Mystery of Writing

 

Inspired by the Halloween 2008 enactment of War of the Worlds 2 on Twitter, I began writing a story to follow my alter-ego’s experiences during the aftermath of the alien invasion. By the time I got past 1400 words, stopping only from exhaustion, I realized I had a book on my hands.

This is the rough, unedited first draft of Chapter Two. Read more chapters and the story process here.

 

2
~~~

 

I never left the house without a basic “survival kit,” as I called it, in my messenger bag. I carried travel-sized toiletries, energy bars, powdered cocoa packets, a bottle of water, aspirin, bandages—you name it. My reasoning was that I could leave on an impromptu overnight trip at any time, and be prepared. It was my adventurous spirit, my romanticism. I never thought I would use my survival kit for survival.

I clutched the strap closer against my chest. Just before I had left my apartment to volunteer at the shelter, I had grabbed my laptop, a few flash drives, and the Blackberry’s charger, along with one or two small mementos I wouldn’t want to lose. I didn’t know why; but there was no telling what might happen in a crisis. A fire, looters, anything. I figured I’d rather be safe and ridiculous than sorry. As a result, I had everything in that bag I needed to survive.

I wandered down the ghostly hallway. Dim morning light barely illuminated the space. My shoes padded softly, the only sound. I passed room after room, and found no sign of humanity. No one was in the lounge where I had left them the night before—I saw scraps of clothing, rumpled food wrappers, dirty bandages. I hadn’t dreamed the survivors—they had been there. But where were they now?

Thinking perhaps they had gone in search of food, I drove my weary legs onward, through more rooms, down staircases. I paused once, as I passed an open doorway and saw a supply room. On a sudden instinct, I took bandages, gauze, and antiseptic supplies from the shelves and tucked them in my bag.

Survival.

By the time I sensed the presence behind me, it was too late. The silence was ended by the explosion that engulfed me.

~~~

“WA-CHOOO!”

An explosive sneeze erupted behind me, spraying the back of my neck with spittle. I shrieked from the surprise, and stumbled forward, falling to my knees on the hard tile floor. I gasped as old bruises screamed.

Breathing hard, I turned and looked up at three men, three of the most incongruous characters I had ever seen. One hovered in the back, hauntingly thin and pale, with long brown hair and dark glasses. His form was draped in a black silk suit and white collarless shirt; he looked like he had stepped out of a ballroom. The second was older, shorter, and stouter; black hair and mustache; wearing torn blue jeans, flannel shirt, and denim jacket. He could have been a construction worker or a farmer, except for the automatic weapon slung over his shoulder.

The one standing above me was young, lanky, garbed in a black leather motorcycle suit and long, blue winter scarf. His blond hair was streaked with grime, and stuck out from his head at odd angles. His nose was red and raw.

“You sneezed on me,” I said through clenched teeth, dragging my sleeve over the back of my neck.

He snorted. “Think of it as a favor.” He reached a hand out to me; fingerless gloves were stained with dried blood and I didn’t want to know what else.

I took his hand and let him pull me to my feet. Ow. Weakness washed through me. The floor beckoned with a sweet song of hopelessness. I ignored it, and planted my feet firmly.

“What’re you still doin’ here, Miracle?” he asked. His voice was a rasp–made my throat hurt just to hear it.

“Miracle?” I mumbled.

“You survived. You’re a Miracle.”

My throat constricted.

“So?” he said when I didn’t answer.

I rubbed my forehead. What was the question again? I peered into his bloodshot blue eyes and had a sudden realization. “You’re one of them. The sick people.”

His grin looked like it had been whipped and broken, then put back together. “Sicklies. Yeah. So how come you’re still here? The rest are gone. Left hours ago.”

I looked around the hollow halls in dull surprise. “Left? Where?”

“Heard’ve a shelter near San Luis. They didn’t take you?”

“I was sleeping.” I fumbled in my bag and pulled out my Blackberry. It had blank bars where the time should have been.

“Nevermind. Come on, we’ll get you there.” He waved me to follow, and set off down the hall.

I shuffled after, and the other two fell into step behind me. I studied his back. He couldn’t be more than a college kid. I hadn’t seen him with the other Sicklies last night. A group of them, like a ragtag militia, had come north to defend us when I reported an alien attack. I didn’t remember much—except I knew they had come in hijacked alien tripods. The rest swirled in my brain, memories disappearing like stray leaves in a whirlpool.

“What’s happening?” I whispered. Moreso voicing my own feelings aloud than asking a direct question.

“We’ve been invaded.” He cast a mad blue gaze over his shoulder. “The Martians have landed.”

Nausea swept over me. Flashes from last night’s news reports and Twitter updates came back into my thoughts. “Is there…anything left?”

He turned away. “Sure there is.” His tone was that of an adult consoling a small child.

“Where did you come from?”

“South.”

I swallowed. My mouth was very dry and sore. “Where…where in the south?”

“San Diego.”

“Did you see LA? Is there anything…is it…”

He scowled at me. “You know someone there, right?”

“My family. I can’t get in touch with them.”

He stopped and turned around. “Look.” His scratched, bedraggled face harbored a tired expression. “It’s bad, okay? It’s all bad. You can hope. But there’s a really good chance you won’t find anything.” He glanced sideways and nodded at the man in the silk suit. “Y’see him? That’s Pádraig. He was in a night club with his girlfriend last night when they struck. A tripod dragged him out & caged him. We got him when we took it down. He was the only survivor.”

I stared at the thin, dark-robed man. He moved down the hall like a shadow.

“José’s from the valley,” the low rasp continued moving his gaze to the rough man with the gun. “One of the meteors landed on his ranch. He lost everything in the fire. He doesn’t know where his family is.”

The hollowness in my soul grew deeper. “And you?” I asked.

He straightened to his full height. “I’m Will. My Mom and Dad were in the epicenter of the San Diego attack. I started fighting on my way to find them. I haven’t found them yet. I had to stop. The boss needed me. My snot.” There was a wry twist to his mouth. “We’re Sicklies—whatever we got, the Martians couldn’t hack it. Took ‘em down fast. But not fast enough.”

He turned on his heel and started walking again. I followed, as if I were attached to a leash.

“I’m Byrne Wyeth,” I volunteered flatly. “My grandfather, aunt and uncle, cousins are in LA. I can’t get them on the phone.”

“Service is sketchy. Specially south.”

“I have to find them.”

“You probably…” he stopped.

I didn’t ask him to continue.

 

~~~~~

 

 

(c) 2008 Christine Taylor, All Rights Reserved

 

 

Well, that was quick. Day two of NaBloPoMo, and I forgot to post till after midnight.

Good thing I posted a spare after midnight last night. I just happened to forget that, too, long enough to wallow in defeat for a few miserable seconds. And then—I realized, I was saved! So, this post, this brief and ridiculous post, will count for Monday. Since it’s after midnight.

Distracted, much? Yep.

~~~

The War of the Worlds 2.0 is far from over—you gotta check out C.J. McKee’s first chapter of his wotw2 novel, Of Men and Martians!

~~~

In other news, I’m having a blast listening to soundtracks on Last.fm. This is totally scoring my NaNoWriMo novel, Aftermath, a project which is reminding me how much I love, love, love science fiction writing.

After some inner conversation, I decided that I’m going to fictionalize my alter ego in Aftermath. I wouldn’t be able to write a story in which my family and friends are endangered; and this deals with a post-cataclysmic world where survivors are few and far between. So, I extrapolated from reality. My character’s name is Byrne Wyeth—Byrne being a takeoff on my middle name, Bernice (and utilizing the nickname “Bernie” that my brothers used to tease me with). Wyeth is a nod to my artistic side, being an homage to the Wyeth family of painters; specifically N.C. Wyeth, who illustrated some of the greatest adventure tales of all time.

Once I made that decision, it felt like sliding my hands into soft, well-fitting gloves. This is my genre—this is what I do well. The story will still be a huge challenge for me, since happily-ever-after has always been my route. “War of the Worlds” is a stretch. But the gloves are on—and I can do this.

Much like my protagonist, I look forward to discovering who I am at the end of the story.

 

 

Inspired by the Halloween 2008 enactment of War of the Worlds 2 on Twitter, I began writing a story to follow my alter-ego’s experiences during the aftermath of the alien invasion. By the time I got past 1400 words, stopping only from exhaustion, I realized I had a book on my hands.

This is the rough, unedited first draft of Chapter One. Read more chapters and the story process here.

 

1
~~~

 

I awoke.

Perhaps it wouldn’t seem out of the ordinary, to awaken in the cool, gray dawn of a November morning. I never thought much of it on most mornings before.

But that was before.

I came to an awareness of myself this foggy morning, breathed a shock of cold air into my lungs, and felt my heart pound. I was alive. Thank God.

But then, like a rock slide, reminders of yesterday hit me, one by one. Sharp ones first, like the lingering throb of the headache nothing would alleviate last night, and pain from the raw burn on my left arm and side. Then tumbling little sensations—gaggy smells of disinfectant and smoke and unnatural rotting flesh in the air; the ironic silence of a world that tried to dawn like any other; the taste of stale blood in my mouth, where I’d nearly bit the side of my cheek away during a fall. Finally, the heaviest weight of all, crushing my chest: the lives lost. The macabre visions replayed in my mind. Men, women, and children vaporized, their last expressions of terror seared into my eyes forever. Cities decimated, never ever to be the same again. Friends lost. Families destroyed. A world in chaos.

Because of last night.

I gasped for breath and heaved my shoulders up, rolling to my side; but the weight couldn’t be cast off. It came with me. For a moment I lay still, with my face pressed against the stiff sheets of the hospital bed. That alone was more than most others had this morning—a bed, with blankets. We had taken refuge in an abandoned hospital, so there were beds to spare. But not many of us dared to spread out alone last night. Most of the twenty survivors in my group had huddled in knots of two or three, clutching each other in desperate panic. I couldn’t take it anymore…I finally commanded my leaden feet to carry me away from everyone. Not far, only down the hall. I felt secure enough, especially since the guard troops had arrived near midnight. But I needed to be alone, where I could get a handle on my grief, in whatever way it chose to manifest itself.

Once I established that I had survived and was awake, I expected to find the grief overwhelming, rendering me unable to pull myself from the grasp of depression. But oddly enough, it wasn’t grieving that drew me in—it was a sense of urgency, of drive. An impetus to get up and get moving. I couldn’t understand it—the Earth as I knew it was destroyed, laid waste by an invading army from an alien world. My family was gone, lost in the first sweeping attack. What was there to get up for?

Keep moving, the words seemed to echo in my mind. Get up, find them. Find survivors, move on.

I pressed my elbow into the mattress and raised my body up on one side. It hurt. I shivered in the cold, and dragged the blanket with me as I slowly unfolded myself from the bed, feeling every strained muscle and bashed joint. I rubbed my face with the blanket to waken my senses. The gray light was filling the room, like snow flurries that had finally collected enough to make their presence known. I deliberately didn’t look out the grimy window when I slid my feet into my shoes and stood. I was afraid of what I would see in the daylight—it had been horrible enough in the dark.

Little more than twenty-four hours had passed since the first meteor showers marked the beginning of the tragedy; so in a way, it made sense that I still felt as if the battle was not yet over. But that went beyond reason. Every report we saw said that the monstrous tripod bots and their pilots were dead, beaten by the life forms that often landed human beings behind hospital walls: germs. Plain and simple. The aliens had no resistance to our bacteria. They were defeated by the common cold.

So why did I feel like we were still on the run?

I left the thought unanswered and stepped softly across the room to try out the bathroom facilities; they still worked. Even the hot water worked, and I splashed it over my face with relief. It stung the raw burns and scratches that covered my skin, but I didn’t care. I looked up from the towel and faced my own visage in the mirror—young enough, but suddenly so very old. Haggard shadows under my sunken eyes, lurking in the tense lines that framed my mouth. I quickly took up a handful of my long brown hair and twisted it into a knotted ponytail at the back of my neck, fastening it with the stray rubber bands that held a packet of hospital-issue tissues together. I gave one last, doleful glance at my face, almost breaking down in tears at the hopeless expression in my own eyes. But whenever I tried to give in to those tears, there was nothing there. Just a few drops to promise relief, then nothing in the reservoir after all. Much like the unfulfilled promise of rain that had been my biggest worry day before yesterday.

I pulled the blanket around my shoulders again and huddled into it as if it were a poncho, then crossed to the door. I swept a hesitant glance back at the room. I didn’t want to leave, in a way, because I didn’t want to face what was ahead of me. I felt numb, devoid of the sorrow I knew I should feel. Half detached, hovering on the brink of defensive denial. But I couldn’t sink into the merciful arms of denial—I had too strong a sense of work left to be done. And some force other than my Self was driving me to do it.

Find survivors. Move on.

I entered the hall and let the door slide closed behind me. It was too quiet in the hospital; my imagination began to conjure up horrific scenarios as explanation. They had come back, to destroy everyone. They were there, standing behind me. I glanced back warily. But there was no one there.

 

~~~~~

 

 

(c) 2008 Christine Taylor, All Rights Reserved

 

 

I had a personality enlightenment the other day—I was told that I have a tendency to begin things, but have a challenge completing them. NO-o-o-o…ya think?

My folder full of pencil sketches can attest to this. Also the ink drawings waiting for watercolor. And the papers and canvases covered with paint, awaiting completion. There’s actually an incomplete painting on my wall. (Though that doesn’t really count, because I like the way it looks. And I did finally draw features into the Prince’s face.)

And stories—I have notebooks and documents filled with words upon words upon…you get the idea. Lots of beginnings…bunches of middles with no beginnings. Very few endings.

I have always been like this. I attributed it to my creative nature; I loved the thrill of a new idea, like a new world to discover. New characters to get to know, new challenges to tackle. But as time went on, I began to feel an inner weariness with all this unfinished work hanging in the background. I started to wonder—am I weak when it comes to commitments? Am I leaving a trail of beginnings and middles because I can’t say yes to an ending? That worried me.

Then came this personality review. And light bulbs went on all over the place. I wasn’t discouraged to hear that “finishing” things is hard for me—the news was liberating. What this told me is that I’m not afraid to commit; I just get bored, restless. I need to move on.

Knowledge is power. When you put a name on your enemy, it’s easier to conquer it. One thing I do have is a strong will—so I can will myself to complete things. It’s a challenge. When something is important to me, I do finish it. I can commit.

I just happen to like shiny things, is all.

Oooh…shiny

So here I am, with a novel in the final stages of development. I was terrified—terrified—that I wouldn’t be able to go the distance and bring it to completion. I felt jinxed. But then this glimpse into my inner self came along, and I realized with joy that I can do it! I can conquer my weaknesses! So I tackled the book with renewed focus.

Until, um, yesterday.

It’s not like I didn’t know November was National Novel Writing Month and National Blog Posting Month. I did. I just determinedly turned my eyes away from them, so I could devote all my attention to my novel.

But then came the alien invasion.

I got swept up in the Halloween enactment of War of the Worlds 2 on Twitter. (More on that in a future post.) It fired my imagination to the point that, instead of going to bed at 2am, I stayed up for another three hours writing a brand new story, following my alter-ego’s experiences during the aftermath of the invasion. By the time I got past 1400 words, stopping only from exhaustion, I realized I had a book on my hands.

Specifically, I was now participating in NaNoWriMo.

I made the goal of writing 50 thousand words of fiction when I joined in the Southern Cross Novel Challenge in June, so I wasn’t flying blind into this. I knew what it would take. But I figured, I try to write 2000 words a day as a rule. Working on another side story—a shiny, new story—keeps my mind fresh and only helps the novel I’m finishing. What if I didn’t join NaNo, but wound up writing the 50 anyway?

Arrrg.

Resistance is futile.

Seeing as how I launched this blog on Halloween night, also, it was a quick step to take on NaBloPoMo, too. That one will keep me accountable to my blogs (plural) so that they don’t lie stagnant while I focus on other things. But I draw the line at NaPodPoMo!! (And that’s just because I don’t have podcasting tools yet.)

So, I will go into November finalizing and publishing The Rosewood House; posting a blog every day here, or at mousewords.net, or at KritiqueKritics.com. And I will create my novel-length post-invasion story, Aftermath. I will finish what is mine to finish, and I’ll make my love of new things work to my advantage.

And so I begin.