The Moon Looks Pretty Rad Tonight

The Moon looks pretty rad tonight

I was writing my astronomy homework about the moon and tried to write

“the moon appears red during a total lunar eclipse […]”

but instead I accidentally wrote

“the moon appears rad during a total lunar eclipse”

Well… I… I guess it does, if you wanna think about it that way.

me: I have my mother’s eyes, my father’s smile, and my grandmother’s sneeze

person: uhhh what? your grandm-

me: *sneezes, waking up deaf people in Taiwan and launching myself into the stratosphere*

person: … gesundheit…???

That moment when you “accidentally” add six gorram sequels to your main story project and they cover more than half a trillion years of canonical time (in addition to the quarter trillion years of canon history that occur before the first story) 🙃

Houston, we have a serious problem. I cannot locate one of my vitally important sketchbooks. I have combed the entire house. I have searched literally everywhere the thing could be. It is conspicuously missing. That book has the only translation pages for Elvish, Dwarvish, Goblintongue, Bïïkani, and Neo-Zorsk. Character sketches (some of which are copied, thankfully), weapon concepts, and five unpublished fictional language systems are all just GONE. I have things in other places that are written in Elvish and Goblintongue, so I could reconstruct it from those and from what I remember. But Dwarvish, Bïïkani, and Neo-Zorsk are all utterly gone unless by some miracle I find the thing. I think I’ve narrowed it down to the one place where it has to be if it’s not in my house. It has NOT been to school with me this semester and it DEFINITELY came home from the last one. I had it with me over winter break. I don’t go out much, and even when I do I rarely take my notebooks. Much less that particular one, considering that it doesn’t have a cover attached to it anymore (of course, the cover with my name and contact info is the ONLY piece that I actually HAVE). I am incredibly stressed and frustrated. I have to start reconstructing what I can of these languages before I forget.

Them (Part I)

We don’t know who they are. We don’t know where they come from. All we know is that they want us dead.

The faint whine of a high-altitude jet sent chills down my spine. “Oh no,” I murmured as I glanced up. Sure enough, just visible against the deep blue of the sky was a formation of small black spots traced by faint contrails. “GET TO THE DIVECHUTES!” I screamed, hefting my rifle and breaking into a run. Panic ensued. Crates and barrels were abandoned and tools clattered on the tarmac as panicked people made a desperate break for the tunnel openings that led to the buried shelter. I made it to the main entrance and ushered people inside, shouting above the rising sirens. Normally we would check ID tags, but during a surprise raid protocol went sideways. The ID checks were pointless anyways, just instituted to give some sense of security to demoralized survivors. But the truth was: there was no way an ID check could stop one of Them. They were an enigma to us. We never saw who They even were; all the attacks were done from high-altitude bombers. The level of detachment was scary, like we were just pests that had to be cleaned off the face of the planet. A shudder passed through me as I frightfully eyed the tiny dots that were hurtling towards the ground. The bombing had started. I saw a few rookies take a stance and raise their guns. I screamed at them to get inside but their faces were full of rage and they didn’t heed me. They started firing. I held myself back from running out to stop them; they were wasting ammo but I didn’t want to risk my own life. The bombs were too close. I backed further into the tunnel entrance, too horrifically expectant to look away. The first bomb hit, spraying melted asphalt high in the air. Two of the gunners chickened out and made a break for it. One stumbled in, and I shoved her through the door. The other one dotted the cliffside in a matter of seconds. I held back a sob as I watched the last rookie holding his ground amid the bombs. He was shooting at nothing. I told him so, but my voice was lost in the explosions. I watched in horror as a bomb fell beside the gunner. He didn’t move at all when the bomb landed, he just fell to his knees and kept shooting until it went off. My arm stung with shrapnel. I looked down and nearly puked. A sliver of bone was stuck in my skin.

Update on the Missing Sketchbook

Language reconstruction is going relatively well. Did some digging and uncovered a trove of Goblintongue scraps and a picture of the original translation page! Elvish has been harder to work out because I used it less, but I remembered a surprising amount of the letters. I've already totally rebuilt Goblintongue, and Elvish is ~80% restored. I also found an image with faint traces of Neo-Zorsk, (probably around 60%-70% of it), so that could be partially restored. I only have a few traces of Bïïkani, but I remember some of the characters so we'll see where that gets me. I don't have any way of rebuilding Dwarvish though. I don't recall any of it and there are no traces.