Wordcount: 536
Rating/Warnings: PG
Summary: Blue gets used to being something more than human.

NOTE: This is a very rough draft with no editing at all (per National Novel Wiriting Month rules) and is presented for amusement value only. Think of it as a periscope into my writing process rather than a coherent story!

There will most likely be spelling and grammatical errors afoot as well as flat out bad writing, info dumps, plot holes, contradictions/retcons, uneven characterization and pacing. These snippits are also posted out of order, so please refer to the Outline to figure out where it’s supposed to fit.

~*~*~*~*~

Spark

Blue can feel the city taking over and it feels like drowning. There’s a flood of information coming so fast and so thick that he can’t get his bearings and just as he thinks it’s over that he can’t save the city, everything clears.

He’s standing in an empty field with grass and flowers and the young woman it gray hoar and gray eyes that he knows is Atlantis.

Small lightening dance around her fingers and as she reaches out to take his hand he sees that the lightning is his now too.

“Is this better?” she asks, concerned.

“Yes, thank you.” said Blue. “Where are we?”

“It’s nowhere,” said Atlantis, “It’s made of data and mists, but I figured you might like it better.”

“I do,” said Blue and he reached down to touch the grass. He felt nothing and Atlantis frowned.

“I can make it more real, if you like,” she offered. “I just diverged a few processes for now, so you had a break from the stream.”

“Is it always like that?” asked Blue.

“Not always,” said the City,” but being reborn is work and I need every scrap I can get.”

“Then this is waste,” said Blue,. gesturing at the field.

“Necessary waste,” shrugged Atlantis. “I’m nothing without you, not anymore.”

“I’d better learn then,” said Blue. “Can you bring it back, but slowly? I think it was just too much all at once.”

Atlantis gives him a measuring look and then nods.

The world fades slightly and the noise is back, but this time he finds if he focuses the noise is starting make sense.

“It’s the elf, I think.” said Atlantis. “They’ve bred you to do things that normal humans can’t and I think that’s why you’re not mad.”

“Good to know,” said Blue as the rest of the scene faded out leaving him in the darkness and the flood of information.” It was slightly scary in the dark, but he clamped down on the fear and remembered he was part of the city now too. He had a thought, took the thought and put it into action as best he could and the darkness turned into ribbons of light, each one a data process, twisted into bundles and streams as the city ran herd on a million possibilities and problems at once.

“I like that,” said the city, from nowhere and Blue grinned.

“I’m a visual person,” he said, “this is easier than the noise.” Because his brain had to process it somehow and he’s figured that shifting things from audio to visual might be less demanding.

“Can you tell what I’m doing?” the city asked curiously.

“Not really,” admitted Blue, “but I suppose that will come in time.”

“You don’t have to learn if you don’t want to,” said Atlantis. “You aren’t here for that.”

“Then what am I here for?” asked Blue.

“To be the half of me that can tolerate the irrational.” said Atlantis. “You’re my escape valve, my overflow. When the world and the math get to be too much I have you to step in and guide me. You are the spark, I am the fire.”

“There are worse things to be,” said Blue.