Story #67 - Spaced

Spaced

The say in space no one can hear you scream, but guess what – that's bullshit.

Sure, there's no air out here, no way for the sounds of your pulsin' vocal fear to be broadcast to the uncaring planetary dust you've got all around you, but the truth is you can hear it in your head, loud and long and clear as you're ripped out of the universe you know and into something wholly different – wholly other – than anything you ever thought possible.

You're like that tree in the woods they always talk about – if no one's around to hear you, do you still make a goddamn sound? You bet you do, bucko.

See, it comes to down to the fact that Einstein was right about a bunch of the nutty stuff he talked about, crap that rocket-jockeys didn't really need to know about before blasting off and heading out into the wild black yonder. Lightspeed and relativity were relatively ignored in favor of technological advancement and the pursuit of human “improvement”, with whatever spin it is you want to put on that.

What it really meant was fly-boys stuffed in metal tubes and shoved up the ass end of the speed of light until we came spewing out the thing's nose, careening faster than man had any right to go. All that nonesense about infinite mass and energy once you got up there? Can't speak to it, but I'll tell you this – shit sure got weird.

Screaming was the first step, deep breaths in that resulted in face-shaking expulsions on the way out. The cabin went de-pressured almost immediately after the hop and the suit kicked in, keeping me from dying as my oxygen bubble escaped to the uncaring midnight and the straps on my chair making sure I wasn't another piece of garbage floating around in Saturn's rings. I bellowed 'till I was hoarse, 'till there wasn't much else to do but stop and look around, take stock of just what'd happened and where the sam-diggity-hell I was.

They covered a whole mess of things when I went through the program, from what to do in a failure situation to how to keep your home life settled down when things got hot at the agency. Most of it was good stuff – taught by guys that had been there and back and one that had actually managed to stay married – but none of it covered this.

Not that they could, since so far I as knew I was the first guy to make it, first guy to get through to the other side and see what all the fuss was about.

Lookin' around didn't tell me much; everything mechanical or electrical was shattered and lying in pieces at my feet, so figured I'd better get on the horn and report back in to base. A few tries told me I should've been smart enough to include in among the stuff that'd been broken, but a trip this this did some number on a guy's nerves. I checked the suit – the radio still worked in there – but I got nothin', no answer from any of those pocket-protectors back at HQ. Even with the expected time-lag factored in, I should have at least got a confo message, a beepin' boop that told me what I spewed out in patchy sentences and colorful language actually got through.

No dice.

Along about then I figured on two choices: stay put and hope the next guy they sent found me but didn't ram into the husk of a ship I was sittin' in or de-strap, pull the pin and get the hell out. I had enough air to last a day or two and anchored to the ship I could get a better read on just what kind of tree I'd stuck my head into. Sure, there might be hornets, but they'd get me just as surely inside as out, and being cowardly just isn't part of the makeup.

Stupid brave might be, though.

You'd think I'd have lashed myself to the ship, prevented the suit from floating away and of course I did, but you know what? I cut that cord in about a minute and a half.

The outside wasn't space, buckos, at least not like I'd ever seen it. Yellowed ropes of blazing fire hung together in impossible combinations, blue starlight filtering out from every impossible angle to suffuse the suit visor with more azure eye candy than I'd seen or ever wanted to. Color was the barfed-up everything of the world outside the rocket, and it was like nothing. Really. Nothing.

'Course, there was also Him.

The pronoun might not be right but a guy's gotta pick something and that's the one I'm more familiar with. I'd tell ya he was floating there, open arms outstretched in greeting, but he wasn't really anywhere, 'cept inside my head. That, and suffusin' the universe.

He said my name – I heard it, loud and clear. Somethin' about a welcome, a gift I'd been given. Said he'd show me – and you know what, he did. I cut that cable and went, followin' after some mind-stranger I'd barely met and he showed me just about everything I'd ever wanted to see.

God, Buddha, Allah – buddy was it, and it showed. He also didn't care.

I got all emotional, started tellin' him my problems and he just floated away, moved on 'til I couldn't feel him anymore and I was alone, somethin' in my eye and real twist in my heart. I went lookin' for him, turning over planets and kicking down stars until I realized just what I was doing.

The helmet came off, folks, and the air went right out – swish, boom, gone.

Air – didn't need it. Planets – mine to move. God? Sure, you can call me that.

Gotta tell ya, though, you're startin' to bore me.

- D

Story #66 - Shudder Step

Shudder Step

The Shuddering came, and broke our homes.

The Shuddering left, and we believed that we were safe, believed that we had escaped the terrible vengeance of our Gods.

Now it has returned and we are seeking someone to blame, a sacrificial object onto whom we will heap all of our guilt. The Old Ones say it must have been one of the Younglings, those that wish to stray upward, those that wish to leave the sanctity of the covered depths.

The Younglings speak in crystalline whispers about the Oldest One, soft murmurings that mock his inability to lead, his fragile and reedy voice. Thick murmurs in the dark, tainted words that spread across still lakes and into hard-wrought dens. They are mad words, angry words, words that would tear our people apart – were the Gods not already doing so.

I myself find fault enough in both camps, fault in the scurrying steps and sharp odors of the Younglings and as much in the ponderous treads and musty damp of the Old. I have touched the dry and peeling skin of the Oldest, felt the supple curve of young flesh under my care. I am the Middle, the stoic, the calm. My segment cannot be to blame; we have done nothing wrong, but we do not wish to blame the others.

And yet, it happens.

Each day we fragment, our heightening screams threatening to do quickly what the Shuddering is drawing out over time. Discussion turns to argument and sometimes to violence. Old Ones have gone missing; packs of Younglings have been abandoned in the Reaches. It is madness; it is judgment.

Today I spoke; I do so rarely, and my voice cracked along the syllables I desired. Younglings snickered but their betters silenced them. I wept for our people, for the homes we have lost and the division that is coming. I made my plea, and all considered it.

It is time to leave.

Each day, the Shuddering is more fearful than the last. Sometimes it lasts for only moments, casting down a sheen of rock salt upon our heads, and others it stretches throughout the hours, shaking loose the very foundations of our homes and buildings to send them splashing, churning into the waters below.

At first, the tears of our angry Gods carried no danger, but so much has happened, so many pieces have come undone that many of us can no longer hear the shifting, hear the delicate creak as structures are broken as the stable becomes loose and tumbles downward, ever downward, onto whatever or whoever lurks below.

We are dying.

***

Truly, they had no choice but accept, though each made it seem as though the other side opposed it and only they carried they day. I do not care; what matters is that we are moving, that we are lifting ourselves away from this place.

Away from our homes.

The Shuddering is constant now, a low-toned hum that persists no matter where we hide. Each tunnel sought out by groping hands, each passage found by quick ears seems no better than the last, and many seem far worse. We lose men and women by the hour; children wail, beyond all reason, their peaceful cohabitation shattered with each passing moment. We were not meant for this – stability is our refuge, steadfastness our gift.

I can conclude only that this is a test.

Blame serves no purpose; sinners or no, we are subject to what the Gods have chosen, and we must endure. We must prevail.

A cry comes from the front; one of wonder, one of pain. The youngest of them, the most spry, has found something, something beyond our imagining.

At forks in passing it came to my eyes, a blazing fury that cast my gaze down, bade my to wrap cloth about my head and continue, Shuddered mind incapable of rational thought. An artifact, I believed – a rarity, brought on by the unfathomable.

Now, a reality.

A blazing-bright beacon tears from the tunnel mouth into our number, sends them scattering to the darkened edges, huddling with eyes turned to walls and hands over ears. Beyond its maw lies a twisted thing of nightmares, writhing life that sickens with sinewy grace and movement.

Such things cannot be borne by us, cannot be endured by a people such as ours! Why, why have the Gods done this, cast us out of what was right, what was peaceful, what was true? What good and noble beings would punish a devoted people so, scour them from their homes with terrifying destruction only to lead them into a world of basest fear?

What could we have done to deserve such a thing? Could the Old Ones in their hubris, in their desire for power have sickened the Gods, cast us all into a pit from which we could never emerge? Could the Younglings, with their desire for knowledge, their mockery of the ways, offended the Gods so deeply that all of our souls would be forfeit?

What of us, the Middle? What have we done to deserve such a fate? Would the God punish steadfast devotion to the words of the Old, kindness to the Young? Mock simple joy in the first breath of a child, or the scent of a lover on the air? We enjoyed, we endured, we enlightened.

They catch my eye, Young and Old alike, bunched together in a frightened mass, gibbering sobs ripping from their throats, words of shame and accusation banished by what they have seen – by what I see.

Finally, their forms are revealed, the reason for our darkness, our cool and perfect midnight. Perhaps our Makers have grown restless, or perhaps they wish our lives to be changed. Perhaps they merely act to destroy us, to stamp out what must surely be an accident of power on their part, a mistaken creation they now choose to erase.

I look, I see, and I know. By the Gods, we are ugly.

- D

Story #65 - Only Moments Of The Gods

Only Moments Of The Gods

Only Moments Of The Gods

It was ten past twelve as the humans recorded time; it was apparent he wasn't coming.

I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised. He'd been getting cocky lately thanks to strong early successes, telling the rest of us just how we should run things in our own domains based solely on the fanatical devotion of his followers.

Frankly, I'd never cared for him, even when his people were a bunch of back-water louts with no idea how to build a working city plan let alone dig themselves out of the mud huts they were living in. That, and I couldn't stand the way he treated them. With his “no gods before me” insistence and all of his punishments, it just seemed like he was laying it on a bit thick.

Of course, it was hard to argue with his results. Apparently he'd gone and found the only people out there that wanted to be smacked around and call it love, and the formula had been working wonders for him while the rest of us were struggling just to bring in the numbers. We weren't exactly all nobility and light ourselves, but most of the others I'd talked to found that a whole bunch of honey – magic, medicine, maybe some technology – and a little bit of vinegar – the occasional sacrifice to prove undying loyalty – tended to make for an excellent worshiper overall and a produce a well-rounded people.

We'd never been too worried about migration, about our followers moving around freely as they saw fit. What I lost I'd find again from someone else when their policies became to onerous or they weren't able to deliver. But not him. Oh no. It was either him or nothing, a stricture we'd become increasingly concerned about as the centuries rolled by. He'd agreed to meet me here to at least discuss some sort of accommodation, but it looked like he was going to blow me off.

In a way, it was good to see. It meant I had a case to bring up with the others the next time we met. We were a conservative group despite out power – or maybe because of it – and most of us didn't want to act rashly. Together, we could probably crush him and send him running for the bosom of the Galactic Mother, but we'd rather not affect things so directly if we didn't have to. It would be better for all concerned – gods and their humans alike – if we could just settle this peacefully.

I sighed as I floated off and angled down toward the surface of the planet. A peace still might be possible, even with his breaking of his word, and so long as I couched it properly the more hot-headed of our group would likely listen to reason. We'd had different experiences on this planet, some of us having to deal with single-minded aggression from neighboring peoples and some able to remain neutral and aloof, building a cohesive theology on vast and barren plains.

A whiff of smoke caught my attention – a whiff to me, at any rate – something massive was burning. I skipped down quickly, no time passing between thought and descent. A large, walled city was under attack, followers of a god I didn't recognize holed up inside and desperately praying for salvation. I could see his shimmering form above the city; he was weak and transparent. His last followers were being extinguished, and he along with them.

Scanning the ranks of the attackers, I could easily make out their nationality and allegiance. He had chosen them in part because they looked different than the other tribes in the area, but even had they shared the same appearance as the ones trapped in the burning city, the looks of fanatical devotion on their faces would have been enough. Behind them, hovering some two hundred yards up a bloody slope, was the fool himself.

No moment passed and I was there.

- What do you think you're doing? - Our speech was not something the attackers or defenders could recognize or hear, but rather on an order of a magnitude so great it simply passed by the small planet on which we stood

- Doing? What does it look like? Eliminating the competition – There it was, that smug self-satisfaction I'd never liked about him. From the moment he came into existence, he'd always believed himself to be better than us, despite the methods he used.

- We had a meeting – or did you forget thanks to your amusements? - Several distant planets bent at the force of my sarcasm, but it brought no reaction from him.

- Hardly. I needed to keep you distracted, believing I would appear. Even now, my men march against your stronghold. -

My view shifted and I was present, bathed in the blood of my faithful as they were slaughtered by the devout and smiling faces of his men. I glanced down to see my own form losing consistency, thinning out to be re-proportioned among the universe.

I glanced up and he stood there, smiling broadly and glowing ever brighter. A part of my essence went to him with each death, with each man impaled in the name of his enemy's god.

- Why? - I couldn't keep the sorrow from my voice, and a sun light-years distant flamed out. - I had hoped to save you from them!-

- Save me? I appreciate your foolish attempt to protect my well-being, but I have no need of it. I've grown beyond you, beyond the need for control or consensus. You rule by partitioned power, by allowing those that serve you to partake in your own essence, and their deaths give me strength. - He pointed and a nearby mountain trembled and exploded, sluggish magma oozing out of its cracked top. - I keep what is mine and become stronger, as is right. These creatures you created were meant to serve and they do so admirably. -

The last of my strength was sapped, drifting outward and into the creature he'd become.

- You won't get away with this. They'll stop you. Time will judge you. -

He laughed, loud enough to rock the firmament itself.

- Time will name me liberator, mercy. Time will forget your name was ever spoken. -

Story #64 - Lamplight

Lamplight

Lamplight glittered off of the plate in front of him; the food was unappetizing even in the dim casts of the seven lit stands around the room.

An invitation from his uncle wasn’t something he could turn down – being Baron of the Western Tributaries granted the power of unrefused requests – though why the man so abruptly wanted his company was a mystery. They were hardly close.

“Riles!” His uncle gestured at him from the head of the table, not bothering to swallow before speaking. Bits of flaky crust spun from his lips to fall unnoticed among other dishes on the table, and Vicecount Riles Lillby made a mental note to stop eating as soon as what was on his plate had been consumed.

“Yes, my Lord?” His uncle demanded strict observance of protocol no matter the situation, a surprise given the disheveled look of the man. Riley was glad the table was so large; his position midway along one long side meant the maximum distance from the man at its head, as well as both other dinner guests.

“Before you arrived, the three of us,” he gestured around the table, “had been speaking of the great King’s policy. What is your opinion on the matter?”

Dangerous ground, but his uncle knew full well how he felt. Why bring it up here and now? Perhaps it was for the benefit of his other guests – his uncle had always taken pride in revealing the faults of others amidst large crowds or in public.

The other two at the table were an odd pairing; had he not seen them chatting before the meal was served he would have been sure they belonged to such vastly different circles that they had nothing in common about which to speak.

Of the two the woman was certainly the fairer prize, and not simply owing to his bias as a man. Gold-spun hair and a lithe frame were clothed in swathes of the finest silk, clearly marking her as highborn. Her companion, across from Riles and now looking at him slack-jawed as he awaited a reply to the Baron’s question, was something else entirely.

He hadn’t been able to get an accurate read on the man’s age, though he appeared to be no older than Riles himself. His uncle had always been spendthrift despite his position - lampoil was considered a luxury to be used sparingly - and while the dim light had the advantage of blurring the appearance of the poor attempt at cooking on his plate, it also made observing the young man more difficult.

Of a certainly, Riles could say that the man was dirty – not simply in the way that the recent dust storms had fouled all men, highborn and low alike, but almost aggressively, as if he were more comfortable behind a mask of grime.

With lank hair that could have been of any color along with a slumped posture and knobby hands, the man would have been out of place in the home of the poorest merchant and certainly had no business in the home of the Baron – except for the Baron’s obvious invitation.

“I find it repugnant, my Lord, and you know this. For the King to suggest that women – any women – are a form of public property violates the spirit of the End.” He was in the minority, certainly – many highborn found the prospect of unfettered access to any female form they wanted a titillating prospect – but the voices of his minority were growing. He had no fear of speaking his mind.

“He is your King, Riles. His word is law.” The Baron leaned forward, his substantial girth slopping into the gravy of his current helping of dinner as he pointed a grease-covered finger. The man spent like a peasant on everything but food and his bulk told the tale.

“No,” Riles said, shaking his head, “he is the King, not mine, and his word is only law so long as it does not conflict with what we know as right – what the End has spoken – and this law is in clear opposition.”

The filthy man across from him drew his attention again, not so much by gesture or appearance but by a set of eyes that smoldered low under furrowed brows and seemed fixed intently on every gesture he was making, every word that came out of his mouth. Clear and unwavering orbs, the eyes were a significant departure from the rest of the man.

“Nephew, I have always considered you to be at best a foolish dreamer, at a worst a gibbering idiot,” the Baron’s voice was condescending, a master speaking to a servant out of line, “but you may have a point.”

Riles snapped his attention to the large man at the head of the table. Could he have heard that correctly?

“What?” All semblance of forced respect was gone. Was this the truth of it? Had his uncle finally seen the error of his ways?

“Your dissent is gaining ground, nephew, in part because it relies so heavily on the laws set down by the End. This gives it traction, makes it powerful. Dangerous.”

The man across from him spoke, an echo of the highborn whose table he shared. “Dangerous.” There was something familiar in that tone, something known.

“I have not introduced you to my guests, Riles, and for that I apologize. The woman is Eilzra, a noble of some small standing in the country estates. The man is family – another of many young nephews the King’s favor has seen fit to bestow upon me.” A wide grin split his massive face. “Remarkably, certain family traits have bred extraordinarily true.”

Riles knew little of combat or strategy but could feel the shift in the room, feel the sudden burst of aggression carried by the words of the Baron. Pushing back his chair, he stood.

Men swept out of the shadows, driving forward from between softening pools of lamplight, black grips around their fingers, black masks upon their heads. Glasses were broken and plates shaken from clean cotton, but Riles had no real chance at escape, no real hope to resist and quickly found himself bound and gagged.

“The King’s word is law, my friends,” the man across the table said, rising, a familiar voice coming from his lips “and we must support him. We must cease this foolish opposition.” Riles had little opportunity to listen to himself – did he really sound so strident, so young?

“I’d often wondered what it would be like to have a family member I could be proud of, one that would live up to the high standards of our line and I’m sure you, Riles, with your misguided need to protect these lowborn of yours have wondered what it would be like to live among them, wallowing in their squalor. Now we can each have our way.” The Baron’s tone was boisterous, his features stretched, widened into a mimicking rictus of human happiness only partially blotted by the softening lamplight.

- D

Story #63 - Ghost Runner

Ghost Runner

The thing arced in a soundless scream as Lenny Jacobs jammed down the hammer. They always did, once he caught them, though he’d never quite gotten used to the way they bent double on themselves, incorporeal hands clutching at too-wide mouths and wispy forms wavering for a moment before the Device finally snapped them up.

In twenty years of Ghost Running, Lenny had never watched one destroyed from start to finish; something about it just seemed wrong – too personal to watch.

Most of the other Runners didn’t have his problem; they lived for the thrill of the hunt, the quick kill and the sweet rewards that came afterward. He was more methodical, more paced in his approach and despite young gun after young gun touting their ability to replace him, he’d always come out ahead when the tallies were done at the end of the year.

Fact was that he liked the cases that were less than 90% odds, the ones where homeowners had no real proof they had a spirit or churches weren’t sure if the graves beneath their cellars had been consecrated. Lenny reveled in the challenge, in the game of figuring out what and when and where so he could finally home the Device in, finally bring the thing out of hiding and back into the light.

He had no illusions – the spirits he took weren’t being taken to a higher plane and they certainly weren’t given a new home with harps to play and clouds to perch on. They were being broken down into particulate matter; Ghossitrons, some egghead had named them, and just a cubic centimeter of them at a low density could power a city block of homes for a month. They were big business and the few companies that were licensed to Run stood to make big money, so Lenny just couldn’t say no.

That was the official story, at least; Lenny didn’t care as much for the money as he did for the fact that he couldn’t imagine himself doing anything different. He was a Savant, one of only a few Runners that could actually sense ghosts without the assistance of technology. A century ago he’d have been called a fraud and a liar; someone who claimed to see spooks and haunts at every turn, but now his special skills had a real-world outcome, a practical application that gave him a way to support his family.

That was an official story too; his wife had left him long ago, taking the kids with her when she went. He should have cared more, should have been more upset, but she knew him well – better than he had imagined. The work was his life, and it always would be. He’d always felt like a fragment of a man, and his work was the only place he fit.

There was one more here – he knew that much. Asylums were favorite haunts for the disturbed and the still-remaining, those who couldn’t break free or hadn’t been given the proper death rights their religion demanded. Crazy houses tended to be low on holy men, owing to any number of ethical, moral and plain stupid concerns.

Lenny snorted. He could smell the last one upstairs somewhere, floating around. The things didn’t really have much will left in them, or at least none that he’d ever noticed. Science said that they were remnants, parts of the dead that were broken off somehow, left down on earth while the rest of them went somewhere else. They were a piece of the person they’d been, but they certainly didn’t bear any similar traits – just a mindless need to wander and wail.

Two quick flights of stairs brought him to the cafeteria level and he strode confidently across the slick linoleum floor, not bothering with the light on his Device. Ghosts couldn’t hurt men, not really, and they were about the scariest thing that went roaming around in the dark. Lenny was far less at ease with those things that skulked around in broad daylight than anything he’d find in here. Ghosts were evil without purpose; men were evil by intent.

A movement from the door to the kitchen caught his eye and he stumbled; ghosts weren’t evident to the naked eye without the Device and they had no ability to affect physical the physical world.

He wasn’t alone.

“Come out!” Lenny bellowed as he stalked toward the lunch counter. He’d never been one for subtlety and he wasn’t about to play a game with whoever was hiding. Likely it was a squatter, but he loosened his pistol in its holster just in case.

“Lenny.” The voice came from behind him, and was one he was unfortunately familiar with.

“Patterson,” he said it like a curse. Jim Patterson was one of the new Runners; another hot shot who figured he’d challenge the big dogs. So far, he had an impeccable track record, but this would put him severely off-pace. Interfering with another Runner’s contract was strictly forbidden.

“I figured you’d crack eventually, Patterson, but I’d given you at least four more months.” Lenny spun to face the other man; shorter than he was with spiked blond hair, Patterson was well-built and good-looking, but with a curl to his lip that made most women stay the hell away.

A laugh cracked out of him; Patterson hadn’t bothered to draw his own pistol but instead held his Device, leveled at Lenny’s chest.

“This one is mine, Jim. Put your damn Device away and get the hell out right now. I won’t even report you to the Board.” All things considered, Patterson was getting off light.

“It took me a while to figure it out, Lenny,” Jim said, his voice think with self-congratulation, “I’d always wondered how you were so much better than the rest of us, so much quicker at getting every job done.”

There was a click as the hammer on Patterson’s Device came down, and Lenny could see a dark blue beam spring to life and lance out toward his chest. He smiled.

He smiled all the way to the ground as his back arced and his hands groped soundlessly for his mouth.

He’d always felt like a fragment of a man.

- D

Story #62 - Emotional Detachment

Emotional Detachment

“But how do you feel?”

Dr. Tayes Carmichael found the question irrelevant but not surprising.

“Feel?” He asked mildly, “This has nothing to do with feelings. The Council is choosing to cut my funding into electrochemical brain research and it is a bad idea. I’m close to a breakthrough, possibly one that will save millions of lives. Your ignorance could harm people across the globe.” There was no anger in his voice, no malice. These were simply facts, easily identifiable with even the barest of consideration, but it was as though he were speaking to five foam mattresses – his words made an impact but the Council members simply formed their own wrong-headed opinions – feelings – around them.

“So what we hear you saying,” Councilman Maas Liener steepled thin hands on the large board room table, “is that you care for the good of world.”

It took everything Tayes had to keep his eyes forward and not roll them in an exaggerated move to the side. They were getting to him, he knew, despite his best efforts to remain calm and unaffected. The shift had come gradually; the movement from intelligence-based decision making to that of “right-brained” thinking. “Emotional consideration”, they called it, or more accurately, “going with the gut.” What it really meant was a bunch of wishy-washy council members who would rather talk about feelings than solve problems, and that made foolish decisions like the one they’d just handed down.

“No,” his tone was firm but distant; no sense in giving them more to work with, “I’m saying that this decision is a mistake. That human lives would be saved by further research is a potential consequence of the action; my care for humanity is implied in that work.” He glanced around the table, making sure to meet each set of warm and sympathetic eyes in turn. “This has nothing to do with feelings. This is about what is sensible, rational.”

A moment of perfect silence gave the fleeting impression he might have made a real impact, might have found the notch in their spongy emotional armor.

“We appreciate your tireless efforts, Dr. Taves.” It was Tenaj speaking this time – she was the undisputed leader of their group, owing to her deep appreciation for emotional undertones in traditional decision making and an unnatural friendliness bordering on the aggressive. From what he knew, she was regarded by those outside of the Council as being completely unreliable; reasonable one moment and a raving lunatic the next. Such were the pitfalls of obsessive emotionality.

“The bulk of your work was done under the auspices of our predecessors,” she continued, “good men and women but with a narrow world view. We know it will take you time to adjust and are committed to providing whatever counseling or assistance you may need.”

He hung his head, defeated. They hadn’t heard; hadn’t really listened to a word he said. Without bothering to wait for a dismissal or giving them another spoken fragment to analyze, he stalked out the room. Fools!

***

Waiting for the second sequence printout he threw another plauqed accolade into the cardboard moving box and let himself enjoy a moment of blissful nostalgia.

They’d be closing down the lab soon enough, but in the meantime he was committed to finishing as much work as he could, to completing the project he’d started over a decade ago.

He still found it hard to believe the Emotocracy had risen to power, but he wasn’t one to follow social media or pay attention to trends. Apparently it had been a long time in coming, with thousands of books written and blogs posted on the new superiority of the right brain, of the inestimable impact of emotional thinking in the dreary world of left-brainers, those left out in the cold by their own limbic system – at least according to the hype.

A populous tired of empty promises and full of workers unwilling to perform the “menial” tasks that had fueled the country’s rise were easily swayed by a right-brained campaign, one that played on their sense of fear, anger and remorse at the country’s loss of clout on a world scale. Right and left, words once reserved for ends of the political spectrum now described how one thought, how one processed information. Logical left-brainers weren’t hated; merely pitied for their lack of emotional activation.

The shrill wail of the printer broke his abstraction and he grabbed its printed product quickly, reading over the latest course of results. His work had been on general electrochemical interactions but the focus of the Council on forcing his department out of funding had refined his aims, and for the better part of the month he’d been specifically targeting those chemicals that were precursors and results of intensive emotional states over long periods of time.

Fortunately, students on campus had been more than willing experimental subjects, owing to their interest in the new government’s policies and their desire to act out against the system they’d always been bound to. For weeks weeping, laughing and raging young men and women had filled his office, each given a specific cocktail of medication to increase both their reception to emotion and its results.

He read the data three times before setting down the sheet on his desk, then waited five minutes and picked it up again. He had to be sure it wasn’t just him – wasn’t his own emotionally heightened state making him see things that weren’t there.

A laugh escaped his lips. The data was real, accurate – black and white.

They were destroying themselves; ruining their own capacity for thought by accessing nothing but their right brain tendencies all day, every day. He did a quick calculation; six months at best for those like Tenaj before their brains were nothing more than cranium-bound piles of emotional goo.

He paused with the number to the chancellor’s office half-dialed. They’d coddle him, tell him he’d done well and hold untold numbers committee sharing circles before they ever made a decision about his findings.

Or…

He set down the phone. He could be ready; prepared with backing when the padded walls of the Emotocracy came thudding down.

How would they feel about that?

- D

Story #61 - Paths of the Gods

Paths of the Gods

He could feel a pressure at his back, an almost imperceptible push toward one of the three Paths below. It was non-specific, of course, his Father had never been concerned about which Path he chose, simply that he chose one rather than none. The old fool probably thought he was being clever, hoping to push Ydron over the edge and down onto one of the waiting tracks below, sealing his fate.

There was little that could bind a God of the Universe, but a decision of Path was one that could not be rescinded. Creation, destruction or preservation were his only three choices; choices Ydron felt had been outdated an eon ago, but that his Father would not bend on. The old God was just that – old – perhaps too much so for his own good and that of his children. To hear him tell the tale, he had raised thousands of Godlings from their first waking moments in the Universe, and every single one had made a choice at the appropriate time.

Some had chosen poorly; there were stories of creative Gods who had no interest in the process and destructive Gods who had hoped to save some small measure of the patch of universe they were condemned to destroy. Preservation Gods were often looked at as lazy, but Ydron had it on the best authority that maintaining the status quo was far more difficult than raising up a new species or sundering an entire planet.

“Father!” He called, putting his back to the edge and taking one large stride away; he would not be caught unaware. “Father, I know you're here. Show yourself!”

Technically, his Father was everywhere, but the God was often not paying specific attention to many areas of the universe, waiting instead until there was a problem before appearing in person if at all, but this was different. Ydron had distinctly felt the old man's touch, trying to nudge him forward and over the edge into a decision.

In front of him a reddish mist congealed, punctuated by streaking arcs of silver lightning as it became fully formed. Color was one of the few things that gave his Father pleasure any longer; that, and aggravating the next crop of young Gods to be risen. Many felt it was time for Father to step down, for him to give up his position and pass it on – it had happened at least twice before in the memories of most of the Gods – but Father was a stubborn old thing, all thorn and spike, his gentle leaves having long ago been torn away.

His roots, however, ran deep, and he had no interest in pulling himself up and walking away into the darkness. Not yet.

“Yes, Ydron?” The mist blew away to reveal a smallish man-shape, today with a nose too big by half and tiny ears for contrast – likely some low-level bipedal species Father had seen and found interesting. New creation Gods tended to be extreme in the appearance of their life forms, at least for the first few eons, and Father made it a point to try and stop by each of their worlds and see how they were progressing. “What can I do for you?” Father's tone was smooth and calm; too much so, and he knew it. The old fool could not for a moment believe that Ydron didn't see exactly what he was doing.

“I know what you're doing, Father, and you have to stop. I'll make my own choice.” Father nodded, stepping closer and reaching out a thin hand, but Ydron backed away. Father was as likely to hold him in a tight embrace as to fling him over the side of the wall, leaving him no avenue but to choose a Path before he hit the ground. Some things even Gods could not bear and a Path refusal was considered to be akin to complete dissolution. Rumors abounded about those who had refused to make a choice, who had fallen and let the winds of fate take the reins. Oddly, none existed for Ydron to speak with.

It seemed that the Path required a conscious choice and the absence of a decision would simply declare that existence forfeit; the Universe could always birth another God.

Father stopped no more than an arm's length from him. “Then why not make it, Ydron? I have no care for which Path you choose, but one must be chosen. It is the way.”

The way. Ydron rolled his eyes – it was always “the way”, a fateful force that seemed to guide everything in the cosmos but displayed no manifest form. Even his Father answered to the way, but for no reason that Ydron understood. Why obey what you could not know?

“Please, Father,” he said, his voice quavering, and the old God took another step forward, arms outstretched. Ydron turned quickly, moving back to the edge. Perhaps his Father was right. Perhaps he simply had to make a decision, finally act on what he knew was right.

Ydron could feel a pushing again, a subtle touch on his back but this time it was the warm hands of Father himself, fingertips ghosting lightly at his waist, ready to add momentum to his leap.

He considered each Path in measured turn, each aspect as his Father waited. Watched.

And finally, began to drift off.

Stepping back, Ydron grabbed his Father's arms, wrapping them around his waist. With a quick drop to one knee and a heave of his back, he leveraged Father up and over his head and down toward the waiting Paths. There was no sound as the God passed through the three planes of choice and into the bottomless Below, but Ydron could feel a new power suffusing him, a new awareness layering over his mind.

He had made his choice, long ago, after seeing what Father was unwilling to. The Universe needed change, and he has been chosen as its instrument, its scalpel. Now, he could be its savior.

- D

Story #60 Notes

60 stories. Almost two months. I must admit, I'm fairly impressed with myself.

Overall, I think the quality of my work is improving, so I'm happy with where this thing is going. For the two or so of you that regularly read my stuff - thanks! It's much appreicated.

Today's story is the "other" serial story I'm working on, Fey'ted Thrones being the original one. I'm enjoying the world of Barry Howe and the Deacons, and we'll see how it pans out from here.

Once again, thanks for reading, and here's to another great two months.

- D

Story #60 - Deacon First III

Deacon First - III

“See where I hit ‘em?” Pike Rolson grabbed the ‘wolf by the ears and lifted its face off of the ground. “Right between the eyes.”

From most Seconds, such a statement would be a boast, a way to one-up the First they were training, but Pike Rolson was simply stating facts; teaching Barry how he could be most effective on the streets. He was a good man and a good teacher, though most assumed a different sort of character lurked below the surface of his scarred face.

Barry looked away from Rolson’s thin frame as the Second let the creature's head drop back to the wet pavement. It was another night of rain, a silvery drizzle that mingled with the blood and filth on the streets, not quite strong enough to wash it all away.

In the streetlight the whole city seemed covered in dark, slippery blood, oozing through the cracks in the pavement and slipping quickly around corners to pool out of sight. The Bridge had been seeing more action than usual; two werewolves in the space of three days and twice that many vamps, so they’d been told to step up patrols in the area.

For most of the guys on the street it was chance to show off – to them, it was about who could bag the most undead and with the most “style”; Rolson was one of the few that seemed to care more about the job than the killing.

A nod from his partner told him it was time to go, and Barry made his was to the waiting squad car, holstering his gun as he went. The first time they’d come up against a ‘wolf he’d drawn his Chastiser just like they’d told him in training, and Rolson had torn him up one side and down the other.

“Use that thing if you have to," Rolson had said through clenched teeth, “not because they told you to. If you’ve got the range, draw and fire – don’t get me killed out here, First.”

Rolson hadn’t mentioned the incident again, but Barry had been very careful to leave his Chastiser at his hip.

Once they were both seated and safe behind the bulletproof glass of the car, Rolson pulled a small pad from the center console and made a quick notation. He kept his Kill List meticulous and accurate, a testament more to his ability to do his job than the size of his ego. Trammel had made the right choice in picking the tall Second as a training officer, at least from where Barry was sitting.

“Another one,” Barry tried to keep his voice steady, but actually seeing the undead in person was a whole different ballgame than having instructors dressed up in foam suits and growling at him from across a gym floor, “what the hell does this mean?”

He’d been told vamps and ‘wolves liked to congregate wherever there were pockets of concentrated unholy energy, invisible disturbances in the normal order of things that humans would perceive as “creepy” but drew the undead like moths to a hellflame.

“Mean?” Rolson’s voice was soft in the car, but it carried the confidence that came with experience. “It means there’s a bubble here, Howe.”

“Yeah, but,” Barry hesitated – his time on the streets amounted to little more than a month, but from what others in his training class were telling him, the amount of action he’d seen was far out of the ordinary, “there are just so damn many of them. More than usual.”

“Usual,” Rolson said, and Barry could hear the amusement in his voice, “more than usual. Really, Howe? Is that your considered opinion? From your years of long experience?”

Barry shifted in his seat; he hadn’t spent long as a Deacon, but that didn’t mean he was completely green – he’d done four years with the sheriffs in his home town before coming to the big city. “My experience doesn’t really matter – there are more undead here than there should be. I’ve looked at the daily reports, same as you. This is one of the biggest spikes we’ve seen in a while.” He turned from scanning the darkened streets to look directly at Rolson. It was a breach of protocol; Firsts were supposed to always be “eyes out” in the car, but the Second needed to know he meant business.

Rolson met his gaze for a moment and then his mouth curved up in a small smile, tugging at the long scar on the side of his face. “Not bad, First. At least you can read the dailies well enough to know a spike from your own ***. Most can’t.” He pointed a thin finger out toward the bridge. “Now get your eyes back where they belong.”

His point made, Barry went back to scanning the pavement in front of the car. The undead could move faster than he’d ever believed and even parked in the open, a werewolf or vampire would be able to cover the distance to their car in a matter of seconds.

“It’s about that ‘wolf, isn’t it?” Rolson asked softly, and Barry nodded. The Second had seen what happened, even if he didn’t understand it either. Two weeks ago, their first call at the bridge and a shaggy brown ‘wolf had run them down, cornering Barry and cutting him off from Rolson.

There had been a moment of awful silence, of horrifying realization that his throat was going to be torn out and spit on the ground like so much gristle, and then the thing had actually spoken.

“He comes,” the creature had said, and then loped off into the darkness, leaving both Barry and Rolson stunned. They’d both heard it; these things were supposed to be brain-dead monsters, twisted human representations that had sold their souls to a lower power.

That ‘wolf had been different.

“Look, Howe,” Rolson spoke slowly, “we’re just grunts, you and I. You’re smarter than the average First I train and maybe I’m not your typical Second, but they don’t pay us to think. They pay us to keep people safe, to keep the streets clean,” he drew his Chastiser and thumbed the button, black spikes springing into view, “to kill.”

Barry grunted; somehow, that didn’t feel like enough.

- D

Story #59 - A New Blade

A New Blade

The glimmering steel length made a small “shhht” sound as it slipped into the scabbard at his waist. Along with a pair of patched leather breeches, a food-stained shirt and gloves that would have been appropriate on a street beggar, Tarq Cheemo looked like a man who had no business holding the Blade of Many Kings, let alone sheathing it in the jeweled prison that sat around his waist.

Of course, that was exactly what Tarq wanted. Merchants and nobles alike mistook him for far less dangerous than he was, something his employers always found to be of great use.

He was fortunate, after a fashion, to have been born ugly. Larger than normal eyes only served to highlight a too-small nose and thin lipped mouth, one that turned up at the left corner, giving Tarq the look a man always smiling – an oily, slippery smile that most glanced away from. In short, he was the perfect assassin.

Master Yoano hadn’t thought so at first, given that he’d tried to rob Tarq as he lay begging on one of the side streets of Undal. Even then, Tarq had been in good health but without a noble linage or family to rely on, he’d been forced to beg for his food and steal what he could. Yoano’s light touch had brought him out of the half-daze he commonly operated in and he’d managed to graze the man’s wrist before the master assassin had pulled away in shock.

He hadn’t had any choice in the matter – though he wouldn’t have chosen otherwise for himself. The training had been difficult, but Tarq had taken to it with a skill and ferocity that surprised even the eldest in the Order. On several occasions he had to be brought up just short of killing a fellow prospect, limbs straining and face caught in a snarl as his trainers held him back. Weakness was death as far as Tarq was concerned and should be punished as such. Losing a battle meant you were weak, unprepared, and if you died than so much the better; the world was removed of one more piece of useless chaff.

Glancing down at the still-twitching body of King Menos the Third, Tarq suppressed a small surge of pleasure at killing such a well-known figure. Much of what Yoano and the other Masters taught him he already knew – mercy was foolish, compassion was useless and fear was death – but control was something they were able to give him that he had never been able to manage on his own. A combination of meditation, physical disciple and repeated beatings for the slightest failure had given him the ability to calm himself almost instantly, to retreat to a flat grey place where only the mission remained.

A small sound outside the King’s chambers told him the guards had finally arrived, alerted by the two well-hidden bodies he had left behind. They were slow and lazy, even for the best in the Kingdom, but could not fail to notice that two of their number had gone missing as the night wore on. Their search had given him the time he needed to slip in and meet with the King.

He smiled; “meet” was perhaps not the best term to use as he was not one to speak to his prey before they met their end. They were no more than pawns in a game, orders from above that Tarq was responsible for carrying out. Gripping the hilt now at his hip, Tarq had to admit that this job had proven to be more attractive than most. The Order always specified that anything on the body of the dead was property of the killer, and once he had seen the sword sheathed at the King’s bedside he knew he had to possess it. It was a simple matter; he had simply made the King think he had a chance, given him a moment of warning to jump up and pull the sword from its resting place, and then killed him in one swift strike.

Sprinting out the open doorway, Tarq took a running jump from the King’s balcony and gracefully descended the five stories to the ground, landing solidly in a large pile of hay he had arranged for just this purpose. Distant shouts could be heard from above as he disappeared into the alleyway; cries for a King that had been murdered in cold blood.

…

The Blade had moved. Tarq was sure of it.

His hovel contained only three items, each of which had a specific function. He ate at the table, slept in the bed and urinated in the chamber pot. Nothing else was necessary; anything else could be tied to him. Under the floorboards lay riches uncounted, gold coins and gems he’d been paid for ten years of service to the Order. None of it mattered.

The Blade had been left on the table, rather than stuffed under the boards with everything else. There was something about it; its bluesteel length, its silvered handle, that made it impossible to put away, impossible to ignore.

Now, it was moving.

He had placed it directly in the center of the table, hilt outward, three days ago. In that time, Tarq had done nothing but sleep, replenishing his body after an intense two weeks. Now, the Blade lay partly over the edge of the table, sliding dangerously toward its own tipping point.

He’d moved it several times, always setting it back to the exact center of the table but each time he looked it had shifted, always getting closer. Closer to him.

Finally, Tarq reached his limit.

“Blade, stop!” He cried out; it was foolish, but it worked. The legendary artifact quivered and seemed to root itself to the table, a fact he confirmed by stepping forward and trying to lift it away with no success.

“Blade, come free!” Tarq shouted and it did, swinging easily off the table as if it had no weight.

The legends were true; whispered stories of souls trapped within the Blade, answering the bearer’s call. Their origin was unknown – a dark power, perhaps, or a bargain brokered with demons themselves?

Tarq knew, now, what they were: the souls of Kings themselves.


- D

Story #58 - The Reminder

The Reminder

It was the white of the doctor's coat that first caught his eye, new as he was to the world of the sight. It was a bright white, the white of man who took a great deal of pride in his clothing and his office, a pristine covering free of the host of bodily fluids that a doctor normally encountered.

It was also well-fit, with a perfect stretch across the shoulders and just the right length at the arms, showcasing what could only be described as the “perfect” doctor, or so Roy Lazur had decided some twenty-five years after their first meeting. So far as Roy knew, Dr. Tyson was still practicing somewhere out in New Jersey, though the man had never known just how much of an impression he'd made on Roy.

Why would he? Men weren't supposed to remember their own birth, let alone the cleanliness of the coat the doctor was wearing at the time.

Roy could.

Roy remembered everything.

It wasn't a visual or mental assault as many who wondered about having perfect memory thought it would be; instead, it was more like a series of video clips that Roy could call up anytime he wanted to and sift through. Like a giant Google in his head, he needed only to think of a search term and whole list of possibilities would pop up, allowing him to pick and choose the moment he wanted to view. They were time-stamped as well, though not in a system that would make sense to someone outside Roy's frame of reference. Each clip, each moment felt different, and based on that feeling alone Roy could tell how it old it was, how far back it stretched. What had consistently amazed him over the years was the clarity of even his most distant memories.

At first, he'd been worried he could ruin them, like a VHS tape played too often, but many of his favorites – his first kiss, the third time he'd had sex and telling off his old boss – were still as clear and fresh as ever.

Of course, not all was well in the world of Roy, stemming largely from the fact that significant stimuli in his environment could prompt a memory whether he wanted it or not. Most people he knew went through the same thing to a lesser degree – the smell of perfume might bring up the face of an old lover, a sharp scream might dredge up a painful car accident – but for Roy it was as if he was there all over again, touching, feeling, smelling the events as they unfolded.

Roy was tired.

He'd tried all the meds, gone to self-help classes and even meditated in hopes of gaining more control over random memory eruption, but nothing had worked, and he was stuck will a head full of useless recollections about techniques that held no scientific merit.

“Last chance, Mr. Lazur. We're obligated to offer it to all memo-wipe patients before their first session, in case they've suddenly reconsidered. Do you want me to stop?” A white-coated lab tech's voice broke his recall; he knew something had set him off.

“No,” he said, waving for the young man to continue. Not much older than Roy himself, the tech carried himself like he knew what he was doing. Even if he was the newest kid at the company, Roy would never know, and there was comfort in that.

The tech placed a small metal cap over each of Roy's ears and hooked a cable up to each one, then ran them to the center of his head and down his spine. Coming around to the front of the chair the young man took his own seat at a console opposite Roy and shot him an apologetic look.

“I'm sorry, sir, but I'm obligated to list the risks again before I proceed. Company policy.” Roy nodded quickly – better to just get it over with than fight about it.

“First, some discomfort will occur as memories are erased. The amount varies with the intensity of the memories stored as well as their number.” Great, thought Roy, this is going to hurt like hell. Still, it would be worth it.

“Second, we cannot guarantee that a full wipe will take place. A basic warranty is available on all treatments for a second session at half price within six months. Finally,” the tech hesitated for a moment – these companies always left the worst until the last, “while you should be able to start forming new memories immediately after the treatment is over, we are not liable for any inability, lack of clarity, oddities, fractured minds, or death.”

Roy smiled; he'd take it all, if it meant he could be free. “That's fine. I agree. Let's get on with it.”

The other man nodded – he knew Roy's patience was wearing thin and he'd satisfied any legal obligation the company had in making sure patients knew the risks. His hand went to one of the many dials in front of him. At first, Roy didn't feel anything but a slight tingling in his spine, one that slowly moved up to settle just behind his earlobes. It was actually pleasant, in its way, a kind of dancing “pins and needles” that had him bouncing in his chair.

The tech pulled a lever and Roy screamed, every pin seeming to erupt in fire and burrow its way into his brain.

…

Roy's vision cleared, the image resolving into man in white standing above him, and Roy twitched hard to the side - he screamed, pins seeming to erupt in fire and burrow their way into his brain.

Slowly, his vision cleared and he saw a small room, a console and chair opposite him – and he screamed, pins erupting in fire and burrowing into his brain, writhing there as he shook violently in his seat.

Raising his head, Roy felt as though he'd been awake for hours. Where the hell was he? What was going on?

His vision clearing, he looked around the empty room, decorated only with a small poster on the wall. “Don't regret,” it said, “forget!”

Roy screamed, and pins of fire burrowed into his brain, tearing him up from the inside out.

- D

Story #57 - Dying And What Not To Expect

Dying And What Not To Expect

Dying wasn't supposed to be like this, or so I'd been told. I mean, no one's really prepared to go no matter what line they feed you but when it comes at the hands of some psycho you've never met and you're just past the three decade mark, going is about the last thing on your mind.

First up: it hurts.

I think the guy used a knife, but all I really know is that there was a twisting sensation in my guts and down I went, kicking at the air and chopping out a few brief bleats for help before the pavement met the back of my head and it all went black.

Silence, right? The silence of the grave or maybe a softly glowing light, accompanied by a too-perfect harmony of chorused angels? Not so much.

And no, not Hell either, no demons rising up from ground to swallow my soul or the dark one himself pointing with cloven finger to whisk me away.

Pain, darkness and then light again, light like the kind you'd have if you were looking out your own eyes except – and it takes you a minute – you can't seem to control them. In fact, nothing is under your control, nothing is the way you expect it to be and you panic; you try to cry out but you can't, and you start to have a nice secondary freakout, owing to the fact that well, guess what sweetheart, you've just been killed. Murdered, more accurately.

Of course, that's when I realized – that's when it all sunk in, hit home, whatever metaphor works best for you. I was looking down, through some alien set of eyes, and guess what I was seeing? Me.

There was a period of complete madness after that, I'll admit.

***

When I “woke up” the second time, my eyes seemed to work they were supposed to and I was, surrounded by beings that looked suspiciously like angels. No wings were fluttering but we were indoors, so I took a wild guess that they were like hats – you took them off or put their feathered goodness away when you were inside.

The two men at my bedside, though, had all the other characteristics of angels; the too-perfect bodies, slightly cherubic faces and of course the white robes.

Sorry, let me be clear: the WHITE robes.

We're not talking the kind you bleach to get this white or the kind that just came from the store and isn't yet sullied by whatever blend of perspiration you create. We're talking about whiter-than-thou, blazing pure, you wish you owned clothes this white, white. If there hadn't been sunlight streaming in from an open window I was fairly certain these two could have lit up the room all on their own.

“Welcome, Brain,” the one on my left said. I almost responded with the obligatory “how do you know my name” but had just enough brains left in my head to let that one slip by. Judging on appearances – and smell, since these two were as fresh as daisies – I'd ended up somewhere that wasn't exactly lacking on information.

“We know this is going to be hard for you to accept, but you're dead,” he continued, face a perfect mix of sorrow and anticipation.

“I know,” I said flatly, “I got to see my corpse twitching through my killer's eyes.”

“What?” The other one asked sharply and I turned my head, but not before I caught the expression from the first one that had been speaking – he hadn't expected this. “That's not possible.”

“It is.” I made sure it was a declarative statement. Sure, I'd been murdered in an alley, transported to my killer's body and ended up here, but that didn't mean I was going to pretend I didn't know what had happened. I was sure, and that was that.

My companions were not convinced, of course, and took the route of ignoring my statement and bustling me out of bed and onto my feet, in the process bringing my attention to the fact that I now wore a similar white robe to their own, though of a shade much closer to gray. Guess I hadn't earned anything brighter.

***

The next two “days” were a mess; heaven or whatever the place wanted to call itself operated on a mostly day/night time-line and my two guides – Chris and Charles – always left me when the sun went down. As soon as that happened, however, I found myself twisted up and out of my robed form and placed back down behind the eyes of the man I was sure had brutally murdered me in the alley. He seemed to be a night owl – no surprise, given his nature – but he didn't actually manage to kill anyone else while I was down there with him, though not for lack of trying.

From my end, I could do nothing to stop him or influence anything he did; I was just a passenger in his head, along for the ride. I did learn that his named was Michael and that he lived in an apartment building not far from my own, but that was about it. Each morning when he fell into an exhausted slumber on the single mattress in his bedroom, I'd find myself back “upstairs” and with C&C knocking on my door.

Of course, I was starting to get a little testy, so I told them again what was going on.

“It's not supposed to happen that way,” said Chris, the more talkative of the two and the one that had woken me up, “it just isn't.”

Supposed to didn't mean “couldn't” and I told him that – not with a particular mind toward courtesy, either.

“I want a meeting with Him,” I said it with no intention of backing down, and they both drew in a sharp breath. From what I'd learned, everyone met Him eventually, but it required a period of good behavior and “fitting in” before it was allowed. My argument was that this was a special case – I had special circumstances.

More to shut me up, I think, than because they believed me, the two engineered a meeting with the big Him and off I went to his domain – after four nights more of hanging around in a head I had no business being in and couldn't wait to get out of. I was displeased, to say the least.

I went hot under the collar, ready to tell Him just what I thought, but he stopped me with a raised hand as I got twenty feet from the simple chair he was sitting in. Funny – he didn't look like much, just an older guy in white button-up shirt and slacks, short hair trimmed neatly and bare feet resting in the grass.

“I hear Micheal’s been giving you trouble, Brian,” he said. He had one of those soft voices, one of those ones just filled with power you didn't want to mess with, so I nodded quickly instead of opening my mouth.

He sighed. “He was always the most troubled of my Sons. Sit, and tell me what's he's done this time.”

- D

Story #56 - Hardwood

Hardwood

The blood in his veins seemed to drop sharply in temperature as she walked by, then spike again as she crossed to the other side of the room, stockinged feet tapping out muffled rhythmic thumps on the hardwood floor. This was the difficulty in marrying a girl so stubborn; he couldn't help but love her, but damned if she didn't make him angry sometimes.

Today he wasn't even sure what he'd done wrong. They'd been having a normal dinner, or as normal as it got around here when he asked a question about her work. Long ago, he'd learned that most such questions were either ignored or the answers given bore little resemblance to the nature of the query, but today was different; something was wrong and he knew it. He could tell.

The question was simple enough, even if he couldn't remember the exact words that had tripped off his tongue to apparently assault her ears. He had to believe such had happened, that perhaps they carried a poison sting or sharp-tipped barb, to make any sense of her response. Standing, she'd pushed her chair began and begun a slow loop of the room, hands on hips and nose high in the air. Between asking him just “what he thought he meant” with such a question, she shot him looks of varying emotional engagements, though none of them appeared to be pleasant.

She was impossible to deal with when she got like this; a raging tempest that had to be endured rather than conquered for his night to go anywhere approaching well. He could fight, certainly, stand up for himself and what had been merely spousal concern at her stress but it wouldn't end well. Too stubborn to sleep on the couch, he'd end up back to back next to her in bed, a cold wall of silence neatly dividing them and soaking the room in a stomach-turning saturation of stress. Neither of them would sleep.

Lithe arms went crossed as she completed another circuit of the room, though she hadn't spoken in at least five such laps. Usually, she let fly with logical quips about whatever she was feeling; hardly the perfect way on his part to get his wife to open up but at least questions got her moving, got her talking, even if it was an outburst at the “insensitive” nature of what he'd said.

From the few words she had spoken this evening the problem seemed to lie around his desire to know more about her work. Honestly, he'd given up caring what she did a long time ago and had just wanted to know what was making her so sad, what was drawing her away from him each and every week. He'd expended all of the energy he had searching for the true nature of her work – she wasn't a hooker or a spy and he had enough friends in the Federal building to know that she was no illegal immigrant. At a certain point he'd resigned himself to the fact that she was who she was and that he would simply have to get used to it.

Some days, though, were harder than others, and he wasn't about to be put off tonight, cold looks and distant bed or not. He was going to get through to her.

“I don't know what your problem is,” he said flatly, almost aggressively, and she stopped in her tracks, “I just wanted to know if you were OK, to see if there was anything I could do to make your day better – like a good husband should - and now I'm being punished for it. Rae, what is going on? You don't have to tell me what you do – but please, tell me what's wrong!” His voice warbled on the last bit; he knew that logical presentation of facts would do the most to get her attention, but this was more to him than just logic.

“Walt,” her voice was low and soft, as calm a tone as he'd ever heard from her in this state, “please don't. Please don't ask me any more questions. I know you're just trying to help, but please...I can't. I can't!” The inflection at the end drew his attention; unless they were actively creating a a dual-backed monstrosity in the middle of their bed, he rarely her her tone deviate from the straightforward and the calm.

He was getting to her.

Standing, he moved across the room to her and opened his arms, expecting her to back away or throw up a hand to stop him. Instead, she merely held her ground and waited, green eyes chilled but curious at his approach. He encircled her small form quickly and put one hand to her head. How could such a small form seem so large, so imposing when they were separate? She needed love and protection just like anyone else.

She was rigid and cold beneath in his arms but he felt a pulsing in his chest, a spreading warmth that traveled down his stomach and into his legs. Together, they would get through this. Together, they would find a way.

“I love you,” she whispered, “and I'm so sorry.” Sorry? He stepped back; tried to, at any rate, but her arms had locked around him, crushing him to her and preventing his escape. Another bloom of heat blossomed, this time in his lower abdomen and he shuddered. What had she done?

“You were never the target, Walt,” her voice ghosted through the still air in the room, “but I've got my orders and I don't have a choice. If you found out, if I told you...if I became emotionally attached...”

Legs turned to jelly gave way as he crashed down, slipping to the floor through her arms and oozing onto its cherry-wood surface. They had picked the color together a year ago, one of the only things they had ever both liked, both agreed on.

It hid the color of blood remarkably well.

- D

Story #55 - Dream Cleaver

Dream Cleaver

The hackles on the back of Adrian's neck raised.

Until that moment he hadn't ever felt his hackles raise, let alone knew what caused them to do so but the feeling was unmistakable, like someone was trying to pull him upward by the fleshy confluence of his shoulders but without enough strength, resulting in middling discomfort mixed with a feeling of “what the hell was that?”.

He'd love to say that he sat “bolt upright” in bed like people do in movies and on TV, but things don't often work like that and never had for him. Instead he lurched up and to the side, managing to clip his cat in the side of the head with his elbow, let out a distinctly un-manly screech and then came to partial rest panting as the cat look at him from the floor with an offended expression as he tried to keep his teeth from chattering. Something had scared the hell right out of him and though he didn't much care for the hell when it was in him, he'd like it back – this wasn't pleasant at all.

A few moments of deep breathing brought his lungs back under his control; he hadn't really been asleep yet, just drifting off, so whatever had brought him back from the brink had come at the worst possible time. Disjointed and disoriented, he couldn't pinpoint what had frightened him so much but couldn't shake the feeling either.

Slowly, carefully, he leaned across the bed and turned on his table lamp, being wary of the cat on the floor. Sammy was a good girl, most of the time, but strange noises and odd movements excited her, and that included those that went along with trimming her razor-sharp claws. She could be quite the fluffy white ball of terror when she wanted to be.

The lamp snapped into brightness and Adrian peeled his gaze around the room, looking for anything that might be out of place, that might be other than it should, but everything seemed as it was when the light had been turned off. An overfilled clothes basket still held court behind the door and functioned as second bed for Sammy when the mood struck, his not-quite-the-cheapest window shade hung, nearly slipping, from its metal contact points, and his battered dresser sat firmly against one wall, covered in dusty mementos and items of memory he'd managed to forget. Nothing, then, was out of order. The blind had been his first choice as a culprit; the thing had a habit of falling down every time the weather turned warm, but it remained just where it was supposed to be – in the window.

His house alarm hadn't gone off and he was sure he'd locked all the doors and windows; some called him overly-concerned, but he just considered it pragmatic. If thieves were coming in, they were coming in regardless, but his security would buy him time to make a call and maybe get the hell out.

Although – he reached quickly for the phone and breathed a sigh of relief when a crackling dial tone met his ear – it appeared no one was so desperate to rob or maim him that they'd cut his phone line.

It was the deepening shadow in the room that drew his attention and he threw a look at the lamp. The department store bargain was still on, filament humming softly, but was growing dimmer by the second. Odd – these things usually burnt out rather than decaying, but perhaps it had reached the end of its time and was going out with some dignity.

At ten watts or so the thing just stopped. Still on, it covered the room in a useless half light that played tricks on his mind, creating new shadows layered on top of old and birthing twisting gray specters in lonesome and unused corners. Even Sammy took on an odd, almost unholy cast in the light.

Swinging out of bed Adrian slipped on a pair of cotton pants and kicked his feet into slippers, then cautiously waded out into the hallway arm first and groping along the wall to the switch. Fingers found it and flicked, bringing the sixty-watt pleasure of a compact, carpeted walkway with two doors to each side.

With a quick sigh of relief he stepped forward, only to be met by a dimming that surrounded him, deepening the hallway's confines into unfamiliarity.

What the hell was going on?

Fear struggled with reason and formed an uneasy alliance; he moved quickly throughout the house, throwing light switches on steady feet while his mind had itself a nice old-fashioned freak out. Two minutes and he was done, every switch flipped and every light darkened to a single pinpoint of its former glory; none burnt out, but each only glowing with ten watts or less.

Creeping to the front door he saw a darkened block; no streetlights blazed in the dark November night and not a single other house had a light on of any kind, be it porch, bedroom, or kitchen. Blackout.

Lightout.

Adrian began to shake, hackles rising and falling in waves that sent his stomach to turning.

He knew full well there was one light in the house he hadn't tried, one switch that hadn't yet been flipped. He didn't mind his basement during the day but at night thoughts of hidden burial chambers or old church sites came to mind and he high-tailed it out of there in favor presumed upstairs safety.

One deep breath and a quick tug on the door revealed a long hallway leading down to a sharp curve, or would have if there was any light to see it. With a trembling hand, he reached out and thew the switch he knew was there.

Stunning whiteness faded to dampening yellow and he saw it; a drooling mastiff twice his size, crouched at the bottom of the staircase, its own hackles literally standing on end, a deep growl coming from its throat. A poor schoolyard experience had instilled an irrational fear of the beasts in him at a young age and though he loved cats, dogs were simply not an option.

Fear and reason had no chance to come to an agreement; his feet remained rooted as the primal part of his mind took over, dooming him to his fate.

The mastiff hunched down, powerful muscles taut beneath its elastic skin, and it leapt.

***

Adrian did sit bolt up in bed this time, heart pounding and sweat soaking his bedsheets. The dream was getting worse each night, and each time he had no inkling he'd had it before. Specialists had done nothing, and drugs made him too dull to work. Beside him, Sammy purred quietly, only mildly irritated at his terror.

Sighing, he lay his head back down and rolled to a new spot on the bed; he was hard on bedsheets, harder than any man should be but he would deal with them in the morning. Perhaps the dream wouldn't come again.

Uncounted time passed and his consciousness retreated under the soothing waves of his cat's contralto tones.

Then, just before he drifted off to sleep, an oddity, a vocal trick, surely, but something real and present nonetheless.

A growl, from that sweet little kitty.

Story #54 - Locked In

Locked In

Jesse scratched off another day on the calender; one down, an untold billion or so to go. It was hard to get up in the morning anymore. The hope had been that he would get out some day, be free to go where he wanted when he wanted but he always seemed to be going the wrong direction.

It was the walls, he decided, that were getting to him the most. The same white-washed gray day in and day out, never a change, nothing he could do to make it feel more like home. Not that he wanted to call it that; nobody wanted to end up here, and he'd like to think that had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Really, it hadn't been his fault.

He sighed as the picture fuzzed again, then leaned forward and slammed one hand down on the hard plastic top of the television. The thing was from the 80's, at least, maybe even further back and only got the four basic channels – when the weather was good. He shouldn't complain, he knew – convincing the warden to put them in for “good behavior” had been hard enough, and if too many guys abused them they might just get taken away.

Shifting in his seat, Jesse wondered if maybe a cushion could be next on his reward list for good behavior, but he doubted it. The warden was very specific about what he let in and out of Smithshold, and a lone request for a better way to sit wasn't something he was going to take seriously, not that Jesse had anyway to communicate with the man directly. They were on different levels, he and the warden, the big man in his fancy office, overseeing one of the nation's most effective prisons and Jesse, wallowing in the muck with everyone else. Sure, everyone else down here could commiserate, but that didn't do much good.

At least he wasn't one of those poor bastards in solitary; he had no idea how they made it through in there, even for a day. Maybe they had stronger minds than he did – maybe it was the promise of something better, of getting out of here someday, getting back to a wife and kids or a girlfriend that kept them from the screaming habdabs. Even walking by the hallway was bad enough; he didn't know what he'd do if he was ever forced to go inside.

His own thoughts wouldn't be much protection in there; likely as not they'd come looking for him, looking to squeeze him out of his own mind for all the dumbass mistakes he'd made and times he'd screwed things up. His story wasn't out of the ordinary – talking to the other guys had shown him that much – but that didn't make it hurt any less. A broken family, a kid he never saw, money troubles from here to the butt-end of time, he had it all and it weighed heavily on him, some days.

Others, he just sat, starting at the TV and wondering if he was ever going to get out.

The commercial playing on the screen showed a happy couple, arms around each other and enjoying a beach sunset somewhere too perfect to be real. Overly white teeth and faces cracked from grins pierced him, made him feel all the more keenly what he lost and long for what he'd never had. He wasn't a bad guy; not as bad as a lot of the guys in here, anyway, and he deserved better than he'd been given. Sure, he'd made some bad choices; hell, he was even willing to take the blame for some of this whole mess being his fault. If that wasn't the act of a stand-up guy then what was? Didn't that count for something? Didn't that make a difference? It should. It had to. Right?

An inkling slipped into mind. Maybe there was a way out. Maybe. If he just thought about it hard enough. It should be simple, really – he was a bright enough guy. Everyone always told him so, always encouraged him to get out there and follow his dreams. What had happened? Where did he go wrong?

Oh yeah – her.

He pushed her face out of his mind. She wasn't going to distract him this time with her bobbing curls and off-center smile. They'd told him not to marry her, told him she'd do wrong by him, and he should have damn well listened, should have gotten out. She'd twisted him up, chomped down hard and spat him out to the pavement – and now he was here.

Not this time!

She wasn't going to get away with it any longer. All he had to do was this one thing, this first step, and the rest would be easy. How hard could it be to get out of Smithshold, really? He'd heard about other guys doing it, a few that had made it upstate and one or two that went out east. It was possible; it had potential.

It wasn't going to work.

The thought hit him hard and he slumped back down, his sudden burst of energy gone. He'd never be able to start fresh, to get around what he owed. They'd chase him, he knew that; the government was relentless like that, going after small timers like him when they had so many bigger fish to fry.

Alarm bells went off outside and he stood, resigning himself to his fate. Another inspection, another day wasted. Another day spent under the watchful eye of Uncle Sam, just trying to figure out a reason to keep going, to keep living. Frankly, Jesse was running out.

The door banged open. “Jesse, let's go!” Al, white shirt soaked with sweat, rushed off down the corridor once he saw that Jesse was awake.

Slowly, Jesse stood and cinched the belt around his waist, making sure his gun was seated properly in its holster.

One more down.

- D

Story #53 - Taxman

“So...why exactly am I here again?” Jim's voice sounded muffled to his own ears in the padded office. It had its own door and even a window, so he couldn't really see the need for such thick foaming on every available wall. He knew that taxmen were a little nuts, but this seemed more like the “asylum” kind than the “funny kid up the block” variety.

“Mr. Radcliffe,” the taxman spoke in a clipped tone, as if every syllable was a piece of income he'd have to report and he'd better note them all, “you are here being audited because you have failed to fill out form 37-B.219, section 4a, three times out of the past four years.”

Jim shook his head. “Look, that doesn’t make any sense to me. I've got an accountant, he does my taxes every year – Jack Bennett – why aren't you talking to him?”

The taxman – Tudai, his desk nameplate said – didn't bother to answer right away but instead grabbed a sheaf of paper from the top of a large stack. Most of Tudai's desk and half of his floor were covered in similar stacks of paper, some topping four or five feet and all looking like a good gust of wind would blow them over. Depending on what the taxman had to say, Jim might consider reducing the height of a number of them as a show of his displeasure.

A few moments passed while Tudai scanned the sheet. Finally he spoke, though his eyes didn't leave the high-bond printed paper. “Mr. Bennett is not responsible for these taxes, Mr. Radcliffe, you are. Form 37-B.219, section 4a is very clear – a simple declaration of intent to own and operate a business that has a reasonable profit making capacity with in the year specified and has an expectation to continue beyond the current tax calendar's duration.”

That didn't sound so bad – or that hard to fill out, all things considered – why had Bennett missed it?

“In addition, it contains a simple chart requesting a detailed analysis of all goods in an operating retail business including their height, weight and physical dimensions.” Tudai had a droning sort of voice, the kind that would put a man to sleep as easily as white noise from a softly humming fan, and Jim had to force himself to pay attention.

“Wait! What?” Words fell out as Jim's mind caught up with Tudai's words. This was nonsense! “You wanted me to weigh and measure everything in my store, every goddamned year?”

“No,” Tudai's voice was soft as he finally broke his gaze away from the page, “we wanted you to report said weights and measures.”

Jim kept his temper damped with an effort. He paid Bennett to deal with this nonsense because he hated taxmen and their rules, hated that a system for funding military operations had somehow become a way for an honest guy to get locked up for life. Didn't seem fair. Wasn't fair, really, but there was nothing he could do about it – which was why he hired Bennett!

“Fine,” he said, keeping his tone soft and squishy like the taxman, “what do I owe you? Will you take a cheque?” He forced a smile onto his face; maybe these suckers wouldn't notice if he post-dated.

“No, Mr. Radcliffe, we will not take a cheque, and the balance owing is,” Tudai grabbed for another sheet on his desk, sending one of the stacks into a ponderous swing that had no business righting itself on the wooden surface - figured that the taxman would be lucky, “one million, eight hundred thousand dollars and sixty eight cents.” Tudai glanced at the wall clock, which had just passed noon. “Sixty nine cents, rather.”

“WHAT?” The walls' extensive padding made a sudden horrific sense to Jim – this was utter madness. “Prove it, you leech! You thief – show me where you got that number – show me where it says I have to pay! That's three years of my life – three years I paid every red cent I owed you!”

Tudai shrugged. “I have all of the calculations right here, Mr. Radcliffe, if you'd care to see them. As for authority, the government has seen fit to grant us – special measures, shall we say – when dealing with amounts so large.”

The two bigger-than-average security guards in the lobby took on a host of potential functionality – Jim should have known better than to walk in alone. His shoulders slumped. There wasn't much he could do but see exactly what Tudai was willing to offer.

“Alright, taxman,” he said slowly, “what's your game?”

“No games, Mr. Radcliffe,” Tudai smiled - a thing more tooth than trite, “we are simply here to collect what is owed.”

Suited arms went wide, tightened smiles seemed to be everywhere as paper paffed and flew through the air. Tudai was gone.

Tudai was close.

Too close.

***

“I don't know, Jim - just one of those things modern medicine can't explain, I expect.” Doc Robertson was about the oldest sawbones the town had ever known, but he was still one of the best. “Your annual test results are same across the board everywhere else, but somewhere along the way you lost out on three years,” a smile crossed his wrinkled face, “either that, or I made a mistake. Happens to us old people.”

Jim shrugged; he didn't feel the loss now and really, he'd never miss it.

His phone buzzed as he stood up and made his way out of the office.

Taxes done, the message said.

Good old Bennett always came through on time – he might have lost three years but at least he wasn't going to get audited; he never wanted to so much as meet a taxman in person if he could avoid it.

- D