Day 17, TINSEL RAIN NaNoWriMo: 36392/60000.

60% done! Huzzah. It’s starting to feel kind of like a book, although this one isn’t being written all that sequentially. And, honestly, there’s 20K words that need to be added to TINSEL RAIN after NaNoWriMo*.

*I’d also like to note how there’s a tuckerization opportunity for TINSEL RAIN, courtesy of the new Kickstarter. Get your name in the book! One spot left!

I ducked through two alleyways and hopped the fence to a cul-de-sac, before my luck finally coughed its last and died. There were a few more of Rowan’s boys in the cul-de-sac than I could manage on my own, and I wasn’t exactly quiet when I jumped in. I don’t even think they were waiting for me; I saw a map of the city on a makeshift table. They were probably planning how to look for me, only to have me show up on my own. See what I mean about my luck dying?

There’s a time for the quipping, and there’s a time for just flat-out mayhem. I was going down swinging, and maybe I wouldn’t be getting up again, so it was time to make it all count. There was a dim chance I could push my way through; and, if I didn’t? Ehh, there were better places than this. Shamuses don’t always die in their beds.

When they’re outnumbered ten to one, some people hit the weakest person first; other people, the strongest, or the leader if he’s not the strongest. Me, I look for the one who reacts first. I mean, he’s gonna be coming after you right away, so you might as well? This gang’s veteran or badass or whatever looked older, so he was probably unflappable or some other annoying kind of stoic. You can’t really punch somebody like that and expect him to fall over.

What you do instead, is trip ‘em. And boot ‘em in the head while they’re getting up. You have to be really stoic to ignore a boot to the head.