Lucifer needs a favor.

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When I walked into my office break room, I’d been hoping that there’d still be a half-full pot of coffee sitting in the machine, maybe a couple extra donuts left over from the day’s lunch meeting. If I got unlucky, I figured that I might see Doris sitting at the flimsy Formica table on one of her many “breaks”, poring over the newspaper as if it contained more of the gossip that she loved sharing around the office.

What I wasn’t expecting to see, however, was a man in an elegant suit of pure blackness, sitting with his feet propped up on the table and a cell phone in his hand.

“Um, can I help you?” I asked, feeling strangely uncertain. Normally, I didn’t need to even try in order to project an aura of composure and competence – it just came naturally to me, I suppose. But in this moment, all of that ability seemed to desert me.

The man looked up at me, and grinned. “Ah, Alex. Good to see you.” Continue reading →

[AGttA] Chapter 8.4: The Summit

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Continued from Chapter 8.3, here.

Read it from the beginning, starting here.

Axiom 8: Adapt to setbacks.  

I stood on the top of Mount Megiddo, the fabled ground zero of the Apocalypse, the mountain foretold in Biblical legend.  The wind whipped around me, pulling at my tattered clothes, cutting through the layers of insulation and hitting like knives against my bare skin.

“Now what?” I asked out loud, even though the words were stolen away by the ever-blowing wind.

A little part of me had hoped that, when I got to the top of the mountain (the real summit, not the false one), I’d find a sign of some sort.  Of course, I was thinking more of a circle of stones with crackling energy swirling inside of it, although I would have happily settled even for a real life sign, maybe one that said something like “Click your heels together three times to go to Heaven”.  

But instead, I saw nothing but rocks and desolation, the mountain sloping down and away from me in all directions. Continue reading →

Just Like The Others

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XR-378 trundled along, its treads crushing dried clods of dirt into powder as it rumbled along the rough, badly maintained track.

Once, this track had been paved with smooth asphalt, a road flat enough for XR-378’s wheeled brethren to glide along. Now, however, that asphalt had long since cracked and been crushed down by the bots with treads, and those with wheels could no longer traverse this way.

XR-378 moved along without concern, however, one large claw held up to protect the item it had gathered. Its protocols gave clear instructions on what to do next, and it couldn’t think of anything but obeying. Continue reading →

“May you live in interesting times.”

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The heavy wooden door to Clancy’s Tavern opened up with a scrape, but none of the men sitting at their tables turned to look at the newcomer. Showing too much interest, they knew, was an easy way to get killed.

Instead, they kept their eyes locked firmly on their own drinks, and instead listened to the footsteps as the newcomer entered.

After all, there’s a lot that a man with a good set of ears can tell about someone, just from listening to their footsteps. Continue reading →

Happy Freedom Day!

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That’s right, it’s the Fourth of July!

In celebration of freedom, I’m giving myself a FREE PASS from writing a blog post today.  So, if you’re reading this… sorry!

Posts will resume on Wednesday.

Earth Strike

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There are, of course, no sounds in space. With no atmosphere to carry sound waves, the noises of a collision or explosion can’t propagate and spread.

So instead, Harrison only looked up when he caught the flash of light out of the corner of his eyes. Lifting his gaze from his equipment, his jaw dropped – but then, an instant later, it closed again as he shook his head in dismay.

“Come on, guys,” he groaned into the microphone mounted inside of his bulky space suit. “Can’t we do better than this?” Continue reading →

The Grand Gate

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Alain walked behind the cart, his steps slow and measured. Occasionally, the cart hit one of the many potholes in the road, sending dirty, rancid water splashing everywhere, but he anticipated these drops and moved just far enough aside to avoid the worst of the spray.

He’d walked this spot, behind his father’s cart, for two days now. This would be his first trip to the City, the first time that his father deemed him old enough to go along on the twice-yearly pilgrimage to sell their wares, to bring back the battered and scratched silver coins that would pay for the repairs to their little farm.

In Alain’s mind, the City was this mystical place, a wonderland where everything existed, and his father somehow know how to submit their humble wares to trade for the objects they needed. His father, a stout and doughy man named Cuthbert, Cuth to the others in his village, only returned with what was necessary – but one time, Mat’s dad, Singer, brought back a strange small box of crystal that produced wondrous tunes when a small crank in its side was turned. That tiny box filled Alain’s head with all sorts of ideas about what other incredible devices and sorcery might exist in the City. Continue reading →

[AGttA] Chapter 8.3: The Climb

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Continued from Chapter 8.2, here.

Read it from the beginning, starting here.

Axiom 8: Adapt to setbacks.

When I woke up, the lion was still there.  He yawned at me when I crawled out from beneath his paw, revealing incisors big enough to easily bite my entire face off, but didn’t seem inclined to attack me.

“Uh, hi,” I said to him.

He blinked huge, golden eyes at me, and then pushed his head forward.  For one terrified second, I thought that he was about to rip into me, but instead he tilted his face aside so that his cheek rubbed against my shoulder, and a low rumble drifted out of his mouth.

“Oh.  Right, cat.”  I reached up and tentatively, still a little worried that I’d draw back a bloody stump, scratched him along his big jaw.  The massive cat purred louder, tilting over to one side so that I could reach all the way under his chin. Continue reading →

The Tribal Protector

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The village chief stood at the entrance to the hut, fighting to keep his composure. He gazed into the darkness of the hut’s interior, fighting against his own reluctance to step past the threshold.

His hair was turning gray, and his back now bowed forward slightly, but the chief still trusted his ears. From behind him, he heard the sounds of the nightly fire, in the middle of his small village. His friends, family, laughing and chattering about their day, passing around the coconut filled with ayahuasca, taking small sips of the potent brew. He yearned desperately to return to them, to leave this solitary, small hut on the edge of his village alone.

Instead, he forced one last, deep breath into his lungs. He felt the little pull, the stitch in his side where, many years ago, a boar caught him with its tusks as it charged from the undergrowth.

The chief took a step forward, past the threshold of the hut and inside. Continue reading →

Night Express

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Sitting on the faded fabric of the seat, feeling the familiar rumble of the car rattling over the tracks rising up from beneath him, Richard finally let himself relax. The effort came slowly, and he had to force himself to take the first few shaking, unsteady breaths, but he felt his muscles slowly begin to unwind.

This was all he needed, he told himself. A few minutes to relax. He needed to stop thinking about it all, how it was all falling apart.

Just relax. Continue reading →