#PennedPossibilities 648 — MC POV: Tell us about your home.

[Streak:] I live in an apartment building near the edge of the better part of town. It's remarkable for being in a neighborhood populated by day angels because it's not a village tree nor built into a hill, but a conventional building. I live there with my sisters and my mother, and I'm the middle child. My room is little better than a small pantry or a large closet, but I'm happy for it. My sisters hate me because I had to raise them and set rules (long story), so I'm thankful for a window I can fly in and out of, a black lacquer floor desk, where I keep my books, and a place to unroll a sleeping mat. Baskets and hampers hold my things. You would call the place a boarding house where you live. The apartment is only three bed rooms and a kitchen. The rain room (showers) are on the shared entry floor at the end of the hall, opposite the entry with the post boxes, next to the squats. Both utility rooms are unisex, so you'd better knock before entering.

[Thorn:] I'm a daemon, but live in what many consider a bad neighborhood populated by day angels. It's a village tree house my mother bought because she feels safer there than amongst people who look like us but refuse to accept us as their equals. Our entire nest is called an aerie, and it once belonged to a famous day angel who rebelled against the government a century and a half ago. It requires us to climb ladders to enter it and to levitate provisions to stock it.

My room is a chamber grown from a flattened lateral branch, in a crotch between an auxiliary trunk and uprights. The floor slopes upward and my bedstead is in a hammock across what amounts to a raised dias. I've a nightstand that is a cut-off stump. It's opposite from the casement windows installed at the lower end of the space. I'm thankful for the door like crank windows because they're convenient for when Streak comes to visit—when Mother isn't home, obviously! They provide light despite the tree's heavy canopy, and are enough that foliage forms an interior ceiling and I can culture moss and lichen as carpeting so I don't have to wear slippers to protect my feet from the bark. Smaller windows with rainbow-stained wedged rock glass also provide light to fill in shadowy corners during day light, and can be tilted to encourage convective circulation.

My desk is a form of wood ear mushroom, the top of which is polished to a glassy sheen. The shelves scattered up and down the walls for my hundreds of books are a combination of the same myco-archeculture and woven smaller branches.

I've hung posters by red ribbons, so as not to hurt the living tree, including a grand one Mother bought me of an exploded diagram of the structure of the crystal spheres. After our adventures with Rainy Days, I've also hung enlargements of pictures the woman gave us of her and Streak, though I know he finds them embarrassing. I can't help but admire my boyfriend's best attributes.

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#WordWeavers 2504.18 — What would it take for your MC to become violent?

From experience writing the character, try to kill May Ri or her family, she'll kill you. Otherwise, no worries.

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#PennedPossibilities 646 — How would you describe your MC’s job or occupation? (You can be comedic about it, if you like.)

These stories hop around over more than a decade, thus the lists. Some stints are very temporary.

• Thorn: High school then university student. Occupational prefecture governor. Astronaut.
• Streak: High school then university student. Lover. Researcher. Test pilot. Advisor. Astronaut.
• Devil-girl: Homeless ascetic, grocery clerk, prizefighter, transporter, bodyguard, dõna, troubleshooter.
• May Ri: Student, mother, engineer, princess (she considers that one a joke but others don't), general.
• Wintereyes (feral but kind human): Friend of animals (including wyverns), wolf pack member and provider, involuntary student, idiosyncratic mage.

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#PennedPossibilities 645 — What was the most unexpected challenge you encountered while writing your WIP?

I'm of two minds how to answer, so I'll answer twice.

The mainline WIPs both deal with the topic of sex, peripherally—in any case not graphically, but also without shame. How the content of my stories reflects on the stories' author has caused me to choke (as in stop writing) repeatedly. Visit my pinned intro post; the second comment is the mantra I used (use) to get me writing again.

Writing Mars Need Women was unexpectedly challenging production-wise. As a writer who can pump out 2-4K in a writing session, 750 words composed to a prompt to fit a story line, shoehorned into a toot, revised, and published each day for 31 days proved exhausting as it was exhilarating. I'd thought I'd work on the other WIP at the same time. Pfft! Some days I had to give up, then get two stories out the next day to stay on schedule. Well, I did it once… so I can do it again?

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#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2504.16 — How present is music in your work?

Mars Needed Women: There's muzak playing in the scene in O'Hare airport in 2133 (time approximate). In another, there's ambient seashore music, with gulls, which May Ri misinterprets a white noise track of the seashore.

Elsewhere: The devil-girl's deceased mother was an international opera and "Broadway" theatre star. Her records are everywhere. Sometimes she hears them playing in restaurants, and leaves immediately. In the story, she only sings the song in the shower. Folks remark she's pretty good (but they don't know she's the daughter of a celebrity because she hides that identity).

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#WordWeavers 2504.16 — If your MC wasn’t involved with the story, what would they do with their life?

Wow! That's a very interesting question. This character is well-storied, so let's unwrap.

Current story: It was a turning point. In the previous story she'd learned something very essential about how people work, something she thinks she can fix. If she never gets to be in the current story—where she learns she can trust friends and then finds love—she turns the path toward evil.

-1 Story: She attends a school like Princeton with her saved prizefighting money. She becomes a professsor in thaumology and a spinster. Because she doesn't intervene in mob family politics, the main series antagonist may be assassinated. Whether that kills her is another matter.

-2 Story: She works as a grocery clerk and doing other odd jobs, possibly even performing "magic" tricks, eventually ending up in a lessor college. In this path she becomes an eccentric because she doesn't really trust people (she's autistic and can't really read them), something like Nikola Tesla. She likely invents something evil.

-3 Story: Having never run away, she grows up an increasingly angry and dissatisfied elite, with power she feels she has not earned. She governs a small but prosperous prefecture well enough that she is well loved, which confuses her. She marries someone suggested to her and has children who end up squabbling over accession. Being as they are her children, one will be evil. The author will ensure she's female and has to fight her brothers, which sours her.

-4 Story (unwritten, hinted at in backstory): The immortal main series antagonist has been practicing eugenics, amongst her other sins. In her case, it's encouraging the migration of peoples between towns and prefectures, also doing some careful matchmaking. The MC's mother was one such highly "magical" methodically bred endpoint, and one of the main antagonist's lessor students. Had the woman not encouraged the MC's future mother's thaumaturgy and singing talent, the woman would not have met (read: been strategically introduced to) the MC's father.

The MC would not have been born, and neither would the MC's mother died an untimely death having being caught on a spy mission. (Of course, that death is assumed. The author gets to retcon that fact in a later story, as has already been done but not confirmed for the simultaneous death of the MC's father.)

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#PennedPossibilities 644 — Does your MC’s current actions reflect their past experiences?

For May Ri, it's personal. Earth attacked her family and killed her people. She's an engineer. They should have known better.

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#PennedPossibilities 643 — How does your SC respond to the quiet? Do they take comfort in silence, or seek to fill the void with noise?

Bolt, from the Reluctance Series during the Interstellar era, was blackmailed (framed for a murder) by the mob into being a messenger for a decade. She has wings. She had to be silent, sometimes a detective. It's not like she hung around mobsters, or wanted to be pulled in deeper. Nor could she confide in anyone, lest they get targeted by association. Worse, she never got paid much.

Eventually, she found a camera that fell off the back of a wagon. She got into street photography. One time, when she happened to be where news happened (too often in her profession), she had taken a few photos when a reporter's camera got slammed into a wall.

He asked if she'd sell him photos. Turned out she's pretty good.

She often gets her photos into her world's version of The New Yorker and The New York Times and is also a part time stringer. As you can guess, she wanders the cold dank unfriendly streets when she can be free (makes it harder to be given "assignments"), and dispels the dangerous depressing quiet that might otherwise seep in.

Her love affair with B&W street photography does not wane when she is freed from the mob, pardoned, and begins train to become a praetorian. Sure her subjects are different, and her wandering happens between trainings and bodyguard duties, but she has the knack of using a rangefinder without being noticed (think Leica).

Edit: This actually gave me detective noir story idea...

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#WordWeavers 2504.14 — Who is your kindest character and how do they show it?

Of my recent works, Wintereyes from Inklings (now on composition hiatus) is likely my kindest. She lives in my Townships and Wands universe, which is full of various magicks. I've a few sample stories posted in my pinned samples post. Her magic is… well, it's rather peculiar.

She's is a very naïve girl when it comes to humans, and as a result is suddenly shy (like her author). She wants to be helpful and she likes to listen, and not be seen (like her author). She's quite kind; her demeanor. She wants to be friends, but raised on a farm at the edge of the Fell Forest, her opportunities for friends were… well, rather peculiar.

But not limited!

She befriends wolves, is adopted by them, and lives with the pack, running with them, hunting with them, and healing them. This did not make her cruel, even when she also befriends prey animals, too. Her ethics are… interesting.

Oh, about befriending. Befriending is her sacrificing part of herself to become more like her new friend. For example, her most recent mess started when she befriended a wyvern (bat-dragon) because it had a cold and was burning up the forest sneezing. She wanted to find out how to treat its cold! How did she become more like the creature? Besides learning how to converse with it, when she concentrates on its language, she can breathe fire. (It's like a glottal stop.)

But she'd never hurt anybody with it!

The Warlord of the closest Township (actually a woman) takes a serious interest in Wintereyes, and her story begins.

See image: This is how I imagine the wyvern. A face only a mother, or Wintereyes, could love.

https://de.pinterest.com/pin/342344009165649564/

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Self-promo time! Drop links to your creations, including writing, art and other media! What do you want to share with the #Writephant crowd? #writing

Mars Need Women is a hopeful yet deeply dystopian feminist SF web-novel (free-to-read on Mastodon) that leans heavily into Women's rights issues. It is a woman-centric adventure story of overcoming adversity while being female, with all the warts and frustrations, not as a man in disguise.

Our wannabe engineer heroine May Ri escapes a disheartening life, faced with becoming little more than a housewife because she lacks "blessings," to help colonize Mars—if you can call being shanghaied escaping and being contracted to have children a benefit. (She does choose the gorgeous supportive guy to "work with," though, so that's a positive.) As she learns to make uniquely useful martian machines, she keeps putting herself at the center of a global martian dust storm as martian power shifts from being male-dominated to a predominately female 1st generation of martians. May Ri together with her five daughters, shape a world (Mars) the way unfettered women might imagine it.

When the men of Earth take affront—of course they do—they learn that women don't fight like men, especially when their children's lives are threatened, and their wellbeing is at stake. #RSMarsNeededWomen

Thread: https://eldritch.cafe/@sfwrtr/114088945266387178.

I am expiring the thread on April 18th. If you start reading it now, add a comment or send a private mention and I'll delay expiration.

#BoostingIsSharing and read more in #AltText

#PennedPossibilities 0.044 — What is the most altruistic thing your MC has ever done?

May Ri is neither altruistic nor is she transactional. For a woman who is always fighting against the paternalistic rules placed upon her, she pretty much does what she is told (but not always!). Her choice of friends and her prior decisions shaped her actions, which greatly helped the initial generations of native martians. She's great at engineering design and is especially talented at reverse engineering tech if given plenty of electronic and optical scopes, and other tools.What she did for Mars will be noted as foundational as much as it was politically ancillary, except for the last thing. She often volunteered in the crèche domes taking care of 3-6 year olds, but she liked that. Having been oppressed and mistrusted as a girl, she let her five daughters make their own choices, which is arguably how they grew up to be a force in their own right. She mentored and apprenticed hundreds of young martian women (and a few boys) in engineering and design.

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#PennedPossibilities 642 — How old are some of your characters?

I'm glad this isn't just MCs or SCs. I'll go with the last written story point or idea that isn't written.

Devil-girl: ~19
Bolt/Streak: 27
Streak and Thorn: 18
Emeraline: 31
Marigold: 26
Triplets Cloud Dancer, Meadow Dancer, and Fire Dancer: 35
The Hawk: 26
Chrome: 31
Rainy Days: > 3,000

May Ri: 45
Mari: 22
Manette: 19
Twins Miriam and Maurine 17
Moria: 13
Reina Īto: 35
Randy: 55

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#WordWeavers 2504.13 — How dangerous is your MC? CW: Definite Background Spoilers.

The Reluctance Series stories MCs by danger score least to most:

• 0: Devil-girl — Give her a book and leave her alone.
• 1: Streak — He's a sweetie. He'll have your back if you are mobbed by bullies. His danger score is multiplied by Thorn's as he's protective of her. He did charm the pants off of Rainy Days, so there's that wild card.
• 2: Thorn Rose — She's capable, just not very antagonistic. Pushed into a corner, watch out. Her danger score is divided by Streak's because she realizes he has more common sense than she does and listens to him when he's around to advise her. She loves him.
• 3: Rainy Days — She's a lot less capable then most people think, but she has experience. Her inclination is to fight for others. First it was family, then it was for women. After millennia of bearing children, all of humanity is related to her—except the dragons. She's very sweet, caring, supportive, and she'll teach you lessons if she thinks you'll benefit from it. You don't want to cross her, however. She's lived through the fall of two civilizations, and ended up being rebuilt from parts at the end of the last fall. She's technologically immortal and always 24 years old.
• 4: Devil-girl — Told you to give her a book and leave her alone, didn't I? Nobody listens! She's very capable (unlike Rainy Days) and self-taught. People keep using her as their sharp tool. She'll try the dangerous, impossible, and taboo things anyway because, Well, that's Interesting! The character was conceived as a study in how evil isn't born but is created through interaction with others and their environment. Each story is, Which side of the knife edge will she tumble? Will she end up saving people or suddenly be so frustrated she ceases to give a damn? Recently she discovered love, and got that used against her—not by her lovers, thank goodness! Well, we'll see.

BTW: Streak and Thorn live 200 years before the Devil-girl. Roughly 1960 vs 2160.

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#PennedPossibilities #PennedPossibilities side prompt: Elevator quick pitch of your WIP, only the worst pitch ever.

A daemon and a day angel fly to the moon. The lunatics there believe they're really a demon and an angel. They're as right as they are wrong.

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#ScribesAndMakers 2504.12 — Shameless self-promotion day. Show us what you're proud of. Let's boost away.

Mars Need Women is a hopeful yet deeply dystopian feminist SF web-novel that leans heavily into Women's right's issues thanks to a set of writing prompts on the subject. It is a woman-centric adventure story of overcoming adversity while being female, with all the warts and frustrations, not as a man in disguise.

Our wannabe engineer heroine May Ri escapes a disheartening life, faced with becoming little more than a housewife because she lacks "blessings," to help colonize Mars—if you can call being shanghaied escaping and being contracted to have children a benefit. (She does get to choose the gorgeous supportive guy, though, so that's a positive.) As she learns to make martian machines, she keeps putting herself at the center of a global martian dust storm with her children as power shifts from being male-dominated. As the daughters of the Martian immigrants increasingly control Mars' future (how is spoilers), May Ri together with her five daughters shape a world (Mars) the way unfettered women might imagine it.

When the men of Earth take affront—of course they do—they learn that women don't fight like men, especially when their children's lives are threatened, and their wellbeing is at stake. #RSMarsNeededWomen

It remains free-to-read on Mastodon for a few more days:

https://eldritch.cafe/@sfwrtr/114088945266387178.

If you start reading it now, a comment or a private mention will tell me not to delete the posts until the end of next week. I consider it a beta read. I'm already revising an augmenting the original story, tying up loose ends, and might add more chapters along the path to publishing it as a book. Meanwhile, I'm going to start boosting chapters for a last hurrah.

See #alttext for book cover description.

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#WordWeavers 2504.12 — MC POV: Name 3 dangers that exist in your world. How do you protect yourself from them?

[Thorn Rose speaks. She's a bit of an egghead.] The heat of day time is very dangerous, but nobody really thinks about this. Buildings big and small are designed to use convection to cool the interior. Since daemons, like me, are fairly common, you can pay for more efficient miraculous recirculation. Mostly, when the day shine is bright, most people sleep.

People are dangerous. Not just the prejudiced people who might gang up on you because they think you don't have a right to exist, or at least walk in their neighborhoods. I got the pleasure (NOT) to witness what the dragons did in their autonomous region; that type of thing skews your whole idea of humanity. Of course, there is also the armistice with the Wild, and even Rainy Day's does her best to tread quietly around them.

Last, the sky is falling. Literally.

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#WordWeavers 2504.11 — Could your SC do your job?

I'm retired. Pretty much any of them could do that. To the extent that the main series antagonist is also a secondary character, getting to be retired is the WHOLE POINT of her existence from her point of view!

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#PennedPossibilities 640 — MC POV: Tell us about the good habits you have.

[Devil-girl:] I'd been asked this question and it hadn't occur to me that habits could be good or bad. It was while I was training for my first prize fight, so I asked Rabbit, who was doing roadwork with me, running the pedestrian path between Northfork and downtown along the river.

He said, "You read."

"Doesn't everyone?" I asked.

"Well, if it were the newspaper, the funnies or the sports page—" He was a little winded. "—I might understand, but a book? The pavement is uneven, too!"

I was getting a twofer, levitating the tome three hand widths before my face. It allowed me to properly swing my arms and shadow box as I ran. "I've got good peripheral vision. You wanna look? It's on quantum thaumadynamics—"

"No thanks. I'm a muscle nerd not an egghead."

"But… is it a good habit?"

"Only if you don't trip and break your pretty neck."

"Don't worry." I giggled. "I won't."

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#WordWeavers 2504.10 — Antagonist POV: How do you feel about the government?

[Rainy Days gives Thorn Rose a big hug for asking such an insightful question! Even after the pressure Rainy Days put the young woman under to test her mettle and the hell she'd force her to deal with (20K words), she had hoped she'd finally ask, but hadn't been holding her breath…]

The government is a work in progress, pretty much like always. These days I keep the central population under tight regulation. Instead, I perform my social experiments in the autonomous regions. It rather irked me, however, when their leaders took their freedom to choose and chose to enslave people by criminalizing them. The dragon lords were unhappy when I told them to knock it off, then outraged when I started this war to assert my authority? In what way is an autonomous region actually sovereign? Come on!

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