A Progress Report · 3:41am Aug 10th, 2015
ray of doom, I don't mean to call you out here, or anything. I get your frustration, but here's a direct, much more lengthy response than what I posted earlier. I sincerely hope you, and all like-minded individuals will understand.
I'm well aware I haven't posted in a while. Believe me, it's just as frustrating to me as it has been for you guys, probably more so. I want to write my stories. I want to pen my tale for the pony-loving world to read. Summer has always been my least favorite season, both when it comes to things to do to my writing.
Simply, I'm entering into my final semester of college, and this summer was all about making preparations for it to be the most relaxed semester I've had. I took two summer classes (two hours a day for four days, plus homework and programs) and worked every night I could. For TEN. STRAIGHT. WEEKS. Beginning of Jun through last Thursday.
Do you know how limited my time was, with all of that? I barely had on average 12 hours of the 24 hour day as free time, and this is including the three days off (which weren't really taken off, since I took two shifts at work for each day). 10 of those hours were spent sleeping (so as to retain my sanity). So, essentially, I only averaged about 2 hours of free time for every 14 hours available. Do you know how much I was able to write in those two hours? Not much. And while I want to write, I'm not going to spend all of those hours writing. Sometimes, I just need to completely drop everything and take a huge break. I've learned from what happened with Monty Oum that no matter how much I love something and want to see the finished product, I have to take breaks, and I can't constantly keep working.
I even had to completely drop a fic I had hoped I would be able to do. I had been asked to do a FlashLight fic, in which I had planned on them going to Comic-Con, with Flash being a closet nerd and everything. Nope, couldn't do it. Couldn't find the time to write it in the midst of trying to write three other long chapters on top of schoolwork and work-work.
Now, I did make progress in all three stories. I didn't make nearly enough to consider posting, but I still made progress. As I posted earlier, Apprentice is nearing 15k words in length. I would say roughly 8k of those words were written before class started (in the whole two weeks before I had to go back). Another 4k were written during the ensuing ten weeks combined. For Worlds, I wrote a good 4k words before class started. Since class started? 1.5k. And the chapter's going to be longer than usual, because I need to establish Nova getting over the crazy events of last chapter, and still advance the plot. I'm thinking this chapter will be around 15k when I'm done. More on that below. Starbound, however, suffered the most. As I write, it's 2k words in. And I have added 0 to that number, in the ensuing ten weeks. Partly due to the fact that I didn't pen another word until I got Worlds and Apprentice updated following April Fools day, so I essentially wrote those 2k in those two weeks.
So, long story short, I'M TRYING. I'm trying to get everything written. I'm not in high school. I'm a grown-ass man who has to do grown-ass things, and I don't have the luxury of a lot of free time and it completely sucks. I'm working on finishing this new revised chapter of Apprentice (again, next couple of weeks, methinks), and then I'm probably going to focus hardcore on Worlds, and thence to Starbound.
Now, with that being said, allow me to detail what's going down in the new chapters of Starbound and Worlds. What's going down in the new revised chapter of Apprentice can be seen in my previous post, as well as the chapter itself (since I didn't add too much)
WORLDS
Simply put, Nova is recovering from the events of Stained. It's not working, but it will take time. Chrysalis is looking into the incident herself, and she chooses an opportunity to speak to Nova about it, along with Scheherazade. Changeling politics are explained, as well as who, what, and why Killik is what he is. Backstory ensues. Nova and Rainbow/Rachel make plans for, and go on, their little date. Plot advancement ensues. After this, there should be two, maybe three chapters before Act II comes to a close and we hit Act III (which will be a lengthy, action-packed final act).
STARBOUND
Jack and Twilight go over a bit of history. Kinda a crash course on where ponies are compared to humans in technological development. They get to discussing their own pasts. Twilight gives Jack a crash course in her own history, and we see the last day the Mane 6 spent together as best friends, because all of them were going to be separating over the five years she'd be gone. Jack explains his history to Twilight, detailing his own backstory, his friends (who are plot-relevant, and one of whom we've already "met"), and his life on Earth before he jumped planet. Not much action, mostly exposition.
