excerpts from Dandelion Mine

[talesuntold]

Hello, darlings! I hope you're ready for some sizzling romance, swashbuckling adventure, tragic love, and mysterious happenings, because all those and more are on the schedule for this week. I'll be on the live chat every night from seven to ten Pacific time, and I'm always happy to talk about anything your little hearts desire. I'm your private Scheherazade, and I'm here to tell you stories all night long. Welcome to Maggie's House of Horrors—I hope you're planning to stay for awhile.

After all, you know I always miss you when you're gone.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, April 11, 2041




Screw you, David Novakowski. Screw you for being noble and good and earnest and staying in that damn building, and screw you for that last transmission, and screw you twice for taking so fucking long to say anything. You idiot. You stupid, stupid idiot.

I loved you too, you idiot.

I can't post this. I want to post this. I can't post this. But writing it down helps, a little, because writing it down is what we do. They're on their way here—they have to be, because if they're not... I won't think about it. The house feels so empty. God.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, April 12, 2041. Unpublished.




I'm sorry, my darlings, but I won't be able to make tonight's chat. I know, I promised, and I'm sorry, but Auntie Maggie has a headache right now and needs to have a nap. Normal transmissions will resume tomorrow. Be good. Be kind to each other. And if there's somebody you love, tell them. The world always needs more love.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, April 12, 2041.




But when the springtime turns to dust
(A thousand shades of blood and rust)
And everything is ash and stone
(Contagion writ in blood and bone)
Then what exists to have or hold?
(What story, then, has not been told?)
Let this be my sacred vow
(Oh Mother Mary, hear me now):
I will not fail, I will not fall
(Though Heaven, Hell, and Chaos call).
We are the children of the Risen.
This world our home, this prayer our prison.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, April 16, 2041.




The sweetest summer gift of all
Is knowing spring gives way to fall
And when the winds of winter call,
We'll answer as we must.
Persephone chose to descend
Into the night that has no end,
In Hades' hands she goes to spend
Her nights amidst the dust.
For Hades holds his loved ones dear
Away from life, away from fear
And so when death is drawing near
In Hades' hands we trust.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, June 23, 2041.




I am a poet, and I am a storyteller, and it is with these two callings in mind that I make the following statement, which comes from my heart, my soul, and my middle fingers:

Fuck you people and the horses you rode in on. You better watch yourselves, because we are done screwing around, and we are going to take your bitch asses down.

This is for Dave.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, June 24, 2041.




I keep writing letters to my parents. Letters that explain what happened, where I went, why I ran. Letters that tell them how much I love them, and how sorry I am that I may never see them again. Letters about how much I miss my house, and my dogs, and my bad-movie parties, and my freedom. I sometimes think this must be what it was like for everyone in the months right after the Rising, only the threat of the infected was never personal. They didn't kill all those people because they wanted to, or because their victims knew some inconvenient truth. They did it because they were hungry and because the people were there. So maybe this isn't like the Rising at all. With us, it's personal. We asked the wrong questions, opened the wrong doors, and Alaric will try to say that it was never my fault, it was never my idea, but he's wrong.

I always knew there was an element of danger in what we did, and I went along with it willingly because these people are my heart's family, and this is what I wanted. So I keep writing letters to my parents, saying I'm sorry, and I miss them, and I may not make it home.

So far, I haven't sent any of the letters. I don't know if I ever will.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, July 16, 2041. Unpublished.



Let us, who are the lost ones, go and kneel before the dead;
Let us beg them for their mercy over all we left unsaid,
And as the sun sinks slowly, the horizon bleeding red,
Perhaps they’ll show us kindness,
Grant forgiveness for our blindness,
Perhaps they’ll show us how to find the roads we need to tread.

Let us, who are the lost ones, ask the fallen where to turn,
When it seems that all the world is lost, and we can only burn,
For in dying they have learned the things that we have yet to learn.
Perhaps they’ll see our yearning,
And may help us in returning
To the lands where we were innocent, that we have yet to earn…

—From The Lost Ones, originally posted in Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, July 23, 2041. Unpublished.



I was never a "poor little rich girl." I had a lot of money, sure, but I also had parents who loved me, and who balanced the urge to give me everything I wanted with instilling me with a strong sense of personal responsibility. I never thought of my money as a burden. The only burden was the way it made people look at me. That was what I couldn't stand, and that's the reason I chose to go into the field I went into. I was good at being a Fictional. I was never that good at being a spoiled brat.

There are things money can't buy. People who love you, a job you're good at, a sense of personal respect... those are on the list.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, July 31, 2041. Unpublished.




I never thought of myself as a coward before all this. I actually thought was kinda brave. Choosing to live in the middle of nowhere, where I could be attacked at any moment. But I was lying to myself. I was never brave at all.

I also wasn't nearly as stupid as the people I love tend to be. So I suppose that's something to reassure me as I wave from the window while they all march off to die. God, Buffy, why did you have to hire me? I could have worked for some other site. I would never have gone through any of this. And if you had to hire me—if God insisted—why did you have to go off and leave me to deal with all of it alone?

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, August 1, 2041. Unpublished.




Madre de Dios... Mother Mary, hold me closely; Mother Mary, love me best. Mother Mary, treat me sweetly. Mother Mary, let me rest.

I have never hurt this much in my life. Morphine is supposed to make the hurting stop, but instead, it shunts the pain to the side, like a houseguest you never intended to keep. It isn't in your face, but it's there, using the last of the milk, leaving wet towels on the bathroom floor...

This hurts. I am alive. The two balance each other, I suppose.

This was supposed to be Buffy's revolution. It was never supposed to be mine.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, August 4, 2041. Unpublished.




The concierge just came to tell me my parents have landed at the Seattle/Tacoma International Airport, and will be at the Agora in less than an hour. I look like hell. My hair doesn't even bear thinking about. But oh I am so glad they're coming.

Mahir and I have discussed what to tell them, and we've settled on the only thing they're likely to accept. The truth. He's pointed out (a few too many times) that they're in medtech, they have contracts with the CDC, and they could be on the wrong side. I can't find a way to explain that I don't care. If they're on the wrong side now, they'll change when they find out what happened—what that bad, bad side was willing to do to me.

I have hidden the truth from them for too long. It's time I started living up to the mission statement that Georgia Mason chose when she founded After the End Times It's time for me to start telling the truth.

But ah, it hurts.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, August 6, 2041. Unpublished.




Because we chose to tell the truth
(The cool of age, the rage of youth)
And stand against the lies of old
(The whispers soft, the tales untold)
We find ourselves the walking dead
(The loves unkept, the words unsaid)
And in the crypt of all we've known
(The broken blade, the breaking stone)
We know that we were in the right
(The coming dawn, the ending night).
So here is where we stop the lies.
The time is come. We have to Rise.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, August 7, 2041.



all entries from Maggie's blog are, like Maggie, copyright Mira Grant, and are not my words.

Comments

excerpt from The Antibody Electric

[talesuntold]

—transmitting? You fucking useless piece of crap, don’t you cut out on me n—

—fixed it. I hope that means I fixed it. If this is getting out, this is Dave Novakowski reporting live from the headquarters of the After the End Times. Well. This was Dave Novakowski reporting live. By the time this report finishes bouncing to our servers, and Mahir sees it and clears it by the boss, I’m going to be long d—

—shit, the sirens just stopped. That means they’re not letting evacuees out anymore. Too late, ha-ha, joke’s on me, couldn’t get out if I wanted to. I take my hands off the controls, the building goes into lockdown. I stay here, I can let people out—or I could, if there were any people left—but I can’t escape. Irony in action, ladies an—

—dalene? Even if this entry stays in-house, I know you’ll see it, some. God, Maggie, I’m sorry we screwed around so much. We should’ve just gone for it. That’s what people ought to do. They should just go for it. I loved you a lot. I loved my job a lot. I guess that makes me one of the lucky ones. I guess—

—can hear the bombs now; I can hear them coming, I can he—

—From The Antibody Electric, the blog of Dave Novakowski, April 12, 2041. Unpublished.