20 March 2024

I think I’d started watching the anime Zom100 when I wrote this. There’s some pretty cool themes about seizing control of your life in there. Anyway, I had zombie stories in my head, but had no idea what to do with it. I was looking through my list of concepts I want to play with, and saw plant people. I wondered, how would “plant people” zombies be different from the human kind? So here we are.

Even almost a decade later, Violet still had nightmares about that day. The fear on her parents’ faces when the alarm sounded. The screams and press of people out in the streets. The claustrophobic feeling of breathing through a mask. The moment when someone knocked Mother’s mask loose, and Violet and her father could only watch in horror as Mother unwillingly rooted herself to the ground, her face twisted forever in pain as the fungus used her body to produce even more of its deadly spores.

Violet had come a long since then. But there were times, especially in the dark of the night, where she still felt like that same little kid.

30 January 2024

This was a lot of fun! I struggle with coming up with outlines for my stories, and particularly putting said outlines to paper. I’m not sure why; it just seems boring to me, I guess? So I had a thought. What if I made it a more creative project? So I started writing my outline as a poem. It’s not a particularly amazing poem, but it is fun to write, and has helped me decide how the story goes. I have two other Rapunzel poems continuing where this one left off as of this writing (April 24). I really enjoyed the formatting to convey the different POVs, though I’m not sure how will the second poem will translate.

Come one, come all,

And see the blessed babe

Aurora, our light,

Our hope and delight.

Fae gifts touch her

Good health, and grace, and more

What cost have these?

‘Tis secret, hidden so none may see

But one, late come

Maleficent, queen

Fae’s foe, pronounced the woe

Gifted the sweetling child

For Gothel, nightmare again

Traumas cloud all thought

The child she takes

Spirited away from the kinslayer’s grasp

Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down crimson hair

Cooped in the Tower, trapped not with bands

But fear of what lays beyond

Fear begets fear, and so she stays

Cautious, quiet, mostly content

Only wandering through paints and in dreams

“Tis glorious adventure seek we this day!

Is it not so, dear Phillip?

Perhaps more grueling than glorious,

But so it is. What mischief make we today?

Why, two fairies over yon,

Would make quite the excellent catch

And with debts to claim

Perhaps a princess, my sister, at last

Through forest and fog

Evading the kidnapper most foul

To a grand Tower’s base

And yet, where lies the door leading in?

Eh? People? Outside?

And worse, family, to boot

What can be done? What should be done?

Can hiding avail me aught?

No, still here, still striving

Why seek they one such as I?

My doom is near, already at the doorstep

Yet still… To speak for a bit should suffice?

She is not who I’d dreamed

This sister of mine

All the adventures I’d yearned, and more,

All shadows and reflections and gone

Too timid by half, and no thanks

Still, her choices are hers, not mine

If here she will stay, ne’er to travel,

I’ll visit so often, at the least

What is this scent?

A human, a boy

Intruders in my abode?

A thief in the night

Or that woman’s spy

He’ll not take her from me!

Spare him his life

But instead, steal his sight

See, child, the mercies I show?

Rage

Despair

The only kin I’ve known

Mercy? What mercy?

I was never yours

Though ne’er I planned to leave

Then as you took, take I in turn

Your sight I’ll trade for his

And if you think I’m yours to keep,

Perhaps it best I leave you

My home…

What have I done?

That… who was that?

Not the Rapunzel I raised

The power, the fury, the magic within…

Like her. It was her, again.

Maleficent.

Blind

Lost

Confused

Whate’er did I do wrong?

A touch of fingers

A gift of sight

But no less lost than before

16 January 2024

…when she was going outside. “Are you heading out?”

Mother nodded. “We’re running low on flour, and we could always use more bacon. I also wanted to look into getting you more medicine.”

Somehow, Rapunzel was able to force her grimace into something resembling a smile. “I’m fine, Mother.”

“You’re fine now, but what if something happens later?”

By then, I’ll be dead. Rapunzel kept her mouth shut, though. That would definitely upset Mother. For her part, Rapunzel herself had come to terms with the idea. For the most part. It was strange to think she only had [a few weeks] left, though.

Meanwhile, Mother hovered around the covered easel. “Is this your latest project?”

“Wait, don’t–!”

It was too late. With a flourish, Mother lifted the sheet from the canvas. At first, she didn’t respond, still as a statue. Then her face distorted, shifting from one face to another. Old, young, thin, pudgy. The rest of her soon followed suit, changing shapes and outfits faster than Rapunzel could process them. Always blue, though. Mother always wore blue.

This was a bad one. Mother wasn’t saying anything. When she talked, Rapunzel could at least piece together what was freaking her out and calm her down. But when she got like this… Rapunzel had no clue. And if she said the wrong thing, she might just make it worse.

Rapunzel took a deep breath and moved closer. “Mother?” When the fairy didn’t respond, Rapunzel braced herself and hugged her. It was always a strange sensation, hugging Mother while she shifted forms. “It’s alright, Mother. I’m here. We’re safe; you’re safe.”

Mother finally looked down at her. Rapunzel took the opportunity to gently guide her away from the painting toward the door.

“She… she was there, Therese. With her. It… it had to be a trap, even though she looks so kind…”

Therese again, huh? As near as Rapunzel could tell, that was the name of one of Mother’s “sisters”. However that worked for fairies. “It’s okay. They’re not here. She’s not here. You’re safe. See?”

They’d gotten far enough away the Tower was able to put up a wall between them and the painting. Mother was finally calming down; she settled into the shape of an old woman with a stooped back. “Yes… yes, you’re right. Thank you, Therese.” Mother patted her hand and tottered off.

Once she’d left, Rapunzel sank to the floor and heaved a sigh of relief. That went…fairly well, this time. No animal shapes, at least. Still, it would probably be a few days before the Tower trusted her enough to let her work on Hannah’s painting again.

Later

“And to you, Princess Aurora, I grant the gift of good health.”

As she spoke, Lena grasped for the threads of fate from the child’s future, selected the one she needed, and wove it around the child. She felt immensely proud of herself; if only all those naysayers could see her now! Who cared if it was a small country out west, leagues from the nearest faehold. Now, she walked among royalty.

6 January 2023

Felt like working on Adeline. I realized I couldn’t remember exactly where I was trying to go with the scene with the jeweler, so I picked another section of the story to work on.

I actually don’t know a lot of the circumstances of what’s going on around this scene. I know the basics; Kenna Magleby, the other protagonist, is part of a squad of law enforcement-type peeps. Adeline has been arrested for helping her father (unwillingly, but they don’t know that yet, per se) in his illegal kidnap and slave trade; Kenna was one of their victims during that time, though she eventually escaped. Needless to say, There’s some history there, and Magleby’s being affected, though I need to do more research to understand how better.

Adeline watched the members of the squad that had arrested her. There was a tension in the air between them; was there something else going on?

Privately, she was afraid it was somehow her fault. She remembered the blonde one in red. Magleby, they called her? She’d been with her brother the last time Adeline had seen her, and Magleby seemed to be at the center of it all, along with the younger man in blue.

Eventually, one of them, a shorter woman with ruffled brown hair, came over and watched Adeline for a while. When she finally spoke, she asked, “You must have really done a number on her for her to be this spooked by you. What the heck did you do?”

As best as she could with the manacles, Adeline signed, “I don’t know.”

The woman–Rayner?--seemed surprised by that. “You don’t know?”

Adeline shifted to give herself more slack with the chains. “Father took care of most of that. And I think the worst usually happened after they got sold. I don’t actually know what she’s been through.” She looked away, her expression clouded with guilt. *”I… didn’t want to know.”

There was another pause, then Rayner asked, “Your father. Was he the one who did this to you?” She tapped against the side of her cheek.

Adeline nodded. When Rayner didn’t reply right away eventually Adeline added, “Not long after he found us, I tried to warn someone to leave.”

Rayner nodded, as if that was the answer she’d been expecting. She glanced over at Magleby and cursed under her breath. “This ain’t gonna be pretty.”

“Why? WHht’s going on?”

Rayner stood up. “Let’s just say there’s a lot of hurt mixed up in all this, and suddenly it’s got nowhere to go. Here’s hoping she gets her head on straight before she does something she regrets.”