Spiral of Atlantis ~ Elycien's NaNoWriMo

[Elcie]

So. This is where all my planning will go, once I have some. ^_^

Character Designs

Neri Telsar

Character Names
Stormslight
-Quinn Telsar
-Neri Telsar
-Nashura
-Kirin
-Shensel
-Aster

The Spiral
-Xenec
Before: ?
After: Time
-Era
Before: electronics power/manipulation
After: electric energy
-Thaelis
Before: repairing
After: healing/timesight
-Tanal
Before:
After:
-Caline
Before: data manipulation
After: memories
-Evrin
Before: programming, etc - hacking?
After: telepathy/telekinesis
-Aurelie
Before: building/invention
After: transmutation/advanced telekinesis (think FMA alchemy)

Chronos
-Kairos
-Kaos
-Kalare

Other
-Shigo Tillas
-Shon Mirek
-Lyra
-Maria

Plot Points
CHRONOS:
-some memory loss/fuzziness (?)
-never gained access to the engines
-have no machine abilities
---> could not recreate the engines
Spiral: has Thaelis/Evrin?. He was able to determine the purposes of the engines.

[puffydude]

You have a plot already? Aw, man...

Nice title, though, it sounds intriguing.

[Ginz ❤]

Ooh, cool character, Elcie =D The things you've plan for your NaNo look interesting!
Are you gonna make your siggy banner link to this thread? ^^

[Elcie]

imogenweasley said:

Ooh, cool character, Elcie =D The things you've plan for your NaNo look interesting!
Are you gonna make your siggy banner link to this thread? ^^

Yes :3

Now you all know what my banner is referring to... sort of... ^__^

[Elcie]

T_T I feel dumb now, I just realized I had a typo in my title. ^_^;;;;

[Ginz ❤]

elycien said:

T_T I feel dumb now, I just realized I had a typo in my title. ^_^;;;;

If it makes you feel better, I didn't notice. XD;

And wow, those are a lot of characters.

[Elcie]

Without further ado, I present... Elcie's first day of NaNo. :3

I'm not gonna post the entire novel here, but I felt like posting the first 3k or so, just because.

SPOILER: Click to show

“You’re absolutely sure you want to go through with this.”
Neri Telsar looked up from his computer, distracted. He hadn’t seen Quinn enter the room, but now his adoptive father was standing just within the doorway, looking seriously at the black-haired boy.
“We have to. We’ve already been over this, remember? Nashura has determined that much of the data we need is on a closed system… the only way we’re getting at it is to get inside somehow. But our plan is foolproof. I’ll stop the teleportation disrupter that TARO has set up around the building. Kirin will provide my teleporter with enough power to get himself and Nashura inside. She’ll get inside, get the data, and get out. It’ll take half an hour tops.”
“Too many things could go wrong.” Quinn brushed longish, graying brown hair out of his eyes impatiently. “I understand how you feel about this, Neri, but breaking into a government complex is different than hacking into their servers from the outside.”
Neri frowned slightly. “They’re not the government.”
Quinn gave an exasperated sigh. “Come, Neri, you know as well as I do that TARO controls the city. The incident five years ago… proves that.”
“Well, then, that incident is exactly why we need to do this.”
Neri was nothing if not stubborn. Quinn looked him in the eyes. “I know. But this information not worth your lives.”
“Apparently, it was worth theirs,” Neri said shortly, and turned away, continuing to shut down his computer. He stood up then and turned to leave, facing Quinn once more. He gave him a slight smile. “Dad… don’t worry. We’ll be fine. I promise. They’ll never know we were there.”

The flash of light was nearly blinding. Nashura blinked several times as they emerged into the darkness of the TARO building, stars bursting in her vision whenever she blinked. Kirin had fared slightly better. The blonde boy had remembered to shield his eyes when they activated the teleporter.
They took a few moments to look around. Tall, metal cylinders stood nearly filling the dark room, connecting the ceiling and the floor. Nashura was soon satisfied that they had come to the right place; this was definitely one of the rooms that held one of TARO’s private databases. There was no user interface, but Nashura knew exactly how to get around that. She’d come prepared. Pulling her handheld computer from her pocket wrapped in wires, she clipped the wires onto one of the cylinders and turned the small device on.
Kirin knew that all he needed to do now was wait. At fifteen, he was the youngest one of the three of them, and looked even younger than he really was. His behavior did nothing to undermine that assumption, either; he’d always seemed rather immature for his age. But he’d been through more than most fifteen-year-olds. He’d survived the era of Division 9, five years ago, with only twelve-year-old Nashura for a companion. And as Quinn and Neri had found out shortly after taking the two orphans in, he was a brilliant mechanic and engineer.
“Kirin, over here for a second.” Nashura’s tense voice interrupted his voice. He walked over to stand behind the black-haired girl, looking over her shoulder.
“Yes?”
“Hold this.”
Kirin took the proffered wire and stood there, staring off into space. Nashura gave him an irritated look. “Don’t just stand there.”
“What?” he said innocently. “You told me to hold it.”
“You know what I meant!” she snapped. Kirin cringed.
“Fine, fine.” He supposed he should have known better than to tease her; Nashura was short-tempered even at the best of times. The boy closed his eyes and tightened his fingers around the wire, feeling the familiar surge of power as he sent an energy boost through it, enhancing it. He heard Nashura give a small gasp of satisfaction.
“Got it.” Kirin stood and let her do her work; this was her domain now, not his. Fifteen minutes passed in silence; he knew she was transmitting the data they’d won back home to Neri, who would be holding the network open for them.
“Are you done?” Kirin asked her, once he thought it would be safe to speak.
“Yeah,” she said faintly. Her face was paler than normal, and Kirin hoped she hadn’t overdone it. He nodded.
“Stand over here, then, and don’t forget to close your eyes this time.”
There was a bright flash of light, completely illuminating the dark room, and then they were gone.

Morning over Tiral was always beautiful. As the sun rose over the horizon, it began to illuminate the earth below long before it touched the flying city; an observer could look down over glowing clouds and water while the city itself remained in complete darkness. Shigo Tillas loved it. He always made a point of rising shortly before sunrise.
Today he had been able to catch a hovertaxi to work, so he was earlier than usual. The man smiled slightly, pleased with this thought. The headquarters of TARO, the Tiral Aerial Resource Organization, were almost always empty this early. It would be nice to have a chance to slip quietly into his office, have a cup of coffee, and catch up on some work before the work day really began.
He was one of Tiral’s top engineers, and had become famous for his most recent series of inventions. Only a month before he had installed his new models of security equipment in the building. Now TARO security was state-of-the-art. The office building in front of him was not just impressive; it was literally one of the safest buildings on (or above) the Earth.
Shigo walked forward, preparing to enter his pass code into the side of the mirrored glass doors. The atrium wouldn’t be open this early. But today, something was off. Before he reached the key pad, the glass doors slid open automatically to admit him. And there were far too many people in there.
He could already feel his peaceful morning slipping away. Resigned, he entered the building slowly, the glass doors sliding shut behind him. For a few minutes he just stood there, unnoticed in the general hubbub.
Even in the middle of the day it shouldn’t have been this busy, but the atrium was complete chaos. People were running back and forth across the hall, others were pacing and talking furiously on cell phones, and a few guards were standing still, looking impatient and talking occasionally into headsets.
For a few minutes Shigo observed this mayhem while completely ignored. Then a young Hispanic woman spotted him and ran up to him, clutching a clipboard to her chest. “Shigo! You’re here early today. Thank goodness.”
“Good morning, Maria,” he said, still slightly confused. He scratched the back of his neck. “There was less traffic than usual and I caught a hovertaxi down here… what on earth is going on?”
“There was a break-in,” Maria said in a hushed voice that was completely unnecessary, considering the noise. “The alarms didn’t go off or anything… really, if it wasn’t for your new security equipment and Lyra’s software, it would have gone completely undetected. Even the records of the intruders were so subtle that I don’t think anyone but Lyra would have seen the difference.”
Lyra was TARO’s head programmer. Shigo seemed amused. “She would. She’s here already, then?”
Maria nodded. “She sounded the alarm. I think Mirek is disappointed he wasn’t the one to catch them… he and the President are in search of a scapegoat, by the way. I’d keep out of their way for a while if I were you.”
“Thanks for the tip.” Shigo glanced up at the crowded atrium. On the opposite wall from the double doors was a reception desk, now empty and filled instead with three security guards ready to turn away any visitors brave enough to weave their way through the chaotic crowd. The ceiling was vaulted and went high enough to allow a balcony on the second floor. A few interns were leaning over it, watching the activity below with interest.
A large, impressive fountain in the center of the atrium currently was obscuring the row of elevators lining the wall to the right of the reception desk, but Shigo’s gaze fell in that direction anyway. “I think I’ll go up to the fifth floor and talk to Lyra about this. Cover for me for a while, okay?”
Maria nodded. “Right. See you later.” She ran off, slightly awkward in heels and a skirt. Shigo turned to the other direction and fought his way through the crowd. The elevators were all quite crowded; at last he was able to squeeze himself into one that was headed up to the fifth floor.
The elevators all worked with voice recognition now. “Fifth floor,” someone called out, and the doors closed, barely missing someone else’s arm. Shigo stood silently in the corner, listening to the scared talk circulating among the programmers in the crowded elevator. No one seemed to have much of an idea about what was going on; Shigo wondered if someone was purposefully hushing things up. Probably Mirek again.
The doors opened and an impossible number of people flooded out into the hallway, some gasping in relief at their renewed ability to breathe. As they all dispersed throughout the fifth floor, Shigo headed off in a completely different direction, making his way to Lyra’s office.
“Laboratory” really would have been a better word, he thought as he opened the door. Plasma screens lined two of the walls, and keyboard consoles seemed to be everywhere, some with small screens of their own. Lyra was seated in a comfortable swivel chair with well-oiled wheels, sending herself whizzing back and forth along the computer-lined walls as she ran diagnostics on TARO’s most vital systems. It was a room designed for electronics, not people: there was only one extra chair beside Lyra’s, and it was a plain metal stool. Lyra did not usually welcome visitors.
But apparently Shigo was someone she actually wanted to see. When he cleared his throat nervously, not wanting to interrupt her, she whirled around to face him with a somewhat fierce grin on her face. “You’re here! Good, I needed to talk to you. Take a seat.”
Somewhat gingerly, Shigo sat down on the stool. It creaked, unreassuringly. He was never sure that it was actually going to support his weight. Lyra had turned back to her computer system, rolling back and forth as she typed incomprehensible codes into three or four keyboards at once.
“I want you to take a look at this,” she said finally, still typing. “It’s odd. Ah… there we go.”
Several lines of data scrolled onto one of the text-only screens. Shigo leaned forward, and saw that it was access records for one of the databases. He smiled slightly; that had been captured by one of the new security procedures that they had collaborated on.
“Well? Isn’t it weird?” Lyra crossed her arms and watched his face as he scanned the data. As he read, Shigo grew more and more confused.
“That’s…” He blinked several times. “That’s definitely not supposed to happen.” There simply wasn’t enough data there. There was a date and several times, all impossibly late at night and within several minutes of one another, but the user ID was shown only as “Unknown” and there was no record whatsoever of the files accessed. It was almost as if the mysterious hacker had gone back and erased the records that he was ever there… except that Shigo and Lyra had taken every possible precaution to prevent that from happening. Or so they had thought.
“Geez,” Shigo muttered, leaning his head on one hand. “And here I thought we’d gotten carried away with that project. You remember what I said… I thought most of the new measures were superfluous, only put them in at all because we put so much work into them…”
“You thought we’d gotten carried away for no reason.” Lyra sounded, and looked, quite smug. “Well, see? I told you that they’d come in handy.”
“Yeah, yeah.” He turned to look at her. “But you’re sure that…” He indicated the data onscreen. “…is an intruder, not a glitch.”
“Yup. It’s backed up by—” More typing. “—at least four other security checks, maybe five. And here’s the odd thing: it’s all in that one room. Database 4-C. There is no conceivable way they could have broken in there without detection.”
Shigo was still doubtful. “It could have been a glitch with the equipment in that room… it’s quite possible…”
“No,” Lyra snapped, suddenly at the end of her patience. Shigo saw then how strained she really was. “I’ve been running scans on that room all morning. I made sure before I even called the President. And it all checks out. Unfortunately.”
There were bags under her eyes, and her hair was even frizzier than it normally was. Shigo sighed. “How early did you get here?”
“Four. In the morning,” she added hastily in clarification. It said something about her character, Shigo thought with a sigh, that he would have easily believed her even if she had arrived yesterday afternoon.
“Get some sleep already,” he said. “Really, if you’re not feeling well, it won’t help anything. You might make a crucial mistake.”
Her eyes narrowed in his direction. “I do not make mistakes.”
“Everyone makes mistakes when they haven’t had any sleep!” Shigo exclaimed, exasperated. There was really no arguing with her when she was like this. He threw up his hands in defeat. “Fine. Fine. Just remember to get breakfast, will you? The café is probably still open… the workers there have nothing to do with inner TARO, after all.”
They were interrupted by the buzzing of Shigo’s phone. He took it out of his jacket pocket, looked at the caller ID, and winced. He flipped it open anyway. “Shigo Tillas speaking.”
“Tillas, are you at headquarters?” Shon Mirek’s unwelcome voice blared out of the earpiece. Shigo sighed.
“Yes, I’m here. Do you need—”
“President’s office, ten minutes.” Then dial tone. Shigo blinked and shut the phone.
“Well, that was… to the point.”
“Let me guess. The President,” Lyra said, grinning.
“Close. That was Mirek. Apparently the President wants to see me.”
Lyra rolled her eyes. “So why didn’t he call you himself? Idiot.”
Shigo winced. “Can’t you cut back on that sort of comment, just for a little while? From what I’m hearing, he’s in one of his rages this morning.”
“Oh, I know. I’ve seen him.” Lyra’s smile faded. “You’re the one who needs to watch your step. The rumor mill is working overtime today… the name Division 9 seems to be going around.”
He blinked. “That was Naira’s idea, and it’s been dead for five years.”
“I know. But be careful. He might be more popular than Naira was, but I’ve always thought he was just as ruthless.”
“Believe me, surviving the overhaul after Naira’s death wasn’t easy. I’ll be fine.” He smiled reassuringly, rather more confidently than he actually felt, and slipped out the door.

The President’s office was on the top floor, with a wide window behind his desk that overlooked the city. Seated behind a half-circle shaped wooden desk was Thane Trilen, the President of TARO and mayor of Tiral. He watched Shigo enter, looking severe. Shon Mirek, the head of TARO security, stood behind him and looked even more severe, glaring out at Shigo from over Trilen’s shoulder.
“You’re late, Tillas,” Mirek snapped.
Distracted, Trilen waved him into silence. “I wanted to speak with you about this break-in, Agent Tillas.”
“I just arrived, sir,” Shigo said, ignoring the “Agent.” He didn’t like the title anymore – those days were long behind him – but he supposed Trilen must have found the habit hard to break after Shigo resigned from his position as an enforcing agent of TARO in favor of the more peaceful job of engineer. “I don’t know much about the situation. If you’ll speak with Lyra Setell, she’ll tell you…”
“I already have,” Trilen interrupted him. “She already has told me about the data from your security program. What I need to know now is your opinion on this matter… Agent.”
Shigo swallowed hard. Trilen had never really stopped thinking of him as a spy. “Sir, please. That’s all in the past. My only part in this is as the engineer of the security equipment that detected the intruders.”
“Really, now.” Trilen leaned back, folding his hands in front of him. “You’re telling me you haven’t had any thoughts, any theories at all? I find that difficult to believe. You were one of the best, Tillas.”
There actually was something, but Shigo wasn’t sure how relevant it was. Nonetheless, he needed to tell them something. “Well… I have been following the case of some computer hackers who have digitally broken into TARO databases worldwide. There’s not much substantial information… I just thought it was an intriguing case. Some of their feats nearly defy reality.”
“Is it possible that these hackers and our intruders are after the same data?”
“Possible. Impossible to tell. Whoever these people are, none of them have left any records of what they were after. I believe there may be dozens, even hundreds more cases that went undetected.”
“Stormslight,” Trilen murmured, almost to himself. Shigo felt a chill from the spine. This was like a ghost from his past.
“Sir, the last surviving members of Stormslight died years ago,” he told the president quietly. “The organization was nearly destroyed by the time Division 9 was instituted anyway. Many of them split up in the years following the Atlantis Project disaster, seventeen years ago.”
“But how do we know that?” Trilen said. “They probably had many more undercover operatives than we ever knew about.”
“I don’t think so.” Shigo’s voice was suddenly terse. He didn’t want to talk about this anymore. But Trilen continued to press him.
“This could pose a serious threat to our operations,” Trilen said. “So I have considered reopening Division 9.”
“What… no! You can’t do that!” Shigo leaned forward in alarm, all pretense of respect lost in sudden panic. “You – for heaven’s sake, Trilen, you know what happened to Naira! It was a disaster. If you hadn’t stepped in…”
“Don’t worry. It won’t be like last time,” Trilen said. “But I want you to up security. If something like this is detected again… I will expect you to return to your previous position.”
Shigo clenched his fist furiously, and then relaxed it. “Fine,” he spat. He could sense that now was not the time to argue with Trilen. And it wasn’t as if he was going to bring back Division 9 until there was a repeat occurrence… there was still time to change his mind.
Trilen smiled in a satisfied manner. “Excellent,” he said. “Report back to me if there’s any news.”
Shigo nodded curtly and then left, feeling acutely uncomfortable under Mirek’s gaze. That man was planning something, and he didn’t like it.

... I like Shigo, Lyra, and Maria too much. ^_^; They're not even very major characters, but I don't care.

[Elcie]

SPOILER: Click to show

“So I had this great idea,” Elcie said.
The interns were back in their usual spot, overlooking the balcony. “What?” Xivvy said, doodling in the dust that coated the railing.
“Do you remember Enesqu from psychology class?” she said.
Xivvy’s eyes widened. “Oh, yeah! I remember now, you two were friends, right? She had a few other classes with you too… Man, she was hilarious, even though she was pretty weird… Why do you ask?”
“Well, I had this thought,” said Elcie, a crafty grin on her face. “Why not invite her to come to work with us sometime? She’s not taking summer classes either. So…”
Xivvy burst out laughing. “Oh, man, it’s perfect! We totally should. And don’t forget to take her up to meet Shon Mirek.”
“Welll…” Elcie grinned. “I’ll just take her with me tomorrow when I go take him that paper Maria had me type for her. Knowing him, it’ll be at least an hour. Which means Enesqu will be stuck in Mirek’s office… bored…”
Xivvy laughed evilly. Mirek was not popular among the four, not after their first day at TARO. Though Elcie had to admit that he probably didn’t care for them much either. Fenny, convinced he was stalking them, had tried to attack him before Rainy told her in a low voice that he was actually the head of security, testing them on their knowledge of basic procedures. They all speculated on whether Mirek still had the bruises.
“What’s the big deal with this Enesqu person?” Rainy said curiously.
“Oh, you don’t know her? Too bad,” said Elcie. “She’s totally insane. Has the weirdest ideas… we had lunch one time and I’m not even going to tell you what she ate. Another time she painted ‘Chet Flash Was Here’ all over Professor Telsar’s office walls.”
Fenrix whistled. “Wow, what’d he do to her?”
“Nothing. He thought it was hilarious. The janitors weren’t pleased, though…”
“Who’s Chet Flash?” Rainy wanted to know.
Elcie shrugged. “Still no idea. But do you see now why I want her to meet Mirek?”
“Point taken,” said Fenrix with glee, rubbing her hands together.
“It always scares me when you do that.”
Everyone turned around to see the fifth TARO intern walk up to them, smiling. “Echo, Echo, Echo!” Elcie said, bouncing up and down. “Guess what we’re going to do?”
“She’s going to sic Enesqu on Mirek,” Xivvy said, nodding. Elcie sighed.
“You ruined my dramatic revelation,” she said. Echo laughed.
“Now that, I would pay to see,” she said.
Elcie nodded. “I’m intending to charge admission,” she said. “Just for you, I’ll give you a discount and a bonus plushie.”
“A plushie of who?” Echo asked.
“Mirek. When you squeeze his tummy, he squeaks!” Xivvy burst out laughing.
“Mirek is just about the least squeaky person I know,” she said.
“How do you know?” Rainy asked her. “I dare you to just go up and poke him sometime. Maybe he does squeak and you just don’t know about it.”
“Yeah, right,” said Xivvy. “He’d murder me.”
“Well, we’re going to have Enesqu come to work with me for one day,” Elcie explained to Echo, bringing the conversation back on track. “It’ll be hysterical.”
“But didn’t you know?” Echo said. Elcie blinked.
“Know what?”
“Sorry to burst your bubble, but Enesqu’s on vacation this summer,” said Echo. “She went to the Bahamas with her family and won’t be back until November.”
“Drat it all,” Xivvy sighed. “And I was sure we had actually figured out something interesting to do.”
“Back to square one, then,” said Rainy.
For several minutes there was silence as all five girls were deep in thought, and then Fenny spoke.
“I could kick him again. Harder. A little higher up—”
“No, Fenny.”

[Elcie]

Two clips today! X3

SPOILER: Click to show

Shigo sighed. “Lyra, you know I have no idea what you consider ‘normal’ in this place. But I’ll tell you what’s not normal.” He pointed at the security screen. “Look at that! I swear I saw the intruders last night, but there’s nothing there. They must have figured out a way to override our security procedures. We have to…”
Lyra burst out laughing. Shigo stopped short, looking somewhat hurt. She grinned apologetically, still giggling. “Sorry. But I wasn’t expecting you to freak out about it like that. No, this is perfectly normal… I know the records are gone. I took them off.”
Shigo’s eyes widened. “You what?” Then it struck him. “Oh! I see. If you remove the records rather than letting them go public… you can keep Trilen happy and prevent him from reinstating Division 9. Clever. But what if they keep coming back? Something will have to be done about that.”
“They won’t,” said Lyra confidently.
Shigo raised one eyebrow. “Oh, really? How do you know that?”
“They told me,” she said, smiling.
“And you know they weren’t lying?”
“Oh, no. They weren’t lying. They don’t need to come back now.” Lyra smiled at him pleasantly. “I’m taking over for them.”
It took Shigo’s mind a few minutes to process what she had just said. “So you mean… wait. You’re going to start hacking into TARO’s databases?”
Lyra grinned like a cat. “Why not? Sounds fun enough to me.”
“You can’t do that!” Shigo said, appalled. “You’re supposed to program security software, not… not hack into it!”
“We talked it over,” said Lyra, ignoring him. “And we’ve decided to come to an agreement. They’ll investigate Chronos and the Spiral for us, seeing as the Spiral seems to be blackmailing them. And in return, I’ll get them the data they need… or, rather, the Spiral needs, since they’re getting the data for… them, actually.” Lyra laughed. “So this will be interesting, don’t you think?”
Shigo blinked. “I don’t even know what to say to that,” he said finally. “Say that all again, slowly, from the beginning.”

SPOILER: Click to show

“Neri?” There was a timid tap at his door. He stood up and opened it to see Nashura. Her previous icy expression had now given way, and she looked distraught.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” Neri stepped out into the hallway with her. Only then did he see that there were tears in her eyes.
“It’s all come up so fast,” she whispered. “First the Spiral… Neri, they tried to kill you. I couldn’t believe… it felt like a betrayal. I spent five years searching for them… but now this. Not Quinn.” Impatiently she wiped at her eyes with her sleeve and looked at him. “I know how all this must sound to you,” she said in a low voice. “I know I never knew my father. But I knew my mother – I remember how she looked sometimes, thinking of him. At least I always believed his death to be an accident. She never once told me…”
“Maybe she knew you’d blame them,” Neri said gently. “Stormslight was worth enough to her that she remained with them even after the disaster they caused… maybe she didn’t want you to know that.”
“I thought – all those years – I was doing something worthwhile, fulfilling her last wishes,” Nashura said angrily. “But the Spiral is turning out no better than… Neri, I don’t know what to do now. I don’t know what I can do.”
“Stop Chronos.” Her tear-filled eyes widened. He smiled slightly. “I’m serious. That was Stormslight’s mission all along, right? And that was what we were trying to do – to finish what they started.”
She nodded slowly. Then suddenly, they heard footsteps on the stairs. Rabbits… hundreds and hundreds of rabbits! They were coming for them!
Nashura gasped. “Neri, run! It’s Division 9! Trilen must have decided that rabbits would make better agents! I’ll try to distract them!”
“No!” Neri shouted. “I won’t leave you!” But the rabbits were clearly rabid, and they were outnumbered. The only way out was to jump out of Neri’s window, but they were on the third floor! One of the rabbits jumped between them, snarling rabidly.
“President Trilen has demanded that you come with us,” it said. “You are to be pumpkinized! Celery will prevail!”
Neri opened his eyes with a start. The sound of a door closing had awakened him. Already, the strange dream was fading; all he remembered was something about Nashura and… rabbits. And something about pumpkins and celery? Odd.
He supposed this was what anxiety did to him. Groaning in annoyance, he turned over and tried to get to sleep again.

Explanation for that one: I wrote that scene between Neri and Nashura but then I really hated it. So I wanted to take it out, but that would leave me down 300 words - so I turned it into a stupid dream sequence XD

[Elcie]

Well, I've done it.

I completed 50,000 words in 30 days... in 28 days, no less! ... for the first time in my life.

^__^ *incredibly happy*