MyccoHaccers: Prep for NaNoWriMo 2022

Protagonist Meets Antagonist (Outdated, Outline)

9/30/22

Mom is at it again, but there's no time to get to the usual places. Protagonist looks longingly at the bookshop, which is presently full of revelers celebrating Free Fries Fri-yay - one of many frequently re-occuring Sales Days.

It sure would be good to get something to eat....

It sure would be nice to sit down in a corner of the store where none of the mirrors actually reflect over to the shopkeepers... wonder if they have anything new in there now.... Probably not. THere hasn't been anything for months. No new movies either.

No time, Mall Management sends the Assistant Managers out to tell everyone. So much work to be done - and if there's no movies, no books, no new toys - well that's because lazy thieving liars are ruining it for everyone. More bag checks in and out of every store and at the ends of all the escalators.

But! The service corridors... The stairwells.... No one's watching them. Why would they? People are hungry, and Free Fries Fri-Yay is the only time everyone eats for sure. Even well off people will come for the freebies; even they are deprived enough that they would at last enjoy the extra. Eveyrone else - they're either so hungry they have to eat it, or they're so desperate they need to sell the fries to get things they need.

Even the Assistant Managers are taking their turns in line....

The secret to moving around unnoticed is simply to watch everyone closely. Eyes wide, pupils dilated, taking in every scrap of light and detail. Quiet breathing, moving with purpose, not stopping to second guess anything. All they have to do is get past 5 people... 5 is always enough to disappear into a crowd with no chance of mom being able to intervene, or ask for someone to go follow them.

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Oh shit, someone drops a package. Oh no, people's attention starting to turn this way.....

P turns left towards a hybrid planter-and-bench. A fiddle-leaf fig! They scan the leaves and spot something. A little white spot. Is that mold? A bug injury? How fascinating.... How very rapt their attention is on this enigmatic little bit of plant. What a strange wonder this world is, that even as the outside world is deep red and orange, rusted and worn away by acid, yet inside the blessed and exhaulted mall, plants bloom! They even manage to get the usual maladies now and again - but nothing so out of place that an ancient person wouldn't recognize them....

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By now, anyone who noticed the package fall has completely forgotten it. If any of them also saw P, it didn't really register. Best to never notice the little scrawny ones; it's easier not to wonder why they aren't around anymore int he future.

P carefully holds the door just enough that when it finally closes, it barely makes a sound. They back against the nearby wall, well protected from the prying eyes of any potential onlookers. Finally, they sigh. No chance of running into any of those assholes here. None of the useless, thoughtless shitheads are gonna bother trying to get any work done. They're too hungry. Good thing P never has that problem.

As they descend the stairs, P reaches into their pocket. The foil of a packet of peanut butter crinkles when they squish it against the others they've managed to lift from the Food Court. Good thing no one's gonna be around to smell it, or else P would get turned into the Food Court's Acting Judge - Mr. Authority. None of them have ever been a piece of cake to deal with, but this guy is all Law & Order, 24/7.