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wintermutal · 5 years

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8, 11, 17, 20, 32, 36, 40!

8. Oldest WIP

now? probably the becoming, my obligatory gears reimagining tale. i started thinking about writing it in high school, but couldn’t settle on an exact version of gears to write. in college i’m still bothered by it, like it’s something i need to write but i just dont know how. i have a good plot set up now involving gears and mann in hong kong in the 80s that deals a lot with some mekhane cults and stuff, but it just….doesnt feel right yet. so that one’s like…..4 years old now lol

11. Books and/or authors who influenced you the most

amazingly- and this kind of sounds like it’s coming out of left field knowing the kind of stuff i read these days- gary pulsen. when i was in 6th grade i read a ton of his shit, and i remember a very specific moment where i was reading Winterdance. i remember one day, i loved what he had written for a scene so much i decided to go back and ‘figure out’ for myself how he made it feel so exciting using the words like that; it was the first time i ever closely examined someone’s actual writing technique. my 11 year old self observed that he used run on sentences in the areas where it got really exciting, and i started experimenting with it myself, and as you can see some eight years later…..i should have never done it. it’s now like, a hallmark of my writing style. if i would have never read that goddamn dog book we wouldnt be in this mess

as for more specific recent influences…..i stumbled across off-site access to a few obscure ancient ess see pee works over the winter. the story was…dazzling, and reawakened some of the awe and ‘fuck it, let’s write a wild ass story’ attitude i had when i was a newbie on the site. as of right now i keep them in a folder on my desktop for when i need to remind myself that nothing matters and its more fun not to care

17. What writing habits or rituals do you have?

i get awful writers’ cramp writing on paper. like, when i took my AP exams at the end of high school, i went out and bought an arthritic pen to write the essays with (it worked, and that pen is the most comfortable motherfucker ive ever used). i have no idea if i grip my pen/pencil too hard or if i fucked it up as a kid or what’s going on in there, but it means that i write almost everything on my laptop. this is unfortunate because i also do a lot of other things on my laptop, and my little gremlin brain gets distracted by them in .3 seconds. of course, once i get writing, i get writing and can go for hours, but it makes it hard to start.

this means that i have a separate writing program i keep up in full screen in another window 24/7. whenever i write, i go there. its great because it’s so fucking barren. look at this shit.

aside from that, i always find my voice a little easier if i read a page or two of something else before i start in on a session, even if it’s an old piece of my own shit or something. i dont always do it, because my writing schedule and mannerisms are chaotic as hell, but yeah.

20. How many WIPs and story ideas do you have?

oh my god……………so many………..im never going to get through them all……

i’m on a pattern where i randomly cling to a certain idea and spend months to a year on a huge piece for it before shitting it out onto the internet. the two biggest pieces that have come as a product of this are Major Tom and ess see pee-4231, taking me 8 months and a year, respectively. i write other things, too, obviously, but i usually end up unable to shake a few very choice ideas, and those are the ones that get the most blood, sweat, and tears put into them. usually they’re larger ideas with a big scope to work with.

32. Most difficult character to write

right now? i have a main character named rowan in a big original project i have going on, and i just….haven’t decided on the kind of person he is yet. i have a good chunk of his backstory worked out, but he also ends up getting regularly drugged with heavy horse tranquilizers and reshaping his entire childhood with a few main events warped to reveal possible traumas, so you know how it is. he’s obviously very unreliable as a narrator, but i’m not sure what kind of person he is to be an unreliable narrator. like, the horse tranquilizers definitely helped it along, but there’s also a lot of…wild shit going on in there. he might just be being unreliable out of cowardice, because hes fully aware and conscious of the role he played in several murders, including those of a few of his close friends and collaborators. so who knows

36. Last sentence you wrote

Well, the last three are sentence fragments. So backing up a little to the last paragraph:

“The tile in the deep dark was black, white, grey. The eternal floodlights on vaulted caverns cast scales of reds, electrical white florescence. The door was six inches thick; the hallway was not patrolled; the cameras obediently turned away; and just like that, with a mix of something teetering between greed and fear, the Foundation chose not to see the place of necessary evils in the deep dark of the mountain.

Director Eiler beat him. And beat him. And beat him.”

40. Share some backstory for one of your characters

kilroy fisher’s mom really wanted him to be a web developer, and kilroy was pretty eager to please her until a couple things happened:

1. when he was ten, he was enrolled in a foundation research program doing brain scans of young technopaths with hopes to create an AI system to repel their specific psychic influence. part of the test involved kilroy being exposed to a prototype of this AI, written in an extraordinarily complex unique coding language. how he was able to interact with it and how the code felt to him when he was around it was like nothing he had ever experienced before. he was fascinated. the AI was set to be used, at least at first, around the most secure Foundation databases. the heart of the AI was strongly implied to be centered in the databases themselves. he’d only seen the skin of it.

2. he read william gibson’s neuromancer, and very quickly became a cyberpunk technopath hacker kid, to his mother’s horror.

Kilroy ended up obsessed with this. like, absolutely off the shits, increasingly lost in the sauce as his teenaged years wore on. he quickly discovered that if technopaths work with this coding language for like, more than an hour in their unique psychic state- which is the most effective way to go about it due to the complexity of the code- it starts manifesting in bleeding from various areas of the head (ears, nose, teeth) and eventually leads to seizures and really intense migraines. this makes sense because like….its literally used as an anti-technopath code for anti-technopath interests, but kilroy, who at this point was severely depressed and bordering on suicidal, became addicted to working with it as a means of regular self harm.

Kilroy ended up writing a bootleg terminal program for the language, which would theoretically allow people to more easily work with the code and even eventually break into that all-important foundation defense AI that was now his sole reason to live. after a fight with his girlfriend resulted in her calling him ‘a fucking ruthless pig’ for being literally obsessed with it to the point of regular physical collapse, he deemed it RUTHLESS.exe and started going with the handle ‘Gip’ online, especially in circles where the program was in high demand for Criminal Actions™ and he was seen as a fucking godsend to working with this thing.

this eventually culminated in some attempted hacking of the actual AI itself, quickly followed by an intense hospitalization while he recovered and had surgery to remove the traumatic cataracts in both eyes, subsequently followed by being shipped off to containment. technopath containment is literally just….a setting with no technology. in his case, this meant that he has since lived alone in a specially built little house on a foundation-owned little farm in the middle of nowhere.

he gets visits from foundation agents twice a week that bring him food and supplies, because he’s not allowed off the premises. he takes care of his sheep (or at least like, the sheep the foundation has put him in charge of as part of his ‘rehabilitation’ or whatever). he’s bordering on suicidal again, and they put him on some heavy medication that leaves him feeling numb most of the time. he wears bifocals because of the permanent damage to his vision. he lives without electricity. he reads a lot. he reads and rereads neuromancer a lot, and after a few years of this he decides that he needs to reach a decision on the whole ‘suicide’ thing, because this is really getting ridiculous.

and that’s where the story finds him. i have no idea how im gonna write all that backstory coherently. im probably gonna binge read more william gibson stuff and pray.

A Writer’s Ask Game

#this is so long im so sorry #and this is only one of them nooooo #scp wiki writing #writing #asks #long post #vandal.txt #v1als #bm tale

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puellafatua · 5 years

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College advice for people like me

So I've seen a lot of posts floating around with advice for college freshmen, and while those are great there's still definitely things I wish I'd known going in that I haven't seen mentioned. So, without further ado, here's my college advice- the Type B personality edition.

1. More than anything, I want to emphasize that just because you're staying up late and working for hours and stressing out DOES NOT EQUAL being an amazing student. If you're not sleeping well and dividing your time up well, you're not gonna be capable of your best work. So my advice is to work smarter, not harder. Join study groups, go to office hours, go to tutoring or the writing center. Dont make your own flashcards if you don't have to- most of the time, someone who's taken the class before will have study sets on quizlet you can use, and that saves so much time and stress. Just be nice and make sure to make your own study sets public when you make them, it's a fair trade. You can also usually find YouTube videos from experts summarizing issues that you're uncertain about. Some of this seems obvious, but it'll all save you time.

2. This kind of fits in with the first point, but go to class and take hand written notes. You can type them up later if your handwriting isnt great, but you'll remember things you write down better. You're also less likely to get distracted during the lecture. Also, check to see if your professor posts the lectures. If they do, you can print them before class and take notes on anything they say that wasn't in the slides.

3. Have a buddy in every class. We all miss sometimes, and its easier to catch up if someone is willing to send you their notes. Also friends are a good thing to have.

4. If you like to procrastinate, write the wrong due date in your planner. This has saved my life and also my GPA. When you go to turn in the project or paper and discover you have extra time, it's like a little gift to yourself. Use it to edit, or to relax or stress cry. Really, just do with it what you want

5. Don't nap. Unless you work nights, then definitely nap. But napping will seriously screw with your sleep schedule, and you'll lose valuable daylight hours. I promise you, you'll do better work at 3 pm than at 3 am.

6. Stop doing homework an hour before you go to bed. There's a long psychological/neurological explanation for why you should do this, but the basic idea is that your brain will process and store what you've studied better if you give it time before you go to sleep. I personally never study after 11 pm, and I have a 3.7 so that's gotta count for something.

7. Don’t do what I just did. No one wants to hear you brag about your GPA. College is hard and everyone's already competitive enough as it is.

8. If you have breaks between classes, don’t go home. "I'll just have a snack between classes," you say. "I'll just take a quick nap, or I can study at my desk." Listen. That is the devil talking. Pack a snack, drink some coffee, and spend your breaks at the library. You'll thank me when you don’t have to do all that work at 2 a.m.

9. Get an accordion folder and a five subject notebook. You'll thank me when you never have to worry about bringing the wrong stuff to class. Your back will thank me when the weight of your backpack doesn’t cause you to need physical therapy (you think I'm exaggerating, but I literally needed PT for this reason).

10. Exercise. I'm begging you. Your brain is so much happier and more functional when you do. I'm not saying you have to become a gym rat. Stretch before bed, take a walk around the library when your brain is fried, take the stairs instead of an elevator. Getting an actual workout in is better, but it's not realistic for everybody. Just don’t get sedentary. Your brain and your body will thank me later.

11. Eating healthy sucks. Pizza is better than salad and You Can't Change My Mind. So trick yourself into eating healthy. Green smoothies taste amazing; green tea has caffeine and is good for your metabolism; some protein shakes don’t taste like ass (I drink a lot of them so message me if you want suggestions); stir fry is heaven; there are many companies that now make vegetable "chips" that are not processed and have all the same value of actual veggies without the effort of making veggies. I'm a mindless snacker who just wants to sweet release of biting something crunchy and salty so these are a godsend.

12. Don't cheat on people. Don't date people just so you don’t have to be single. Don’t get into "things." Treat other people right, and make sure they're treating you right too. My friends are all in difficult majors but the number one cause of stress in most of their lives is shitty relationship decisions. Don’t do that. Be smart. Make me proud, son.

13. Schedule time for yourself. Honest to God, write it in your planner. "Saturday from 10 to noon I will sit in my pajamas and drink hot chocolate and watch netflix and no one is permitted to talk to me." Don’t waste a whole day on stuff like that, but in college you're with your friends constantly (especially roommates) and even the most extroverted person on earth needs alone time. Make it happen.

14. Unfollow and block to your heart's content. You are not obligated to give social media validation to people who make you unhappy or uncomfortable. It ain't that deep.

15. You're already paying for the counseling center through your tuition. You might as well go.

16. Dont live with your best friend, I guarantee you they're a bad roommate. I've been there. I've been her. We are all worse in the comfort of our own rooms than we are the rest of the time.

17. Condoms please and thanks. No unwrapped d**k is worth your health, and if you get pregnant in college the desks are very small and difficult to fit a belly into. And who wants to get an abortion when you can just avoid the whole mess all together. Safe sex babes.

18. Weed isnt that great and neither is alcohol. But both pale in comparison to how incredibly lame and pointless vaping is. Dont do it kids. Not even once.

19. Join a club or befriend your coworkers. Sometimes you need a get away from your main group of friends, and you can never have too many friends.

20. If you talk too much in class, then on behalf of your classmates, please reconsider your choices. Especially in psychology classes. We know when you're trying to diagnose yourself, even if you think you're being subtle. Go to the counseling center if need be, there's professionals there.

This is not at all a comprehensive list, and it may not be valuable to everyone. But I'm more than halfway done with college and based on my experiences and those of my friends, I think this is absolutely vital information for some people.

#College #advice #study #studyblr #lazy #studyspo #swearing #weed mention #alcohol mention

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stuclyblrs · 6 years

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hi, would you have any tips on getting started with chinese? i would love to have a tutor and i think that would be the best way of learning but im completely broke, so which other ways would be good? i know its super difficult and im a complete beginner so i have no idea about pronunciation or symbols or anything so i need a good place to start. Thanks!

你好! so sorry about the late reply!! i started studying chinese with classes at uni so im not 100% the best person to ask about self-studying but i’ll do my best !!!

first learn pinyin and tones

pinyin actually isnt as hard as it seems tbh tones on the other hand are something i struggle a lot with even after a semester of college level chinese so dedicate a lot of time to this !! i recommend this playlist by yoyo chinese/yangyang chen. the first several videos cover tones which is followed by pinyin itself. i also recommend this video by her as more pinyin review (its very lengthy so i recommend watching it in chunks) and this video by her for tone practice. she also has a pinyin chart which is soooooo helpful! it has audio recordings of each syllable w/ the 4 tones + quick videos for the harder syllables (strongly recommend her youtube channel in general)

writing/learning characters

this basically comes down to practice practice practice !!! when ever you learn a new character look up the stroke order and only write it that way. it will make your characters look nicer and if you write the same way every time you’ll build muscle memory making it much easier to remember (writing characters that you’ve studied will come naturally this way) i use this website to look up stroke order for each character (you can look up the rules for stroke order but tbh i dont understand them so i just look up for each character). i suggest learning the 40 most common radicals first. understanding these will make learning meanings of new characters easier.

in terms of actually practicing i strongly do not recommend flashcards. i think flashcards are great for vocab in any other language but not chinese. they’ll help you recognize characters and associate them with meaning and pronunciation but when you go to write you’ll blank out (if you only look at the pinyin/meaning side and write the characters i think they’re okay but its kind of a lot of work) when i learn new words, i would write out about two lines worth of the character over and over again (i usually used printer paper rather than lined cause some characters are big and its kind of a squeeze - many people use hanzi grids to write). once i did that for every character in the lesson, i would write out the dialogue once or twice. after this i would look at the pinyin for the dialogue (covering the characters) and write it out again a few times until i made sure that i remembered every character. i like doing this because it ensure that i actually know the character and then im learning it in context rather than just knowing meaning. i also then look at the dialogue and write the whole thing in pinyin (covering the pinyin and looking at the characters) just to make sure i remember that too!

textbooks

for self studying i think getting a textbook and following it is one of the best ways to learn. it will have vocab and grammar that goes with it and will allow you to stick to a more precise learning schedule rather than getting lost on what you should study and what order to learn things. there are a lot of different books so i would look at ones that interest you and read reviews/watch video reviews on youtube to determine which is the best to use

the only textbook ive used is integrated chinese since thats what we used in class and i believe its a very popular one to use but i havent used anything else so i dont have anything to compare it to. there is a pdf of the third version here (dont think there are major differences between the third and fourth tho) i have seen people say that its not super good w/out a teacher but idk :// i feel like how my professor taught class wasnt completely based on the book - more her taking the vocab/grammar in each lesson and then making her own explanations/lessons based on that

other textbooks that i have pdfs on (have never used so cant give opinion on)

modern mandarin chinese grammar and a workbook (original post)

folder with a lot of stuff (original post)

another folder with a lot of books (original post)

helpful apps

pleco - dictionary app that includes simplified and traditional, example sentences and audio recordings of the words

hellotalk - im using this for korean rn and have had a general positive experience with it ! you can talk to native speakers learning english w/ the chat function and post “moments” publicly for others to correct. its super easy to correct sentences w/in the app (some people have had issues w/ this app in terms of people only contacting them to try and date but i havent encountered that yet) i used the moments feature a lot to post scripts and other writings for class so someone can look over it before i handed it in :^)

chineseskill - i actually havent used this yet but pretty much every chinese langblr recommends it! chinese duolingo essentially

other

some various other things that might be helpful for studying !

if ur interested my general tag for chinese, vocab, and grammar

favorite blogs @liu-anhuaming and @langblog

making a langblr/studyblr !! its fun, theres lots of resources, vocab lists, other people learning on here and making ur own posts is helpful in seeing where you lack some understanding about certain topics and for learning new vocab

listen to music and watch tv shows/movies! its good for listening practice and lets you learn more in context

reading practice site - has different levels, you can hover over words for instant translation, and there is an explanation of more complex grammar

masterposts that i like (x) (x)

i hope this is helpful and if you have any more questions please feel free to message me again. good luck with your studies 加油！

#chinese #mandarin #chinese studyblr #mine:chinese #sspoons #asks

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the-space-case · 6 years

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Hi! First of all I love your art and I love you

Hello and Thank You!!!! I’m not sure if you’re talking about a fan comic or an original, or long or short but I’ll give you some tips. GRANTED I am not a professional and you may find a different way that is easier for you.

1.) Think of a basic storyline or prompt. Like, “Man is dying and is going to a mountain to see it before he dies and meets his DESTINY???” it can be stupid. It can be silly or vague so long as you have something to start with.

2.) Think of the protagonist, as well as a bit of the timeframe or universe. Are they human? Alien? Medieval? Elf? For our example here lets say its a medieval man from a heavily forested area. He is a lumberjack who hates potatoes and his old man told him stories of the mountain in the west that holds a magic temple; only the pure of heart may enter. He is dying, and wants to see this mythical place before he passes. Draw a few examples. You’ll want some basic refs to look back on.

3.)Think of the antagonist. It can be nature, machine, man, elderich horrors, etc....(typical story tropes are something like man vs. machine or man vs. nature). For our case lets say its mainly man and nature. Bandits, bad weather, illness, etc...DRAW SOME OF THOSE REFS. These beginning ones don’t have to be in depth. just basic stuff.

4.)Hash out what you want to happen in the BEGINNING, MIDDLE and END. These are kind of the most important parts. Its definitely important to think of the end ahead of time instead of thinking about it when you’re halfway through; thats a quick way to never end it at all. Our lumberjack begins his journey selling all he owns and getting a horse to set out to the mountains with nothing but a bit of gold, an old axe and a sick ride. In the middle he encounters various trials that test his “pure of heart”-ness. Probably three, they can be as long as you want so long as they are generally even alongside each other. (3 or 7 are magic numbers WINK). In the end he reaches the temple and is welcomed inside due to his good deeds and it was allllll along a metaphor for the journey to the afterlife.

5.)get some good references. You have a time period set, a scene in mind, and some tools. Gathering from our example, we’re going to want; various forest scenes of pines, plains, dirt roads, medieval towns, mountains, temples, animals, people, cultures, etc. We need refs for our horse, axe, and gold. Remember those quick refs of characters you made in steps one and two? Now is the time to finalize those. They’ll have developed with the level of detail in your story. Add background nonsense no one else will notice but will enliven the story like how our axeman always ties his beard when mad or how he prefers apple cider over beer anyday. Give those fuckers some names. Bandit Bill challenges Axeman Abel for his horse and loses his head (literallly???)

--if you can go to like, museums or lectures or fairs about these things and take notes. USE YOUR RESOURCES!! ASK QUESTIONS!!! (For ilulatte I visited a couple of coffeeshops and roughed out some cafe drawings haha)

7.) Separate events into chapters. Generally theres a prologue, chapters 1-whatever, the end, and an epilogue. Our axeman has a prologue of starting out on the road, chapters 1-3 depicting pure-heart-trials, climax/end of reaching the temple, and an epilogue of someone else starting their journey to the temple based on his influence on the world because this shit is cyclical, baby.

6.) make a fuckton of thumbnail drafts. You know these characters now; you built em out of your own head. You know how they move and talk, so slap down their journey in tiny pages. add minor details to the sides. (Here’s a shitty example of mine from ilulatte!!!!!)

7.) finish allllll of them. or at least the first few chapters. Its good for you I promise. You’ll notice the pacing much better this way! You can add a bunch of extra details in the margins like extra panels and bg notes. Don’t be afraid to experiment with the direction of your story, but try to keep the overall plot the same! (sticky notes are great for this!)

8.) start roughing out the actual pages. You’ll change things from the thumbnails (like I always do haha); thats okay!!! They’re more of a helpful guide than solid stone rules. It’s like making the scaffolding to make the base for the rest of the building.

9.) do the lineart, bgs, text, etc. There’s tons of helpful art programs for this like CLIP studio paint or medibang if you’re doing it digitally. Remember those refs you collected for our horse, axe, and bgs? Now is the time to use em. BE VIGILANT. Keep copies of the originals. Go back frequently to look for mistakes or missing details. Keep a check list. Freckles? check. Scar on nose? check. shading???? UHHHHHH----SHIT.

10.)you should probably number the pages. keep em in a nice sized resolution if you want to print but lower it if you’re posting to the internet to dissuade reposters. keep em all in one organized folder if possible. Slap your signature on em for extra safety.

11.) ????? Sell it on gumroad idk.

GENERAL TIPS:

-start with short stories. Build your own stamina.

-have relatable characters with flaws. Tumblr seems to hate “problematic” characters but thats literally the point of character building and narratives. THEY’RE RELATABLE IF THEY’RE FLAWED. If a story doesn’t have characters that conflict with each other its a boring one. Axeman Abel wants to help everyone; Bandit Bill wants to help himself only. LET THEM HATE EACH OTHER.

-its also good to have characters that are friends but still conflict with each other. The Dragon Age series is phenomenal with this (their characters are good in general, take notes!!)

-theres a lot of shitty people out there. USE THEM. (seriously though examine other peoples interactions and you’ll make better characters. )

-bad things happen to good people. Bad things also happen to bad people. Bad things just sort of happen. Don’t shy away from unfortunate events; your story will fall flat without conflict both planned and random.

-Obviously you don’t have to share the same world views as your characters. (dont let the antis fool you.) Axeman Abel can hate broccoli but you can still enjoy it. Bandit Bill can be a racist piece of shit but that doesn’t mean you are.

-have characters of various personality, body type, race, height, etc….it really livens up the story.

-generally you don’t want the bg to overwhelm the characters, so most people do a sort of painterly bg against the solid outlines of the characters but thats all really up to you and how in-depth you want it to be.

-you should also make a regular schedule, if you can. Say, something like “twenty finished pages a month” or “four pages a week” depending on the level of detail. Simplistic style and palettes of course take less time to make than full color/heavily detailed pages, so plan accordingly to prevent burnout. If you post weekly, having a few pages done ahead of time will be good in case you need an emergency break.

-be open to critique but don’t be a doormat, either. ESPECIALLY if you’re doing it for free. People will try to take advantage of you; don’t let them. Block them and move on.

-above all; BE DEDICATED. Comics take a great deal of time by yourself, but doing them helps you develop important skills in the end like time management and general technical know-how like digital programs and writing. It’s not just art, though that’s a major part of it.

-probably should’ve said this earlier but make what you enjoy??? People can generally tell if you dont enjoy your own work. There’s less effort there.

THIS WAS REALLY LONG SO I HOPE IT WAS HELPFUL IN SOME WAY ILU HAVE FUN BE SAFE OUT THERE

#personal jazz #comic making #comics #tips and tricks #comic tutorial #comic ref #art ref #art help #IDK MAN I ENJOY THE PROCESS #enjoy the journey yo #Anonymous

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arvoze · 6 years

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if you're not a pussy, give me the fursonas of every single one of your ocs.

heres a list of animals off the top of my head that may or may not be 100% accurate

if i write X it jsut means i havent thought about it yet

peruru - rabbit (actually has a rabbit motif/sometimes presented with rabbits in mind) (the only one with a fursona that actually exists)

takaka - deer

nitoto - cat (actually has a cat motif/sometimes presented with cats in mind)

chikuku - beaver

majojo - x

tepopo - wolf (maybe not a wolf but something down that line; i’m leaning heavily towards tiger instead)

panana - monkey

knaveve - lion (thanks matt,)

nadede - s. shark. hes a fucking shark thats literally what he i

kuchichi - x

hehehe - cobra

sififi - whatever insect you hate the most

kuchichi’s difficult bc she’s currently based on a nyororo (which is based on an already-existing animal but i feel like she’d be something different). majojo didnt have any traits in her design applied by me in the slightest which probably doesnt mean much but its still smth that impacts it to me? (takaka and majojo were both adopted designs but takaka was redesigned whereas majojos design hasn’t changed)

bonus from the majors folder

kagaga & yakuku - parrots or some shit, probably. or gazelles or something. i dont know

himama - i’ve realised this was a bad addition to put down because himama is literally just a sunflower so i

korere - god probably a dove or something honestly

kumomo - sp..... spider

kuroro - o... owl

molala - teeth

nororo - a big bird but its like a BIG bird and it scares you

pojiji - i do not know but i would trust him to be some kind of dog. or a bear. oh fuck hes a bear

nikuku - u know wat probably a ferret or some shit i have no fucking clue

rasusu - can i say cat twice because i

sinono - oh you know

turere - i have given up trying to remember what kind of animals exist at this point

#orikero #i dont know animals adn im rly unfamiliar with how most animals look/act so #tamamago

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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Read an Exclusive Excerpt From Charlie Jane Anders’ YA Debut

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

We need hopeful, critical, and empathetic voices in speculative fiction now more than ever, and Charlie Jane Anders is one of the best. The io9 co-founder who has gone on to write Hugo-nominated speculative fiction novels All the Birds in the Sky and The City in the Middle of the Night, is coming out with her first young adult novel, and we couldn’t be more excited. The upcoming science fiction adventure is called Victories Greater Than Death, and it’s being billed as perfect for fans of Star Wars (us) and Doctor Who (also us). We’re honored to bring you an exclusive excerpt from the novel—but, first, the synopsis:

THE UNIVERSE IS CALLING—and time is running out. Tina has always known her destiny is outside the norm—after all, she is the human clone of the most brilliant alien commander in all the galaxies (even if the rest of the world is still deciding whether aliens exist). But she is tired of waiting for her life to begin. And then it does—and maybe Tina should have been more prepared. At least she has a crew around her that she can trust—and her best friend at her side. Now, they just have to save the world.

And now for the exclusive sneak peek…

I have a ball of starlight inside me. A globe, containing a billion bright pinpricks. It’s always been there, since I was a baby—but lately I’ve been chewing up the inside of my own mouth waiting for it to burst out of me. Sometimes I feel all these little suns whirling, like they’re getting ready to emerge from the hollow of my collarbone. My whole life has been leading up to this, and I can’t stand the waiting.

I’m dangling by my waist from the side of the highway bridge. All the blood rushes to my head as a sixteen-wheeler truck rushes past, so close that I can feel the air disturbance and smell the fumes. The bridge quivers, and so does my heart. I feel like I’m going to pass out.

“Anything?” asks Rachael Townsend, who’s holding my belt in her strong grip.

“Nothing,” I gasp.

“Maybe you’re not scared enough,” Rachael says.

“I’m definitely scared enough. This . . . isn’t working.”

Rachael helps me pull myself upward, back behind the rusted old railing. I collapse on the hot cement walkway, next to a graffiti tag with a picture of a snarling puma.

“Okay.” Rachael smiles, sitting cross-legged on the walkway with her eyes looking wide and extra green in the midday sun. She’s dressed like a fourth-grader, as usual, in corduroy overalls and a long-sleeved stripy shirt.

“So it’s not reacting to fear. Or adrenaline.”

“And we know it’s not triggered by anger,” I say, “or it would have activated when Lauren Bose put dirt in Zuleikha Marshall’s new shoes. For sure.”

“Is Lauren Bose still harassing Zuleikha Marshall? And the school is doing nothing?” Rachael shakes her head. “This is why I’m being homeschooled.”

“Yeah. And yeah, the administration is both-sidesing the hell out of it. Makes me want to scream.”

“Okay.” Rachael reaches into her backpack and pulls out a folder. “So I’ve personally seen your rescue beacon light up on three separate occasions, and you’ve told me about four other times.” She shows me a chart, with beautiful handwriting and amazing doodles showing different versions of me with a bright blue-tinged glow coming from my sternum. Because Rachael is the greatest artist of all time.

Each cartoon version of me is labeled with things like:

1. Tina about to go to junior prom with Rob Langford 2. Tina right after cops broke up our flashmob outside the slumlord offices 3. Tina finds out she flunked trig midterm

“I got a D on that trig test,” I protest. “I did not flunk!”

“So I don’t see a huge pattern,” Rachael says. “I mean, it’s supposed to turn on when you’re old enough for the aliens to come get you, right?”

“They’re taking their sweet time.” I drag myself to my feet. “My mom keeps saying it might not happen until I turn eighteen, or even twenty-one. She just doesn’t want me to leave. As if it would be better for me to just stay trapped here forever.”

Rachael stands up too, and we walk back toward her rust-colored old Dodge hatchback. She’s being quiet again, which . . . a lot of being friends with Rachael is learning to interpret her many flavors of silence.

Like, there’s the “I’m mad at you and you won’t find out why for a week” silence. Or the “I’m figuring something out in my own head” silence. The most common is the “I need to be alone” silence, because Rachael has major hermit tendencies. But this silence is none of those, I’m pretty sure.

We drive for a while, without even any music. I’m one-quarter wondering what’s up with Rachael, but three-quarters obsessing about my rescue beacon and why it won’t just spill all the stars already.

At last, when we’re stopped at an intersection near the upscale mall and the tech campus, Rachael glances my way and says, “I wish I could go too. When the aliens come to collect you. I wish I could come along.”

I just stare at her. I don’t even know what to say.

“I know, I know.” Rachael raises her hands from the steering wheel.

“It would be ridiculous, and I would be useless up there in space, and there would be creatures trying to kill us, and it’s your destiny, not mine. But still. I wish.”

I want to tell Rachael that she’ll have a way better life down here on Earth. She’ll go to art school, find a new boyfriend to replace that loser Sven, publish tons of comics, and win awards. She’ll have adventures that don’t involve things like an alien murder team trying to kill her. She has plenty of reasons to stay.

Unlike me. I don’t have any real friends at high school, since Rachael dropped out. And the only thing I have to look forward to here on Earth is more people talking down to me. More bullies and creepers at school. More feeling like a bottomless pit, crammed with garbage emotions.

When Rachael drops me at my house, I just say, “I wish you could come too.”

“Yeah.” She smiles and hands me the folder. “Here. You should have this. Maybe it’ll help.”

She drives away. While I stare at a painstakingly annotated chart full of cartoon Tinas—each one bursting with pure dazzling light.

A few hours later, Rachael and I are already chatting again:

Chat log, Aug 19: Trashstar [5:36 pm]: its gonna happen soon. i can tell. the beacon. it’s gonna light up. Inkflinger [5:36 pm]: thats what u said last spring. and last winter. and five other times. Trashstar [5:37 pm]: its different this time i swear Trashstar [5:37 pm]: my mom is doing that thing again where she just stares at nothing Inkflinger [5:38 pm]: oh man, i’m sorry Inkflinger [5:38 pm]: what do u really think will happen when it lights up???? [Trashstar is typing] [Trashstar is typing] [Trashstar is typing] Inkflinger [5:40 pm]: helloooo?! Trashstar [5:40 pm]: i dont know Trashstar [5:41 pm]: they didnt tell my mom much when they dropped me off Trashstar [5:41 pm]: just . . . alien baby. massive legacy. evil murder team. Inkflinger [5:41 pm]: i hope there’s a dragon that u get to ride on Trashstar [5:41 pm]: like my own personal dragon Inkflinger [5:41 pm]: ur personal dragon that u share with me Trashstar [5:42 pm]: i’m pretty sure there will be at least a suit of armor Trashstar [5:42 pm]: rocket boots!!!! Trashstar [5:42 pm]: my theory is i’m the heir to a space casino Inkflinger [5:42 pm]: u’ve had YEARS to think about this Inkflinger [5:42 pm]: and space casino is the best u’ve come up with???? Trashstar [5:42 pm]: or maybe a wizard school Inkflinger [5:43 pm]: its definitely either casino or wizard academy Trashstar [5:43 pm]: pretty sure i’ve narrowed it down to those 2 options yea

This beacon is a part of me, like my liver or kidneys. Except sometimes at night, a faint growl wakes me—and I feel like I have a pacemaker, or some other foreign object, jammed inside my chest. And then I remember that my body isn’t the same as literally everyone else’s.

I fill our electric teakettle, with the switch jammed in the “on” position. And then I lean all the way over the side of my bed, so the steam is hitting the exact spot where the beacon is located. Mostly, the steam gets up in my nostrils and makes me choke.

My mom hears the kettle squealing. “What are you doing in there?” She peels back the curtain that separates my “bedroom” from the rest of the apartment. “Stop messing around. This is ridiculous.”

“It likes the steam! I can feel it reacting.” I cough and sputter.

“It’s an interplanetary rescue beacon, not a pork bun.” My mom turns the kettle off.

“I’m just so sick of ‘almost.’” I flop back onto my bed and bury my face in my knees.

Lately, my mom spends her time either trying to hide her tears from me, or acting like I’m already gone. Last week, I caught her folding the same shirt for five minutes, just creasing and tucking over and over until it looked like a paper football. She’s started calling up friends she hasn’t seen in ages, signing herself up for adult education classes, working on ways to move on with her life without me. But then, she’ll blow off some social plan that she spent hours making, just so she can sit at home staring into a Public Radio mug full of Chablis. I want to comfort her, or reassure her, but I don’t know how.

For all we know, the people who left me on Earth as a baby are all gone, and there’ll be nobody to answer the beacon when it does come to life.

“You could just stay here on Earth and have an amazing life.” She stares at her refrigerator door, with all the old photos and the terrible artwork I did in fifth grade. “You’re already helping people down here,” she says with the full force of her midwestern Presbyterian earnestness. “All of the things that you do with the Lasagna Hats, everything you make happen . . . Nothing could ever make me prouder of you than I already am.”

“Yeah.” I stare at the floor. I don’t know what to say. My mom knows I want this, more than anything, even though it’s going to destroy her.

My mom sighs and drinks from her wine-mug. “Just promise me one thing.”

“Sure. Whatever.”

For once, we are actually looking at each other. Her red hair has wiry streaks of gray, and her eyes have new lines around them.

“When the beacon lights up, you have to run.” Her eyes blaze, out of nowhere, with an intensity I’ve almost never seen before. “Run as if armies were chasing you. Because I’ve told you, the moment your beacon activates, monsters from beyond our world will try to kill you. They won’t stop. Keep running, until you’re sure you’re being rescued for real. Promise me.”

I kind of shrug it off, but my mom grabs my wrist. So I say, “Yeah, yeah. Of course. I promise. Jeez.”

That night I wake up, and there’s someone next to my bed.

All I can see at first is a pair of coal-black eyes, glinting in the moonlight filtered through the branches of the yew tree outside my tiny window.

Then I make out his face. Pale, like a ghost. Grinning, like a serial killer.

Something lights up in his hands. I glimpse a shiny metal tube with four wings on all sides, and an opening, full of bottomless darkness, aimed right at me. Somehow I know this is a weapon.

He stands over me, huge as a mountain, blocking out everything else. Even if I had the strength to rise, I would still be a speck next to him.

“I take no pleasure from killing you.” The giant speaks in a low purr. “Satisfaction, certainly. And an adrenaline rush. And oh yes, a sense of vindication. Your death will probably give me closure. But still, I feel sad that it came to this.”

My skin is so cold, my hands are numb and my arms feel prickly. I can’t breathe.

“I want you to know that I feel nothing but pity for your miserable state.” The huge figure raises the gun to my head.

I scream until my throat hurts.

The gun hisses. I’m about to be burned down to nothing.

I’m so cold, I can’t stand this cold.

The word “miserable” rings in my ears as I scream and brace myself for death.

The next thing I know, my mom is shaking me and yelling my name. “Tina!”

My mom wraps my quilt tight around me. “Tina, are you okay? Talk to me.”

I still can’t breathe. “He was here,” I wheeze. “He was right here. He wasn’t even human. He was about to kill me.”

“Honey, it’s okay,” my mom says. “It’s okay. You’re safe. You’re here with me, it’s only human beings ’round these parts. I promise.”

“I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

That sentence takes me several breaths to say, with all the shivering. The quilt (with squares containing famous women who fought against oppression) helps a little. So does my mom, whispering reassurances in my ear.

That wasn’t just a random hallucination, or a dream. It was a memory. A memory of the person I used to be. Whoever that was. Don’t ask how, but I just know this was a glimpse of her life. The rescue beacon whirs inside me.

“I’m glad you saw that,” my mom says, “because I keep trying to tell you. The moment that beacon activates, they’ll be coming. I only saw a glimpse, and that was enough to make my skin crawl.”

My stomach flutters. “Tell me again.”

My mom hesitates, then nods. “I had just failed another infertility treatment, and they showed up at my apartment. They had a baby, with skin the color of fresh-picked lavender, and big round eyes, and they said you were a clone of someone who had just died, someone important. They took some of my DNA and used it to make you look like my daughter, so I could watch you until they were ready to come get you. They showed me a hologram of the monsters that I needed to keep you hidden from, and it was like seeing an army sent by death itself.”

My mom leans on my quilted shoulder, like she’s about to start crying.

Then she takes a deep breath instead. “Let’s do something fun tomorrow. I have a day off. Worthington Garden Party?”

“Wow. What? Really? We haven’t played Worthington Garden Party in forever.”

The beacon goes back to sleep behind my breastbone.

“Oh! There’s that brand-new mall near the tech campus that we haven’t even been to yet. I can wear my church-lady hat!” My mom laughs, and rubs her hands together, and I can’t help smiling too.

But after she leaves, I close my eyes again, and I still see the pale giant leering at me. Raising that terrible gun. I feel frozen to the marrow, like I’ve waded neck-deep into a lake on the bleakest day of winter.

Worthington Garden Party is a game my mom and I invented, where we go through the mall looking at things we could never afford to buy, and we pretend that we’re planning a fancy garden party for the Worthingtons (who don’t exist, just in case it wasn’t already obvious).

My mom puts on her scariest hat, with the carnations and the pink ribbon, and I wear bright apricot capri pants. And we drive to the new shopping center, over on the rich side of town.

The kitchen store has this red-chrome machine that turns fresh fruit into a decorative fountain, and you can program it to spray a few different patterns. “I don’t know,” my mom says, in a very serious voice. “The Worthingtons are quite particular about their juice formations. We wouldn’t want to have a fruit salute that lacks proper parabolas.” My mom says the words “fruit salute” with a straight face.

“Yes, yes,” I say. “I mean, the Worthingtons. How many times have they said they prefer their papaya juice to really soar? So many times.”

My mom nods gravely. “Yes. The Worthingtons have strong opinions about properly aerodynamic papaya juice.” Over in the corner, the salesperson is hiding her giggles behind her hand.

This is the mom I’ve been missing lately. The one who decided that she and I would treat everything like a grand ridiculous adventure, the two of us against the universe. Even when we went camping and set fire to our tent, and got ourselves menaced by beavers. (They were really terrifying. I swear.)

“I always knew that you were going to be taken away from me,” my mom told me a while ago. “I thought about taking you off the grid, or trying to find people to train you in survival skills. But I decided it was better for you to have some good memories of your time as a human being. However long that lasts.”

We keep moving through the mall, along marble floors that are so shiny, I see a murky ghost of myself reflected in them. We gaze upon shiny shoes, in a riot of colors, that cost nearly a month’s rent. These kid-leather saddle shoes, with peacock feather heads all around the sides, might be just the thing to help the Worthingtons launch the season. “Mundane,” my mother proclaims, squinting at them. “Frightfully mundane.”

The only thing we actually buy is a basket of truffle fries, which we eat in the food court. They smell of rich oils and spices, but they taste like regular fries, just a little sweeter.

My mom chatters about the book club she keeps missing, and I let myself breathe. It’s okay. Only humans ’round these parts.

Then I look away for a second, and see the pale man, standing near the video game store. Watching us. His lip curls upward, and he pats the ugly gun attached to his dark tunic.

When I look again, a second later, the pale man is gone.

The next day at Clinton High, someone has posted a slut-shaming video about Samantha Kinnock, and it has a hundred likes already. Only thirty seconds long, just a close-up of Samantha’s ass in this pair of booty shorts that she decided to wear one weekend, with ugly messages popping up. I hear Lauren Bose and her other friends whisper about it in the hallway.

It never stops. The cycle just keeps going and going. People only feel like their footing is secure when they can step on someone else’s head.

Why would I even want to be human?

I step into Lauren’s path and the rage settles onto me, like armor.

“Leave Samantha alone.”

I get tunnel vision, and my nerves are jangling, and Lauren’s dimply smirk gets under my skin—and the beacon wakes up. Something to add to Rachael’s chart of cartoon Tinas.

This ball of light throbs and pounds against the wall of my chest like a trapped animal, pale glow showing through my hoodie. And I think, It’s happening, damn damn damn, I’ll finally be who I was meant to be.

One of Lauren’s friends, maybe Kayla, sticks out her foot, and trips me. I fall face-first onto the tile floor, hard enough to scrape my palms. Everyone is laughing and chattering and aiming their phones.

The beacon sputters.

All at once, I’m not picking myself up off the hallway of Clinton High. I’m raising myself, painfully, off an opaque black surface made out of glass, or plastic. The floor quakes under my hands and knees—and all around me is nothing but darkness, peppered with tiny lights.

Stars to my left, stars to my right, stars all around.

I’m standing on top of a spaceship, in deep space.

And my skin has turned purple. Not grape-soda purple, more like a pale, bluish purple that shimmers as it catches the starlight. I’m wearing a crimson suit, or some kind of uniform, with a river of lights on the left sleeve and a picture of a strange mask, like for an opera singer, on the right. My violet palms are cupped around a holographic message that I somehow know is telling me this spaceship is about to explode.

“You mustn’t blame yourself,” says a voice like the rustling of dead leaves in the wind. “You were always doomed to fail.” The giant from my bedroom turns his depthless black eyes toward me. He’s wearing a bloodred sash across his long dark tunic.

His face looks wrong, even besides the paleness and the big dark eye pools. I can’t figure it out at first, but then I realize: he’s too perfect. No flaws, no blemishes. The two sides of his face are exactly the same, like a mirror image. His dark hair is cropped short across his white scalp.

“Marrant, even if you kill me, that doesn’t mean I’ve failed,” I hear myself say. “There are victories greater than death. I might not live to see justice done, but I can see it coming. Also, that sash makes you look like a third-rate CrudePink singer.”

The giant—Marrant?—snarls and lunges forward, and his right hand holds the same weapon as in my vision from the other night. I’ve never even seen a regular gun up close, but at this range, I can tell this one will rip my entire body in half.

The darkness in Marrant’s eyes makes me feel tiny, weak, a speck of nothing.

Then reality comes crashing back. My skin is back to its usual shade of pale cream. I’m standing there in the hallway, trembling, and the bell is ringing, and I’m about to be late for class. My legs won’t budge, no matter how hard I try to make them.

Saturday morning, the sunlight invades my tiny curtained-off “bedroom” and wakes me from a clammy bad dream. Even awake, I keep remembering Marrant’s creepy voice—and I startle, as if I had more layers of nightmare to wake from.

My phone is jittering with all the gossip from Waymaker fandom and random updates about some Clinton High drama that I barely noticed in the midst of my Marrant obsession . . . and then there’s a message from Rachael on the Lasagna Hats server.

Monday Barker. It’s happening: disco party! Coming to pick you up at noon.

The Lasagna Hats started as a backchannel group for Waymaker players—until the game had one gross update too many, and then we started just chatting about whatever. And somehow it turned into a place to organize pranks and disruptions against all of the world’s scuzziest creeps.

I grab my backpack, dump out all my school stuff, and cram it full of noisemakers, glitter, and my mom’s old costume stuff. I’m already snapping out of my anxiety spiral.

The back seat of Rachael’s car is covered with art supplies and sketchpads, and I can tell at a glance that she’s leveled up since I last saw her works in progress. As soon as I get in her car, Rachael chatters to me about Monday Barker—that online “personality” who says that girls are naturally bad at science and math, and women should never have gotten the vote.

Then Rachael trails off, because she can tell I’m only half listening.

“Okay,” she says. “What’s wrong with you?” I can barely find the words to tell her I’ve started having hallucinations about an alien serial killer.

The artwork on Rachael’s back seat includes a hand-colored drawing of a zebra wearing a ruffly collar and velvet jacket, raising a sword and riding a narwhal across the clouds. Somehow this image gives me the courage to explain about Marrant.

“Pretty sure these were actual memories from . . . before,” I say. “I think this means it’s going to light up soon.”

“That’s great.” Rachael glances at my face. “Wait. Why isn’t that great?”

“It is. Except . . . I’ve been waiting and dreaming for so long, and now it’s suddenly a real thing. And . . . what if there’s nothing out there but the evil murder team? What if all the friendly aliens are dead? Or don’t bother to show up?”

“Huh.” She drives onto the highway and merges into traffic without slowing down. “I guess there’s only one way to find out.”

I close my eyes, and remember that oily voice: You were always doomed to fail.

“Maybe I can’t do this.” I suck in a deep breath through my teeth. “Maybe I’m just out of my league and I’m going to die. Maybe I’m just not strong enough.”

Rachael glances at me again, and shrugs. “Maybe,” is all she says.

She doesn’t talk again for ages. I think this is the “working something out in her own head” silence.

We make a pit stop at a convenience store, and Rachael pauses in the parking lot. “Remember when you decked Walter Gough for calling me an orca in a smock?” (It wasn’t a smock, it was a nice chemise from Torrid, and Walter deserved worse.) “Remember the great lunch lady war, and that Frito pie costume you wore?”

I nod.

“The entire time I’ve known you, people have kept telling you to stop being such an obnoxious pain in the butt,” Rachael says with a gleam in her eye. “But here you are, preparing to put on a ridiculous costume and prank Monday Barker. This is who you are. So . . . if some alien murder team shows up to test you, I feel sorry for them.”

Rachael smiles at me. Everything suddenly feels extremely heavy and lighter than air, at the same time.

“Oh my god,” I say. “Can I hug you? I know you don’t always like to be touched, but—”

Rachael nods, and I pull her into a bear hug. She smells of fancy soap and acetone, and her arms wrap around me super gently.

Then she lets go of me, and I let go too, and we go to buy some extra-spicy chips and ultra-caffeinated sodas, the perfect fuel for confronting asshattery (ass-millinery?). I keep thinking of what Rachael just said, and a sugar rush spreads throughout my whole body.

I feel like I almost forgot something massively important, but then my best friend was there to remind me.

Monday Barker is scheduled to speak at the Lions Club in Islington, and we’re setting up at the park across the street. Bette and Turtle have a glitter mist machine and a big disco ball, and a dozen other people, mostly my age, have brought sparkly decorations. I wander around helping people to figure out the best place to set up, since this “disco party” was sort of my idea.

“We got this,” says Turtle, buttoning their white suit jacket over a red shirt. “Why don’t you get yourself ready?” They’ve put pink streaks into their hair-swoosh.

In other words, Stop trying to micromanage everyone. Message received.

I retreat to Rachael’s car, where I rummage in my knapsack and put on a bright red spangly tuxedo shirt and a big fluffy pink skirt I stole from my mom, plus shoes covered with sequins.

Rachael sets to work finishing some signs she was making, which are full of rainbows and stars and shiny Day-Glo paint. I pull out the tubes of glitter-goop I brought with me, and she lets me spread some around the edges using a popsicle stick.

I coax Rachael into telling me about the comic she’s working on right now. “It’s about a group of animals living on a boat. They thought they were getting on Noah’s Ark, but the guy they thought was Noah skipped out on them, and now they’re just stuck on a boat in the middle of the ocean alone. There’s a pair of giraffes, and a poly triad of walruses. They have to teach themselves to sail, and maybe they’re going to become pirates who only steal fresh produce. Once I have enough of it, I might put it online.”

“Hell yeah,” I say. “The world deserves to learn how excellent you are.”

She just nods and keeps adding more sparkle.

I wish the bullies hadn’t driven Rachael away from school. She just made too easy a target for ass-millinery: her parents are nudists, she’s a super-introvert who sometimes talks to herself when she gets stressed, and she wears loose rayon clothing to hide all her curves.

The rich kids, whose parents worked at the tech campus, took her picture and used filters to make her look like an actual dog. Kids “accidentally” tripped her up as she walked into school, or shoved her in the girls’ room. One time, someone dumped a can of coffee grounds from the teacher’s lounge on her head. I tried to protect her, but I couldn’t be there all the time.

So . . . homeschooling. And me never seeing Rachael during the week anymore.

Soon there are about twenty of us across the street from the Lions Club, everybody feeding off everyone else’s energy and hoisting Rachael’s glorious awning. And a pro–Monday Barker crowd is already gathered across the street, on the front walk of this old one-story brick meeting hall with flaking paint on its wooden sign.

A town car pulls up, and Monday Barker gets out, flanked by two beefy men in dark suits holding walkie-talkies. Monday Barker is about my mom’s age, with sideburns enclosing his round face, and a huge crown of upswept hair. He waves in a robotic motion, and his fans scream and freak out.

Someone on our side fires up a big speaker on wheels, playing old disco music. The handful of cops between us and the Lions Club tense up, but we’re not trying to start anything. We’re just having an impromptu dance party.

The brick wall of the savings and trust bank seems to shiver. I catch a glimpse of Marrant, the giant with the scary-perfect face and the sneering thin lips, staring at me.

But I remember what I said to him in that vision: There are victories greater than death. I can see justice coming. And then I think about Rachael saying, If an alien murder team shows up, I feel sorry for them.

The throbbing grows stronger . . . but Marrant is gone. The brick wall is just a wall again.

The Monday Barker fans—mostly white boys with bad hair—are chanting something, but I can’t hear them over our music. Rachael and I look at each other and whoop. Someone starts the whole crowd singing along with that song about how we are family. I know, I know. But I get kind of choked up.

We keep on, chanting disco lyrics and holding hands, until Monday Barker’s supporters vanish inside the Lions Club to listen to their idol explain why girls shouldn’t learn to read. Out here, on the disco side of the line, we all start high-fiving each other and jumping up and down.

Afterward, we all head to the 23-Hour Coffee Bomb. Turtle, Bette, and the others all go inside the coffee place, but I pause out in the parking lot, with its scenic view of the wind-beaten sign for the Little Darlings strip club. Rachael sees me and hangs back too.

“I started to get another one of those hallucinations.” I look down at the white gravel. “During the disco party. Snow-white serial killer, staring me down. And this time . . . I faced it. I didn’t get scared. And I could feel the star ball respond to that, like it was powering up.”

“Hmm.” Rachael turns away from the door and looks at me. “Maybe that’s the key. That’s how you get the rescue beacon to switch on.”

“You think?”

“Yeah. Makes total sense. When you can confront that scary vision of your past life or whatever, then it proves you’re ready.” She comes closer and reaches out with one hand. “Okay. Let’s do it.”

“What, now?”

“Yeah. I want to be here to see this.” She grins.

I swallow and shiver for a moment, then I clasp her hand and concentrate. Probably better to do this before I lose my nerve, right?

I remember Marrant and his bottomless dark eyes, and the exploding spaceship, and that curdled blob of helplessness inside me. And I catch sight of him again, striding across the road with his death-cannon raised. The icy feeling grows from my core outward, and I clench my free hand into a fist.

Then . . . I start to shake. I can actually see the dark tendrils gathering inside that gun barrel. Pure concentrated death. My heart pounds so loud I can’t even think straight. I couldn’t even help Rachael feel safe at Clinton High. How could I possibly be ready to face Marrant?

“I can’t,” I choke out. “I can’t. I . . . I just can’t.”

“Okay,” Rachael says. “Doesn’t have to be today, right? But I know you got this. Just think of disco and glitter and the look in Monday Barker’s eyes when he tried so damn hard not to notice us in all our finery.”

She squeezes my hand tighter. I look down at the ridiculous skirt I’m still wearing. And I focus on the person I am in those visions—the person who can see justice coming, even on the brink of death. That’s who I’ve always wanted to be.

I’m ready. I know I can do this.

I growl in my throat, and feel a sympathetic thrumming from the top of my rib cage.

The parking lot and the strip-club billboard melt away, and I’m once again standing on top of a spaceship, and my free hand is cupped around a warning that we’re about to blow up. The stars whirl around so fast that I get dizzy, and Marrant is aiming his weapon at point-blank range.

But I can still feel Rachael’s hand wrapped around mine.

I gather myself together, step forward, and smile.

I can’t see what happens next, because a white light floods my eyes, so bright it burns.

Rachael squeezes my hand tighter and says, “Holy bloody hell.”

A million stars flow out of me, inside a globe the size of a tennis ball. I can only stand to look at them through my fingers, all of these red and blue and yellow lights whirling around, with clouds of gas and comets and pulsars.

Way more stars than I’ve ever seen in the sky.

All of my senses feel extra sharp: the burnt-tire smell of the coffee, the whoosh of traffic going past, the jangle of classic rock from inside the café, the tiny rocks under my feet.

Everybody inside the coffee shop is staring and yelling. I catch Turtle’s eye, and they look freaked out. Rachael has her phone out and is taking as many pictures as she can.

As soon as the ball leaves my body, it gets bigger, until I can see more of the individual stars. So many tiny hearts of light, I can’t even count. The sphere expands until I’m surrounded. Stars overhead, stars underfoot. This parking lot has become a planetarium.

I can’t help laughing, yelling, swirling my hands through the star-trails. Feels like I’ve been waiting forever to bathe in this stardust.

Used with permission from Tor Teen, an imprint of Tom Doherty Associates; a trade division of Macmillan Publishers. Copyright Charlie Jane Anders 2021.

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Victories Greater Than Death will hit bookshelves on April 14th, 2021. You can find out more about Victories Greater Than Death, including how to pre-order, here.

As a kid, all I wanted was for aliens to show up and take me away from this planet. So I put that dream into a new YA book, #VictoriesGreaterThanDeath. Now there's a brand new pre-order page, with links to all the places! Pre-ordering is awesomely heroic!https://t.co/K9v5vUsiSV

— Charlie Jane Anders *Victories Greater than Death* (@charliejane) November 18, 2020

The post Read an Exclusive Excerpt From Charlie Jane Anders’ YA Debut appeared first on Den of Geek.

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