Mad Dogs and Englishmen

I've been playing Mass Effect 1+2 recently, with Mirek as my main character (dumb game won't let me modify his surname, boo), and it's just as well I've finished AIoM, because I don't think he wants to leave the Mass Effect universe. I keep telling him that giant living spaceships which want to destroy all life in the universe are several scales of magnitude worse than Nazis, but he won't listen. I think it's because here he gets to have a gun and shoot at them (doesn't do squat, but he feels happier). Being a character, he's pretty bossy, and had me re-load back one hell of a way because something didn't turn out the way he wanted. No Johannes, but I think he prefers Garrun, and it's really a pity AIoM isn't published because this would make one hell of a crossover.

So yes, brain being eaten. No spoilers please, because I'm currently (thanks to Mirek being fussy) still trying to get through the Loyalty missions in MS2, and had to reload from the Collector spacecraft so that's about as far as I know.

I'm right pissed about the reload, btw.

*ramble*

Is over. I wrote the final words "The world has ended and the only thing that could be worse would be going through it alone." a few minutes ago.
Of course, now comes the ton and a half of editing and re-writing, but it's over, for the first time I actually have finished a story. A self contained story done and dusted and over.

Final word count, for the first draft at least, 99,418 words.

Now for the champagne we've been saving. An early celebration.

I wonder if my father would agree to call my new brother Mirek?

:DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

Crawled a little closer to finishing AIoM. Fingers crossed it'll be done by December, or at least January 25th ;-). Today was writing down in longhand in my notebook a summary of everything I'd written so far so I could reference it while brainstorming what to put into the blank months between October 7th (Sonderkommando rebellion, pretty much last mass killings in Birkenau) and late January in which everything that's left (which isn't much) hits the fan and the story's all over bar the epilogues. I've already written October, and I know exactly what's happening in January, but I'm left with this kind of limbo between the two in which nothing really happens and there's nothing for Mirek to do except scrounge food, dodge guards, dismantle barracks and try not to get deported just yet.

Oh well, I'm up to 86,000 words now.

In other news, I now have an ebook reader, it's actually a sony, which is more flexible and has touchscreen, and finally won me over and never mind the Kindle.

I'm re-reading and editing the old chapters of AIoM to get it ready for NaNo again this year. The later chapters especially need a lot of editing, I started a completely usless subplot which need to be thrown into the crematoria and burnt with the rest. Pile of pointless shit.

It's odd, because with the first few chapters its gotten to the point where there's not much I can do with them now. They've been raked over, steamrolled, hashed out in front of fellow students and tutors alike and finally dropped in that state where I can't change much. Which is good, yeah, but its a bit weird. I write flat out until the plot falls over, then backtrack, rewrite, try again, and hopefully end up going a bit further than last time. Last NaNo, for all its issues, at least got me within spitting distance of 1945, and I hope the next one will allow me to push once and for all to the end. The middle was always the hardest part of AIoM, the end was one of the first things I plotted. It reeks of 2008 depression time, but I don't think I could change it now, its become too integral to the story.

Fingers crossed, I'll finish it this year.

60,000 words done and done. I kept lagging behind, November is not the best month for me to do this in (birthday etc) and the plot keep fuckign derailing, and eventually feel over entirely when Johannes decided that he could make things a lot easier for him (and totally fuck over the plot) but not telling Mirek a small but vital piece of information. So I said 'fuck you I'm moving this to Birkenau' and they were like 'WTF?' and Mengele was like 'OMG yes! Finally!' So the sick fuck got his look in and Mirek got to work in the medical baracks and instead of finshing the story I'm still lagging miles behind. Fuck.
Still, I can just about see the light at the end of the tunnel. It's a light made of burning cities and crematoria and death trains coming stright towards me, but it's still a light, no?
Fuck me.

*goes back to ferreting out Terminator slash fics*

Having the usual Wrimo panic of 'god I'm writing a load of crap!' moment now. Afraid I haven't made Mirek's family strong enough to act as counterpoints to Karl, but it's bloody hard because Mirek does not make human connections very well and in this fucking setting it could be constituded the wrong way. God I hate my story right now.

"You know the punishment for. Thieves in the camp. Johannes?”

Schwartz calling him by his first name. Johannes can’t help but swallow this time. His fixes his gaze just behind Schwartz’ cap, staring at the wall. “Loss of privileges sir.”

“For inmates. Dieter. Not guards.”

His stomach clenches. “Death sir.”

“Just as well you. Are not an inmate. Yes Johannes?”

“Yes sir.”

“See that it remains that way. Your leave is cancelled. Dismissed.”

Dear Schwartz. You are evil even for an SS. Case dismissed. You are probably the most fucking evil person I have ever written, simply because you are so human.

Brrr.

Getting there :) Thanks to massive history fail (not my fault. How many ex- Death camp SS write their memoirs anyway?) this is basically meshing a lot of 1st draft and second draft. Fortunately I've nearly finished the rewriting and will be writing straight. Rewriting is very hard to do to a wordcount because if I cut words away I have to make them up to get a positive difference to the wordcount. Fortunately there are enough changes for me not to have to waffle too much, but I still have to cover a lot to make up full 2,000 count.
But rejoice! I have a new full scene to write tomorrow, a Schwartz and Johannes forshadowing conversation where the Morowitz Kommandant would like to know why he saw a certain inmate coming out of Johannes' quarters when he supposed to be on leave. Heinrich's practically foaming at the jaws at this moment, and Deiter's pretty much trying to walk a really nasty tightrope. Chop chop.
I love these characters. I only hope I can do them justice. I mean, they're my first real, fully fleshed characters who could go toe-to toe for realism against any of my fanfic characters and still come out heads up.
I'm actually confident about this :) :) :)

October is now officially DON'T PANIC month. Waaahhh!
Especially so since this year I have decided that the standard 50,000 word limit is just too easy (done it twice after all) and I'm going for 60,000.
It's a nice round figure, it means a straight 2,000 per day.
But now I'm running around trying to iron out the last kinks in All Instruments of Measurement. Does anyone know, beloved friendlist, where the SS in Auschwitz actually lived, as in, slept? Were they in communal living quarters or had they hijacked local Polish houses? I have no idea and it's becoming a real problem becuase I don't know for certain where Johannes is living.
PANIC

So here are two poems from Mirek and Johannes.
In other news, I marched on the Royal Bank of Scotland and lost a kneecap, and next month I will be responsible for sheparding the Nazi contingent through modern Berlin.
I will got in a corner and die now.

Aquarius

Tip the tumbler for water

You hold it out to me

To take from your hands.

You sip and swallow and sip again

And lean over for me

To take from your lips.

Hold the water, for when I kiss you

And taste it on your lips

Instead of the ash that chokes me.

-By Mirek.

 

Aquarius

Cradle a bowl of water

Your hands frail as twigs

Brittle bones bowing beneath

But holding high the gift

Sweet water to parched mouths

Of your Broken People

Pour down a waterfall of plenty

To cracked and parted lips

Glory and exhaustion on giving

And giving. The water bowl is empty

But you stand full and tall.

-By Johannes.