First, some statistics.

BOOK STATS
Chapters: 4 (12,500 words per chapter? WHAT THE HELL?)
Characters introduced: 9
Main characters in the wings: 4
Fight scenes: 3
Objects thrown as weapons: Approximately 11
Times Dark has suffered severe injury: 4
Total hours passed, story time: 28, or thereabouts
Random, impulsive rewrites: 589,302
Dream sequences: 1
Times Dark has had an interior monologue: 9000
Times Calamity has grinned: 9001
Estimated % of story completed: 15%-20%

Final word count: 50,055

AUTHOR STATS
Remaining sanity at submission: 24% and dropping fast
Estimated words per hour on final day: 1800-2200
Total number of sleepless nights: Roughly 7
Most words written in one day: 11,227
Longest streak of not writing: 3 days
Times considered giving up: 1
Self-deprecating comments made: 10,000,000
Lessons learned: 3
1) Write. Don't wait for inspiration. Grip her by her moody, evanescent tail and put her to work. Ignore her pouting.
2) Write. Either use your emotions, or disregard them. Don't use them as an excuse to leave your story unattended.
3) Write. With enough time and determination, there's no end to the words that you can produce. Always grasp for that next line, the following phrase. Don't fear the transient, ever-shifting, endless ether of your own mind.

At 11:36 PM, on November the 30th, I wrote my 50,000th word in the (ongoing) story of A.I. At 11:37 PM that same day, I very nearly collapsed from exhaustion. My cheeks were drawn, my waist thinned, my bones clearly apparent - all for the sake of channeling my remaining energy to my fingers. I had entered the stage in which I was most productive in both school work and extracurricular activities: the state of The Final Hour.

My sister calls my family "artists" of procrastination. We stall and delay until the very last minute or beyond... whereupon we succeed beyond all expectation. It's a kind of daredevilry comparable to skydivers who wait as long as possible before pulling their parachute rip cord. Apparently I'm fairly good at it.

Now that my requisite 50,000 words are finished, I have a choice - continue writing, or go back and edit. I'm rather tempted to do both, but perhaps I'll just keep writing. There is such a massive store of plot left to uncover, with significant details changing all the time, that I'm entirely unsure of whether or not that which I have written will even be kept as is, edited or no. In any case, there is much work to do on all fronts, and while my progress may not be as frenetic as it has been for the past month, I do hope that it will be substantial. Expect postings occasionally.

As presumptuous as it is to say, I would like to see this story published, eventually. Perhaps years from now. Even though this is my first attempt at writing anything of this length, with nothing to inspire me but my own cognitive ramblings... I feel like I've put a lot into A.I. Allowing more people to enjoy it would bring me immeasurable pleasure. As unlikely as it is, I'd like this story to be the one that vaults me into the hallowed realm wherein published authors reside. I hear tell that it rests somewhere between the eaves of Olympus and Valhalla, and that it is full of eternally warm, fresh baked cookies.

Please, enjoy my story, if you see it as fit for enjoyment; devour the fruits of my labors, quaff the wines of my madness. And once you leave these halls of words, perhaps, someday, with luck, your house can find room enough for a too-large paperback with my name printed on it.

I hope so, anyway. Time, as always, will tell.