Well, National Novel Writing Month is progressing slowly but surely so far; I’m behind, but not super behind, and most importantly, not falling further behind: and the daily deficit is keeping constant. Today I have some extra time, so I will try to get caught up completely. You can see how far I’ve gotten on the graph below:
I’d say this is procrastination, but it really does help to know just how far behind I am, and how much I need to write each day to catch up. Plus, I can reuse this Excel graph next year (this is actually a slight refinement of last year’s Nano graph for Liquid Fire).
Also, to save time, for the first time I’m using WordPress’s scheme for inserting and saving images, rather than my own. Downside: problems if I need to leave WordPress, but I’m a big boy now, and can write my own converter and URL rewriter if I need to. Upside: time, of course.
Oh, I almost forgot … the excerpt! Here’s where we are now:
Without a second thought, Jeremiah decked the guard. One fist, one punch, flying out, clocking her jaw and laying her out, ten feet out on the tile. The gun spun away, impacted, fired, the deadly bullet shattering a storefront of glass.
There were shouts, screams, and panic, but to Jeremiah’s delighted horror the crowd did not scatter like civilians. A dark-suited man saw the guard fall and came at Jeremiah; a frilly young girl in a beret saw the gun and dove for it.
“Capital,” Jeremiah said, ducking one punch, blocking the other, popping the man on the jaw, then kneeing him in the groin when he didn’t fall. “Absolutely capital!” she said, kicking the gun away into the glass just as the bereted girl seized it. Jeremiah clamped both hands on the girl’s arms to neutralize her, lifted her up, and said, “I’m so proud of you!” before head-butting so hard her beret came off and she fell back in a sudden spray of hair, eyes rolling.
“We should go,” Patrick said, shepherding Georgiana out of the darkened cave of the restaurant.
“Did you see,” Jeremiah said, blocking another punch, kicking her new assailant in the gut, then decking a third man. “These people have spines!”
“Very much so,” Georgiana said. “Good for them, but for us—”
“Fear not!” Jeremiah said; there were no more instant heroes popping out of the crowd, but there were still the shouts and screams and now whistles blowing, so it was very definitely time to go. “Follow me, thataway!”
Onward! Wind up your braces, let’s do this…
-the Centaur
