The Three Faces Of Buddha

Four teenagers embark on a mystical journey and encounter strange gods.

Nanowrimo November 2011 Novel.

Goal: 500 words minimum per day / 50k words story in 30 days.

Day 1
Day 11
Day 21
Day 31
Day 41
Day 51
Day 61

Day 1:

Everything starts out normally. They go to school, finish the day, but on the way home, something strange happens. They don't know what happens. When they wake, they have no memories of what has happened to them.

Day 2:

The teenagers explore. The world doesn't look solid. Everything is grey or brown or dull looking. They are surrounded by walls and ceilings. They appear to be in some sort of cave.

Day 3:

A stranger appears. He doesn't appear solid or real. He has a blank expression on his face and appears hardly moving.

Day 4:

They discover a book. It's a long book with large page numbers and pictures. Very beautiful but the story it tells seems to be divided into 2 parts. The upper part and the lower part. There is a man standing on the the left page, who points to the right page. He appears to be walking towards the right page. Above him is another man. He is upside down. When they turn the book upside down, the man is standing on the right page, pointing to the left page. He appears to be walking towards the left page.

Day 5:

The teens speculate on the meaning of the book. Each one comes up with their own interpretation.

Day 6:

The statue moves. The teens are freaked out and leave the room and get separated.

Day 7:

They try to escape the cave but slowly realize the cave is strange. The Girl calls out to her Boyfriend for help. He tries to reach her.

Day 8:

The Boyfriend's Baby Brother reads the book. He reads several pages and something about the pictures begins to make sense to him.

Day 9:

The Girl reunites with her Boyfriend. They rejoice and try to find the others.

Day 10:

The Boyfriend's Best Friend finds Baby Brother. Snatches the book away which irritates Baby Brother.

Day 11:

The Girl and Boyfriend walk in to find Best Friend and Baby Brother fighting. The Best Friend has the advantage being bigger and stronger. The Boyfriend is mad at his Best Friend but tries to appear unbothered. No big deal.

Day 12:

Baby Brother shares his epiphany about the book. Baby Brother thinks the book shows the way out of the cave. Although mocking, the others are secretly awestruck.

Day 13:

They set out to test Baby Brother's Theory. They read the pictures and look for the signs hidden in the pictures.

Day 14:

The signs show them where to step on the rocks and where to climb. Some areas are more difficult than others. They all have fun tripping and falling. They decide that Boyfriend leads the way, followed by Girl, followed by Baby Brother, and finally Best Friend.

Day 15:

The path gets harder and it turns out that the Girl has a fear of tight spaces. The Boyfriend tries to make his Girl feel better by making the climb appear easier than it is.

Day 16:

Baby Brother drops the book. Boyfriend tells Best Friend to get the book because it was closer to him. As he reaches out to pick up the book, he sees a sign that he didn't see before and realizes that they'd been traveling the hard way. The book revealed an easier way out of the caves.

Day 17:

Best Friend tries to convince Boyfriend to take the easier route but the Boyfriend is adamant about continuing on the path he saw in the book. In an attempt to persuade Boyfriend, Best Friend hangs on to the book (refuses to give the book back to Baby Brother) and heads off in another direction, telling the others, Meet you on other side.

Day 18:

Boyfriend leads the others the rest of the way swearing. He's mad at his Best Friend for abandoning them and taking the book with him. Fortunately, Boyfriend remembers the route depicted in the book and they meet Best Friend. Once more he tries to appear like it's no big deal.

Day 19:

Best Friend tries to convince them to take the easier path. Apparently the book contains the solution for 2 paths. Held right side up, the signs point to a harder path through the caves. Held upside down, the signs point to the easier path. Best Friend chides Boyfriend for reading the book upside down. Because Best Friend arrived to the destination sooner than did the rest of the group, Boyfriend agrees to let Best Friend pick out the easier path by holding the book upside down.

Day 20:

The travel appears to go faster. They are turning the pages faster. The order is now, Best Friend, Boy Friend, Girl, Baby Brother. However, there is a strange feeling of something not right but they can't put their finger on it.

Day 21:

Best Friend is starting to act weird. He doesn't want Baby Brother to hold the book any more. Baby Brother protests and soon they wind up in a fight. Boyfriend breaks up the fight and tries to end the fight peacefully but winds up defending Baby Brother's right to carry the book during travel. Best Friend reminds them that Baby Brother has dropped the book before.

Day 22:

Baby Brother and Best Friend are fighting more.

Day 23:

Boyfriend and Girl are fighting more. Girl is sympathetic to Best Friend's case.

Day 24:

Best Friend sneaks off with the book. He doesn't feel the others deserve to have the book.

Day 25:

Boyfriend is furious and scared. He knows deep in his heart the book holds the secret to getting out of the caves alive. He tries to hide his fear by telling the others that he's memorized several paths and Best Friend was just pulling another one of his tasteless pranks.

Day 26:

They start climbing and Boyfriend did indeed memorize some of the signs but for the ones he wasn't sure of, he guesses. The path feels dangerously hard and the ground below them appear even less solid as bits of dirt and gravel tumble into the abyss below. Boyfriend is moving fast and everyone is too tired to talk or fight.

Day 27:

When Girl mentions how tired she is, Baby Brother realizes for the first time since they arrived at the cave, that they haven't eaten or drunk. As soon as he mentions this, they all feel fatigued and extremely hungry and thirsty. They stop and rest.

Day 28:

Best Friend watches them from a distance. They are so close but the unguided path they are traversing is taking them in circles. He has the book but feels lonely. He's still angry at Boyfriend for choosing Baby Brother's side. They'd been best friends since childhood and known each other longer than either one has known Baby Brother.

Day 29:

Distracted by their hunger and thirst, each makes a mistake. First Baby Brother slips and falls into the abyss. Girl who tried to catch him, falls through a false wall and disappears. Boyfriend is stunned to have lost both Baby Brother and Girl at the same time.

Day 30:

Best Friend is bored out of his skull. The others are acting very strange now. They seem to be climbing all over the place with no rhyme or reason. He decides to rejoin them and save them from themselves.

Day 31:

Girl gets a vision. Some apparition like the statue they'd seen earlier reaches out to her and warns her about the top mission. Additional notes: "The Face of Budha" 

Day 32:

Boyfriend gets a vision. He's falling but a giant smiling fat Buddha lifts him up to a safe spot on the rocks. He sees Girl and rushes out to hold her while she's still in a daze from her own vision.

Day 33:

Baby Brother gets a vision. He sees a dark figure with scary looking eyes approaching him. He picks up a large rock and lobs it at the creature. The creature yelps and Baby Brother is horrified to see that he threw the rock at Best Friend who is now bleeding on the side of the head.

Day 34:

Boyfriend hears voices and gently pulls a dazed Girl in the direction of the voices. He is overjoyed to see both Baby Brother and Best Friend are both safe.

Day 35:

Once more they try to travel together. Since they'd been separated, Boyfriend is convinced taking the easier path is not a good idea. Best Friend continues to insist on leading the way. As they play tug of war with the book, both trying to highlight the merits of their chosen paths, the book separates into 2 books. They are identical in every way except their cover. The replica of original book is in Boyfriend's hands. The other book's cover is now reversed and Best Friend is holding on to the book where the upper path now appears as the bottom path. It appears that you will go your way and I will go mine.

Day 36:

They split into 2 groups. Group 1: Best Friend by himself. Group 2: Boyfriend, Girl and Baby Brother. They agree to meet at the next page.

Day 37:

At first this works out but slowly the 2 Groups meet every other page. Best Friend begins to grow resentful that the others aren't looking up to him or letting him lead or not being as appreciative of what he's done for them so far.

Day 38:

Group 2 talk about the strange powers of the book. With the book, they don't feel hunger or thirst. They still need sleep. They've gone beyond halfway through the book so they're feeling pretty good about everything in general.

Day 39:

Best Friend decides to go ahead without his friends. He leaves them notes to let them know that he's gone ahead and wonders if that is doing too much for them too.

Day 40:

Baby Brother wants to go home so badly. He misses his mother, his friends, his pets, his bed, everything. He's starting to get bad dreams where he's trapped forever in the caves.

Day 41:

Girl wants to go home badly. She gets the same dream every night. They are walking through this strange town where they live. Best Friend and Boyfriend are hanging out but then they would argue and she would leave their house and drive around town in a go cart size race car.

Day 42:

Boyfriend is getting so good at reading the signs in the book that he doesn't even realize how fast he's absorbing the information until Girl and Baby Brother are kidding him about it. He gets a bit miffed when they poke fun at him because he's a serious guy. As he leads them on the path, he doesn't even realize until they reached their next rendevous point that he'd forgotten to consult the book but somehow he'd found his way through without the book.

Day 43:

Best Friend is bored and lonely. He watches his friends travel and appear to be having a great time together. He starts feeling hurt and jealous and wonders how he can rejoin his friends without giving up the easy path.

Day 44:

The friends are surprised to see Best Friend at the rendevous site instead of a note. At first they felt weird because they'd gone so long without him that they didn't know how to open up to him. Best Friend senses the tense atmosphere and awkwardly leaves and tells them he'll meet them at the next page.

Day 45:

Group 2 feels bad about their encounter with Best Friend but they brush it aside. The terrain starts to shift. Wood beams appear along the cliff like terrains.

Day 46:

Best Friend watches his friends from a distance. He suspects they're talking about him and feeling sorry for him. This makes him mad.

Day 47:

At the next rendevous point, Best Friend greets his friends with angry words and angry tone. Group 2 is shocked. They had no idea he had such animosity inside him. Best Friend says, if you don't know how much I care about you then to *beeep* with you. He makes a threatening gesture at Boyfriend with his book which Boyfriend ignores but Baby Brother swings his book at Best Friend. When the 2 books connect, both books vanish. The Boyfriend and Best Friend look each other in the eyes completely stunned knowing that the way out of the caves has vanished with the books. Suddenly, the cave splinters and the four of them are split up and separated again.

Day 48:

Boyfriend knows that he knows the way out but he won't leave without his friends. Every step he takes, he knows where to walk, and when to walk. Like magic the way opens up to him. Instead of following the path, he steps where he knows he shouldn't, with hopes of finding Girl and Baby Brother.

Day 49:

Best Friend is pleasantly surprised to realize that he can see the easy path without help from the book. He watches the others scurry about the cave aimlessly, feeling sorry for them for not taking his advice. He decides to lend them a hand and help them after they've been lost for a while.

Day 50:

Girl gets very close to where Best Friend is. Unable to stay away any longer, he approaches Girl. He thought she'd be happy to see him but instead she backs away from him. He tries to convince her that he's the good guy and that Boyfriend was all wrong about him. She remembers the warning from the apparition and tries to escape.

Day 51:

Boyfriend begins to recognize the tracks in the cave. He can separate his from Girl's and Baby Brother's. It bothers him that he can't find tracks left by Best Friend. How is he doing that?

Day 52:

Girl is scared but she yeses Best Friend on everything. He wants her to follow him on the path but she reminds him that she's afraid of tight spaces. He reminds her that the spaces are illusions. All she has to do is trust him and he can lead her out of the cave. What about the others? I'll come back for them. I promise.

Day 53:

Boyfriend finds Baby Brother at rendevous point. Apparently they'd been wandering in circles trying to find each other that it never occurred to them that they could meet at a rendevous point until they were too tired to keep searching. Boyfriend is getting nervous but hopeful that Girl will come to rendevous point. Baby Brother convinces Boyfriend that he'll wait at the rendevous point while Boyfriend looks for Girl.

Day 54:

Girl sees Boyfriend and Baby Brother at the rendevous point. Her eyes pick out the path to the rendevous point and she wonders how she can sneak away from Best Friend before he could stop her getting on the path. Something told her that he couldn't really hurt her along the path, only at the rendevous points. He's nowhere to be seen. Her heart pounding, she readies herself to run to the path, when to her horror, she sees Best Friend approach Baby Brother at the rendevous point.

Day 55:

Baby Brother is not happy to see Best Friend. Best Friend tries to come across as a nice guy and paint out Boyfriend as the bad guy but Baby Brother is not buying it.

Day 56:

Girl watches as Best Friend attacks Baby Brother. She wants to walk the path but she knows that she won't see what's happening once she's back on the path. Best Friend is bigger and stronger than Baby Brother and eventually Best Friend over powers Baby Brother with a choke hold. Girl is screaming for Baby Brother to run even though she knows they can't hear her. She realizes Baby Brother's only chance would be to get her help. Girl starts walking.

Day 57:

Boyfriend is overjoyed to encounter Girl on the path. He's even happier to see that she seems to have no trouble finding her way. Girl quickly fills Boyfriend in on Best Friend and Baby Brother. Alarmed, they rush to the rendevous point.

Day 58:

Best Friend is mocking Baby Brother and trying to get him to yield to him by calling him uncle or giving him a wedgie or something. Boyfriend shows up with anger clear on his face. Best Friend releases Baby Brother saying what's your problem? We're only having some fun. Not anymore, you don't touch my brother like that. Best Friend's face grows nasty. A knife appears in his hand by magic. Illusion? Would you like to find out?

Day 59:

While Best Friend and Boyfriend duke it out, Baby Brother and Girl walk the path just as Boyfriend ordered them to. As soon as they disappear into the path, Boyfriend tries to slip away from Best Friend and escape onto the path as well. Best Friend throws the knife but the throw is bad and misses Boyfriend by a large margin, causing him to swear a streak.

Day 60:

Best Friend chases Group 2 through the path. He's able to reach the rendevous points quicker than the others using the easy route. When he reaches the rendevous point, he sits down and waits.

Day 61:

Best Friend laughs Group 2's stupidity. They are so slow. Eventually they'll emerge and they will have to deal with him again. After a while, he gets bored and starts watching them. They are walking the path together, holding hands and climbing as usual. Suddenly Boyfriend reaches out and pulls himself up onto a flat surface. The others come up behind him and they begin walking normally as if on a paved road. Best Friend is shocked. Somehow they found a flat road to walk on. How did he miss it? Where are they going? Where does that road lead?

Day 62:

The road is smooth and narrow but slowly widens up. The walls on the left and right sides are filled with life size pictures from the books all pointing to the way out. They recognize the trails they followed and are surprised to see their footprints on the pictures on the left side. They recognize the foot prints of Best Friend on the Right Side and feel sad when they see the foot prints all over the page so close to the exit but never reaching the exit. They walk until something strange happens and they find themselves back into their own world just as they left it. There are 3 of them now. They wonder if Best Friend will make it out of the caves. They wonder how to explain his disappearance.

Day 63:

Best Friend has walked several hundred times over the trails and still couldn't find his way to the flat path. Returning to the first room still hoping for the book to return, he comes across an inscription on the floor where the book originally lay. There is no easy way out of here.

Day 1
Day 11
Day 21
Day 31
Day 41
Day 51
Day 61

"Chapter 1"  Word Count: 421
"Chapter 2"  Word Count: 359

"Chapter 3"  Word Count: 1123
"Chapter 4"  Word Count: 702

"Chapter 5"  Word Count: 1293
"Chapter 6"  Word Count: 1049

"Chapter 7"  Word Count: 817
"Chapter 8"  Word Count: 769

"Chapter 9"  Word Count: 596
"Chapter 10"  Word Count: 580

The Outline was arranged to help me plot out the story for the novel. It's not a table of contents. My first Nano Project failed miserably (lasted 4 installments) so I'm hoping the Outline will keep me from stalling.

This is either my 2nd or 3rd attempt at Nanowriting.