Back to the Word Mines for Me
Words Friday: 2,741
Total words: 183,246
Reason for length: The Quincy sections are just flying along right now. Also, I couldn't go to Acrobop, so I got more written because of that.
Other writingy stuff: Um. Read some writing newsletters, I think.
Overused word: convivial
Gratuitous word: fichu
Type of scene: A little interlude with a chemist, followed by a visit to a brothel.
Challenge(s): Trying to keep the brothel from straying too far into Spider Robinson happy-whorehouse territory.
In which the chemist likes his job:"Very well," Quincy said. "You may have what remains of the sample with my blessing. Now, will you please tell me what you mean by 'not entirely human'?"
The chemist smiled and rubbed his long-fingered hands together. "There is human blood in there," he said, before pausing dramatically.
Quincy wondered if the chemist had a heretofore unsuspected desire to walk the boards as an actor.
"It is the base, if you will. The original donor was a male human without genetic defects. But!" Here he raised one hand, as if to stop Quincy from interrupting. "This blood sample is more additives than blood. There are preservatives, some kind of nutrient, and all sorts of chemicals and drugs, a few of which I've never seen before."
The chemist looked as if he was about to dive into a lecture on the nature of chemicals, so Quincy interrupted him. "Keep it in layman's terms, please. What does it mean?"
The chemist sighed but complied. "It means that what you're dealing with was once a human being."
"Was--once?" Quincy repeated slowly.
With a nod of his head, the chemist continued, "One group of the drugs I recognize as being specifics to keep the body from rejecting a donor organ or a medical device implanted in the body. There were three mood-altering chemicals at work in this--individual's bloodstream, as well as faint traces of a dozen others. And what I suspect will most concern you--there were all manner of chemicals and hormones whose combined effect would be to radically increase the strength and speed of the individual as well as crippling his ability to feel pain. This man could run on two broken legs." Almost as an afterthought to himself, the chemist added, "If he still has legs."
"If. . .he still has legs?" Quincy said, with what he thought was commendable patience.
The chemist nodded. "The percentage of regular old human blood was too low to be able to support an entire human frame. I presume that the donor of this sample is still alive?"
"Yes, I believe so."
"Then he is not, as they say," the chemist permitted himself a wry smile, "a whole man."
Notes: I'm having a lot of fun writing these bits. Hopefully that means people will have fun reading them.
Saturday was an unusually productive day for me, too. I got over a thousand words written on the short mystery story that I'm working on (and briefly posted to lj, because I was writing on another person's laptop), did a crit for Critters, redmarked two of my own older pieces of writing for editing changes, and read through two old pieces of writing only to pass judgment that they could not be saved.
Total words: 183,246
Reason for length: The Quincy sections are just flying along right now. Also, I couldn't go to Acrobop, so I got more written because of that.
Other writingy stuff: Um. Read some writing newsletters, I think.
Overused word: convivial
Gratuitous word: fichu
Type of scene: A little interlude with a chemist, followed by a visit to a brothel.
Challenge(s): Trying to keep the brothel from straying too far into Spider Robinson happy-whorehouse territory.
In which the chemist likes his job:"Very well," Quincy said. "You may have what remains of the sample with my blessing. Now, will you please tell me what you mean by 'not entirely human'?"
The chemist smiled and rubbed his long-fingered hands together. "There is human blood in there," he said, before pausing dramatically.
Quincy wondered if the chemist had a heretofore unsuspected desire to walk the boards as an actor.
"It is the base, if you will. The original donor was a male human without genetic defects. But!" Here he raised one hand, as if to stop Quincy from interrupting. "This blood sample is more additives than blood. There are preservatives, some kind of nutrient, and all sorts of chemicals and drugs, a few of which I've never seen before."
The chemist looked as if he was about to dive into a lecture on the nature of chemicals, so Quincy interrupted him. "Keep it in layman's terms, please. What does it mean?"
The chemist sighed but complied. "It means that what you're dealing with was once a human being."
"Was--once?" Quincy repeated slowly.
With a nod of his head, the chemist continued, "One group of the drugs I recognize as being specifics to keep the body from rejecting a donor organ or a medical device implanted in the body. There were three mood-altering chemicals at work in this--individual's bloodstream, as well as faint traces of a dozen others. And what I suspect will most concern you--there were all manner of chemicals and hormones whose combined effect would be to radically increase the strength and speed of the individual as well as crippling his ability to feel pain. This man could run on two broken legs." Almost as an afterthought to himself, the chemist added, "If he still has legs."
"If. . .he still has legs?" Quincy said, with what he thought was commendable patience.
The chemist nodded. "The percentage of regular old human blood was too low to be able to support an entire human frame. I presume that the donor of this sample is still alive?"
"Yes, I believe so."
"Then he is not, as they say," the chemist permitted himself a wry smile, "a whole man."
Notes: I'm having a lot of fun writing these bits. Hopefully that means people will have fun reading them.
Saturday was an unusually productive day for me, too. I got over a thousand words written on the short mystery story that I'm working on (and briefly posted to lj, because I was writing on another person's laptop), did a crit for Critters, redmarked two of my own older pieces of writing for editing changes, and read through two old pieces of writing only to pass judgment that they could not be saved.