(Part 2) Snippet Tag: The Library in the Stars

Part 2

The Snippet Tag @ Short & Snappy by Madeline J. Rose

And I’m back with Part 2 of my NaNo 2016 snippet sharing, with the second half of the Snippet Tag from Madeline J. Rose @ Short & Snappy!

See Part 1 of the Snippet Tag for more snippets, if you missed those, and for the rules etc. 🙂

Meanwhile, here are more snippets from my NaNo, The Library in the Stars! Enjoy! ^_^

Snippet Tag:

Part the Second

6. Share a snippet that gets you beaming with pride and you’re just like yep, I wrote that beauty.

The young man sat on top of a pile of rubble, his shadows wrapping around him and stretching down the pile of stones and debris in all directions away from him, in defiance of the laws of the sun, which sent its light between two other buildings and illuminated the area. The sight was a striking one—a person in shadows sitting in the middle of a pool of sunlight. It looked impossible—but Veronica was beginning to learn a few things about that word and its lack of applicability, as well as the word coincidence.

“That’s far enough,” the young man’s voice said, as they paused in the shadows of the building next to them. “Unless you want to lose your shadow, too,” he added, a glance from his black eyes flicking toward Veronica. The sun gleamed on his raven hair and his arms were folded and rested on top of his drawn-up knees, cloak or shadows or both spread around him.

“You were just who we were looking for, my lad,” Drayke said pleasantly. “Only one request for you: kindly return the shadows of myself and my space craft.”

“Love to,” the young man said. “Can’t.”

Drayke narrowed his eyes. “Is that right?”

The other sighed. “Look, I can’t help you—it seems I can’t help anyone, come to that—so I suggest you just go away.”

“Love to. Can’t,” Drayke said cuttingly. “You seem to have taken my ship’s shadow, and she says she can’t fly without it. So until you give it back, I and my good craft, as well as this girl here—unless she can time-wisp away, which seems to be uncertain—will be enjoying (if that’s the word I’m looking for) a stay in this rather depressingly desolate place.”

7. Share a snippet of genius, deliciously witty dialogue between your characters.

[Note: I couldn’t help picking a few for this one. And yes, Eon’s in all three of them. >.> Ahem.]

“We need your help breaking a friend of ours out of prison,” the blue haired girl spoke up cheerfully.

The hologram of Kelly was seen to drop her forehead forward onto her folded arms atop the table surface.

“And this is why the fate of the universe should not be in your hands, pet,” said the unseen Ether Eon.

“Curious,” Drayke remarked. “I don’t think I’ve ever been asked that before.”

***

“Eon, is your time working correctly?”

“I’ll pretend I’m not insulted. You’re welcome. Of course my time is working correctly.”

***

“I hate turning into tools,” Eon complained. “At least when I’m a pocket watch I’m moving and time is flowing through me… Why do you think I turn into the shapes of living things? But when I’m a wrench or a key or a grappling hook, I’m just… a metal thing. It’s annoying.”

“Very sorry,” Briley said, “but I’m sure it’s worth it for the rewarding feeling of knowing you helped me.”

“Don’t push it,” Eon warned.

“Well then try this: knowing that you’re the only shape-shifting Ether pocket watch in the galaxy and that I couldn’t continue in my measly existence without you.”

“Getting better,” Eon admitted.

“Or… how about that since we’re trying to find a way to fix time, we may very well be saving the galaxy, and that you’re a key part of it?”

“That’s more like it.”

8. Share a snippet that makes you feel like an evil genius for thinking up such a malevolent villain (Mwa-ha-ha!)

“Lying?” Wilecka repeated.

“Oh, don’t pretend,” Damian snarled. “I never bought that thing about your finding me abandoned with no memory—I know you took my memories. And by the way, I would like them back.”

“I should have known,” Wilecka muttered as if to herself. “The blood that flows in your veins—of course you would betray me and steal what was mine! You were my son, and now you turn traitor! You want back memories, do you, you shadow-skulking traitorous cur? Oh, you shall have some, and more shadows too—see if that makes you happy,” she spat.

9. Share a snippet that leaves you breathless, in a cold sweat with action-induced intensity.

Drayke seemed to grow somewhat larger, his long draping green sleeves flapping and shoulder-length green hair flying about his head in the almost-wind, and his eyes—they seemed to be glowing green with a sort of green light of anger.

“Let. Us. Out,” he said in a steely voice.

The house moaned its refusal with mixed angry and sad emotions.

“At least let Veronica go!” Drayke shouted then, even more wrathful then before, with more force than she had heard him use yet. “I don’t care about me—I’m a space elf, I’m going to live a long time, and I imagine you’d get tired of my living here after a couple of hundred years; besides, it’s not like I have anything better to do. Keep me if you wish. But Veronica has a life to live—she has her brother to find. Are you going to keep her trapped here against her will? Look at her! She’s a frightened girl—like Aurora.”

The house rocked as if an earthquake had hit it at the mention of Aurora’s name.

10. Share a snippet of a most interesting first meeting between your characters.

“Well, since we seem to have run up against each other, and I am to be denied my solitude,” the space elf continued, coming down the white rocky slope toward her—he walked with an easy cat-like grace—“we may as well meet properly. I am Drayken Essengale. And yourself?”

“Veronica Coltridge,” Veronica said.

“A pleasure to meet you,” Drayken began, paused, and added, “All right, I’m lying there a little bit. The whole solitude thing, you know. Still.”

Veronica laughed. “Well, what’s politeness other than lying about one’s feelings because of social norms?”

Drayken’s green eyes—they were green, she saw—glittered into a sort of smile. “Aptly put.” He eyed her critically for a moment. “I take that back—it is a pleasure to meet you. You may call me Drayke, in fact.”

“Well… thanks. Pleasure to meet you too,” Veronica said, and meant it—she’d always wondered what meeting a space elf would be like; apparently it was unpredictable, was what it was. “I just wish…” She looked around.

“Ah, your friend,” the space elf picked up. “Maybe he’s waiting with your space craft—more visible than a little thing like yourself.”

“I don’t have a space craft,” Veronica said before she could stop herself.

Drayke arched one dark green eyebrow. “Then how did you get here?”

“I—” Veronica stuttered.

He looked very closely at her. “You’re not a space elf. How— Ah. You’re a Time Wisp.”

“So everyone keeps telling me, despite my lack of knowing it myself!” Veronica exclaimed.

Drayke blinked mildly at her. “So, what year is this for you, if I may be allowed to ask? What can I say—this traveler has picked up a taste for curiosity in his wanderings.”

“Four years before I was born,” Veronica said, then winced. “That… sounds strange when I put it that way.”

Drayke laughed, his teeth glittering white in the moon light and his long dark green hair swaying. “Not by half. I once knew a Time Wisp who was at least—” He broke suddenly off and became somber again, his face clouding as he turned to stare off into the stars.

Tagging:

2 to 5 bloggers… okay… I can do this.

I tag: Jenelle Schmidt || Tracey @ Adventure Awaits ||  Sarah @ Light and Shadows || Claire @ The Overactive Imagination. (Obviously no pressure to do it, any of you, just if you want. ^_^)

And if anyone reading this wasn’t tagged and still wants to do it… CONSIDER YOURSELF TAGGED! *waves magic Fairy Godmother Muse wand and makes it so*

Easy copy-pastable list of questions:

The Snippet Tag (created by Madeline J. Rose)

Rules:

-Include the fancy-shmancy graphic I included somewhere in your post. (Or make your own, just so long as you include a link back to my blog.)
-Answer all the questions, however you want to. Creative interpretation is key here! You can use the book you’re currently working on to answer the questions, or other books you’ve started or have written.
-Tag 2-5 other bloggers.

Questions:

1. Share your most gripping, fascinating, and hooking first line of a story.
2. Share a snippet that literally just crushes your heart into a million feelsy little pieces.
3. Share a snippet that makes you want to shout to the world that you’re SO. HAPPY.
4. Share a snippet that gives a bit of insight into one of your most favorite characters ever.
5. Share a snippet that literally melts you into a puddle of adorable, squishy, OTP mush.
6. Share a snippet that gets you beaming with pride and you’re just like yep, I wrote that beauty.
7. Share a snippet of genius, deliciously witty dialogue between your characters.
8. Share a snippet that makes you feel like an evil genius for thinking up such a malevolent villain (Mwa-ha-ha!)
9. Share a snippet that leaves you breathless, in a cold sweat with action-induced intensity.
10. Share a snippet of a most interesting first meeting between your characters.

What think ye of part 2? I’d love to hear your thoughts! Tell me aaall! ^_^ (And if you read all the first post AND this one… then, goodness, I don’t think I have enough cookies to give you how many you deserve. *does anyway*) Thanks for reading!