A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Tower...

Word count: 89,751K/ of... well, we gotta talk about that.

It's great when characters, born of a thought and a dream, grow flesh and depth and start acting on their own. It's awesome. It's like, the marionette strings float free and yet the puppet still has movement....

It can also be a goddamned pain in the ass.

I had my characters on a trek through a park. They were laying low from all the technogadgets looking for them. For some reason, who knows why, I throw in another substation entrance. These are mostly blocked off, as the substations have been given over to the Morlocks, refugees from a doomed planet who have rebuffed all attempts to assimilate into Hanarian culture. Schemer, the character with a penchant for controlling darkness (specifically, shadows) who never goes in a room without looking for the exit or considering its defensibility should there be an attack, was drawn to this substation. You can't blame him, really, he didn't know about the Morlocks. He's a refugee of a sorts, as well. He saw it as a great place to hide in a pinch. A defensible position.

However, Ghost told him: Don't go below. That way lies danger. All hell's gonna break loose if you go down there. She even knew (being an intuit) that telling someone that sort of thing is dangerous, but that is how serious the situation was.

Ok, so they find a place to "camp" in the middle of this city park (yes, a defensible place, signed sealed an approved by Schemer) and we all think the matter is settled. Me, Ghost, Schemer, we're good. I put them to bed for the night.

And then he gets up in the middle of the damn night and high tails it to the substation entrance! Everything goes to hell. I have to add about 40K to my projected total. Ghost turns to me and says "I knew I shouldn't have said anything." And I was like...Why the hell didn't I know that? Why didn't you tell ME?! I wouldn't have had you say anything! All she did was look out at me from those implacable, flat, unnatural blue eyes. And didn't say a damn thing.

She does that to the other characters a lot. I guess now I know how it feels.