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coutelier · 2 years

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Irongate: Lana Sane, Part One

This a little novella I’ve been working on while doing the next draft of my main project (it’s set after, so a few spoilers). I will post over the coming weeks it junks like this of about 2,000 words.

SYNOPSIS: Pint-sized anti-hero Tenley Tych leads some residents from a care home on a quest to fulfil one of their numbers dying wish, while she learns the value of history and connecting with the past. Then she fights a statue.

Millenia ago a family sheltered in a cave. On the tundra they faced many dangers. So many relatives lost to ice or sickness or predators. The world outside was one they could not control; even praying to the Gods did little to mitigate the harsh realities of nature. But perhaps to survive as a human means looking past what is cruel to what is magnificent. The icy plains, the herds of mighty beasts, the sun, moon, sky. With infinite patience the family sparked a fire, ground charcoal and other things into paste, all to celebrate the splendor of their world. They began to paint.

Twenty thousand years later twelve-year-old Tenley Tych tilted her head and squinted at a holographic projection of their work, concluding, “it’s rubbish.”

Seated next to her in the van, Jennifer Airhart gaped like she’d been punched in the gut, “rubbish!?”

“What’s it even supposed to be?”

“Well, it’s a Mammoth. I think. The trunk’s just a little faded.”

Tenley folded her arms to huff, “I could draw a better Mammoth than that and I have never even seen a real one.”

“Okay, well, I’ve seen your drawings so-“ Jenn swallowed, revising what she said next as Tenley’s eyes bore into her like lasers. “Anyway, it’s not about whether you’re a better artist than a caveman. They were the first animals to create like this. To make tools not for survival but to appreciate the beauty of their world. Don’t you feel any awe seeing something one of your own distant ancestors might have done?”

“Can’t have been my ancestor,” Tenley shrugged, “whoever did that had no talent.”

“You know,” Jennifer sighed, hanging her head as she shut down the projector leaving them in the back of the van surrounded by blinking lights and gadgets, “this is reminding me too much of school trips to museums. Everyone just wanted to fool around, except me. I guess it’s my fault - I’m not really a good communicator.”

Tenley peered sympathetically at her adopted elder all sagging and defeated. “You’re fine,” she assured her. “What I don’t understand is you always talk how amazing humans are and the incredible things they’ve done, but you don’t really like people at all. You’re always trying to avoid them.”

“It’s not that I dislike people,” Jennifer sighed, “it’s like Tangerines; I like them a lot, but too many at once will make me poop.”

“So that’s why we’ve been parked outside this care home for twenty minutes?” Tenley nodded, the old mansion - Dashwood - clearly visible through the van’s windscreen. “And it’s not just because you’re avoiding your uncle?”

“Great Uncle Quinn,” Jenn corrected, shoulders bunching as her hands slid beneath her. “He stayed with us a for a few years after my parents left, until he moved here. To be honest we never really got along.”

“What’s he like?”

“Oh; grumpy, grouchy, racist, misogynist - like all seven dwarfs stood on each other’s shoulders and wearing the skin of an old man.”

“So why is it you checking on him and not your cousins?”

“Said they were busy,” Jennifer said with all the conviction of someone totally unconvinced but too tired to argue about it.

“Well they’re going to start wondering why a van is out here, so you better decide whether we’re going in or not. If I have to knock-out another cop there’ll be more problems later.”

“It’s just I’ve never been here before. Not really sure where to go.”

“Maybe to the door marked reception?”

“Right,” Jenn bit her lip. It was obvious of course, but, “what then?”

“Then ask whoever’s there where your uncle is.”

“Right,” that was the problem; having to go inside and talk to a complete stranger before getting to her uncle. Jennifer took a breath, balancing herself. She could do this; just walk in there, say hello, sign-in. Easy, right? What if the person inside didn’t see her, like they were reading a magazine, watching videos, or perhaps just ignoring her? How would she get their attention? Would there be a bell? How annoyed would they be if she rung it? It was nonsense, all this thoughts rushing through her head. Intellectually Jennifer understood that, and yet her heart quickened regardless. Somewhere toward the back of the van, almost as if she’d planned it, a little blue light started blinking. “Oh! Actually, I have to quickly calibrate the thingemmydonk.”

Tenley’s eyebrow raised to form a question-mark on her face. “The thingemmydonk?”

“Right. So, could you talk to them while I…?”

“Yeah,” Tenley’s eyes rolled, “I figured that’s where this was going,” she grumbled as she slid out the side door onto the gravel, “you know I could have been watching the new season of Big Dino Brawl. You better be right behind me.”

Tenley stomped her little feet all the way to the reception desk but despite that the young man behind it failed to notice her approach, so engrossed was he in an issue of Colin the Barbarian. She waited a few seconds for him to acknowledge her - which to a child was basically days - before bashing the bell repeatedly. The pernicious ringing and dinging got him up to peer over the desk at the small girl.

“Stop that!” He groaned, “it’s not a toy.”

“If you use your imagination it could be,” Tenley encouraged, “like one of those clicking games people have on their phones.”

“It gives me a headache,” he was obviously unused to children or he would not have given away a weakness like that. “So what do you want? You checking in?”

“Funny,” Tenley acknowledged, “I’m looking for Quinn Alto.”

“You got a grown-up with you?”

“Sure. She’s,” Tenley gestured back to the door only to find Jenn had already slipped inside. “Well she’s hiding behind those plants now. You see? She’s waving - yes, hello. She’s shy. She’ll come out of there eventually.”

The desk man looked between the blonde haired, pale skinned Jennifer, and the black haired, tan skinned Tenley, astutely observing, “you don’t look related.”

Tenley’s dark eyes flared as she huffily answered, “do I look like someone who wants to tell you her life story?” She raised her arm, threatening to ring the bell again. “Just tell us where the old man is.”

Soon they were stood in a hall outside a wooden door, Jennifer taking several breaths before tentatively knocking. After a moment with no response she suggested, “maybe he’s not in there.”

“He’s in there,” Tenley said, tapping her foot impatiently. “He’s just being really slow.”

“How do you know?”

Tenley looked up, her eye whites swallowed by velvety black as a brief reminder of what she was. “I could just smash it open,” she suggested.

“N0 - no smashing anything. We’ll just wait.”

“Guess he’s up now anyway,” Tenley continued tapping her foot for another minute. “Did I mention I’m missing my show?”

“Well, it’s not really your show, is it? You weren’t involved in making it.”

“I bought a Lego set so I have invested.”

“And when everyone hates the finale you’ll disown and not take any responsibility. That’s very Meridiem.”

“Is it normal to have quite long conversations waiting for your uncle to cross a small room?”

The door finally clicked open, Jennifer gasping, “Uncle Quinn!”

He was of course an old man, thin wisps of white hair clinging to a liver-spotted scalp, one arm in a sling, loose cheeks pulling his lips down into what seemed a perpetual frown. Perhaps it more than just seemed as the first words he said were “what the hell do you want?”

Tenley had grown used to seeing frequent changes in Jennifer. At home or in her van she was relaxed. She told jokes. She often grew anxious at the prospect of meeting anyone new, but could relax again once she had a clear purpose. This time however was different; after Uncle Quinn opened the door Jennifer bowed her head, clasped her hands, standing there like an old maid. “I heard about your accident. I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

“You wanted nothing - you were told to come here and were too spineless to say no,” he hobbled into an armchair while turning up the volume of the TV to hear the news. “And I’ve nothing I need or want from you so just crawl back and tell them I’m fine.”

Tenley had said a similar thing after Jenn had got the call. The difference was that when she’d said it she was trying to look out for Jennifer and convince her to be less of a pushover, whereas when Quinn said it he was just trying to hurt her. Tenley had known him five seconds and didn’t want to waste any more time on him, and there were TV’s in each of these rooms. “Well, you heard him - he doesn’t want any help,” she shrugged, “we can still catch the second episode before Burplr is overrun with spoilers.” But Jennifer was biting her lip in the way that meant she was torn - she didn’t want to stay, but felt she had to do more before she left.

Quinn briefly looked over with mild curiosity but mostly disdain. “Who’s the brat?”

“This is Tenley,” Jennifer explained, “she’s living with me now. Long story.”

He shook and snorted disapprovingly, “taking in strays? You should be thinking about starting your own family. A real family.”

Jennifer muttered her response, loud enough to be heard but quiet enough to be plausibly misheard, “Well what I know is real is that she helps me more than you’ve ever helped anyone, so…”

Quinn scoffed, “I just don’t get it. Pretty blonde like you should have boys lining up to propose marriage.”

“Okay that felt all kinds of wrong and creepy,” Jennifer sighed, “I suppose now you’re going to ask if I’m lesbian?”

“Are you one of them lesbians or something?”

If she was, this would hardly be the time nor the person she would choose to come out to. The truth was relationships just weren’t something she thought much about at all, but that seemed to strike everyone as the least human of persuasions, although incidentally she wasn’t exactly human either - there was no need to burden anyone with that or the very long explanation it would entail. “I just have my mind on other things. Besides I’m only twenty-two.”

“Yeah, you always think you’ve got all the time in the world, and then,” he shrugged with his one good shoulder before turning up the volume again. The coverage was of evacuations around Abominable Zones. Not long ago a synthetic mutagen had been released into the atmosphere spreading far around the globe. There was a vaccine and it wasn’t as potent as the version Tenley had been exposed to, but now it was out it was free to mutate and evolve. Places where it fell most heavily had been sealed off by various militaries, guns trained on the dark in case anything emerged.

“Look,” Jenn exhaled, “I just need to make sure you’re been taken care of and looking after yourself. Everyone is worried about you.”

“Um,” Tenley raised a hand, “I’m not.”

“Of course I didn’t mean literally everyone.”

“I just want it clear that I don’t care at all. I’m only here because it’s too dangerous to leave me unsupervised. And for Jenn, I guess.”

“Thank you, Ten,” Jenn gently placed a hand on her ward’s shoulder, “it’s okay - I think I can handle things from here. Go watch your show.”

“You sure?” Tenley narrowed her eyes at the old man. Jenn was sure - there wasn’t much Tenley could do here; if he yelled or got abusive she could punch his head off and shove it up the other end, but that was exactly the kind of thing Jennifer tried to discourage. Besides, back in familiar territory with her uncle and all his annoying questions Jenn no longer needed the forceful twelve year old to get through. “Well, holler if you need me.”

As Tenley exited the news report was interviewing refugees. “You know whose fault this all is?”

“Actually, yes - I was there when it happened,” Jenn mumbled, “but I’m guessing you’ll make it out it’s somehow the fault of anyone who isn’t straight, white, and capitalist?”

“It’s those damn Australians!”

“Okay, well, that I wasn’t expecting. I’ve got to ask how and why exactly?”

“Cui bono - most of these people want to head south to countries least affected. The economy down there is booming like never before while we spend billions trying to contain this thing.”

“Ergo, Thor created a virus to force more tourism down under? I’d say that’s a fine example of abductive reasoning leading to entirely the wrong conclusion.”

“So what’s your explanation for all this?”

“Meridiem and Stag Corp being reckless, irresponsible, and stupid. That’s it. That’s all it was. And because of it the world is changed forever.”

“Bah! That’s fake news.”

“No - you mean it’s news you don’t like because it suggests that other things need to change. You think every report should just be ‘once again, Uncle Quinn was right about everything’.”

Quinn curled his upper lip, nostrils flaring like a terrible smell had entered the room. “You Airharts always thought you were so damn smart. Where’d that get your mom and dad, hm? Not here, are they?”

Jennifer’s cheeks sunk as she squished her lips. It was good that she had sent Tenley away or the girl might have reacted far more violently to such a low blow. She just had to remind herself that he was just a confused bitter old man and it wasn’t worth lowering herself to his level. Besides, she didn’t think she would last long in a women’s prison - catfights and bullying really weren’t her fortes.

“I’ve never said you were stupid,” Jennifer said. She had admittedly thought it many times just because he said so many patently stupid things.

“Don’t patronize me, girl - I managed a business for forty years! I don’t even know what you do, up there in that lighthouse all the time, adopting strange children.”

“Like I said - it’s a long story,” and honestly, Jenn sighed to herself, she didn’t think he was really interested. She slowly sat down on the bed. What he wanted, she thought, was someone to just listen to him complain for a while, which she could do while pondering math problems and the news report spoke to some of the refugees fleeing south.

Quinn snorted, shaking his head at them, “damn emigrants.”

#writing #writeblr #fiction #original fiction #science fiction #sci-fi #sci-fi & fantasy #wip #irongate #lana sane #writers on tumblr

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coutelier · 1 year

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Lana Sane - Part One (2nd Draft)

(I won't be posting many early drafts anymore and will start to delete the old ones, but I wanted to keep an example to refer to tracking the changes that happen between drafts. So this is the start of the second draft of a novella I started a while back. About 2500 words).

Millenia ago, yet the same moon looked down on Earth as now, most of the same stars still twinkled in their slow procession through the night. And as the gears of the cosmos ever turned, a family sheltered in a cave. There were many dangers out on the tundra. So many lost to ice, sickness, and predators. Prayer would do little to mitigate the harshness of nature, but perhaps to survive as a human means looking past the cruel to gaze with awe and wonder on the magnificent. Outside was a world they could not control, but in here huddled around a fire they began to grind charcoal and other things into paste with which to celebrate the splendor of their world; the windswept plains, herds of mighty beasts, the sun, moon, sky. They began to paint.

Twenty thousand years later, twelve-year-old Tenley Tych squinted at a holographic image of their work. With her black bob hanging to one side and her arms folded, she declared like a British judge on a talent show, “it’s rubbish.”

Sat next to her in the van next to machinery covered in blinking lights, Jennifer Airhart gaped like she’d been punched in the gut, “rubbish!?”

“What’s it even supposed to be?”

“Well,” now it was Jenn’s turn to tilt and squint, “it’s a Mammoth. I think. The trunk is just a little faded.”

“I could draw a better Mammoth than that and I have never even seen a real one.”

“Okay, well I’ve seen your drawings so-“ Jenn quickly revised what she was about to say under the intensity of Tenley’s dark eyed stare. “You know, it’s not about whether you’re a better artist than a caveman. The point is that even separated by thousands of years your ancestors also felt the need to create; humans were the first animals to make things not for survival but just so they could appreciate them. Doesn’t that make you feel something? Anything?”

“Can’t have been my ancestors,” Tenley shrugged, “whoever did that had no talent.”

Jennifer sighed, blonde hair covering her face as she hung in near defeat. She had a flashback to school trips to museums and her being the only kid in her class not interested in just fooling around. She had hoped to instill in her ward a sense of the wonder she felt, but Tenley just wasn’t receptive right now.

Tapping her foot impatiently Tenley said, “What I don’t understand is that you always talk about how amazing humans are and these great things they’ve done, but you don’t really like people at all. You’re always trying to avoid them.”

“It’s not that I dislike people,” Jennifer explained, “it’s like Tangerines; I like them a lot, but too many at once will make me poop.” She began scrolling through her tablet, murmuring, “I’ll find something that’ll impress you.”

Tenley snatched the device, shutting down the hologram. “Stop stalling,” she warned. She pointed through the front window to the mansion they were parked outside - Dashwood. “We’ve been here half an hour. They’re going to start wondering what we’re up to.”

Dashwood was a retirement home. From the outside it seemed well kept even in the low light of early evening; nicely trimmed hedges, colorful flowerbeds, glistening pond. No doubt it all made a pretty photo from anyone looking for a place to spend their twilight years. Jennifer had never seen or been here before, having no immediate family members she was looking to decommission. She did have cousins most of whom had regular full-time jobs and families of their own, so when word came of a problem with her uncle they called on her - as she was surely only busy with little things like preventing the apocalypse - to pay him a visit. She’d made it to the gate before suddenly deciding on the history lesson.

Tenley chided, “if you didn’t want to come here you should have just said so when they called.”

Jennifer stammered, “I-I can’t do that. I mean it’s family.” She also just hadn’t much of an excuse since unfortunately no world ending crisis had come up.

“Well then you should have given the phone to me and I’d have told them to shove it up their butt holes. Honestly you are such a doormat.”

“I’m sure you would,” Jenn smiled. She didn’t know why she was stalling. This should have been very easy compared to, say, hacking a mycelial network, yet here she was drumming her fingers, having to gather herself before she could even walk up to the door. “I’m just not sure where we’re supposed to go.”

“Maybe to the door marked reception?” Tenley suggested.

“Right,” Jenn bit her lower lip. She must have looked pathetic, sitting on her finger procrastinating over something so simple. And she was supposed to be the adult. “Right! Let’s get this done,” she hopped up and out of the van, turning to Tenley as she followed, “I should warn you what Great Uncle Quinn is like.”

“What’s he like?”

“Oh; grumpy, misogynist, racist - like all seven dwarfs stood on each other’s shoulders and wearing the skin of an old man.”

“I should warn you,” Tenley stomped ahead of her, “I’m missing the new season of Big Dino Brawl for this. I’m not exactly cheery right now either.”

“You’ll catch it on streaming.”

Tenley harrumphed then led them into the reception. The young man behind the desk was sat with his back turned, listening to something through his headphones while also watching the news on a screen hung in front of him. The coverage was of evacuations and relocations from the Abomination Zones - places where the mutagen had fallen warping life in them into myriad new forms. Jennifer had seen to it that a vaccine was freely available to everyone, but couldn’t prevent corporations like Meridiem from capitalizing on the chaos to seize swathes of land for themselves. They were far from any affected areas now so all Jenn had to worry about was getting the receptionist’s attention. Just walk up to the desk and ring the bell. Easy. Nothing to it. Then she would have to explain who she was and why she was here, which should have also been easy; wasn’t like she was a criminal, she was asked to come here. Stop being distracted by the TV and ring the bell. But the man there didn’t look like he wanted to be disturbed, and wouldn’t it be rude to-

Tenley tilted her head, prompting, “well?”

“Um,” Jennifer made an undulating pyramid with her hands but a solution to her problem may have just presented itself. “Would you like to ring the bell?”

She was trying her best to sound like a grown up allowing a child to do some minor task so they felt they were helping. Tenley saw through it muttering, “unbelievable,” as she shook her head and stepped to the desk, agitatedly slamming her palm on the bell repeatedly.

Startled from his seat the man quickly covered the bell, groaning, “stop that! It’s not a toy.”

“Really?” Tenley blinked innocently, “I thought it was like one of those clicky games. Press it a thousand times you win a berry or something.”

“What do you want?” He sighed exasperatedly, “you’re a little young to be checking in.”

“Funny,” Tenley acknowledged, “we’re here to see Quinn Alto.”

“Who’s we?”

“My adult. She’s-“ Tenley turned to where Jennifer had been. It only took a second to find her again. “Well she’s hiding over there now. Pretending to be interested in that big potted plant.”

The receptionist peered between the pale blonde cowering in the corner and the tanned dark haired Tenley. “You don’t really look related,” he noted.

“Do I look interested in sharing my life story? Just tell us how to find the old man.”

“Well I need you both to sign in first. And I need to see some ID.”

“Or,” Tenley considered, “you could let us in, and I won’t shatter every bone in your body.” The man, not knowing what she was capable of, just looked bemused by the threat. And Tenley knew that Jennifer likely wouldn’t approve of unnecessary roughness so, “look,” she said, “I’m missing my Dinosaur show. The sooner you let us in the sooner I can be done and out of here, which is what we both really want, right?”

“Big Dino Brawl?”

Tenley brightened as if she had new found respect for him. “You know it?”

“Okay, fine. Just sign and get out of here.”

Having annoyed the receptionist into submission, Tenley was soon stood tapping her foot impatiently as beside her Jennifer tentatively knocked on a wooden door in one of the mansion’s halls. After a moment of no response Jenn suggested, “maybe he’s not here.”

“He’s in there,” Tenley assured her, “he’s just really slow.”

“How do you know?”

Tenley tilted her head back as the whites of her eyes were swallowed leaving behind shimmering onyx spheres. Jennifer bit her lip, feeling foolish for having to be reminded.

“I could smash it open,” Tenley suggested.

“No! N-no - no smashing,” Jenn sighed, “just be good and we’ll get some ice cream on the way home.”

Tenley’s eyes returned to normal. She tilted her head and narrowed them saying, “you’ll forget. But I’ll remind you.”

“Consider it an object lesson; never make promises you can’t keep.”

Finally the door clicked then creaked open. Of course what greeted them was an old man; fit for his age, but his back bent like a well used bow, thin wisps of white hair clinging to a liver spotted scalp, loose cheeks pulling his lips into a perpetual frown. Jennifer immediately snapped to attention, gasping, “Uncle Quinn!”

He snorted, “what the hell do you want?” He then swung about to slowly hobble back around his bed to the other side of the room.

“I came to check up on you.”

“What you mean,” he creaked and groaned as he lowered himself into an armchair, “is that none of your cousins could be bothered, and you’re too much of a doormat to tell them to get lost.”

“W-well,” Jennifer flushed beet red, Tenley offering no support; merely looking up and shrugging. Jenn tugged on her waistcoat, breathing deep. “They are worried about you. They just have jobs and their own families now. They’d be here if they could.”

“Bullshit,” Quinn told her, “you just skip on home and tell them I’m fine. I don’t need your charity.”

“Okay!” Tenley clapped her hands merrily. “You heard him. He’s fine. Let’s go. Ice cream! Remember?”

But Jennifer was less convinced. Hanging around the room were various mementos; tarnished medals, certificates, a yellowing employee of the month award, photos of her aunt, uncle, and cousins, Jennifer off to the side looking glum in a few of them.

Quinn had switched on the TV, although to Tenley’s chagrin he was just watching the boring news. More reports of people fleeing from and being evacuated from the zones, the military and several private mercenary groups - most of them under the umbrella of Meridiem - setting up cordons around the worst infected areas. “You know who’s behind all this don’t you?”

“Actually I was there, so yes,” Jennifer muttered. If her friend Kaya were here she would say maybe he just wanted to be listened to, so Jenn braced herself for whatever nonsense she was about to hear. “I suppose you’re going to tell us your theory anyway. I’m guessing it will be somehow the fault of people not straight, white, and capitalist.”

“Australians.”

“Okay, well, that I was not expecting,” Jenn sighed, “dare I ask how or why exactly?”

“Cui bono, girl. Think it’s a coincidence this disease or whatever it is hasn’t spread down under? And now there’s all these people fleeing there so their economy is booming like never before. Never trusted them. I mean, how could you? They’re all descended from crooks.”

Jenn sighed again, rolling her eyes, “There is so much wrong with everything you just said that I just don’t know where to begin correcting it.”

“Suppose you believe all that fake news blaming the corporations.”

“Well, by ‘fake news’ you mean news you don’t want to hear. You want every report to say ‘once again, Uncle Quinn was never wrong and society in the old days was perfect.’”

“Bah!” Quinn spat, rising slightly in his chair, “you Airharts always thought you were so damn clever. Where’d it get your parents, eh? Where are they?”

Low. Jennifer pursed her lips, looking away from him as if afraid she would do something very out of character if he remained in her sights. Tenley on the other hand fixed him firmly in hers. “You should be nicer to her,” she warned.

“Oh?” Quinn snorted as he bent forward like a grandpa telling a story. “Why?”

“Because no-one else will save you if you keep pissing me off.”

“Who is this brat?” He laughed to Jennifer. “Your guard dog? You taking in strays now?”

“Ten,” Jennifer placed a hand on her ward’s shoulder, gently turning her around, “it’s okay. I lived with this man for three years. I can put up with his nonsense.”

“You sure?” Tenley asked.

“Yeah. Go watch your show. I can handle things from here.”

“Okay, well - holler if you want someone to break his legs.”

Tenley left them. After a moment Quinn leaned back noting, “well she doesn’t take shit, does she?”

“No,” Jenn agreed.

“You know, I just don’t understand why a pretty blonde girl like you isn’t married already. Starting a real family. You one of them lesbians or something?”

“Something,” was all Jennifer was willing to divulge at this time. She just simply had no interest in those kind of relationships, but that was something most people struggled to accept. She would rather just get to point of why she was here. “Look - they say you’re refusing to take your medication.”

“I don’t need any more jabs or pills in me.”

“That’s not what the doctor thinks.”

“That vampire? You know they all just want to implant us with their microchips so they can spy on us.”

“Okay, well, if ‘they’ wanted to spy on you there are much more straightforward ways to go about it. You’re just not-“ Jenn froze. She started biting her lip, unsure she should carry on, but Quinn leaned forward bidding her until quietly she finished, “you’re not important.”

Quinn snorted. Leaned back. His old gray eyes scanned the walls around him. “See that? Lifetime Achievement Award. Outstanding contributions to customer service. They booked a ballroom, a band, they took my photo for a magazine shaking hands with the company president. But now all that’s forgotten. This is what we get for our service; swept away out of sight so we can’t keep being a reminder to you all that nothing ever lasts forever.”

“You know,” Jenn sighed, but this time it was accompanied by a soft smile, “I think that’s the first time I’ve understood anything you’ve said.”

He confessed, “I have missed the arguments.”

“Yeah,” Jenn graciously nodded, “I understand wanting to take back some control of your life, but you do still have to take your medicine.”

Quinn stretched, cracking his neck and loosening his shoulders, getting ready for another round.

#writing #fiction #science fiction #writeblr #writers on tumblr #writers of tumblr #lana sane #sci-fi #sf&f #sff #sci fi & fantasy

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