Excerpt from NaNoWriMo Work

Tomorrow turned into a few days later, but here is a small excerpt from my NaNoWriMo work.

          He had patches of fur poking out of his skin and a slightly snout-like face.  He was stuck, trapped almost between his half-man, half wolfish transformation.  The ears pointed and turned of their own volition.  He stunk of sweat and something else, dung like.  It occurred to Harold that the wolf man may roll in shit on a regular basis.  Perhaps to make himself smell like his prey?  Harold wondered where the wolf man found large enough quantities of shit to roll in.  Unless he collected it himself during those other days of the month when he was most fully human.  Harold had an unpleasant image of the wolf man taking craps into his bath tub, saving up the foul mixture for times when he needed it the most, those times when he was fully a werewolf.

            The strong smelling man turned from ripping into the plastic sheeting around the pallet to jump, snapping at Harold.  Not wanting to become vampire tartar for the half-crazed wolf man, Harold backed up in a hurry.  Something slithered across his tennis shoes in the darkened alley created by the thrice stacked food pallets.  A small hysterical cry forced its way up out of Harold and he immediately clamped down on the sound.  Even amongst others with natures similar to his, a sign of fear was a very stupid thing indeed, especially when the others were self-starved.  The irony of having the meetings in a large warehouse of food struck him.  Food that they could never eat, never digest, never again partake of, even if some of these creatures had been normal at one point.  They certainly weren’t now.

            A joke, he thought, this is all some terrible joke.  They can’t honestly believe they can change themselves through will power.  I can’t believe I’m here.

            Harold wandered further into the warehouse, past moaning things and others like him who looked mostly normal, except they seemed wasted away to nearly nothing.  Harold cringed away from them, sought out the comfort of the dark and kept moving forward. 

He found the meeting area in a cleared space amongst the pallets and assembly lines and silent forklifts.  A banner hung against a wall of pallets announcing with words in blood red (Someone’s funny sense of humor coming in?) the name of the group; Flesheaters and Bloodsuckers Anonymous.  Otherwise known as F.E.B.S. Thirty or so metal folding chairs were filling up rapidly as flesheating and bloodsucking creatures poured out from between the pallets.  They pulled the chairs into a lazy circle, not quite round enough and not quite closed all the way with gaps large enough for things wandering in and out.  If Harold weren’t peering out from behind a stack of pallets at the assemblage he might have been able to continue telling himself this was all a joke.  

I didn’t make it to 20,000 words.  My final word count came in at 18,111 words for the 2007 NaNoWriMo, but I’m glad I finally got to take part in the monthly adventure.  I like the story that has developed so far and will be continuing it into the rest of the year.  I’m thinking about putting it on my New Year’s Resolutions list to make sure I finish it and get it edited by the next NaNoWriMo.