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#i've been wondering since yesterday if I should post it or nah
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Why they shut Mount Starling National Park.
I'll probably be shot for this, but fuck it. It's been 12 years since the National Park Service shut down Mount Starling. Nobody knew why. One day, it was open for the public, and one day it was shut. The whole area around it was fenced up, and signs were posted. I remember the day everything changed like it was yesterday.
"What the hell happened? Aren't these always supposed to be open?" Nate, my boyfriend, asked.
"Beats me." I replied, pulling my rucksack and camping gear from the Jeep.
"Wonder if something happened." He pondered. "Maybe some poor bastard fell into an unmarked cave or something." He mused.
"Well, we've got more than just Starling to explore today anyways." I said, trying to change the subject.
We moved on, skirting the fences around Starling until we reached the south face. Here, the fences were gone.
"Woah, the fence is totally torn up over here!" Nate shouted, clearly curious as to what was happening.
"God, what the hell could do that?" I asked, shocked.
"No idea. I hope it wasn't bigfoot!" He joked.
"We've been together for 6 years and your jokes still fail to make me laugh" I said, a smile forming on my face.
"Oh hush. C'mon, I grew up around here. I miiiight know a way up to the best spot on the mountain." He suggested, a scheme forming in his head.
"Wouldn't that be... You know... Trespassing?" I asked, suddenly worried.
"Nah. They'll never find us." He said.
We trudged up the mountain, occasionally seeing fallen trees and empty burrows. It was clear that something happened here, we just didn't know what.
"Now's probably the right time to tell you about some history on this mountain" Nate said. "There's an old legend around it. Apparently, some ghost, or demon, or alien, or something lives in this area. Nobody's seen it, nobody's survived it. The native Americans of the area called it the 'Dark One'. They avoided this place at all costs." He explained.
"Oh sure." I retorted sarcastically.
Suddenly, all around us, we heard a noise. It was an artificial, sharp ring.
"What the hell was that?" I asked concerned. The noise came back. A computerized voice began speaking through hidden loudspeakers.
"Attention. Attention. This area is protected by the United States National Guard in conjunction with the National Park Service. Any further attempt at hiking may be met with arrest or use of force. Turn back now." The monotone, emotionless voice ordered.
"Uhh, Adam?" Nate said, turning over to look at me, his face one of fear.
"I have no idea." I replied.
"I think it's best if we leave." He said, concerned.
"Good idea." I replied.
Suddenly, a woman in a tattered National Park Service uniform ran up to us, an empty rifle in one hand and a bloodstained hat in another.
"You two need to leave. It's starting to wake up." They said, panting.
"What's waking up?" I asked.
"It's *him* that's waking up." The ranger responded.
"Explain?" Nate inquired.
"Later. My shots bought us maybe fifteen minutes. We need to go, now!" The ranger shouted, gesturing towards her weapon.
A thunderous roar emanated from the distance. It didn't sound like anything I've heard before.
"Oh god, he's awake." The Ranger said, shuddering. "Come on, we need to get out of here. The bunker's right down the trail!"
We ran fast, desperately trying to outrun whatever horror we imagined would be chasing us. We came across a rusted hatch. The ranger tried to open it, but failed. The door wouldn't budge.
"No no no! Fuck! It's jammed!" She shouted, slamming on the door in sheer desperation.
"Alright. New plan. Get as far from the mountain as possible." She said, slamming her rifle butt into the ground.
"Sounds good to me." Nate whimpered, terrified.
"Alright. I've got a Jeep that can seat six. It's at the base of the mountain. If we can make it, we should be fine." I said, unveiling my plan.
"Good idea. I already reported to HQ, and the containment team is on the way." The Ranger said.
"Containment team?" I asked.
"Yeah. We've known about this since World War Two, when artillery training first stirred this beast." She explained.
"What kind of beast are we talking?" Nate asked.
"God, it's so hard to describe. It's like a bear meets a skinwalker, with a dash of lovecraftian elements." The Ranger replied.
"Jesus. That's like something out of a movie." I replied, filled with dread.
We continued our journey to the car, passing a destroyed firewatch tower. Inside was the faint silhouette of what appeared to be a man. Written on the window, in what I assume to be blood, was a single, chilling sentence, "it's rumbling."
"Miguel! Are you alive in there?" The Ranger shouted, both curious and terrified. There was no response.
Suddenly, as if the whole mountain had come alive, a violent shaking gripped us. We fell to the ground, desperately trying to steady ourselves. A thunderous roar once again leapt from the mountain, rumbling in our chests, except this time: it was louder. Much louder.
"Shit. It's moving. We need to move. Now!" The Ranger shouted, suddenly fully alert. We ran like hell down the mountain, ripping open our knees as we fell. By the time we reached the car, the creature was fully awake. This quadrupedal mass of fur, teeth, tentacles, much larger than any living thing on our planet. An attack helicopter roared low overhead, launching a barrage of rockets at the beast. The creature simply shrugged it off. We leapt into the car, and I floored the gas. The roar of the beast echoing in my mind.
"You built a national park around *THAT?* I shouted.
"Yeah." The Ranger replied, traumatized. "We've been studying it for 60 years. We noticed it stirring, so we closed the mountain. Who knows what might've happened if that thing rose with the park at full guest load." She answered.
"God, thousands would've died" I said.
Nate was nearly catatonic at this point. He'd barely said a word since we left. Rightfully so.
"Pull over, I know a bunker. It'll protect us from the contingency plan." She ordered.
"Contingency plan?" I asked, worried.
"Yeah. A B-2 with a B-83 warhead. That's our Connie." The Ranger explained.
"You're going to nuke it?" I asked incredulously.
"Yup. What else could we do? It's tougher than a battleship." She replied. Once again, the computerized voice rang out. Except this time, it was followed by sirens, "T-Minus One minute to Contingency Plan activation. Please proceed to the nearest shelter. If one is unavailable, make peace with your God. Good luck. May god bless you, and god bless these United States of America."
"Let's go. The plane should be here soon." The Ranger ordered. We scanned for other survivors and found none. The computer voice rang out again, for the last time, " Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six, Five, Four..."
We closed the hatch, desperately hoping it would hold. A deafening roar rocked the bunker, and a screech of agony, growing quieter, followed.
"Holy shit." Nate stated, utterly dumbfounded.
"And now, we wait." The ranger said.
"For?" I asked.
"The fallout to settle." She said.
The explosion at Starling was chalked up to the mountain actually being a volcano, which had just erupted. Under threat of death, all witnesses were hushed up. After 12 years, I've finally given up. Nate and I agreed that it was better to die revealing the truth than to live a life of lies. This may be my last post. Take care, everyone.
"
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purrincess-chat · 7 years
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So I've been meaning to ask for some time now: do you ever sleep? You have so many new ideas going on and constantly updating (btw I'm still waiting for the next chapter of Lady Luck). How on earth do you have time for that?!
Sleep is for the weak  Nah, I’m kidding. I actually sleep quite a lot lol. At least 7 hours or so every night cause I work during the week. I’m fortunately in a time where I can update and write so much if I can just find the energy. When I’m in school I have other things that I have to prioritize over writing when I get home at the end of the day, but I’m not taking any summer classes this semester so when I get home from work at the end of the day, my free time can be whatever I want it to be. I’m on a bit of a creative-high right now, but in some ways I always am, I just don’t have time to devote to it. I come up with new ideas all the time based on people’s fanart, text posts, conversations I have on discord, and other times I just have thoughts that come to me.
Like TTQ. The original idea came to me in the shower randomly one morning (because my writer brain never turns off) and it literally started out as “Ya know, if Chloe’s dad is the mayor, wouldn’t she be kind of on the press’s radar? I wonder what would happen if they found out how awful she is...” and you see what it’s become. Depending on the idea, I may start it immediately like I did with TTQ or I may sit on it for a while like Best Friends Forever and Cat-astrophe which I sat on for almost a year. Usually when I get a new idea, I flesh it out in my brain for a while then as soon as I can I start writing it down. I have a Word document titled “drabble ideas” for stuff like that and then if it’s going to be longer than a couple chapters or when I add more ideas to it, I give it it’s own doc that is usually “___ planning” I also carry around a notebook with me so if I’m out and about I can sit and write it down manually.
It seems like I’ve been going crazy lately with uploading stuff, but I pre-wrote days 1-4 of Think Outside the Love Square, so today I need to work on the next three days. I had also been writing that Ladrien chapter for like a month. It really depends on the story and how long it is. I haven’t started Lady Luck yet, but because they’re short, I can push them off a little. I do it with TTQ (and I also did it with Colors of the Soul) where I would wait until the day I wanted to upload/had time to write, and I literally sit and write the whole chapter in one session. 1000-2000 words only takes me a few hours depending on how many breaks I take and how caught up I get writing clever dialogue. For instance, yesterday, I uploaded 3 things, but I lazed around for most of the day actually. I woke up around 8:30 or so in the morning, checked all of the social medias that I usually do, logged on AO3 and replied to comments, Tumblr, Youtube, Discord, etc then I posted my pre-written piece for Think Outside the Love Square, scrolled around tumblr for a bit, posted the pre-written Ladrien piece, around noon I opened a new Word document and wrote “Chapter 12″ at the top, stared at it for a minute then went back to tumblr and actually closed out of it for a while, and then the rest of my day was more aimless scrolling, eating food, playing games on an off, I took a shower in the afternoon so I wouldn’t have to get up early this morning and do it, I took a two hour nap at one point, then around 8PM I opened up that document again and sat and wrote the whole chapter I posted last night in about an hour and a half or so with breaks every so often. Sometimes it takes me longer, and at one point when I was about halfway through I debated waiting to finish it until today, but then I just so happened to get a second wind and finished it. 
I can do that with short fics because I usually have an idea of what I want to happen in each chapter, so it’s just a matter of bringing it to life. When I plan multi-chapters, I usually plan events that I want to occur in each one, and for short fics like these, I stretch them out into 1000 or so words and call it a day, but for my larger fics like Lady du Coeur where my goal is at least 6000 words a chapter, I have a bit more planned and the overall length (6000-10,000 words) depends on what I had planned. I really don’t know how long a chapter will be until I write it, so sometimes things that I had planned for one chapter get spread into several chapters and other times I’m adding so much extra to make it stretch. 
How do I find time? I dunno. I don’t go out too often. I mean, I do a few times a week with friends, and on the weekends I sometimes do stuff with my family (like today I’m going to my parent’s house for dinner). But most of the time during the week when I get home from work since my roommates moved out, it’s just me so I have all the time in the world until I go to bed I just have to find the motivation and energy to do it. I can’t tell you how I come up with ideas cause I just do. I think writing them down helps me remember them. There are ideas that I have in my drabble doc that I forget about until I go back and look at them again. This week is going to be a little hectic for me, so we’ll see how it goes, but if you look at the calendar I posted (I should reblog that for reference) you’ll see when I have each story planned. The dates on there are my goal, so I’m going to do my best to stick with them. Fingers crossed. This got very long, but I hope it answers your question and wasn’t just me rambling for 20 minutes. :) 
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folktaylor · 7 years
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ok lyndsay i need some serious advice fam, i've been talking to this girl for a couple weeks now and every once in a while i'll text her and she won't respond and say she didn't get the message or something and i generally accept it but these past couple days we haven't talked much and she texted me yesterday and i responded and then she stopped texting me but she was posting on her story?? should i double text or wait for her to text me lmao
nah wait for her to text you if she wants to talk to you she will. if this wasn’t a pattern i would say double text, for sure, but since this has happened more than once, then i say wait her out. 
if the silence continues then i say send a text that’s like ‘hey just wondering if anything’s going on, haven’t heard from you in a little while’ bc communication is KEY if you feel something is off.
trust your gut. if you feel like something is wrong, something probably is wrong.
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