Worth 50,000: Day Six - Everybody Scream!

[momebie]

I don't know what to say right now. It might be because it's 1am (for the second time) as of the writing of this. It might be because it's been a long weekend of frantically typing and cackling like a loon and saying inappropriate things with people who don't mind all that much. Or it could be a little of both. I think mostly I'm just coming to the end of this first, beautiful week of Nano and the crazy is starting to set in. It starts off slow at the beginning of the month with everyone pulling out the 10,002 words they need by the end of Sunday night and then feeling pretty good about it. I mean, I've made some pretty cool breakthroughs with characters and uncovered some contention and layers I didn't previously know were there. But as it goes on we realize what a daunting task it's all become and start to doubt ourselves. It's that doubt that will do us in.

Just don't think about it now. Throw it away. Think about the light at the end of the tunnel and push on through. What could it be?



Write. Comment. Repeat.

Comments

[pocky_slash.livejournal.com]

ARGH ANOTHER TRAIN! :;shakes fist:: I USED UP ALL MY TRAIN THOUGHTS ON THE LAST TRAIN ONE. DAMN YOU, KL.

(By which I mean, I love you and thank for you doing this ♥ ;D)

[pocky_slash.livejournal.com]

"You're crazy," Charles says. His voice wobbles more than he'd like and the way he literally digs his heels into the chipped concrete would be comical if he wasn't so terrified. "Erik, we can't. It's suicide."

"It's the fastest way around the pile up," Erik says. "You want to get to your sister, don't you?"

Charles curls his fingers around Erik's wrist, nails biting into his skin nearly hard enough to bleed. He's cautious of that, though, careful. There's a possibility that blood attracts the creatures, and just a trickle would have them swarmed. He can't bear to think of that happening to Erik, even though it's likely to happen anyway if they try to get past the destruction in midtown using the tunnels.

"Erik," he pleads again and he can make Erik stop, but he swore he wouldn't and with the world quickly falling into chaos, he finds himself clinging to his personal morality almost violently. The world may be lawless, but that doesn't mean he can't have his own personal laws.

Erik stops walking, stops pulling Charles along after him, and turns around abruptly. He takes Charles by the shoulders hard enough to bruise.

"Do you want to find your sister?" he asks. His eyes are sharp and cool and focused, but Charles can still feel the fear and despair rolling off of him. And yes, Charles does want to find his sister, need to make sure that Raven is okay, needs to assure himself that she hasn't been harmed. Because while the x-gene seems to leave mutants immune to the disease that's morphing humanity into these creatures, that doesn't mean they can't be torn apart, gutted, feasted upon. He's seen it, and though he can take it away from Erik if he wishes (he doesn't) the way he took it away from Sean and Hank, he'll never be able to unsee it himself.

"People who go into the tunnels don't come out," Charles whispers. Because that's how it started. Of course it is, in New York City with so many people stuck underground where it's hot and slow and crowded, of course someone snapped on the subway. The tunnels had been full of the creatures long before they started venturing above ground.

"Humans, you mean," Erik says. "We're better than that. It's eight blocks.We'll walk quickly and quietly. You can track them--remotely." Charles winces. He's been inside the mind of a creature only once. He was unconscious for eight hours, after, left with no memory and a sharp pain when he tries to access the missing time. He's not about to argue with his brain's own defense mechanisms. "We're in a tunnel made of metal. I can protect us. I wouldn't let anything harm you." As if he'd have a choice. "Charles, we're wasting time."

They are. So much precious time. The rumors Charles has been able to pick up from reading city officials point to all access points to Manhattan and the outer boroughs being closed off within forty-eight hours. The rush of creatures coming up from the sewers in Times Square are likely to advance that timeline. They need to get Raven and Alex and Armando and get out of the city as soon as they can manage, meet Sean and Hank and Moira at the house in Westchester. They don't have time to dawdle.

Charles glances once more at the daylight streaming down from the stairs up to the street and swallows down the last of his fear, holds it tight in his stomach where it won't stop him from taking Erik's hand and nodding and following him, closely, quietly, desperately, into the dark.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Oh, damn. Nice work.

still not nano!

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

I am so glad your retreat went well!

Charlie's point man this time, so he'd been waiting for us, sitting cross-legged in the tunnel. "All clear, so far," he said.

That's something.

I'm the designated pusher for Aron's chair -- us gimps have to stick together, I guess, and to be fair it helps me rest my good leg -- so I stay behind Frankie. It's tedious, and my leg hurts early on and keeps hurting. Another half-mile and the leg that isn't there any more starts hurting too.

I can hear Alice and Ray behind us, their steps steady. A little parade at the end of the world. We can just make out some of the murals in the dim light of the torches; they seem surreal. There's some graffiti, but I can't read it. Probably not missing anything.

I do catch doomed in glittery spraypaint. Great.