway.” She gave up with a defeated sigh. “It’s just—I haven’t!”
He couldn’t help but smile at the sheer outrage in her voice. “This is a problem for you?” He really shouldn’t be teasing her, but he was only human. At least he was humoring her.
“Yes! Don’t—Don’t laugh, Nathan!”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Y-Yes you were! You’re so mean! I’m a girl, okay, and we think about these things! These things are important to us!” she snapped, her cheeks a very bright red. He held up his hands in surrender.

(I also doodled a little comic last night that has me terrorizing Sonya & Nathan in mid-this-scene.)

Anyway, here's some fun facts:
+Nathan and Sara Grace both use .45 semiautomatic pistols as their weapon of choice. No one is sure who started it and who copied who, but of course both of them will fervently exclaim that they were the first and the other is copying.
+Maria is the only female Tego in their year to have been properly sniper trained. Sara Grace went for .45 training, and Talli Johnson took on .22 rifle training as a bet and fell in love with the gun after that. She went in for some sniper training with it, but it wasn't her forte.
+Sonya is one of the youngest in her class. She turned twelve only about a month before meeting Nathan.
+Lenore, unlike most (okay, basically all) other Inven, has had combat training. She is skilled with a hunting knife (long story, and she will never tell you it on pain of death), a Kyymese style of fighting, and due to circumstances repeating themselves far too many times, she's unofficially trained in using her previous Tego's gun.

and i can't fake it the way i could before i hate you but i love you i can't stop thinking of you it's true i'm stuck on you

“Looking for someone?” Vaikuntha asked curiously.
“Yeah, my parents… And Hanna and Jude and Cossette. They’re here somewhere…”
“Even if you cannot see them, I am sure they are cheering with all their might for you, brother.”
“You mean for us. We’re a team now. Even more now, I mean.”
“Ah… Yes, that is right! I have people cheering for me, too.” He smiled happily to himself, pleased with this. I frowned thoughtfully at him. I knew his parents weren’t here, and he hadn’t introduced me to any other visitors (I had introduced him to Jude and Cossette), so maybe he didn’t have anyone here for him…
I set my mouth in a firm line and said, “Yeah, Vai. You have people cheering for you, too. You’re now an honorary part of Team Awesome, yeah?”

You know Vai totally teared up and had a really shoujo-manga-ish moment with a smile and everything. YOU KNOW IT.

And Nathan waxes philosophical:

“…It’s quiet,” Sonya said, straddling the empty windowsill. She stared out at the downpour. Nathan leaned against it, arms crossed against the slight chill the rain had created. It seemed as if the world was painted in nothing but shades of grey. But even with the dull roar of the rain, it was true. It was quiet out. Silent, once you learned to tune out the rain. “I wonder… I wonder what this place was like when it was still alive. When there were still people living here. D’you think someone sat here, right here, and stared out at the rain like I am now?”
Statistically speaking, it had probably happened. Nathan exhaled and leaned down onto the bottom of the sill, and said instead, “Doesn’t it make you feel better to think that you are the only person to have ever done it?”
Sonya turned to him, surprise written across her face. She relaxed into a smile, though, and soon turned back to the rain. “Yeah, I guess so. It’s more fun to be unique.”
“It is, but it’s also sort of lonely.”
“Is what why you’re here with me?”
“Yeah. I guess it is.”