Piece By Piece ~ Snippet 2

Aiden

We all quickly introduce ourselves. The introductions are short because they don't consist of anything aside from our first names. Except for Savannah of course. She has a last name as well. 

"So, what do we do now?" Elise asks, bringing my attention back to the group and away from the fiery redhead. 

"Well, I don't think we need to spend any more time here." Lana says, sliding her bag onto her shoulder and rubbing her arms. "It's kind of cold out." 

"Maybe that's because you're wearing a silk blouse and a skirt." Viren points out. "Or rather, what used to be a silk blouse and a skirt." Viren is definitely more practically, and more androgynously, dressed in cargo shorts and a loose t-shirt. 

"Ah!" Lana looks down at herself and vigorously starts trying to rub out dirt smudges. "This was such a nice outfit. It's all ruined now." 

Viren laughs. "You should see your hair." They point at what used to be a neat bun, but now is just a mess of straight Asian hair. 

"We need to stock up," Danger asserts. "That much is certain." 

"Yeah, come on guys," I second. "Danger knows what he's doing." 

"No I don't," he says over his shoulder. "None of us do. That's the point." My mood falls. He's entirely right. 

The group starts to mobilize and Savannah drifts back to me. "Hey, um, Aiden." 

"Yeah?" I look over to her from the corner of my eye. She's a little blurry past the edge of my crooked glasses lens. 

She tucks a piece of her bright red hair behind her ear absentmindedly. "I never really said thank you, for before. You pulled me up." 

"Oh, that." I rub the back of my neck. "It was nothing really." 

She shakes her head. "It wasn't nothing." Her red hair shimmers, even in this dim light. "You made me get up. You wouldn't leave me there." 

"Of course not." I turn to look at her so I can see her clearly. "I couldn't." 

"Well, I won't forget it," she tells me sincerely. 

"You might not want to promise that," I caution. "I mean, that is part of the current problem, isn't it?" She rolls her eyes, but with a smirk. I look away after a moment. 

My eyes wander over the still unfamiliar surroundings. Moving away from destruction and active fires of the explosion, our path is lit instead by lights lining the edges of the wide street. They sputter occasionally, and only emit a dim glow at best, clearly wanting for power. They've fared better than the cramped blocky buildings though. None of them appear to have any power whatsoever. In the blackness of the night, the towering structures seem to lean in menacingly over our small party. It crosses my mind that any of them could topple at any moment, ailing from unseen structural damage caused by the blast. 

I rub the back of my neck and try to divert my attention back to the woman walking alongside me. "I guess this is the part where we'd usually make small talk, except, we don't have anything small to talk about." 

Savannah shrugs. "I suppose you're right." She looks up a little to meet my eyes. "I don't really mind though. Do you?" 

I shake my head, not wanting to disagree with her. Although the peace is rather calming, when I don't think about the uncertain dangers of our world. "I can't say that I do. With as hectic as it was when we first woke up, the relative silence is a welcome change." 

"Nope, I mind." Viren, walking ahead of us a ways, raises their hand. They turn back to look at us. "It's too quiet around here. It's not natural." 

Elise bites her thumbnail. "Viren has a point. I mean, where are all the other people?"

"Maybe we're the only survivors." I suggest. I wouldn't mind a simple solution, to keep my mind far from any unsavory possibilities. 

"But that doesn't make sense." Lana adds from behind us. Her impractical heels and tight skirt have left her at the back of the pack. "Think about it logically. We all ended up at different distances from the explosion. Elise, Aiden, and Savannah, from your clothes, it looks like you were the closest to the blast. Did you even see any bodies?" 

Danger glances back; even he must be interested in our response. Savannah seems uncertain. She was pretty out of it when I first pulled her to her feet. Elise shakes her head. I think back. "I don't recall any."

Danger exhales, facing forward again. "Well, clearly something happened here, aside from the explosion. We'll have to figure out what at some point."

"Maybe that event, whatever it is, caused our missing memories." Savannah says, thinking aloud. No one disagrees. 

"Fewer people means a smaller group hunting for resources," Danger notes practically. "I'm hoping to find some type of department store along our route to stock up on supplies." 

"Clearly this was a densely populated area at one point," Lana says. "That means it shouldn't be too hard for us to find a store." 

"Good." Danger speaks again. "Then you can change into something more practical." 

Viren guffaws and Elise titters behind a raised hand. Smoke practically curls out of Lana's ears. "Sorry I didn't dress for the apocalypse. I like professional outfits, not the casual attire you're all wearing." The rest of us look around at each other and shrug. 

"Ours work better now, don't they?" Danger asks without turning. 

"Burn!" Viren exclaims, pointing back at Lana. 

"You guys are so mean," she mutters under her breath. 

I notice she's still shivering. I have a hoodie on, though I'm really not cold. I slide it off and walk it over to her. "Here. It looks like you could use this." 

Her eyes widen. "Thank you." She puts it on quickly. I cross my arms over my chest as goosebumps start to rise up. I guess I was pretty used to having that hoodie on. It was a cloth layer of protection I wouldn't mind having back. Clearly though, Lana needs it more than I do. 

"Danger, how much further are we going?" Viren asks. Their shorter strides are working double time to keep up with Danger's significantly longer legs. 

Danger sighs. "I don't know, kid, until we find a store with supplies." 

Viren crosses their arms petulantly. "I'm not a kid. I'm sixteen." Then they turn back to look at the rest of us. "Did you hear that guys, I'm sixteen! In your faces! I know my name and my age." 

"Well, I knew my full name before you remembered your age," Savannah reminds them. 

Viren sticks their tongue out at her. "Oh yeah, well how old are you?" 

"Well..." Savannah stalls, searching her mind for the answer. 

"I'm nineteen," Elise adds, remembering herself. 

We turn to look at her, and then Lana speaks up. "Twenty." 

Suddenly a number comes to me, although something about it seems off. "I'm seventeen." 

Savannah gives me a strange look. "Seventeen? You look older than seventeen." 

I shrug. "I feel older than seventeen, but I'm pretty sure that's right."

"Oh, I've got it!" Savannah claps her hands together. "I'm twenty two." Then her face falls. "Oh no, does that make me the oldest?" 

"Nope," Danger replies. "I'm twenty five. That makes me the oldest." He turns to Viren. "And that still makes you the kid." 

"Aw, man!" Viren crosses their arms over their chest, pouting. 

"Hey guys," Elise stops, pointing to a building. A sign in green block letters reads A-Mart. "Clearly someone had a hard time coming up with that name," she remarks. 

"Well, hopefully this will work," Danger says, leading our group towards it. 

"Hey Danger," Viren starts, and Danger looks over to them. "Are we there yet?" 

Danger pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs.

-The adventure continues as we learn more about our explorers. This week I wrote from a different perspective, and at this point I'm planning to continue that pattern. I typically write from a first person point of view, so rotating through the perspectives of different characters should add some extra depth to the story as it goes along. I hope you guys enjoyed this week's installment, and Piece by Piece will continue next week! 

Piece By Piece

"Get up!" Someone pulls me up by my arm. 

"What?" I open my eyes to blearily take in my surroundings. Everything is fuzzy; something burns my eyes. 

"Get up!" The tug comes again. I try to gather my strength to push up from the rough ground I'm sprawled over. Looking up, I can vaguely make out the shape of a boy pulling me to my feet. I stumble into him and he catches me. "Come on," he yells. "We have to go!" I nod sluggishly as I try to regain my senses. He holds onto me as we start to run. 

I try to take in my surroundings, try to piece together what's happening. Most of my attention is needed elsewhere though, just to keep from tripping over the rubble everywhere. It seems like there was some explosion behind us. Even now the flames of the fire dimly light our way. That must be why we're running. We're running away from whatever destroyed the street behind us. 

My eyes start to clear as we move further from the smoke, though it feels like I'm still breathing in fire. "Stop," I choke out. "I need, to stop." Abruptly, I quit running. Breathing heavily with my charcoal lungs, I bend over with my hands against my trembling legs to hold me upright. 

"Hey, are you okay?" The young man comes over to me and puts a hand on my shoulder. 

"Yeah," I start to answer breathlessly, but I pause to think. "I don't know." 

He straightens and runs a hand through his ash filled brown hair. "Yeah, me either." He looks back towards where we came from, and I follow his gaze. "What was that?" The street behind us has been overtaken by a giant smoldering crater. Even the buildings nearest to us are in ruin, and rubble has been spewed farther than we've traveled. 

"How did we survive?" I wonder. 

Another girl runs towards us from the devastating scene. "Oh, hey." She stops a few feet away, as out of breath as we are. Her huge blonde fluffy hair obscures her dark face for a moment as she leans over like I was. She looks back up at us. "I guess you guys ran away from the explosion too." 

"Uhh..." I grasp at words, still trying to remember what happened. 

"Yes, we did." The boy answers more quickly. 

Her eyes widen. "Do you know how that happened? I can't remember a thing before I woke up." She scratches her head, shaking the huge curly mass. 

"No," the boy says, fixing his glasses. "I don't." 

"You two are having memory issues?" I ask, and they both nod. "I am too. Could it be a result of the blast?" 

The girl shrugs. "I don't know. That's the problem with not being able to remember anything I suppose." She smiles, and I have to smile back in response. She reaches out a hand. "I'm, uh... Oh, I'm Elise!" 

"Aiden." The boy reaches out and takes her hand. 

My brow furrows. "That was fast." 

Elise turns to me with her hand outstretched. "How about you, hun?" 

I take her hand. My small pale hand is engulfed by the warmth of her larger, darker one. "Umm..." Suddenly it hits me. "Savannah. I'm Savannah Jenson." 

Elise laughs. "Well, you're doing better than the rest of us. You have a first and a last name." 

I smirk and tuck a piece of red hair behind my ear. "I suppose I do."

"You guys having memory problems too?" A new voice startles us from behind me. I turn to see a kid approaching, younger than us. I'm not sure if they're male or female. "The name's Viren. Judging from the sight of you guys, you were a lot closer to the blast than I was." They point at us, before gesturing back towards themself with a thumb. 

I look down at my torn and soot covered t-shirt and jeans. Aiden is dressed similarly with the addition of an open hoodie, though in a more masculine fashion. His clothes are equally distressed. Even his glasses are a bit crooked. Elise is clothed a bit more loosely, in a hoodie and sweatpants, but her clothes are singed too. 

"I guess you're right." I admit. "I thought our memory issues had something to do with that explosion, but you've been affected, and you weren't nearly as close." 

They shrug and flip their black hair out of their eyes. "I was still knocked out by it, if that's what you were wondering." 

"You think this boils down to amnesia?" Elise asks, unconsciously shifting her weight to one side. 

Viren shrugs again. "Maybe. I mean, why couldn't it be?" 

"But why would we lose so much of our memory though?" Aiden asks. "I thought, well, I think, that amnesia affects short term memory."

"How can we know for certain?" Elise asks. "We can barely remember our own names."

"Help!" We all turn when we hear a woman's cry. "Help!" As a group we run towards the source of the noise. "Please, help..." We arrive at the woman as her voice fades into a fit of coughing. She's trapped by a fallen beam. 

"Hi," I start. "We're here to help." 

"Oh, thank God." Her narrow eyes are brimming with watery gratitude. "I'm trapped here." 

"Do you remember your name?" I ask. 

She nods. "I'm Lana." 

"Okay, Lana, we'll get you out of there." I reach for the end of the beam and try to pull up on it. "Come on guys, move!" Quickly the others grab ahold of the beam and together we lift. With a lot of grunting and huffing, we manage to move the beam. As we do, something else starts to shift. "Wait, stop!" I yell. Another beam is moving towards Lana's head. Her eyes move over and widen; she sees it too. As sweat rolls down my forehead I watch it slide closer. My sweaty palms grasp the beam we're already holding. We can't drop it back onto Lana. 

Suddenly a tall man runs in and he grabs onto the slipping beam. "Hurry up," he yells. "Lift that beam off of her!" We all push up, pulling the beam off of the trapped woman. "Move!" The man yells at Lana as he holds the other beam away from her. She rolls out of the way with tears streaming down her face. "Drop it!" We let go of the beam and it slams to the ground. He releases his beam only a moment later. 

I look to Lana and smile, chest still heaving with the exertion. We got her out. Then I look back to the newcomer. He stomps over to me. "You were going to get that woman killed!" 

My eyes narrow and my back straightens as I glare up into the dark eyes hidden behind darker shaggy bangs. "We were trying to save her life!" 

"So was I, and if I hadn't gotten here, she would have been killed by your haste!" There's obvious rage in his eyes about how we handled the situation. 

"Well we tried," I yell back. "We didn't know you were coming and we didn't know what we were doing, but we had to try something!" I point to the rubble. "We couldn't just leave her there!" 

"If you had then she would have been safe," he shouts back. "If you had, you could have assessed the situation better! You," 

Lana tackles him in a hug. "Thank you for saving me!" His eyes widen and he seems shocked. He holds his arms awkwardly out to the sides, clearly not sure what to do with them. 

"She does realize we saved her too, right?" Aiden asks. Viren shrugs in response. 

"You can hug her back." I smile at the man I'd been fighting with only moments ago, who clearly doesn't know how to handle Lana's affections. 

"Umm..." He awkwardly pats her back with his much longer arms. 

She seems content enough and backs away, slightly. "What's your name?" 

"Danger," he replies. 

"Well Danger, you saved me from danger. How poetic." Lana's eyes are dreamy, but Danger's seem to be more concerned. "Oh my gosh, my journal! I almost forgot!" She reaches over some of the beams, clearly looking for something. "Wuah!" She starts to fall in, but Danger grabs her waist and pulls her back. She blushes. He simply sighs and reaches into the crevice, pulling out a bag easily. 

Lana grabs the bag and clutches it to herself. "You're welcome," Danger murmurs. 

Viren uses their elbow to nudge Aiden. "Feel better now? She's hugging that bag even more tightly than she hugged Danger." 

Aiden shrugs. "I guess you're right." 

"Lana, what's so special about that bag?" Elise asks the question on all of our minds. 

Lana reaches in and grabs out a notebook with attached pen. "It's this, my notebook. I use this to keep organized, to draw, to write," She starts to flip through it. "I don't recognize any of these. Why can't I remember any of them?" She starts to visibly panic. "Not the lists, not the doodles, none of it!" 

"Hey," I put my hands on her shoulders. "It's alright. We'll figure it out." I look towards the rest of our posse. "We all have missing memories. I think we should stick together until we can figure out what happened to us." Everyone nods except for Danger, who's already walking away. His long dark ponytail trails after him. "Danger. Danger, wait." I jog a few paces to catch up to his longer strides. "Hey!" I stop in front of him. "Aren't you missing memories too?" 

He exhales. "If I say no, will you leave me alone?" 

I cross my arms over my chest. "No." 

"Fine, so I'm missing my memories. Big deal." He brushes past me. I'm so much shorter I can't do much to stop him, but my jaw clenches. "I doubt they'd be much help anyway. This is a whole new situation, but I think I can figure it out on my own." 

"Well, we can't." I tell him. "Look at us. We need you." 

"Why do you need me?" He stops. "To keep you from making foolish mistakes?" 

"Yes." I admit. "We don't know what we're doing. Clearly you have more practical knowledge than us." 

"How would we know even if I did?" Danger turns. "I don't have any memories, you don't have any memories. Maybe we're all equally clueless." 

"Equally clueless people don't carry hunting knives like that." I tell him. He reaches around and touches the handle of the sheathed blade tucked into the waistband of his jeans. "Come on, you must have some knowledge tucked away in that hard head of yours. We could really use your help, and maybe we could even be a help to you. Don't you think we have a better chance of getting our memories back, and surviving, as a group?" I reach a hand out to him. 

Danger sighs, but reaches out and takes my hand. "I guess you guys do need me." 

- Hi, there! I'm so excited to share the first snippet of this new story with all of you. I hope you enjoyed this first installment. Piece by Piece will continue next week. Please feel free to leave feedback or tell your fiction loving friends! 

Also a big shout out to my sister for helping me create the title design up above. Just a reminder that my writings and art are my property, so please help me protect them and always be wary of copyright regulation. 

I'll see you all next week as the adventure continues!

New Launch: Snippet By Snippet

I'm excited to announce something new I have in the works. I'm writing a story in a completely different way, and just for you! Very shortly, I'll be releasing a new story here on my blog, but I'm going to do so a little differently. The upcoming piece, or rather pieces, will be on ongoing story receiving updates on a weekly basis. Like the serials of old, this story will be revealed a bit at a time, snippet by snippet. Each week I'll add more to the story, so you, my lovely readers, can read it as it's written. 

This is a completely new format for me, therefore I plan to write it in a completely new way. I've decided to go into this story rather blind, instead of adapting one of the many stories already buzzing around my skull. I wrote down a basic list of character traits I would need to know, such as gender, age, and basic personality, and gave that list to a few of my closest friends available at the time. While they created a handful of characters for me, I separately tried to come up with the world I would be throwing these newborn characters into. 

My friends came back to me with five brand new characters, to which I added one of my own to complement the group. I spent a day or so acquainting myself with the characters and trying to add a bit of distinction to the indistinct alternate modern world they were about to reside in. Then I just started to write, seeing where the metaphorical pen would carry me and my young characters. I was somewhat scared, but far more excited, by the prospects of this new method. 

So far, the writing is flowing as easily and smoothly as a favorite pen. I am, however, aware that such ease may not last forever, but I've decided to go ahead and share this story with you, snippet by snippet. I still no little about the characters, and less about the plot, but because of that, we can discover the story together. I'm really excited to embark on this new journey with you. Let's see where it takes us. 

Our adventure begins in one week!

Vacation

“A writer never has a vacation. For a writer, life consists of either writing or thinking about writing.” – Eugène Ionesco 

This is one of my favorite quotes, and a thought that goes through my mind many times a day. Everything is inspiration to a writer, or even nothing. A moment of quiet or a break is an opportunity for complete character takeover. They rush in a wave, some or all of them quickly filling the perceived emptiness. Of course, they tend to launch their invasions when their author has other tasks to be accomplished. This leaves the creator to distractedly finish their work while fending off the influx of characters. 

Unfortunately there is an equally frustrating reverse situation. The writer has a moment to breathe and they feel inspired, energized, and ready to write, so then the characters decide to play hide and seek. They are deceptively good at hiding despite their typically demanding natures. It is absolutely one of the most irritating things to be so full of creativity and be unable to write at all. That energy just builds without any viable form of release. 

Even worse, sometimes the characters choose to take vacations of their own. A group of characters, or even a whole story’s worth of characters just leave. The rest of the characters try to obscure the absence, but eventually it’s all too clear that those characters are missing. Suddenly the writer realizes that they’ve been so distracted by newly emerged stories that they haven’t worked on their main series for a disturbingly long time. 

When the characters go on vacation, writers go on hunts. Usually those hunts are unsuccessful, though. Forcing the story when its characters are uncooperative isn’t truly productive in the long run. Character vacations often result in stagnant days for the writer. If the vacation lasts too long, I try to lure my main characters out by giving the attention to other characters in their absence. 

How is it that characters manage to both prevent writers from ever having vacations, and still take vacations themselves? That seems really unfair to me. My main characters have been on hiatus for quite awhile, and yet, I still can’t take break. The rest of my possibly innumerable characters are trying to drag me in a myriad of directions, but I can’t go the one direction I’d actually like to. It’s definitely annoying, but it’s just a part of being a writer. 

The only reason the pause is irritating is because of the thrills involved with writing. The addition of new characters and plot twists, or the completion of a story, creates a rush, and like junkies, we writers want that high again.  We live to move forward, to tell our stories. Any hindrance becomes bothersome, but the wait and fights with our characters are worth it for the thrills. There’s nothing quite like being a writer. 

-Hi everyone! Sorry, it’s been a little longer than I’d planned again. I’ve noticed that I haven’t gotten any comments on my posts. It’s nice to see that they’ve been read, but it’s hard for me to get much feedback from the number of readers alone. Please feel free to drop a comment on any of my posts. You can let me know if you liked a post or if there’s a topic you want me to write on in the future. I’m not always sure what topics in writing you guys would be interested in. 

I’m also working on a plan for something new to add to the blog. I think it’ll be pretty interesting both for you all and for me, so stay tuned!

Formatting Saves Lives

Mary walked down the street alone. She may not have had anyone with her, but she was determined. She refused to be afraid of anything. She had just made a decision that would change her life, forever. 

Yikes. Is anybody else worried about Mary? It seems pretty clear that Mary is heading into trouble. But why exactly are we so certain? Here, let's try reading that again.

Mary walked down the street alone. She may not have had anyone with her, but she was determined. She refused to be afraid of anything. She had just made a decision that would change her life, forever. 

But wait, now Mary seems like she could be determinedly heading off to a bright future. What's the difference? The first and second versions are worded exactly the same. The only difference is the font. The first passage is written using the Chiller font, while the second utilizes Monotype Corsiva. This may seem like a small difference, but it really made a difference for Mary. Formatting saves lives.

Though it may be overlooked, formatting really shouldn't be undervalued. Simple decisions about aspects like font can make a massive impact on a story. Mary, for example, appeared to be in danger in the first snippet. However simply switching the font turned Mary's snippet into a much more hopeful piece. One change completely altered the tone of the piece.

As well as saving character's lives, formatting can save writer's lives too. Formatting decisions can be brushed off or postponed until the last moment, but that can be a mistake. A failure to format a story correctly can lead to a premature rejection. I know, because that happened to me for the first time. Thankfully I didn't have a blunder like that with my manuscript, but I did with my recent submission to the writing contest.

I made a silly little mistake by forgetting to change the spacing of my short story from single to double spaced. I was kind of upset with myself for the error, but in the end, it was still fun to participate. It was exciting to race against the clock and to write with such a clear purpose. I've learned my lesson though and I will definitely double check my formatting in the future.

So just remember everyone, formatting saves lives!

- Hi, there! I'm sorry it's been so long. I didn't realize just how long until I started writing this post today. I've been pretty busy lately, but I'm hoping to get back to posting more regularly. Also Happy World Book Day, everybody!