You fill your nose with the scent of death.
Everything else is far away. Legs, tail, eyes, stomach—these are only memories. They are releasing you. They are letting you g— “NO,” you shout, whatever’s left of your mind grasping tightly to itself. “The scent. Focus on the scent.”
You gasp in a breath, rediscovering your lungs. You feel the dirt below you, and your flesh scraping across it: the parade of a million cells rearranging themselves.
The death-smell is stronger now, but so are you. After all, there’s nothing like death to remind you that you’re still alive. Alive, despite your body struggling to piece itself back together. Alive, despite your organs getting resculpted inside of you. Alive, despite being a shapeshifter. Alive. Alive.
“Alive like him?”
For a heartbeat—you can feel your heart again—you aren’t sure which “him” your mind was referring to. The stiff, rotting body in front of you, source of the scent you anchored yourself to? The smaller, warmer rabbit shape whose pelt was just now sealing itself off from your own? Or— “Don’t think about him,” you growl. “This isn’t about that.”
Except, maybe, it is.
But you can worry about that later. You stagger to your paws, which have exchanged their padless softness for your own familiar claws. With a tug, you pull yourself completely free from the rabbit. You’re panting hard, and an all-encompassing pain is beginning to creep over you as the last of the numbness subsides.
You have to work quickly. You’re not sure how long the rabbit will retain the remnants that you transferred to it when you merged just now. You don’t even know how long it’s already been, only that this is the fastest you’ve ever managed to exit a morph.
“A good sign, hopefully,” you tell yourself. Though hope isn’t exactly the main emotion you’re feeling at the moment.
You sink your teeth into the rotting corpse, pushing back against every instinct that yells at you to get as far away from it as possible. The pain is getting worse now. You bite down harder.
Dragging the body over to the rabbit’s still-unconscious form, you wrap it around the rabbit like a macabre blanket. Your eyes water and your stomach churns. If you hadn’t just come out of a morph, the bile would be rising in your throat right about now.
Though you’re in a rush, you freeze. “What am I doing?” you demand, suddenly terrified. You see a piece of bone blend right into the haze of the rabbit’s white fur. “This is wrong. So wrong.”
But you’ve gotten this far. You can’t turn back now. You’re not the type to give up. Not on yourself, not on your projects—and not on him. Never on him.
You shudder, feeling as though lightning is running through every vein in your body. You don’t even bother with words this time. Words are no use against your own mind.
Mind.
Your mind.
While standing perfectly still, your mind reaches out. The searing pain quickly becomes a mere background sting. The memories, however, only get louder.
Focus. You focus on the rabbit.
You still don’t understand how it works, but something about the shapeshifting lets you do this. Your mind and your body no longer match up. You are a ghost dwelling in an open vessel. And you can reach beyond it. There—another mind—you sense it. Not through sight or touch, but in a way you can’t describe. You just know.
The rabbit.
In the rabbit’s mind, you know his fear. You are his fear. He is paralyzed—but not for long. You control him, far better at this than he is. Herbivorous teeth close down on decaying flesh. The sample isn’t enough. You—the rabbit—bite again. Swallow. Bite. Swallow. It isn’t perfect. Rot makes it harder to single out the original.
But you know what to do.
“I need to stop this.”
You are the shapeshifter that doesn’t die. That doesn’t get stuck. That doesn’t go mad.
“I need to get out.”
You are the only one who can save them. All of them. Even the rabbit. Even…
“AHHHHHH!”
You can’t tell the rabbit’s panic from your own anymore. And yet, it’s done. Your mind releases itself from the rabbit brain even as the brain itself begins to contort and expand. Back in your own body, you listen to the sound of your ears ringing.
And then you collapse.
The pain and the memories flood over you all at once, and you begin to drown in the torrent. You remember him—your brother, the way he used to be—huge and brave and invincible. You remember the turtle. You remember the battles. You remember searching your brother’s mind to learn his illness, the one he tried to downplay for so long. You remember finding that his cells had turned against him. Multiply. Grow. Repeat. You remember finding the rabbit, also sickly, also brave. You remember sparing its life.
You remember death.
You remember hoping ghosts are real.
You remember—
With a start, you wake up, your pain gone. In front of you, the rabbit is gone, too. Instead, there’s a wolf there, its dark, silver-flecked pelt eerily similar to the cold, decaying one whose taste still lingers on your tongue. But that corpse has been reduced to nothing more than a few bones and scraps of skin.
Absorption. It had worked. The mass of the dead had been rebuilt into a living body, its chest gently rising and falling like the tides. But was it—
You stare at the animal you’ve created. A wolf, or a rabbit? Some unholy mixture of the two? Whose soul would you find if you reached out to look?
Anxiety grips you in its needle-sharp teeth.
For the first time since you began your experiment, you turn your attention outwards, your eyes darting wildly from side to side. Sun-filled trees surround you. You notice the sweet smell of fallen leaves—also dead, but much nicer than the death-smell from before. A multitude of insects hum through the air. A spider catches one in its web. Death and life, forever dancing in perfect balance.
“Except for me,” you whisper, the warm summer air doing nothing to soften the chill that races down your spine. “And…”
Returning your gaze to the—the whatever, whoever it was—you don’t try to fight the creeping sensation of dread. You don’t know what you’ve done. You don’t know what this means.
Your fur spikes. The breath catches in your throat.
“I’ve made a mistake. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…” Shaking, you reach out a paw. The rabbit-wolf’s neck is scrawny—there wasn’t enough meat left on the body to rebuild it in full. You see the bones of its spine. It would be so easy to press down, hear a snap, end what you should never have started…
You feel its pulse, pumping dutifully under its skin. The animal twitches at your touch, beginning to wake.
And suddenly, the fear evaporates. Your own pounding heart begins to calm. Your fur flattens. The sun warms your body. In the space of an instant, everything feels alright again.
After all, it didn’t matter who the animal woke up to be. Rabbit or wolf, alive or dead, right or wrong, ghosts or no, you knew that you had done something no one else ever could. And you didn’t give up. Your brother would be proud of you for that.
Whatever happened next, you could handle it.
The rabbit-wolf’s eyes blink open, its nose filling with the scent of summer leaves. “Hello,” you speak, your words finally finding someone else to hear them. “I saved you.”
It looks up, its yellow eyes peering curiously at your face. Your real face.
You smile. “We’re going to be okay.”

• Exposition
⁃ Nimbus needs a break after being cooped up in the library for a while. They go outside, hoping to get some fresh air.
⁃ After flying to the top of a building to escape from the noise of the city, they see a merchant drop a coin below. They swoop back down and take it, then return it after some consideration.
⁃ The merchant is grateful, and, after some discussion, he tells Nimbus about his recent break-ins and that he's worried the guards have discovered some of the…less legal…items he offers.
⁃ Nimbus agrees to help him out, excited to have their own case like the detectives in the books they enjoy reading
• Rising action
⁃ Nimbus sits outside the merchant's store for the night, but is so absorbed in their book that they don't realize a spy is approaching until they're already inside
⁃ They sneak in behind them, ready to…fight? They don't really know how to fight—honestly, they haven't done any of this before
⁃ As the person walks around, Nimbus realizes that it is indeed one of the queen's guards, and they seem to be armed.
⁃ Nimbus stays quiet, wondering what exactly the guard is doing/looking for
⁃ Eventually, another guard enters, and the two start to talk about their problems and snack on some fresh fruit they steal from the shop. Clearly they aren't the most trustworthy people—this isn't at all surprising to Nimbus
⁃ Nimbus comes out of the shadows, intending to get them to leave and pay for what they stole. They don't seem to be coming here for any particular reason other than that they can get through the locks on the doors, so Nimbus thinks it's safe to confront them
• Climax
⁃ When they appear, the guards raise their weapons, clearly surprised at the sight of the bird
⁃ Nimbus announces themself as a detective hired to see who's been stealing from the store, and the guards find this hilarious—how could a tiny thing like Nimbus be any use? They feel very disappointed about this (bad memories from family!), but push on, determined to get them to leave.
⁃ The guards continue to find this whole situation more amusing than anything, but they eventually relent—it's getting late anyway
• Falling action
⁃ Nimbus convinces themself that they did great. The mystery is solved, the guards left, and they're still a wonderful detective!
⁃ They go to find the merchant, letting him know that they've solved the case!
⁃ He is happy, but confirms first that they wouldn't be suspicious if he changed the locks/added more security measures
⁃ The merchant is sure that Nimbus is trustworthy, and they lead them down into the secret room below the shop, where they have a few very old books about spells
⁃ In exchange for their services, he offers them one book of their choice
• Resolution
⁃ Nimbus takes one with the title ‘thaumaturgy’—they don't think magic is still real, but they want to learn as much as they can about it!






It had been far too long since Nimbus had stretched their wings. The library had closed to the public hours before, and even the night guards had stopped their patrols and headed home.
Nimbus, though, was wide awake. How could they possibly rest after learning about the impact of the Enchanted Era on modern Keirian politics?
Thankfully, the sixth-floor windows were never locked, and Nimbus slipped out silently. They extended their wings, catching a current in the cool night air and soaring upwards. Their coat flapped behind them as they landed on the library rooftop.
With sharp eyes, Nimbus scanned Austorp's skyline. A glint of gold caught their gaze, and they squinted downwards, adjusting their hat with one wingtip. As far as they could tell from seven floors up, someone had dropped their purse—and that someone seemed to be quite wealthy. Passersby gave the bag a wide berth—even if they could see the world from Nimbus' bird's-eye view and notice the surprising lack of guards patrolling the street, they'd still be too terrified of getting caught to risk snatching something that wasn't theirs.
Nimbus, though, was tempted—even if whoever dropped the purse returned for it, they wouldn't miss just one gold piece.
They hopped off their perch on the rooftop, swooping to the road below, where shadows cast by a row of locked-up businesses concealed their dark feathers. Furtively, Nimbus reached out, grasping a coin in their beak before hopping back into the darkness. They examined their prize, pleased by its golden glint.
A snore rumbled from the shadows beside Nimbus, loud enough to shake the windows above. Their head jerked towards the sound, feathers ruffling with worry.
From the volume of those snores, whoever lay in the shadows was sound asleep. Though Nimbus was desperate to leave with their shiny coin, they couldn't help but want to investigate. They took the coin in their beak again, approaching the source of the sounds.
Squinting into the shadows, Nimbus made out the silhouette of a middle-aged elf sprawled against the wall, silver hair rumpled and drool running down one cheek. His round glasses had slipped halfway down his nose, and he was dressed entirely in dark linen—it was no wonder Nimbus hadn't noticed him in the near-darkness.
Nimbus was too busy staring, wondering what the elf could possibly be doing here, to realize the coin had begun to slip from their beak. They flinched at the clink when it hit the stone pavement, painfully loud in the night.
The elf abruptly stopped snoring, eyes twitching open. He looked around, clearly startled, before spotting Nimbus, who was standing as still as the statue of Queen Guinevere that graced Austorp's central plaza.
“Oh. Hello.” He pushed his glasses up, leaning towards Nimbus.
Nimbus stepped back.
The elf noticed the fallen coin, and his eyebrows furrowed. He patted one pocket, then the other. “Is that mine?”
“Yes,” Nimbus said reluctantly. They looked longingly at the shiny thing as he slipped it back into his pocket.
They pushed the purse towards the elf. “Is this yours, too?”
“Why, it is!” he said, blinking at the bag.
Nimbus couldn't wait any longer to ask their questions. "Who are you? What are you doing? What are you wearing?“
The elf slipped the purse into their pocket, patting it three times for good measure.
Nimbus' wings twitched with anticipation.
”My name is Adric, and I own this shop,“ he finally answered. ”Every morning for weeks when I've opened up, the shelves seem disorganized, my fruit is missing, crumbs are scattered everywhere…
“I planned to wait outside overnight to investigate the break-ins. Evidently, that didn't go as planned.” Adric gestured to his disheveled clothes. “I haven't slept much lately, and I suppose I couldn't expect to sit in the darkness without drifting off.”
Nimbus cocked their head, picturing the brave investigators from the mystery novels they loved. This elf, slumped against the wall, eyes half-closed from exhaustion, didn't match the description. "Sounds like a job for a real detective,“ they replied.
Adric abruptly stood up. ”Would you help me?“
”What do you mean?“
”I need someone to watch the shop until dawn. You seem wide awake, and you helped recover my purse. You're perfect!“
Nimbus opened their beak, ready to object. They were nothing like Inspector Shadowstep, the hero from their favorite novels. Sure, they'd devoured every book they could find about criminology and forensic science, but reading about mysteries was completely different from actually solving them.
But the chance to take on a case of their own? They couldn't miss this opportunity.
Before they could overthink their decision, Nimbus struck a pose, wings stretched wide and hat tilted jauntily. ”Lucky for you, you're speaking to East Austorp's best detective.“
”Really?“ Adric scratched his head, looking Nimbus up and down.
”I suppose I could make room in my schedule for your case,“ Nimbus said, desperately trying to remember Inspector Shadowstep's dialogue.
”And what payment will ‘East Austorp’s best detective' require?“
Nimbus cocked their head, unsure how to answer. One of those shiny coins would be nice, but they didn't know how much a real inspector expected. ”We'll discuss that later,“ they said as confidently as they could manage. ”I'll have everything figured out by morning.“
Adric nodded. ”Then I wish you the best of luck," he replied, punctuating his sentence with a yawn. Tipping his hat to Nimbus, he disappeared around a corner into the maze of Austorp's streets.
Whenever she was assigned a case, Inspector Shadowstep always began by checking entry and exit points. Nimbus stretched up to test the front door's handle, but found it locked. They turned next to the two windows flanking the door. Though they were small by Elven standards, a dwarf or gnome could easily fit through, not to mention a bird like Nimbus.
They pushed at a window pane, and to their surprise, it slid open. Curiously, the flowerbeds underneath weren't disturbed. If a creature had entered through the window, wouldn't they have uprooted the plants while scrambling through?
Nimbus hopped up and squeezed through the window, dealing some damage to the flowerbeds along the way.
Inspector Shadowstep had an eye for detail, and Nimbus mimicked her scrutinizing gaze as they scanned the store. Nothing seemed obviously out of place. But as they stepped further inside, something soft squished under their talon. They lifted their leg to find a bit of orange peel stuck on one claw.
Strange. Oranges were rare in Austorp—Adric must have imported them from outside Keirus—and they were expensive enough that nobody would leave a scrap behind, much less a trail across the entire shop.
Nimbus quietly followed the bits of peel and pith towards a set of shelves.
They peered around the corner. Hundreds of beetles carpeted the ground, swarming over the remnants of an orange, carapaces shimmering with color in the dim moonlight—mirrorbacks.
Nimbus stumbled backwards, and their talons scraped against the floor.
The bugs froze.
Nimbus had encountered the metallic beetles among the stacks of the East Austorp Library, but never so many in one place. When they read Insects of Austorp, they'd learned mirrorback beetles consumed anything they came across, but they had a taste for fresh fruit and meat. They must have smelled the oranges and bored straight through the brick walls into the shop.
The insects seemed occupied by the orange, but a swarm this size could turn on Nimbus and devour them from talons to beak in an instant.
For a moment Nimbus considered retreating to the safety of their nook on the library's sixth floor. But Inspector Shadowstep never gave up on a case.
Nimbus jumped into the air, wings beating wildly, sending wind gusts whooshing towards the bugs. Their coat billowed around them, and their precious hat flew from their head and landed a few shelves over.
The mirrorbacks scattered from the remaining scraps of orange peel. A group gathered under Nimbus, climbing atop each other to tower upwards, inch by inch, until they were almost high enough to grasp Nimbus' dangling talons.
Nimbus swooped across the shop, trying not to focus on the thousand tiny legs pattering against the ground behind them. They snatched the last orange from a high shelf and squished it in their beak. Just as the mirrorbacks caught up, they hurled the orange out the still-open window, drips of sticky juice trailing behind as it bounced into the empty street.
Catching the fruit's scent, the beetles surged towards the window, rushing through in a glimmering mass.
After the last mirrorback heaved itself over the sill, Nimbus landed, then shut and locked the window. As the fear subsided, their chest puffed with pride. They strutted over to retrieve their hat, then began to search for the hole where the mirrorbacks had entered.
It didn't take long—when they stooped to examine a current of cool air below a table, they noticed an opening in the brick, the edges bite-marked by the mirrorbacks' vicious fangs. Nimbus shuddered at the thought of what would have happened if those insects had reached them.
They stuffed a rag in the hole as a temporary blockade, then settled on a shelf to wait for Adric.


Hours later, the doorbell tinkled and Adric entered, rays of early morning sunlight spilling through behind him.
“You're back!” Nimbus chirped, hopping off the shelf.
“I thought you left! How'd you get inside?”
“I'm pleased to report that your case has been solved,” said Nimbus, ignoring Adric's question and imitating the proud-but-slightly-condescending tone they imagined Inspector Shadowstep used when addressing clients.
Adric brightened, peering down at Nimbus.
Nimbus pointed to the blocked-off hole. “You have an infestation of mirrorback beetles. They burrowed through the wall to eat your produce, and they leave scraps everywhere. I imagine neglecting to lock your windows doesn't help, either.”
“Mirrorbacks?” Adric stroked his chin. “It's a relief nobody's been sneaking in here—except the bugs, it seems.”
He smiled. “I truly appreciate your assistance.”
Nimbus struck another pose, wings outstretched in delight. “Another case cracked by Inspector Shad—Inspector Nimbus.”
Adric reached out a hand, and Nimbus shook it with their wing.
“Well, it was certainly nice to meet you, Inspector Nimbus.”
Nimbus nodded, not budging from the doorway.
“I suppose you require a payment.”
Nimbus nodded again.
“Do you only accept gold, or might I offer you something more…unique?”
“I'd consider an alternative.”
Adric locked the door and closed the curtains. At the back of the shop, he lifted a corner of the carpet to uncover a trapdoor. He opened both its locks, then lifted it, gesturing for Nimbus to enter.
Nimbus' curiosity overwhelmed any apprehension, and they stepped through the trapdoor, fluttering downwards.
As Nimbus' eyes adjusted to the basement room's dim light, their beak fell open in astonishment. Lining the walls were hundreds of books, books they'd never seen in years spent scanning every corner of Austorp's libraries. They rushed towards the shelves, hungrily taking in each unfamiliar title.
“I've been collecting for years—they're all authentic Enchanted Era,” Adric declared. “These books hold great power, for those who put in the time to decipher them.”
Nimbus turned to the elf, bouncing from talon to talon with excitement.
“You can choose one, if you like.”
Nimbus ran a wingtip over the worn covers, landing on a thin book titled Thaumaturgy. They pulled it from the shelf, admiring the gilded text on its spine.
Adric chuckled. “Ah, that's a good choice.”
Nimbus followed Adric back to the shop, unable to take their eyes off the book as the elf double-locked the trapdoor.
Finally, they slipped the volume into their deepest coat pocket. They stepped out onto the streets of Austorp, now bustling with mid-morning activity.
Adric smiled. “Keep the book safe, young Inspector.”
Nimbus dipped their head to the elf, then looked back to the library rooftop and stretched their wings outwards, ready to fly.





hello sandy!! i am also going to be very brief with this (just remembered i have to leave for an event in fifteen minutes aah) but i will come back for more feedback later
i loved seeing the friendship between bailang and haruo develop!! moving through multiple important moments in their relationship definitely worked–it gave a lot more detail and context than focusing on just one would have. i also loved all of the little details throughout (bailang's resting scowling face, haruo's knitting, etc), just like in your january story, they made the characters feel very well-developed beyond the boundary of this fic! while i thought the structure as a whole worked great, i was a little confused by the ending. i wonder if you could expand a bit on those three lines to give a little more context on where they are/what's going on.
great job though, this was super fun to read!! <3

Thunder roared endlessly above, never quite stopping and never quite stopping, each sound rolling into and out of the next. Lighting flashed across the sky in beautiful yet terrifying arcs, seeming to light up the world brighter than the sun did. Sheets and sheets of rain slammed into the ground, creating an almost pulsing sound as the wind blew it in slants.

Yet despite all that din, a voice could be heard.

“Lilac!” it cried. “Lilac Orchid Hale!”

A girl, positively and utterly soaked, turned sharply, and the lightning stuttered for a moment. Unnaturally blue eyes landed on the person calling her name. A woman, about her height with long brown hair and green eyes sparkling with mischief.

“How do you know my name?” she said, feeling electricity dance uncomfortably across her arms.

The girl only grinned. “Unimportant,” she said, waving a hand in the air. Only then did Lilac notice that the girl wasn’t soaked. “Anyways, what is important is that you get an interview!”

Before Lilac could say a word, colorful smoke appeared around her. Startled, she coughed, waving her hand in front of her face—


LILAC, squinting: What just happened?

??? just smiles: We brought you to the interview room, silly!

LILAC: “We”?

??? blinks, eyes sliding to a point beyond LILAC before she waves her hands: Don’t worry about it!

???: Anyways! My name is Bea and I will be conducting your interview today! So, since I can only assume most of the viewers don’t know who you are already, could you introduce yourself?

LILAC: … Lilac. Lilac Hale.

BEA: It’s a pleasure to meet you, Lilac! So, onto the next question. I think we’ll start with an icebreaker first, what’s your favorite color?
LILAC: Don’t have one.

BEA smiles, though it’s noticeably thin: Aw, it’s no fun if you lie! C’mon, what’s your favorite color?

LILAC sighs: … it’s green. The pastel and desaturated one. My… ah, mom used—used to wear it all the time. Brings back memories, I guess.

BEA: Thank you for answering honestly. Next question! Why were you standing out in a dangerous thunderstorm?

LILAC frowns: I thought we were starting with icebreakers.

BEA: We did! Your name and your favorite color. Those are rather standard icebreaker questions. Why? Did you want to answer more of those boring ones?

LILAC: Yes, actually.

BEA: Too bad! I’ll ask again! Why were you standing out in a thunderstorm?

LILAC: … seriously?

BEA: …

LILAC: Fine. Fine. I’m trying to harness my ability, and my professor said it’d be best if I’d tried it during an actual thunderstorm. Less dangerous that way, since nature is doing what nature does.

BEA: I see. And you have storm powers?

LILAC: Electrokinesis.

BEA: Same difference.

LILAC: They’re really no—

BEA claps her hands together: Anyways! So, you said you’re learning how you harness your abilities, yes? Aren’t you supposed to be getting back home to your brother?

LILAC face contorts in fear: What?

BEA just smiles: Sorry, I know I can mumble sometimes. Do you need me to repeat that? Or was it just the absurdity of my statement?

LILAC: How do you know that? I—I haven’t told that to anyone.

BEA blinks, eyes flickering again to a point past LILAC: Does it matter? Answer the question. It’s very clear that you heard me.

LILAC hesitates. She glances behind her shoulder but sees nothing. She turns back around: I… I am trying to get back home to him. But this is the only way. I need to get halfway across the country and the only way to do that is through a competition. I—

LILAC cuts herself short and then sighs quietly: I need to be the best. I—I need to win, but it’s taking too long and the competition is getting closer and closer, and I still feel like I’m in the same place I was three weeks ago.

LILAC turns her head to the side and doesn’t say anything else.

BEA shrugs: Hm. It’s a shame that I would hate to write Deus Ex Machina for your story, it’s so interesting. Though, maybe I’m a bit biased. Unfortunately for you, that means you’ll have to endure another few weeks of this.

LILAC’s expression darkens: What do you mean write?

BEA blinks and then snaps her fingers: Whoops. Seems like I’ll have to cut this interview short.

LILAC starts to take a step forward: Don’t ignore me—

BEA snaps her fingers and another cloud of colorful smoke surrounds them as she winks: Th—th—that’s all, folks!


“—answer my question!” Lilac snaps at the air as she nearly tripped in a puddle. She wheeled her arms about, regaining her balance as she looked around. She found herself back in the torrential downpour she had been in only minutes ago.

That Bea girl was nowhere to be seen.

“… what is my life,” Lilac asked with a groan as she stared up at the sky.

The sky only answered with a rumble of thunder.

interview daily || 545 words

Stella came to an abrupt halt as a face popped up in her vision, smiling widely. “Ah, Stella St. Clair! Just the person I wanted to see.”
Oh, no, not that journalist person. She tried to dodge, but Ruby had somehow grabbed her arm, looking far happier than Stella felt. “I have so many questions for you! How did you feel about being paired with the prince for the Trials?”
Like she’d fallen off a very unpleasant cliff. Stella forced a smile to her face. “It was quite the surprise,” she said as diplomatically as she could. “I originally didn’t intend to participate in the Trials, you see.”
Drat. She’d given the reporter something to pounce on, which she speedily did. “Oh?” Ruby asked, eyes widening. “Do tell. Most people are over the moon to get a Trials invitation, you know.”
Yes, she did know. Her smile felt more strained with every passing second. “Yes, well, I… like a quiet life,” she fumbled. “But I found in the end I couldn’t say no!” Which was technically true. “So here I am. In the Trials. With the prince. Who I probably need to be getting back to soon. You know what he’s like when he gets impatient…” She trailed off with a chuckle even faker than her smile.
Unfortunately, Ruby didn’t seem to be done yet. “What’s that like?” she pressed, gaze pinned to Stella’s face. Her eyes were uncomforting, intense and an odd shade — Stella would almost call them red when they caught the light at just the right angle. She squirmed ineffectively in the journalist’s grip. Good grief. How strong was she? Did she do this a lot?
“What’s… what like?” Stella asked, thrown off balance, both literally and figuratively. Her struggling had led her to stumble on the uneven pavement.
“Being partnered with the prince. You know his nickname is the Pickpocket Prince, right? Does our beloved Prince Desmond live up to his roguish reputation?”
“He’s very — he’s not — what I expected,” Stella answered, struggling to come up with a good answer. Preferably the kind of answer that would satisfy Ruby and make the infuriating woman finally let her go and be on her way.
Her eyes gleamed in that uncanny way again. “No, I don’t imagine he would be,” she laughed, flipping dark hair over one shoulder. She cocked her head. “You know, the prince usually competes with his fiancee. Has that been awkward for you two?”
Oh, great. Just the question Stella absolutely did not want to discuss. “He and Isolde have been navigating the unexpected challenge, I believe,” she said, which was technically true. She didn’t mention they’d been handling it by not interacting at all, as apparently Desmond and his promised bride weren’t exactly the most compatible pair. Some things were none of Ruby’s business, even though she seemed to be trying to make them her business as hard as she could
“I’ve really got to go now,” she tried again, yanking harder on her arm. Mercifully, the reporter finally let go, a strange smile playing around her lips. “Of course. Thank you for your time, Miss St. Clair.”
She melted into the crowd with as little fanfare as she’d appeared — there one minute, gone the next.
Thank goodness.

Daily March 16
Words: 516

“You really thought you could just walk away from that?” Elric said, drawing his sword.
My sword had fallen out as I was riding. Great. I only had a dagger hidden at my hip so I pulled it out. This was going to get interesting.
“Wait!” someone called, rushing between us.
“Wait?” I asked.
“Everyone stop! We were supposed to film a movie about you but we lost you in the woods yesterday! We have to interview you and catch up on everything we missed!” the man screamed, a film crew appearing out of thin air and surrounding me.
Someone sat me down on a couch, a fake backdrop unfurled behind me and Elric was given a couch of his own and a glass of water. I was speechless and sitting next to my sworn enemy about to have a chat for a movie?
“Isen,” the man said, pulling my attention back to him. “How did you get here today?”
“You really want me to admit that in front of Elric?”
“Elric has been put to sleep temporarily,” the man said.
I whipped around to see Elric snoring on the couch.
“What?”
“Please answer the question, we’d like to keep this interruption brief.”
“I got here on my horse, Dovah.”
“Where is Dovah now?”
“I left her tied up at the edge of the woods, a hundred paces from here.”
“Why didn’t you ride her in?”
“Too dangerous. Elric’s guards could’ve heard her hooves and she can’t climb. I was worried she would bring more danger than she could avoid.”
“And why did you want to avoid Elric’s detection?”
Was I seriously about to admit this to a bunch of strangers? I had wanted someone to talk to for a while.
“He stole the crown of Ireandil, and I was sent by the rightful King to bring it back.”
“Is it that simple?”
“Well, in short. You can’t exactly expect me to go into details about a plan we’ve been carrying out for months when Elric’s guards could still be alive.”
“What do you mean?”
“They definitely weren’t conscious when I left them, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t survive. I can’t have them hearing my plans any more than I can have Elric.”
“How are you feeling right now? Are you hurt? Angry?”
“Right now I’m in a bit of shock. I was all prepared to battle, blood pumping, heart racing, and you lot interrupted me.
“But how are you feeling?”
“I guess I’m a little hurt. A few bruises. My legs are killing me from riding so far today and Elric’s guards put up quite the fight, but I’d say I’m feeling determined. I’m so close to the crown now.”
“I believe we’re all caught up, thank you so much for your time Mr. Isen. We’ll let you get back to your battle shortly.”
Now that my heart rate has come down, I don’t know if I’m ready to fight, but fight I must. I draw my dagger as they set a still-asleep Elric back in place and wake him up. Here goes nothing.

⋆ monday, march 16th: random interview

// a lady in her mid-forties is seated on a dark blue leather couch in front of a screen displaying the whirly filler screen stuff typical of news channels. her makeup is far too overdone and she smiles with blazingly white teeth. neon words suddenly light up behind her, reading: plot irrelevant interviewing! next to her is an insanely unattractive man. //
“hello folks! my name is lydia lidenson, and it’s tuesday, you know what that means - today we’re back at it on america’s most popular show, plot irrelevant interviewing! today i’m with my partner joseph lidenson, and we’re gonna check out some girl named… who is it? right. sorya sycamore, who is a character in vanilla mocha bear’s unreleased book series called ‘story that will never be written and/or released’. there’s been a lot of hype around her name, and we’re excited to see what she’s up to! joseph, cut the cameras.”
// the swirly patterns on the screen disperse, making way for some dystopian movie-esque footage. the ground is barren and cracked, scattered with fire and the occasional random explosion. the audience is left to ponder on this for a second, a rehearsed track of ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ echoing through the room. the camera, which is probably on a drone, zooms in to a 17 year old girl who looks to be running for her life. her dark hair is a tangled mess, face smeared with dirt and cuts, each one of her footsteps hitting the ground weaker than the last. she’s visibly panting and looking to collapse at any second, fingers curled tightly around a silver sword. behind her is a pack of hungry… hungry somethings, teeth snapping in a mixture of legs, scales, fur, and horns. lydia and joseph suck in a breath at the exact same moment. //
“oof! that looks like a tough situation to be in. we’ll be releasing a poll to our audience - should we watch for a little while, or transport sorya here immediately?”
// the question pops up at the top of the screen in bold red letters, under it two bars reading wait and now. the numbers climb quickly, each vote making a little *pop* noise. eventually, they die out and ‘now’ leads fifty five votes to forty nine, and the question slides itself up and out of the screen. lydia claps excitedly. on the screen, the creatures are right at sorya’s heel. //
“a close call! but the people have spoken, and it’s looking like sorya’s about to die anyway. we wouldn’t want that to happen before we even got to our interview, right?” a laugh track comes from the audience. “well then joseph, the big red button’s all yours!”
// sure enough, there’s a comically big red button on the table in front of them, just begging to be pressed. the ugly man called joseph slams on it aggressively, and it makes the errr noise typically of that specific subcategory of buttons. almost instantly, sorya vanishes out of where she had been on the screen, and the creatures halt to a stop. they sniff the air, circling the fiery landscape in dazed confusion. the two show hosts sit back and smile patiently. about thirty seconds later the scratched-up dark haired girl is dropped into the studio from a chute in the ceiling, screaming. //
“who are you!” she exclaims, voice scratchy. she gets up from her crumpled heap on the floor, surprisingly fast in brandishing her sword. her leather ranger outfit and bandaged arms are wildly out of place against the sleek set.
“oh, relax, no need to be doing all of that.” joseph waves a hand dismissively, seemingly unbothered. “warm welcomes to the plot irrelevant interviewing show, sorya! we’re the hosts –”
he doesn’t finish before sorya cuts in again, angrier than ever. “how do you know my name. tell me who you are!” she says coldly, pointing her sword against his throat.
“interviewers. duh. we’ve heard plenty about you from your series, and your character is just so lovely and we were so excited to have you on our show –” lydia’s smile tightens as the sword is now turned towards her. “none of that now, darling. don’t want to face detainment, do you?” she says sweetly.
// sorya lets out a frustrated shout as she charges the two of them. the audience gasps and holds their breath, eyes shining at the entertainment before their eyes. it was funny when the character was confused, sure, but a hundred times better when they were feisty. she started saying something about how the two interviewers were probably working for a lord, but her sentence is cut short when two figures dressed in all black hold her back. she kicks hopelessly. //
“right!” lydia says. “on with the interview, then! we only have a couple of quick minutes before you have to go and finish your story. you’re caught in some action currently, we saw.” she winks. “so, introduce yourself!”
“i am sorya sycamore of the ever kingdom, and you will face my wrath!” she kicked again to no use. her sword was clattered on the floor. the audience cheered wildly though, so much so that the last part of her sentence was barely caught. “the hell do you mean, story? is my life a joke to you?”
lydia shrugs, not answering. “it’s very nice to meet you! now, if i could ask a little about your motives… why do you do what you do, stealing and raiding for… who is it that you serve?”
she stops struggling for a moment. eyes wide with something like fear. “how do you know that.” then, a quick switch back to anger. “i’m not telling you anything!”
“ah, so you want a lighter question then. hmm. do you want to tell us about the creatures that were chasing you? they looked quite ferocious.”
“i don’t know how you saw that, but i’m not telling you any of that either.”
“even simpler then… your favorite food? tells us about the cuisine of your hometown”
“no.”
“come on. favorite color?”
“no.”
// the audience is evidently getting bored, as an exaggerated yawn is projected through the loudspeakers. there’s also the sound of someone taking a big slurp of their soda. lydia continues to pester sorya with questions, each one becoming increasingly random and irrelevant. sorya eventually resorts to ignoring her completely, arms crossed and giving a death glare with steely gray eyes. //
“do you know anything about the biomechanics behind figure skating?”
silence.
lydia clears her throat and smiles. goodness, she never really stopped with that eye-aching smile. “well then! dear audience, sometimes our interviewees are a little unresponsive and we just have to deal with that. we’re going to cut it off here to make some extra time for our next character!” the cheering arises again. “thank you for your time, darling, and good luck with those creatures!”
// joseph slams on the big red button again, and sorya barely has time to widen her eyes as she processed the words. ‘wait, no –’ she starts to say, but she’s already vanished from the two who were holding her’s hands. her sword still lies on the floor, and the audience oohs as they realize this. the screen displaying the fiery landscape flashes back on, creatures still circling and growing, and everyone in the room is on the edge of their seat anticipating sorya’s return. and then she’s back, approximately 30 seconds later in the exact spot she was earlier, and almost immediately gets mauled to death. her mouth is wide open but the drone doesn’t pick up her world-rattling scene or any noise at all for that matter. lydia and joseph shake their heads. the audience gives a collective oof. //

PART 1: Plotting a Short Story

I want to write about Chaos’s shapeshifting experiments, or perhaps one in particular. It’s a scenario that can be portrayed as anything from inspirational to atrocious, depending on whose vantage you’re watching from and how much detail there is. Chaos’s own perspective is the only one that understands all sides of the issue, so she’ll be the main focus. However, Chaos is a very complex character with a lot of backstory before this chapter of her life. To avoid having to explain too much, I’m putting this in 2nd-person perspective. “You,” the reader, will be playing Chaos’s role in this plot, seeing from her eyes and having her thoughts. I want to include a decent amount of description, but leave out the mentions of long-term effects, since I doubt I’ll have space for that. I want to explore the classic “means to an end” moral dilemma—how low should one go in pursuit of a high goal? Is it worth risking something going wrong if it means there’s a chance of getting everything right? What if “help” causes more hurt in the process?
Exposition: Nope! I love worldbuilding, but this isn’t the time to yap about it. In short stories, I prefer to start with something sudden, throwing the reader right into the action. Little pieces of backstory and setting can be woven into the rising action instead.
Rising Action: Chaos is de-merging from Lyli’s body, her thoughts a bit scattered due to the process. She pulls herself together, both figuratively and literally. She races to finish the experiment in time, all while attempting to suppress her conflicting emotions and instincts.
Climax: The suppressed emotions finally reveal themselves. She begins to have second thoughts about her actions, fearing the outcome. She mentally debates whether she should follow through or end it quickly.
Falling Action: Choosing to see her experiment through to the end, she is faced with its somewhat-suboptimal results. However, with the uncertainty gone, her own mind settles.
Resolution: Lyli, now in a new form, wakes up, scared, confused, and not remembering what happened to him. Chaos is now sure of herself when she tells him “I saved you.”

PART 2: Writing Your Short Story

You fill your nose with the scent of death.
Everything else is far away. Legs, tail, eyes, stomach—these are only memories. They are releasing you. They are letting you g— “NO,” you shout, whatever’s left of your mind grasping tightly to itself. “The scent. Focus on the scent.”
You gasp in a breath, rediscovering your lungs. You feel the dirt below you, and your flesh scraping across it: the parade of a million cells rearranging themselves.
The death-smell is stronger now, but so are you. After all, there’s nothing like death to remind you that you’re still alive. Alive, despite your body struggling to piece itself back together. Alive, despite your organs getting resculpted inside of you. Alive, despite being a shapeshifter. Alive. Alive.
“Alive like him?”
For a heartbeat—you can feel your heart again—you aren’t sure which “him” your mind was referring to. The stiff, rotting body in front of you, source of the scent you anchored yourself to? The smaller, warmer rabbit shape, whose pelt was just now sealing itself off from your own? Or— “Don’t think about him,” you growl. “This isn’t about that.”
Except, maybe, it is.
But you can worry about that later. You stagger to your paws, which have exchanged their padless softness for your own familiar claws. With a tug, you pull yourself completely free from the rabbit. You’re panting hard, and an all-encompassing pain is beginning to creep over you as the last of the numbness subsides.
You have to work quickly. You’re not sure how long the rabbit will retain the remnants that you transferred to it when you merged just now. You don’t even know how long it’s already been, only that this is the fastest you’ve ever managed to exit a morph.
“A good sign, hopefully,” you tell yourself. Though hope isn’t exactly the main emotion you’re feeling at the moment.
You sink your teeth into the rotting corpse, pushing back against every instinct that yells at you to get as far away from it as possible. The pain is getting worse now. You bite down harder.
Dragging the body over to the rabbit’s still-unconscious form, you wrap it around the rabbit like a macabre blanket. Your eyes water and your stomach churns. If you hadn’t just come out of a morph, the bile would be rising in your throat right about now.
Though you’re in a rush, you freeze. “What am I doing?” you demand, suddenly terrified. You see a piece of bone blend right into the haze of the rabbit’s white fur. “This is wrong. So wrong.”
But you’ve gotten this far. You can’t turn back now. You’re not the type to give up. Not on yourself, not on your projects—and not on him. Never on him.
You shudder, feeling as though lightning is running through every vein in your body. You don’t even bother with words this time. Words are no use against your own mind.
Mind.
Your mind.
While standing perfectly still, your mind reaches out. The searing pain quickly becomes a mere background sting. The memories, however, only get louder.
Focus. You focus on the rabbit.
You still don’t understand how it works, but something about the shapeshifting lets you do this. Your mind and your body no longer match up. You are a ghost dwelling in an open vessel. And you can reach beyond it. There—another mind—you sense it. Not through sight or touch, but in a way you can’t describe. You just know.
The rabbit.
In the rabbit’s mind, you know his fear. You are his fear. He is paralyzed—but not for long. You control him, far better at this than he is. Herbivorous teeth close down on decaying flesh. The sample isn’t enough. You—the rabbit—bite again. Swallow. Bite. Swallow. It isn’t perfect. Rot makes it harder to single out the original.
But you know what to do.
“I need to stop this.”
You are the shapeshifter that doesn’t die. That doesn’t get stuck. That doesn’t go mad.
“I need to get out.”
You are the only one who can save them. All of them. Even the rabbit. Even…
“AHHHHHH!”
You can’t tell the rabbit’s panic from your own anymore. And yet, it’s done. Your mind releases itself from the rabbit brain even as the brain itself begins to contort and expand. Back in your own body, you listen to the sound of your ears ringing.
And then you collapse.
The pain and the memories flood over you all at once, and you begin to drown in the torrent. You remember him—your brother, the way he used to be—huge and brave and invincible. You remember the turtle. You remember the battles. You remember searching your brother’s mind to learn his illness, the one he tried to downplay for so long. You remember finding that his cells had turned against him. Multiply. Grow. Repeat. You remember finding the rabbit, also sickly, also brave. You remember sparing its life.
You remember death.
You remember hoping ghosts are real.
You remember—
With a start, you wake up, your pain gone. In front of you, the rabbit is gone, too. Instead, there’s a wolf there, its dark, silver-flecked pelt eerily similar to the cold, decaying one whose taste still lingers on your tongue. But that corpse has been reduced to nothing more than a few bones and scraps of skin.
Absorption. It had worked. The mass of the dead had been rebuilt into a living body, its chest gently rising and falling like the tides. But was it—
You stare at the animal you’ve created. A wolf, or a rabbit? Some unholy mixture of the two? Whose soul would you find if you reached out to look?
Anxiety grips you in its needle-sharp teeth.
For the first time since you began your experiment, you turn your attention outwards, your eyes darting wildly from side to side. Sun-filled trees surround you. You notice the sweet smell of fallen leaves—also dead, but much nicer than the death-smell from before. A multitude of insects hum through the air. A spider catches one in its web. Death and life, forever dancing in perfect balance.
“Except for me,” you whisper, the warm summer air doing nothing to soften the chill that races down your spine. “And…”
Returning your gaze to the—the whatever, whoever it was—you don’t try to fight the creeping sensation of dread. You don’t know what you’ve done. You don’t know what this means. Your fur spikes. The breath catches in your throat.
“I’ve made a mistake. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…” Shaking, you reach out a paw. The rabbit-wolf’s neck is scrawny—there wasn’t enough meat left on the body to rebuild it in full. You see the bones of its spine. It would be so easy to press down, hear a snap, end what you should never have started…
You feel its pulse, pumping dutifully under its skin. The animal twitches at your touch, beginning to wake.
And suddenly, the fear evaporates. Your own pounding heart begins to calm. Your fur flattens. The sun warms your body. In the space of an instant, everything feels alright again.
After all, it didn’t matter who the animal woke up to be. Rabbit or wolf, alive or dead, right or wrong, ghosts or no, you knew that you had done something no one else ever could. And you didn’t give up. Your brother would be proud of you for that.
Whatever happened next, you could handle it.
The rabbit-wolf’s eyes blink open, its nose filling with the scent of summer leaves. “Hello,” you speak, your words finally finding someone else to hear them. “I saved you.”
It looks up, its yellow eyes peering curiously at your face. Your real face.
You smile. “We’re going to be okay.”

PART 3: Critiquitaire

(Critique for @moosywoosy.)

Heyyyy, so we both ended up writing about dead brothers; great minds think alike— :’D
For real, though, the portrayal of emotion in your piece was perfect. You managed to convey the mixed emotions very well: anger and sadness, regret and nostalgia, and the sense of being conflicted in general. The characters’ behaviors and body language flow seamlessly with their dialogue, making the scenes feel very real.
The pacing did feel a bit off in some places, however. The fact that the rhinoceros beetle segment had more description than any of the other flashbacks felt unbalanced to me. Besides, I’m not certain what purpose that segment holds, other than providing a more detailed window into Xavier’s childhood. But Xavier didn’t really do anything in that segment, so it isn’t as indicative of his character development as it could’ve been.
Speaking of his character development, I felt like I was missing something about why he had so much contempt for his hometown. All the flashbacks to his childhood seemed pretty decent. I understand being bored with the rural lifestyle and/or desiring the better opportunities available in the city, but why not tell his family? Did they not want him to follow his dreams? Would they have done something to punish him if he HAD told them? He is clearly no longer on good terms with his sisters, but it’s never really explained why his relationship with them fell apart to begin with. After he left home, why did he want to never hear from them again? And if that reason was so powerful, how come they managed to reconcile so quickly at the end? I do notice the hint that they reconciled “maybe too quickly,” and I agree; it appears they have some unresolved conflict that occurred before Xavier ever went away from home in the first place.
I like the contrasting sentences you used in a few places, notably “This isn’t going to be the last time we see a rhinoceros beetle” and “When was the last time he saw a rhinoceros beetle?” as well as “He pretended it didn’t bother him. He knew he deserved it.” and “The pressure lessened as the funeral went on, but Xavier found he didn’t deserve it.”
Overall, very good! I know you were trying to squish it in under the word limit, but I’d totally love to read a longer version.

(Critique for @moosywoosy, whose piece is here: https://scratch.mit.edu/discuss/topic/869490/?page=18#post-9034243.)

Heyyyy, so we both ended up writing about dead brothers; great minds think alike— :’D
For real, though, the portrayal of emotion in your piece was perfect. You managed to convey the mixed emotions very well: anger and sadness, regret and nostalgia, and the sense of being conflicted in general. The characters’ behaviors and body language flow seamlessly with their dialogue, making the scenes feel very real.
The pacing did seem a bit off in some places, however. The fact that the rhinoceros beetle segment had more description than any of the other flashbacks felt unbalanced to me. Besides, I’m not certain what purpose that segment holds, other than providing a more detailed window into Xavier’s childhood. But Xavier didn’t really do anything in that segment, so it isn’t as indicative of his character development as it could’ve been.
Speaking of his character development, I felt like I was missing something that explained why he had so much contempt for his hometown. All the flashbacks to his childhood seemed pretty decent. I understand being bored with the rural lifestyle and/or desiring the better opportunities available in the city, but why not tell his family? Did they not want him to follow his dreams? Would they have done something to punish him if he HAD told them? He is clearly no longer on good terms with his sisters, but it’s never really explained why his relationship with them fell apart to begin with, nor why Ace was different from them. After he left home, why did he want to never hear from his family again? And if that reason was so powerful, how come they managed to reconcile so quickly at the end? I do notice the hint that they reconciled “maybe too quickly,” and I agree; it appears they have some unresolved conflict that occurred before Xavier ever went away from home in the first place.
I like the contrasting sentences you used in a few places, notably “This isn’t going to be the last time we see a rhinoceros beetle” and “When was the last time he saw a rhinoceros beetle?” as well as “He pretended it didn’t bother him. He knew he deserved it.” and “The pressure lessened as the funeral went on, but Xavier found he didn’t deserve it.” Clever little parallelisms!
Overall, very good! I know you were trying to squish it in under the word limit, but I’d totally love to read a longer version. The biggest issue for me was the missing background information, and a longer version could fix that.

daily 17: bestselling bookstore

August Wynd wakes up from a concussion with a gun in his hand and a dead body by his side. In a state of shock—he immediately runs out of the house before he’s shot dead by the police despite his protests that he was not the one who committed the murder. Although, death is not the end for August. When he awakens, he finds himself in a strange kind of afterlife—not heaven or hell, but a strange kind of purgatory. It’s there that he’s informed by a strange angel-like creature that happens to be a messenger from god. As it turns out, he had gotten amnesia prior to his awakening. The thing was, prior to getting amnesia, he had been a serial killer. But when it was his turn to be judged to go to heaven or hell—it only brought up the age-old question: should a man be punished for a crime he can’t recall committing? The angel then informs him of his verdict—if he couldn’t remember, they’d make him. August is sent back to earth during a time in which he had not yet committed the murders under close supervision—where he encounters every person before he killed them. He learns their story, their dreams, hopes, and aspirations—before he is forced to watch him kill them with his own hands—taking away every single dream he just learned about—humanizing his victims to strengthen the impact before he’s forced to learn about what he did to them. Not only that, but August is also forced to view the devastating aftermath of his actions from the person’s family and friends in order to repent. As August watches himself do actions he can’t recall committing, guilt and disgust overwhelms him. And as he meets victim after victim, learning every detail about the life he cut short—and what they could have been—he obviously thinks what he did is wrong. But as he reflects on himself and his past self, he can’t help but wonder—after all of this, where does he deserve to go? Heaven or Hell? Should his body still be held accountable for his crime, or should he be absolved as a result of his amnesia? As time goes on, August tries to find an answer as the uncertainty surrounding his fate grows even more suffocating and as his guilt grows, the question only beckons to him more. He doesn’t know where he deserves to go—is his repentance really enough to make him deserving of going to heaven? Or is he far past forgiveness? The question is brought up again: should a man be punished for a crime he can’t remember committing?

438 words

Nick Everhart is a twenty one year old college student who just moved into an apartment with his two best friends. He’s a major in math with a minor in physics, has a near perfect GPA, and he’s living with his best friends since middle school. He has the nicest neighbor ever, an older man who brought him and his roommates welcoming gifts the day they moved in. His neighbor two doors down is a bit mysterious, but she seems kind enough. His life seems perfect.

Or it is, up until his neighbor is found dead barely a week later. Nick doesn’t consider himself nosy, not one bit. His parents raised him too polite to be nosy. But he finds the situation strange and unexpected. He finds the situation even stranger and even more unexpected when his neighbor from two doors down is a private detective. Especially when she ends up roping him into solving the crime with her.

She introduces herself as Alexjandra Cortez, but asks him to just call her Alex. He thinks her last name sounds familiar, but brushes it off, a little distracted by the fact that he’s supposed to help solve a crime now. Through several events that he loves to recount to anyone, really, they managed to solve the crime together. Though, he will admit most of it was just tagging along and watching her. But he learned. A lot. About solving crime and about her.

He learned that she spoke fluent Spanish, hardly ate anything more than a protein bar and a salad in a day, and had graduated from high school a year early. He also learned that she was the one and only daughter of Emilio Cortez. A politician accused of a high penalty crime and ended up disappearing mysteriously two days after he was found guilty. The case surrounding him is considered to be cold, because no answer was ever truly found to the crime he committed.

Apparently, Alex is desperate to solve it, and to prove her father not guilty. She knows that he couldn’t have committed the crime, but the proof she has is only circumstantial and the few pieces of evidence that she has are admissible. She’s made some progress in the past few years, but it hasn’t been much. She’s been too busy with taking other cases to focus on it too much. And it’s obvious that Nick could help her.

… the only question is if he’s willing to get wrapped up in all the drama and danger that surrounds Alex and her family.

Or, that’s what Alex thinks his only question is, at least.

Nick’s only other hesitation is this: what if her father really is guilty? What then?

Aurora Bay is at breaking point.

The government is losing control of law and order in the city as superpowered humans begin to emerge and cause havoc for the general civilian populace. Public services are beginning to be stretched as money is put into rebuilding broken infrastructure and restoring the rule of law, and crime slowly begins to take over the streets.

At Aspen Glenn Memorial Hospital, head of the emergency department Dr Elanna Barton and charge nurse Amber Roberts have to navigate the struggles of running an emergency department with multiple mass casualty incidents per week, and vigilantes regularly coming into the hospital looking for revenge. With funding increasingly being cut to the hospitals and health services, it won’t be long before they’ll be unable to cope with the rising demand.

Resident doctor Rena Miyazaki never intended to find herself plunged back into the world of intelligence and secret agents. She’d retired shortly after finishing medical school, wanting to live a normal life. But as superheroes began emerging across the city, Rena has found herself back in the world she once thought she left behind - and begins living her double life once more.

Meanwhile, Detective Elinor Hayes, Detective Cassie Moore, and state prosecutor Makayla Brunstetter are trying to ensure the rule of law is properly enforced, but with an ever increasing number of crimes being committed and reports of vigilantism, it’s likely that their work is nothing but a futile struggle. Each investigation takes time they don’t have - but when intelligence agents show up wanting to share information and assist with investigations, perhaps all is not as lost as it seems.

Agents Emrys Bright, Aspen Winters, and Alayna Hope work for ERIS, an organisation within the wider city intelligence services. For years, they’ve protected the city from national security threats and neutralised those who posed high risks to the civilian populace. They’ve completed countless missions undercover, and now they have to deal with the threats that superpowered humans pose to the city. None of them are happy about it:

And the government’s solution to all this? The Stellar Force, Aurora Bay’s superhero team, aimed at fighting crime, patrolling the streets, and making sure that everyone is safe. A team of five heroes, becoming Aurora Bay’s new icon of law and order. An extension of the overstretched police force with powers that will allow them to enforce the laws in a better capacity than is being done currently. Though they have a lot of work ahead of them…

Critique for @Peachy_Rain

Hey! So my internet cut out for the past 12 hours, so I wasnt able to do this on time. So so so sorry about that ;-; anyway, thanks for swapping with me for the weekly again! Here's my critique for your piece <3

Serina tucked black hair behind a black meshed veil. Then it fell.

So first off, this sentence is somewhat unclear about what exactly fell- like is it the hair or the veil? Some clarification on that would be helpful. Also, you do repeat the word black twice. Its fine if that's intentional, but its kind of off-putting.

Her eyes widened with terror and a hand cupped over her mouth.

The wording here is also slightly confusing. Did she cup her own hand over her mouth, or did someone else? Maybe revise this sentence

Serina’s hands clutched the edge of her veil now tucked around her neck. However, she couldn’t bring herself to cover her face again. He didn’t run away. I can’t hide it now. It’s too late.

I do like this passage, the emotion you already have here is pretty good. However, I do feel like it might be nice to add a little more showing rather than telling. Add some more visual stuff about how she's sweating or is unnaturally still or how her legs feel. It could help make this scene more heavy and help make the severity of the situation more visceral.

Before Serina could let words slip out of her mouth, a handful of guards in shimmery armor came into view. “Halt! You two aren’t supposed to be out here.”

The guards entrance is very sudden; It would be good to add a little bit more foreshadowing building up to this point, like they hear faint footsteps or something a bit before.

Serina rushed through the approaching woods, trying to allow her feet some grace.

The transition from village to woods is kind of jarring. I think that just like a paragraph of description sometime during or at the start of the story might help this story a lot. The setting is a little confusing and adding just a bit of description would make the whole story a lot easier to follow.

“What are you doing?!” She lazily whispered to him.

Is lazily the word you meant to put here? Sorry if that sounds wrong lol I just think its a little out of place, its very different in tone. Hazily, maybe?

“Keeping the both of us safe. Mostly you. If they find you, they’ll send you into exile themselves.”

Just gonna say it : I LOVE the way you did Calvin's dialogue. Its great, its snarky, nice job.

Butterflies floated through the wind as she sound of the flowing water intruded their voices, making the perfect Jodi spot.

Whats a Jodi Spot? Is that like a typo or do I just not know what that is ‘cause I’m uncultured?

——

All in all, its a good story. It feels a tiny bit rushed and a little unclear, but besides that, its very good. I think you did a really great job in particular with teh dialogue; it all feels natural and fun. Nice job!

-Thanks again!!

Word war
“We have a problem,” my oldest sister, Mel muttered.
My youngest sister, Clara, cackled. “You call it a problem,” she says, “I call it a solution.” Whether it was a problem or a solution, I couldn’t tell.
What had basically happened was that the cookies the girls had baked were way too salty. In fact, they used salt instead of sugar. Clara’s response? She made EXTRA sweet icing.
Mel claimed that we were going to get both diabetes and too much salt at the same time.
“We’re going to get heartburn if we eat these!” She exclaimed, “this cannot be safe!”
Clara waved her away. “Safe! Who cares about safe? They’ll taste amazing!”
Mel looks to me for assistance. I bite my lip. “I don’t know much about baking,” I say, “but I’m pretty sure that doubling the sugar in the icing is not a good idea.”
“See?” Mel says pointedly, “Ally agrees with me. This was not a good idea.”
Clara rolls her eyes. “You two are so worried. It’ll end up great, see?” She picked up a cookie and bit into it.
“AGH!” She dropped the cookie. “That was disgusting!”
Mel laughed. “hah! I was right!”
Clara spat what she had eaten into the trash can. She pulled out a glass of water to rinse the taste out of her mouth.
“Bad idea,” she kept muttering, “really really bad idea.”
“So I wonder who’s the better baker now?” Mel asked.
Clara groaned. “Fine,” she said, “Mel’s the better baker out of the three of us.”
“What are we going to do with the leftover cookies?” I ask looking warily.

271 words

↻ ◁ II ▷ ↺

◪ Word War 8
Wordcount: 319
Person warred: Squidy-IceCream
Win/Loss: Win
Prompt used: “Maybe jumping off the cliff was a bad idea…”
Time: 5 minutes
Cabin: Cyberpunk

part 1
part 2
part 3 ~
part 4

Maybe jumping off the cliff was a bad idea.
That was until the faint sound of water trickling entered Cindy and Mark's ears.

Hope entered their chests as they tried to look down into the black hole beneath them, but they couldn't even see each other anymore. “Is that what I think it is…?”
“There's no way it is water,” Cindy said with disbelief, flashing back to her words before when she'd resignedly said that the only way they could survive was if they landed in a pond instead of hard stone and ground.
“Count your blessings.” Mark was too much in the dark to see Cindy, but he hoped that she could feel his smile radiating off of him.
“Not so fast,” she corrected him. “Water is still going to hurt.”
“What do you mean?”
“Have you ever jumped wrong into a swimming pool and landed on your stomach with a slap?”
Mark winced. “Please don't remind me.”
“Now imagine that, but the edge of the pool and the water's surface is half a day away.”
“Oh.”

There was a small second before his glimmer of hope was snuffed out. “We're going to die.”
“No, we're not,” Cindy tutted. “Just put your body in a streamlined position and hopefully, in the water, the body is deep enough, we'll manage to survive.”
“I can't see you, how am I supposed to put my arms like what you're showing me?”
“Are you telling me you don't know what streamlined means?”
“…”
“MARK!”
“LISTEN, I'M OUT HERE ROCK CLIMBING INSTEAD OF GOING TO SCHOOL FOR A REASON, OKAY?!”
“Like a fish or a bird, Mark!”
“…”
“Mark, I swear to god if you are flapping your wings right now like some sort of pigeon I will beat you up once we swim our war out of here.”
“How did you know?”

Cindy let out a long suffering sigh. “Why are you like this?”

Weekly 2 ☆ Short Stories
0/1300 words

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Part 1 ⋅ Plotting a Short Story ⋅ 205/200 words

exposition: the story starts with a young cat called bean. she is a stray, and starts her journey as a struggling kitten trying to find food. the other animals are intimidating, so she tries her best to stay out of the way. she feels lonely though. eventually, she realises that what she really wants is a family. rising action: she tries to join this group of rough strays - the type that scratch and hiss at anyone that comes near their territory. she manages to fit in for a while, but isn’t very happy. she at least gets food, though. climax: after being part of the gang for a bit, there is a big fight to prove her purpose in the pack, but she comes out of it injured and a loser. bean isn’t a great fighter but at least gets some good strikes in. the other stray cats abandon her and she’s back where she’s started: hungry, and alone. resolution: an old mother cat finds her and helps her get back on her feet. she looks out for her and ‘adopts’ her almost. finally she leads her to an animal adoption centre and they both get nice owners and live together happily ever after.

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Part 2 ⋅ Short Story ⋅ 0/1000-2000 words

bean was a very lonely cat. the streets of greece weren’t the friendliest for cats like her. if she was a bit bigger, maybe. a bit stronger. a bit tougher. but bean was just that: a cat so small, so other, that all the other wild animals have started calling her bean. if only she had some. then maybe she wouldn’t be quite so hungry…

bean slunk through the alleyways as she scoured for food. the bright lights and pounding music of the streets ahead lured her in, but it was scary out there. cat squ

this is kind of rushed and so may be inaccurate - please don’t judge xD

↻ ◁ II ▷ ↺

◪ Noͦ 17
Wordcount: 475/400
Topic: Book Sypnosis
Points earned: 550+200 for proof
Cabin: Cyberpunk

I've had this idea stuck in my head for so long now that it's actually starting to make me crash out that I haven't started writing it yet. In this universe, everybody lives by the rules of a deck of cards- the higher your number (i.e., your hierarchy), the better you get to live your life. The twos, threes, and fours are at the very bottom and are treated quite unfairly by the others. The face cards are the royal family for each suit, if you could say. King, Queen, Jacks, and Jokers are at the top of the pyramid, and get the utmost respect. When you are born, your hierarchy number HEAVILY depends on your parents. There are very rare cases where the child is born with a different hierarchy number. When you receive it, you can no longer change it.

Every three years, there is a tournament held. This is to determine the Ace- only one Ace can exist in all four suits, and that is the winner of this tournament. When you win, you are granted the title and are free to roam in any kingdom or any society. You are also allowed to visit the Forbidden Fountain, which even the royals cannot access, where you can make one wish. This trial takes a LOT of effort, with many puzzles and tricks. The final challenge is beating the previous ace himself- if this ace wins, the contestant goes home defeated, and the ace regains his title. However, if the ace loses, he becomes the ace that represents not thirteen, but number one. He is even lower than the lowest, and disregarded by society for losing his position. He could always compete next year and win the title back, but the popular support he gained in his first round will have diminished.

Our main character is a girl who desperately needs the fountain to wish that her social hierarchy goes up. She's stuck at number three, though she knows she would be well-suited for a job in the higher cities with her woodwork and metalwork skills. However, because she is so low, nobody pays her any mind.

Our second main character is a previously fallen Ace. He refuses to disclose the wish he had made before he had been defeated, and would pretty much do anything to get this title back from him. The two of them are forced to team up to survive, yet knowing that the person who lays the final blow on the Ace is the one who would get the title.

At the end of the day, they have to be nice enough so that the other person helps them, yet also be faster so that they can outrun the other. All for the Forbidden Fountain. You'd think people would have learnt their lessons with the mythology stories </3

➵ Quest the Seventeenth: Fanfic and Novel Idea ⊹ ₊

Okay so, I’m actually struggling with novel ideas because I think school has kinda drained me, but I do have a fanfiction idea so I shall share that. I apologize if you were expecting a really cool and great story idea but my brain hasn’t worked in months xD <3

Fan Fiction Idea:
So, for context, this is a hunger games fanfiction idea and it will take place in the 55th hunger games because there is no canon winner of the 55th hunger games (that I know of) Let’s get to it:
My idea is for a hunger games fanfiction where they switch around the points of view. One chapter, you’ll get a girl from district 5, the next a boy from district 10. It will include every tribute’s point of view. As the story progresses, you will learn more about each tribute and maybe even get attached to their character if I can do that. Once the hunger games begin, you will slowly lose points of view until the last chapter you read is from the victor. Don’t worry though! I’ll probably put one or two annoying characters that you lose along the way but who knows? I could make the annoying character the winner. I will try to keep the victor a mystery throughout the whole entire piece so that hopefully you can’t tell and it doesn’t get boring. Hope that made sense? I might not do all 24 tributes because that gets boring and messy but I’ll do at least 5 to 12. Actually, since at least 12 die in the bl00d bath every time, I’ll probably end up doing all 24 tributes! (sorry. You just got my whole train of thought on the process right there ) I feel like for me the fun parts will be making character sheets, figuring out the arena and creating some slightly morbid twists for the gamemakers to throw out.
Also, I am sorry to inform you that I do not have a title for the fanfiction, any of the characters names (I’ll make character sheets soon ), or any of the story sketched out yet but I am working on it! The most I currently know is that I want it to be the 55th Hunger Games. If you want an update when I’m working on it or the characters, let me know! I’d be happy to let you read or to talk about it.

Sorry that this was sorta just Sage yapping through her own ideas because she realized there’s not much set up yet. I hope you guys are at least a little interested?

» — ⋙ 438 words ⋘ — «

⋆.˚ Story Synopsis ⋆·˚ ༘ * 444/400 words

Saige Merlot is seventeen when her life, already fractured by loss, shifts once again. Orphaned at ten years old after her mother’s murder and her father’s imprisonment and death, Saige spends five years under the care of her abusive, alcoholic uncle before escaping. For three years, she survives on her own, drifting from place to place, learning to rely only on herself. By the time she is forced into Willow Ridge Orphanage in Troy, New York, Saige has unfortunate walls around her heart, and is quietly burdened by grief.
Willow Ridge is far from a sanctuary. The old and neglected building houses mostly boys, with only a handful of younger girl orphans. Resources are always scarce and the caretakers, especially Mrs. Crowder, are not fond of the kids. Initially, Saige struggles to adjust, tired of forming connections she believes will be taken from her. Yet slowly, she begins to find a sense of belonging among the other children.
Saige starts to forms bonds with her roommates. Elias and Nico, two best friends, whose humor brings joy to Saige, Jax, whose hostility conceals deeper struggles he has, and most of all, Caleb, the oldest boy in the orphanage. Kind, protective, and empathetic, Caleb becomes an important person in Saige’s life. He sees past her outside appearance and recognizes the pain she carries. In time, Saige begins to trust again. Their friendship gradually deepens into something more.
As tensions rise within the orphanage, Saige finds herself at the center of the conflict. Jax, assisted by Mrs. Crowder, turns against her. An incident occurs that forces Saige to confront her own unresolved trauma. Despite this, Jax repents, showing her that broken people can change. But Saige is never quick to forgive. She turns to Caleb, who has become her best friend. He shows her support and reassurance. For the first time, Saige allows herself to lean on someone else completely.
Though far from perfect, the children start to see themselves as a family. Bound not by blood, but by shared pain and resilience. Saige, who was once isolated and could barely trust, discovers things she had never believed in. Friendships, healing, and the possibility of love.
Saige's story sets the outline for the future of the kids at Willow Ridge. They will continue to journey on adventures together and learn to support one another.


✎ 3.17.2026 ~ Daily #17 ❀ ~ 444 words ౨ৎ
⌗ ʙᴀᴄᴋ ᴛᴏ ꜱᴀꜰꜰʀᴏɴ'ꜱ ɴᴏᴛᴇʙᴏᴏᴋ ⋆˚࿔

bookstore daily || 467 words

Welcome to Whimsy, where wizards have tea with dragons, side characters chat with the writer, and the protagonist… is dead? Yes — after being the main character in the fan favorite epic fantasy series, A Magic Dark and Terrible, for twelve entire books, Lucretia, the beautiful baddie rebel warrior princess elf mage, has thrown in the towel.
Unfortunately, book thirteen: Verily Thou Hast Vengeance is coming out in a week. And no one will be happy if there’s nothing inside but blank pages… or worse, as one character suggested, a complete copy of the Good Fictional Character’s Handbook and Guidelines. (Which is, as another character pointed out, only intended for use by fictional characters. Also, no one ever follows them anyway, except to quote rules at each other in an attempt to win petty arguments.)
Obviously, a new protagonist needs to be found, and fast. When the Story Council gets word of a potential farm boy being available (main character gold!), they grasp it eagerly… only to find that their definition of a “farm boy” is a little different from his farmer father’s definition of a “farm boy.” If only someone had told them poor Gerald was a little off his rocker, they might have queried his offer of his son as a replacement Protagonist a little more thoroughly.
By the time they realize his “son” is actually a talking chicken — specifically, a scraggly, scrappy, undersized rooster with a very unfortunate sense of humor — it’s far, far too late to redeem things. And thus begins another epic quest in the world of Whimsy, as they attempt to save the plot of book thirteen (irredeemable), get Lucretia to suck it up and go back to work (unlikely, considering that she’s currently extremely and irreversibly dead, having destroyed her indestructible Plot Armor — a testament to how much she hated her job), and avoid drawing the Author’s… or worse, the Editor’s… attention (impossible).
But even more unrest is stirring… because in a world suddenly without a protagonist, who’s to say anyone can’t become the main character? Now all of the side characters are clamoring for a chance to thrust their arcs into the spotlight, the Story Council is trying to stick to the outline (except where things obviously need to be changed, because surely the Author didn’t really mean to put that plot point there…), and not even the Narrator can be trusted, as it’s taken the general mayhem as an opportunity to try and insert itself as a character in its own right.
Will Ben the talking rooster save the day? Will Lucretia ever be resurrected? Will Verily Thou Hast Vengeance be published on schedule, or will there be some very angry real-world fans to deal with? And most importantly, why does the Wise Old Wizard wear a fake beard?

Birds are dinosaurs.
Every bird knows this to be The Best Fact. Their ancestors were beasts of pure, unbridled awesomeness. The birds know: In every song they sing, every egg they lay, they keep alive the spark of their amazing primeval heritage. The breath of the dinosaurs is the wind under their wings.
And yet, the non-avian dinosaurs were gone. An asteroid was the killer, the birds’ scientists deduced. Some random, stupid space rock. A terrible, earth-shattering impact. A worldwide climate collapse. As it turned out, not even all the awesomeness in the world could prevent a mass extinction.
“Why did we survive when they didn’t?” the birds wondered. “Why us?”
Maybe they were smarter, or faster, or simply smaller. Better at waiting out the apocalypse. Whatever the case, millennia had passed since the event, and the birds had done some pretty awesome things of their own. Simple tool use had given way to more advanced machines. Farming was invented. Writing, too. Cities were built. Steam power, electricity, fusion.
Birds from across the world had banded together—a single, mighty civilization. Different songs were still sung, of course, but writing was universal, from albatross to hummingbird. They were no longer separate flocks, nor even separate species, but an interconnected network, each individual rejoicing in its role as part of something greater. Communication was near-instant now, messages being sent across the land faster than a peregrine falcon’s dive. Together, they had explored the skies and the seas, discovered all the secrets of the rocks buried beneath their talons.
“But what about the dinosaurs? Have we not strayed from our roots?” some worried.
“Perhaps the glorification of the past is holding us back from our future,” others answered.
For the first time since hawks were banned from hunting smaller birds, their civilization faced a pivotal ideological divide. The lines between real and artificial were rapidly blurring away. Visions of the future—of nanomachines, of computer-based intelligence, of a metaverse, of writing in the language of life—filled the dreams of many. Others considered those visions to be nightmares.
But then one idea rose into popularity.
Every bird, save for the penguins and kiwis and such, belonged to the sky. To fly was to live. But as one bird can only carry so much, they had found it necessary to create flying machines, too. In the modern day, it seemed only natural to have airplanes, drones, and spaceships. One could hardly imagine life without them. The sky was always crowded now. If the birds wanted to expand, well… they would have to go higher.
While the moons and the inner planets were reachable, resources were scarce. However, there was a treasure trove that was yet to be pecked: asteroids.
Asteroid mining might just let them fly to greater heights. And not only that, but they could finally face the killer of their ancestors.
After millions of years… the birds would get their revenge.