For those just tuning in, this challenge is about taking a story idea from bare bones idea into a fully fledged story by writing consistently every week day for fifteen minutes. The sentence I end with on one day, is the sentence I start with on the following. Part one was Bob’s story and has nothing whatsoever to do with the story below. Part Two follows a character named Penelope. I have a few basic sentences to act as road marks on her journey. I am loosely calling that an outline. We will see where she ends up by the time the story is done. For now, we start Part two of the 2025 Fifteen Minute Writing Challenge.
Day 143: She was pleased he seemed to think the compulsion was sent by someone else and she made a mental note to find out about compulsions.
She was pleased he seemed to think the compulsion was sent by someone else and she made a mental note to find out about compulsions. She assumed a compulsion was some sort of spell designed to get her to do something, but she thought looking it up so she was working from the same definition as Michaelson was a good idea.
‘Especially if it comes up again.’
While she didn’t like to think of herself as having enemies, clearly someone was trying to injure or kill her. The explosion in the car left little doubt.
“Well blue dye aside, it is a good sign that someone is helping as well,” Michaelson said. “We might be able to trace them.” He nodded and seemed pleased with himself. “It also offers me some relief as the sort of skills that would detect an explosion weren’t in the ones we had as possibilities.”
“Oh?” Penelope asked. She lifted an eyebrow and Michaelson smiled.
“Don’t take it personally.” He told her. “The emperor has copies of family trees in a secured archives. Once you were identified I had a look through to see what sort of abilities we may be dealing with and even then, once you affected the plant I had to go into alternative lines.”
“Alternative lines?” Penelope asked. Her surprise turned into a frown.
To her surprise Michaelson looked less sure of himself and started chewing his lip. “There was an alternative line added to your file as a possibility.”
Penelope waited as he went on. “While your father has no magical bloodlines, prior to marrying him she was seeing a man who did. Jerome Mayhew. Jerome died and then your mother married your father. The time line left some possibilities.”
“That Jerome was my father?” Penelope asked. Because of her spell earlier she heard the possibility being raised which somehow made it seem less shocking than it might otherwise. ‘Coming after an actual bomb as well dulls the impact, I suppose.’
“This doesn’t bother you?” He asked.
“To be honest in the last few days I’ve found out my father and step-mother lied to me and stole from me. The possibility of not being related might be a bit of a relief. Less of a betrayal I suppose. Or at least a justification.”
Michaelson nodded accepting the answer. “Because he wasn’t stealing from his own child. I can see that. Oh on that front, I should let you know their assets have been frozen and an investigation is on going. It is the sort of crime the emperor takes seriously and will be investigated even if you do not want to press charges. You can decide to either press charges or not on your own, but the prosecution will go forward regardless.”
“Oh,” Penelope said. She hadn’t actually thought about pressing charges and wasn’t sure how she felt about it.
“You don’t have to decide right now,” Michaelson told her.
“Then I’ll think about it,” she took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “You were talking about Jerome?”
“Yes, he has several magical bloodlines running through him and the one he inherited for his magic was plant based and seems to be similar to yours. I had them run a test and it seems that he is your father. So it at least lets us know what sort of skills you may develop.”
Penelope wondered how they ran a test and what they used for comparison.
Ten til Midnight 