#PennedPossibilities 971 — Where does your SC feel the safest? Is there a particular person or object that helps them feel safe?

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I am going to turn this question around slightly as really it brings to mind one supporting character, Molt. He's a day angel who came to Home City to attend HUHC (Home University at Home City) for a degree in Men's Studies. (Nope, not explaining other to say it would be NSFW.) His first apartment living away from home turns out to be down the hall from Bolt, the main character, who is a courier for the mob. The minimalist aerie setup means they share many facilities, almost like a boarding house. They see each other every day. As events unfold and Bolt is allowed to have a camera, one of her coworkers decides to spy on her. He threatens Molt to do so. Very scary. Lots happen and Molt and Bolt have fun, until the thug, being the punk he is, roughs up Molt incidentally breaking a bone.

Where does Molt feel safe?

He returns home, leaving Home City and a full scholarship behind.

Bolt is livid. She wants to murder her coworker after that.

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#WordWeavers 2026.03.29 —How big is your cast of characters?

Thanks, I needed to capture this.

So… Let's count. In Reluctant Courier (for the Mob), the following people have storylines. There are plenty bit parts I'm not listing.

12?

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#ScribesAndMakers 2026.03.29 —Griddle?

All cultures that cook something we might call a griddle, even if it is only a grill made of sticks. In my stories, day angel cuisine borrows heavily from Japanese teppanyaki and ramen culture, focused on seafood, related broths, and noodles. Yep. Those chefs under the rooftop red tents from which the delicious smoke is rising are cooking on a griddle.

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#PennedPossibilities 970 — MC POV: Have you ever experienced something that couldn’t be logically explained?

[Bolt:] Look. I was never good at school, except in athletics. It never made sense to me, all them girls and guys studying boring things and liking it. Now adays, I can't get my head around the logic of working in an office, doing all them repetitive things over and over and over again. Not being able to move around all day long? Ugh! Don't see the logic in that. I can't figure out how I'd ever let myself do that, no matter the coin it generated. Were I not a courier for the mob, I suppose being a courier might have been what I settled on. Or a furniture mover, if I could get that. Construction, maybe? Gotta be in motion!

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This passage is near the end of the chapter I am currently writing. Bolt narrates. She's a flighty day angel. You tell me, is she excited?

Gloss: Tarantino teaches us that nothing equalizes people or is as relatable as sharing a meal… Teri is the name the devil-girl is using at this point in the story. It is short for Night Terror. She can perform what to us looks like magic. The passage is a barely revised first draft.

My worries fluttered away like a moth to a street lamp when the server delivered a golden custard dessert, a mound on a plate sealed under a burnt-brown crazed caramel-glass shell, in a moat of purple-brown, fragrant with cooked sugar and orange-berry liqueur.

"What's this?" I asked.

Her spoon floated over and tapped. Shards of glass sugar popped into a rubble skirt revealing the yellow hill, flecked with red, green, and brown herbs, which when I sniffed caressed my nose with hints of anise, mint, cinnamon, and… that tingle? Cayenne?

Teri replied, "We danced, so now you've had dinner and here's dessert."

"Sweet," I said, before thrusting my spoon in. Reflexively.

Dancing, dinner, and dessert? Men propositioned by a woman who was too lazy to have a plan suggested that.

Teri is not a guy, I reminded myself, then, a spoonful of—

Oh. My. Stars! Creamy, spicy, sugary bliss. I hugged myself, wings and arms, brushing the napkin off my lap and nearly dropping the spoon. Sweet was something I rarely had, but need it, want it, must have it instantly commandeered my brain, annihilating all resistance, maybe more so than my excuses to allow myself to be ridden by Teri had. I scooped glistening perfection. I sighed enjoying each spoonful. I won't admit to an occasional moan. I barely paused to wipe my chin.

"You happy now?" Teri asked as I crunched on the faintly carob flavored sugar shards.

"Ecstatic!"

Not exactly When Harry Meet Sally…

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#WordWeavers 2026.03.27 —Which character would be the most fun to be around?

If you are male, day angel Bolt (the MC) is your ticket. She's athletic and experienced, and not intellectually challenging though rather perceptive. Generally, however, and assuming you are neither stupid nor malicious, the SC devil-girl is a lot of fun with a depth knowledge that's rather surprising, so long as you're not a history buff as that stuff bores her. She loves books, and discussing them. She likes to perform her miracles for an audience. She's athletic and looking for someone to spar with, and will train you if you like. If you can teach her something, anything, she'll be your friend for life. Sex, however, is not her thing. She uses it only as a tool.

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#PennedPossibilities 968 — What’s the current word count for your WIP?

I should look more often. It's way larger than the minimum for a novel at 93,338 words. In a way, Reluctant Courier (for the Mob) is a bit of an R-rated soap opera, and entertaining things happen along the way. There's probably 20,000 words of essential stuff still not written, however. Here's a screenshot of Scrivener's assessment with TL;DR statistics for your enjoyment, with #AltText! For those interested in chapter length, all my chapters are one document in length.

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[Blue volunteered to answer this one. He is a male praetorian friend and lover of Bolt's, who's both the MC and a woman. They're both day angels... —RS]

Because I live at an association, I am around a lot of women. What is in vogue, what scents the air, are aromatic herbal scents. In our hot and sweaty world, everyone smells to the point that you don't notice it—until you receive a swift kick in the nose with an herbal "Hello, handsome!" I don't appreciate this squeal in the background noise. Truthfully, though I've recently learned that Bolt has a preference for her men wearing thyme oil, she's neither fashionable nor trendy herself. She prefers to be her natural self, whatever her state, with little fix-up, which means she'll pop in looking however she looks, even with a cowlick or two, or feathers akimbo. To me, this comes off a genuine, compared to the other women. I know she has her secrets she is loathe to share, yet it still feels genuine—genuinely, distinctively, my friend Bolt. I admire her athleticism; she taught me plenty of tricks I needed for work. Her constant sweaty motion leaves with her emitting a unique aroma. Kind of like toast. Though I wouldn't say to her directly, because she might take it wrong, I find her scent reassuring and very attractive. It's my favorite.

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#PennedPossibilities 976.1 — #imposterToot: Pick a character. How do they, or how would they, react to sleep deprivation?

@floofpaldi : Get some rest. Feel better. —RS

I'll pick the devil-girl. She's #autistic like her author, and seemingly OP thanks to her training and study and logical-literal take on the world, which grants her plenty of ability through raw unfettered stubbornness, but she's got lots of defects, emotional and psychological. Physical too, but that's because she refuses to take into account her body's limits, and has the scars to prove it. People say she has a death wish.

May be true.

She reacts to sleep deprivation by powering through, regardless. Her trained-into-her sense of responsibility causes her to have the back of anybody she's responsible for, or anyone hurt, or, if innocent, threatened. She makes herself sick fighting exhaustion. Logic requires mental energy and exhaustion obliterates it. This inevitably leads to mistakes. In this she demonstrates that despite her apparent maturity, she's still a teenager.

The good thing is that she's taught herself the soldier's trick of falling asleep instantly. Once it's over, boom, out.

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#ScribesAndMakers 2026.03.25 —Do you use music as a storytelling tool? Give an example.

If music is another character in the story, naturally. When I wrote a series of stories about a DJ who after a traumatic meeting with an evil god (who is quickly defeated by others) becomes a part time hero with suicidal tendencies (she thinks she's the god's knight), the music is integral. Over the novelettes in the series, she goes from breaking into the business, to making a name for herself and a living, to becoming a star recognized by royalty, to a producer songwriter famous throughout the country. She ends up saving hundreds fairly anonymously along the way. However, at an epic rave, when she encounters a guy she went to school with whom she's still attracted to working the lighting, she uses her music to seduce him, singing as she approaches him, clearing a path through the audience, to dance with him to the beat. The song is a duet; he acknowledges her by singing the male part. They end with a very public kiss. The scene would melt your heart.

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