Typing one handed

Mister Bad Guy put forth the in universe theory that Boone writes supernatural romance stories and asks for Meyer's input.

It's not that the plots are inherently bad nor the writing style ill fitting for it's genre, but Meyer's can't help but feel that the physical descriptions of the ravishing supernatural seductress and the helpless buxom noble always seems specific and oddly familiar, despite Boones assurances.

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Bonus Story from Mister Bad Guy themselves!
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“Please,” Sylvia whispered, her heart pounding in her chest, heat flowing through her body, “please, Kurth, it’s me, Sylvia…”

Kurth’s eyes were wide as she advanced, their gray-blue consumed by red, her whites bloodshot. She pushed Sylvia against the wall, and grabbed her collar, before tearing it aside, exposing Sylvia’s chest and neck. Sylvia flinched back, clutching her exposed form, but the vampire was upon her moments later. Kurth’s gaze studied Sylvia, relishing in her catch, her cold hand gripping Sylvia by her neck, sharp fingernails digging into the skin of her throat as she gasped and winced.

There was no availing the vampire--not now, when her strong arms pressed Sylvia against the wall, her eyes consumed with desire for the sweet red nectar that flowed through the veins of the young noblewoman. Kurth bared her teeth, exposing those long canines, and leaned in closely, almost purring, a beast prepared to feed on her prey. The vampire towered over her, black hair spilling about her face, as she leaned in, eyes staring at Sylvia’s, not a hint of the taciturn bodyguard Sylvia had met three days ago. The vampire’s other hand pawed at her, pressing a hand to her exposed chest and feeling it shudder at her chilling touch.

Sylvia’s face was drenched in sweat, her body flush with fear, gasping, as the vampire’s warm breath made contact with her neck and produced a tingling that ran to her core. She felt it burning within her, a surge of heat, of impropriety and apprehension and anticipation. She knew that Kurth needed blood, that it would save them both if Kurth only took what she needed. But if Kurth’s desires went too far, if she drained her, then what would become of her? Would she, too, become a beast of the night? The idea of being the same as Kurth was beyond her imagination… and yet a thought stirred within her, a loathsome impulse, a hope that Kurth would go too far…

“So, uh…”

Gustav Myers, with an utterly unreadable expression, looked up at Alice Boone, currently sitting across from him. The young psyker, shifting a bit in her seat, seemed to be twiddling her thumbs.

Thirty minutes ago, she’d walked into his quarters, carrying around a hundred pages of prose. According to her, she’d typed it up in her spare time, and wanted to see what he thought of it, being a former professional writer himself. The way she had explained it, it was a supernatural thriller focusing on a young noblewoman, Sylvia DeWitt, who was assigned a bodyguard by her family, a tough and taciturn woman named Kurth, bearing a dark secret. After handing it to him, she’d sat, avidly, waiting to see his response.

Myers cleared his throat. “Well. It seems like the initial mystery wore off rather quickly.”

Boone nodded. “I mean… I was going to try to make that more of a thing, but I realized I couldn’t come up with any good alternative suspects. So I decided to just reveal what Kurth’s secret was in Chapter 4, and keep going from there.”

Myers let out a brief sigh. “Good idea. Focus on what works. I’ve noticed there’s a lot of scenes focusing on Kurth and Sylvia’s relationship. It seems like you enjoy writing that.”

That was him being polite. All of Chapters 6 and 7 had been little more than fluff focusing on the two; though he’d been speedreading, he could tell there wasn’t much relevance to the ongoing plot. What was more, the content of those chapters was… suggestive.

Myers was no prude. He was the boyfriend of Wesk Calliban, after all, easily the second least prudish woman on board the Ave Maria. But even then, it seemed as if Alice Boone was doing her level best to write sex scenes without actually writing sex scenes. Half of Chapter 6 was dedicated to Kurth bathing Sylvia and allowing herself to be bathed in return, with heavy descriptions of “slick skin” and soapy massages. A large chunk of Chapter 7 had consisted of Kurth sucking on Sylvia’s fingers after she’d cut herself, with an entire paragraph talking about the vampire’s posture as she kneeled. And then there was Chapter 9, which had a scene of Sylvia being hypnotized for her disobedience, and being told to strip; true, it was to get her into new clothes, and it had some relevance to the upcoming plot, but it still felt entirely gratuitous.

And here was Chapter 10, where, after being wounded by another vampire, Kurth had become so consumed by bloodlust that she was now about to feed on Sylvia. A quick glance at the next few pages suggested that it went on for at least seven paragraphs more.

“So,” Myers finally said, keeping his face as straight as he could make it, “would you say this is a romance?”

Boone visibly blushed, but hurriedly went on. “No, no--well, I guess you could read it that way. They do have a bond, but they’re not together-together by the end. I mean… Kurth does have this obsession, because of that vampire blood-connection, and Sylvia does care a lot about Kurth, but… it’s not really a romance? They don’t get married or anything.”

“They do seem, er. Close. Yes. Was it always meant to be about these two?”

“Well, it was actually supposed to be a story about Kurth being a scary monster for Sylvia to fight, but once I started describing her, I kinda… liked writing about her. She’s fun, you know? She’s all cold and quiet, and she’s really old, so I can have her talk a lot about crazy things she’s done. And she’s great to write fights with, because of her vampire strength. So I kept making it more about her, and introduced the other vampires to give her something to fight.”

Myers nodded, somewhat approvingly. “Yes. It’s good tension; she’s powerful, but she’s also dangerous. It means those scenes of Sylvia being scared of her have some impact. What made you come up with her?”

This was an unbearably obvious question. He knew where every single detail of Kurth, from her muscular build to her lack of social graces to her large facial scar to her height, had arisen from. He had similar feelings about Sylvia’s curviness, noble heritage, red hair, and distinctive mannerisms. And he really didn’t want to think about the implications of Boone writing things like this about the Commissar. He’d known Boone had a crush, but he thought she was better at hiding it than this.

Honestly, to him, the fact that Boone had written the work wasn’t a problem, but the fact that she didn’t seem to think he’d notice the implications was… well, she seemed to have been thinking with organs apart from her brain.

Boone shrank back a bit, her blush now bright red. “She’s… I just wanted to write a character who seemed really attractive to me. That’s what vampires are supposed to be, right? Something where you read ‘em, and you’re scared, but you also kind of look at the people being bitten by them, and you get a bit jealous.”

Myers sighed, again. “Fair enough. Anyway, it’s not bad.”

Boone’s eyes lit up. “Really?”

“Your spelling and grammar is fine, your imagery is good. There are some chapters that don’t seem to have much purpose, but it’s nothing another draft can’t fix. It’s not my kind of thing, so I don’t think I’d want to finish it, but I can see where it’s going.”

Boone’s blush vanished, and she took the impromptu book from Myers’s arms with a huge grin. “Thanks, Myers! It’s great to hear you say that! I’ll try to get to work on the next few chapters soon!”

“I’d say be careful with who you show ‘em to.” Myers chose those words rather deliberately. “It’s not the sort of thing that’d be for everyone. Gets pretty dark, pretty… intense. Wesk might like it, or Minhelm. Have you given it to anyone else?”

“Well, Polato’s read it.” Boone chuckled. “I wanted to keep it private, but she saw me working on it and asked to see it, and when she was done, she said I should show it to you, so you could give it a look over.”

Myers silently put a note in the back of his head to punch the Chem Dog in the face the next time they met. Nonetheless, he nodded. “Well, I’d say don’t show it around too much. Can’t have it look like we’re on downtime too much. Especially you, since a lot of your job’s already paperwork.”

Boone turned her head, letting out a sigh. “I do a lot of work, okay? I did this while I was on break. She’s been pushing me hard, lately; I’ve been trying to get the hang of my powers, but it hasn’t been going great. It’s… draining, you know? Especially when you don’t get a lot of sleep.”

Myers sighed. There wasn’t much point in getting mad at Boone for it. It made her happy; Emperor knew that Wesk had taught him a lot about that. “I’m gonna make a recommendation, then.”

“What’s that?”

“Turn it up a bit. If the story is about those two, just… focus it on those two. Bring it together, and tell what they felt about each other. Doesn’t have to be a happy ending. Just has to say what they’re about.”

Boone’s ears went pink again. She quietly nodded, and left the room.

The moment the door was shut, Myers sighed, uncrossed his legs, and tapped his commbead. “Wes? I’ve got a problem to take care of. A fourteen-inch problem. You want to help me with it?”

As a barely-restrained cheer rose from the commbead, followed by the sound of hurried movement, Myers stared at the hefty tent in his trousers. For all its awkwardness, for all her awkwardness, for all its pretensions to the contrary, for all that lesbian vampires weren’t quite his thing, he couldn’t deny; Boone’s masturbation aid did a fine job of its intended purpose.