Elect

Elect II—2 Amazons, part 2 of 3

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

As Emily limped to her suite, her thoughts turned to Ms Maynard, her Earth Science teacher from last spring.  The woman was not like the other Professors.  She did not just hate the students.  She hated the whole human race and acted like she would not mind if everyone just died.  Emily wondered briefly why the woman came to mind.  She was trying very hard to forget that class.

Emily shook her head to clear her mind, but thoughts about her destiny kept bubbling up to the surface.  She decided that given the chance, this whole being elect business could make her paranoid.  She was seeing shadows around eye-witless news, professors Granger, Maynard and this new professor Orlov.  There might not be any shadows at all.  She took a deep breath even as something occurred to her that she had forgotten.  Pierce once mentioned that he had a younger brother.  And Doctor Zimmer, his maker was still missing.  Please, she prayed, don’t let them come back here.

zenobia-3“And why do you not want them to come back here?” A woman asked.  The woman was pacing Emily, and Emily did not even know it until the woman spoke.  It startled her, but in her mind she responded, because she did not want that kind of fight if she could help it.

“Yes, it is wise not to fight unless you must,” the woman agreed.  “But I thought you were afraid he would remind you too much of Pierce.”

“Yes,” Emily whispered her admission, but her mind mostly thought that she just wanted a quiet semester.  As far as it went, she told the reporter the truth.

“And I wish you could have a quiet semester too.”  The woman smiled and Emily stopped cold.  This woman was reading her mind.  “Sit,” the woman said, and Emily saw two chairs around a small table where there had been only grass.  She suddenly realized they were just outside her new dorm, but she knew she did not limp nearly that far.  She sat slowly because of her ribs, and saw a tall to-go cup on her side of the table.  “Chai Latte.”  The woman pointed to the cup and picked up a bottle of water for herself.

“Who are you?” Emily asked.

“Zoe,” the woman said, and added, “Yes I am real, and yes we are really here, not dreaming, and no I am not an angel.”  Zoe gave the answers even as Emily framed the questions in her mind.  “Honestly!” Zoe sipped her water and rolled her eyes just like Emily.  “Angels are sexless.  I can’t imagine it.”

Emily sipped her Chai Latte and examined the woman, and Zoe was all woman.  She was dressed in what looked like a toga, but more like a mini-skirt version.  The sleeves barely went beyond the shoulder and the neckline plunged more than necessary.  It was pure white besides, and clean, which at the least said something about the woman’s choice of detergent.  Zoe’s sandals tied up to her knees, and they were brown, a match for her light brown hair.  She also wore a choker with a small stone that Emily guessed was supposed to be an emerald.  The green stone matched the woman’s green, deep set eyes which were so piercing, Emily had to look away.  All the same, Emily put out her finger to touch the woman’s shoulder, just to be sure.

“There, feel better?” Zoe asked.

Emily nodded and got a question all the way out.  “So what do you want with me?”

“Here’s the thing.”  Zoe shifted in her seat so she could face Emily better.  “With all I have on my plate right now, what with the Kargill-Reichgo war starting up,” Zoe paused to point at the sky so Emily might guess that was something outer spacey. “And earth politics and international relations bottoming out.  Don’t get me started.  And Melanie fighting off dimensional interlopers, and poor Lockhart trying to take over after Bobbie retired.  And my little ones.  There is trouble in the ranks!  Who would have thought it in this late day and age?”  Zoe clicked her tongue.  “Well, it is more than a lot.  You see, I am not sure I can handle the revival of a real Amazon tribe right now.”

“I’m not sure I can either,” Emily admitted.

“But here is the thing,” Zoe repeated.  “There is something about this place, this campus that is hidden even from my sight.  If I had the time I would never let such a mystery go.  Alas, as my elect, you will have to figure it out.  You and your tribe will have three years to do it.”

“Your elect?”

“Of course, silly.  Who do you think elected you?”

“I thought it was all the ancient goddesses and stuff.”

zoe-1Zoe just looked at Emily and smiled before she spoke again.  “As my elect, you must be queen of the tribe, but you must learn that an Amazon queen never acts alone.  She listens to her counsel.  There are three to her left that face the darkness and three to her right that face the light.  On your left is the hunter, that is Jessica.  The spirit of Artemis is in her though she hardly knows it.  Beside her is the Sybil, your seer Amina.  She must learn it is not always wise to say everything she sees.  Closest to the darkness is your spell caster, Melissa.  I know her power is small, but she is the one always in most danger of falling into the dark.  Her rules are simple.  First, she should not practice her art against those who have no such power to defend themselves.  Second, she must never practice her art for selfish ends, not ever.”  Zoe shook her finger at Emily.  “All of you must do you own homework the old fashioned way and get a good education.  Am I clear?”  Emily felt the scolding in her gut, and nodded as Zoe sighed.  “Just like instructing my children, but then that was five thousand years ago.”

Emily swallowed.  “And what of the three that face the light?”

“To your right hand is your wise woman, Mindy.  She knows the lore, the legends and the ancient ways.  When you face something inexplicable, she is the one who can find a way to explain it.  Her stories are instructive as well.  Let her whisper in your ear.  Beside her is Maria, your healer, filled with the spirit of Eir, though she does not know it.  Every Amazon tribe needs a healer, and Maria has the drive and the smarts to become a great one.  And the last is your priestess, set a bit apart.  She is your Liaison with the source of all things, with the light, with me, and with the universe.  She will not only keep you morally grounded, but spiritually grounded as well if you let her.”

“But wait.”  Emily held up her left hand and counted.  “Jessica the hunter, Amina the Sybil, Melissa the witch.”

“Spell caster,” Zoe corrected.  “A much nicer term than witch, don’t you think?’

“Spell caster,” Emily repeated and held up her right hand.  “Then Mindy the wise and Maria the healer, but that is everyone.  Who is this priestess?”

“I will send her.  I got her reassignment rescinded.  She will be here for three more years with you.  Now I must go.”

“Go?”

ac-emily-7“Lead your tribe.  Solve my mystery.  Somewhere there is a door open to Avalon.  Creatures have escaped.  You met one.  The world is in danger of going mad, blah, blah, blah…”  Zoe disappeared.  She literally vanished and took the two chairs, the drinks and little table with her.  Emily fell hard on her butt in the grass.

“Hey!”  Emily instinctively reached for her broken ribs before she paused.  She stood and ran in place for a second.  She jumped up and down several times.  She Planted her feet and twisted her trunk to the left and right.  There was zero pain.  She was completely healed.  She could not help looking up to the sky and mouth her thoughts.  “Thank you.”

She only felt slightly surprised, and maybe a little disturbed, when she heard the words plain as day, “You’re welcome.”

Elect II—2 Amazons, part 1 of 3

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Emily got to the suite early on Wednesday and unpacked before the others arrived.  She was not too impressed.  There were three dorm rooms, a small common lounge area and a bathroom with two stalls, two sinks, two mirrors and a shower.  That was not going to be enough for six girls.  Emily shook her head.  It was still just a college dorm after all.

Everyone said be there at six.  They said they wanted to celebrate the beginning of a new school year, but Emily could not move that fast.  She was going to be late.  She had to visit Professor Schultz first and bring him up-to-date on her summer activities.

ac-heinrich-1Heinrich Schultz, history professor, was born in 1640, though he hardly looked over sixty.  He was a member of the council of fifty men from around the world that were raised up to keep a careful eye on the women known as the elect.  He told her last year that when the goddesses made the elect at the beginning of history—the so-called “one in a million” warrior women, they neglected to take into account human fallibility and weakness in the face of temptation.  The gods responded by making a small council of plain ordinary men but for the long life who could be activated and empowered for short periods of time to deal with things unseen by the goddesses—like an elect gone rogue.  Heinrich’s mere presence made Detective Lisa nervous, but Emily thought he looked like Santa Clause.  She kissed his cheek and thanked him again for her sword, and smiled when she left him.

Emily also smiled when she talked to her sister elect Lisa earlier in the day.  She was glad to hear that everything around Trenton and around the New Jersey State campus was quiet.  After freshman year, she needed a quiet semester.  Lisa had the good sense to only mention Pierce once, and that was to say she was there if Emily ever wanted to talk about it.  Emily did not want to talk about it, but she appreciated the offer and said so.

ac-latasha-2Emily made sure she talked to Latasha early as well.  Latasha was going to be a sophomore at the high school near the campus.  Emily felt it was important to encourage the girl in her schooling every chance she got.  God knew the girl got little encouragement from her family, friends and neighbors.  Sure, Latasha’s mother loved her well enough, and she had a couple of good friends in Keisha and Janet, but that was it.  She struggled against a terrible cultural headwind designed to keep her down and isolated, and isolation was especially dangerous for an elect.  Given her power, if Latasha was ever tempted to lash out, the consequences could be dire.  Lisa and Emily discussed it.  It was important for them to remind Latasha that she was not the only one, that she was not alone and that they were there for her no matter what.

Emily made a quick stop at the student center and her post box.  She found a note regarding the fall schedule.  They hired a teacher for Anatomy and Physiology, which was good because she needed that class, but they could only schedule the classes as night classes, so her schedule got changed.  The note from the new Professor, a man named Vladimir Orlov said he had other daytime obligations until the end of the year, but do not worry.  He was not a vampire.  Emily rolled her eyes.

She lifted her head and saw Ms Morgan Granger float by.  The woman now had seven hunks and two gorgeous women in her train.  Emily knew the woman was dabbling with Professor Hilde’s Jekyll and Hyde juice, but it was something she wanted to ignore.

When Emily looked toward the door, she saw a woman she only vaguely recognized.  She was prepared to ignore this woman too, but the woman went straight for her and even attempted to trap her by the mailboxes so she couldn’t escape.  The woman put out her hand to introduce herself.

ac-news-6“Courtney Chase, Channel 5, Eyewitness News.”

Emily opted not to shake the woman’s hand by putting her hand to her ribs instead.  “You surveying students?”

“You are Emily Hudson?  I understand you had quite a year last year, and I missed it all.”

Emily had to think about how to answer the woman.  The last thing she wanted was publicity, but then she was hoping for a dull, uninteresting year where she could actually focus on her nursing studies.  “You didn’t miss much, and I expect this year will be just as unexciting.”

“I heard the freshman ROTC got into some bad drugs.  Did you have to kill any of those young men?”

“Most of the freshmen transferred out.”  Emily shrugged.  “That’s all.  It happens.  We have a few sophomores in the class this year.”

“But what about the dead people walking around campus.  You were seen cutting off people’s heads.”

“Actually, there was a person last year who was into mass hypnosis, but she was taken care of by someone else.  It wasn’t me.”

“But I heard—.”

“You heard a bunch of nonsense.  This is a college campus, for crying out loud.  College kids do crazy things, but I am not sure any of them are newsworthy.  Excuse me.”  Emily squeezed past the woman and limped toward the door.

“How did you manage to get hurt?”  The woman seemed to notice for the first time.

“I fell off a dog.”

“You fell off a dog?”

“It was a really big dog.”

“Interesting.  I would love a camera interview.  Say, a week from Thursday, four o’clock so it is after classes?”

Emily stopped in the doorway.  She put on a big smile.  “You want to hear about my nursing classes?  That could be good.  Maybe we could encourage young people to consider going into nursing.  All projections say there will be a shortage of nurses in the near future.”

Courtney Chase, Channel 5, Eyewitness News frowned.  She did not have her cameraman with her.  She showed a thousand questions on her face, but all she said was, “Maybe later.”  Emily escaped.

She limped away from the center with her hand still around her middle.  Her chest was wrapped.  One of her lungs collapsed back when they first got her to the hospital, but she survived.  She did not doubt that she would.

###

Latasha felt good about being back in school even if Janet and Keisha were being dips about it.  She only had a couple of years to get her grades up to where she could go to Mercer Community and study Criminal Justice, Law Enforcement.  She had her heart set on the Police Academy and following in Detective Lisa’s footsteps.  Sadly, everything around her, including her friends dragged her down.  At least she got along well with her science teacher.

boston-5“Ms Riley, I thought you weren’t coming back after freshman year and, you know, the succubus incident.”  Latasha glanced at her friends.  They did not remember much about it.

“What suck-you-bus incident?” Keisha asked.

“You mean that time Mister Santos the bus driver tried to shoot you?” Janet asked.  Latasha just shook her head in response.

“That was my plan,” Ms Riley explained to Latasha.  “But things have changed.  Right now there is something going on in this community and I have been asked to stay for a while.”

“If there is something bad happening, Latasha could beat them up,” Janet offered.  Latasha gave Janet a mean stare before she looked again at her teacher.

“Something I should know about?” Latasha asked.  Latasha was not exactly sure who Ms Riley was except she knew the woman was no ordinary teacher.  Last year Latasha caught a glimpse of the woman all skinny with pointed ears kissing a man of the same description that she said was her husband.  Latasha was not sure what all that meant, but she knew Ms Riley was one of the good guys and that was all that really mattered.

“Right now all you need to know is your biology homework,” Ms Riley said with a smile, and that rather ended the discussion.  Once in the hall, Keisha had another thing to say.

“Why did she move up a grade with us?  Wasn’t it bad enough we had to have her last year for environmental science?”

With that word, Latasha had a moment of insight and stopped walking so the others stopped.  A year ago, she would have been right in there with Keisha, agreeing with the girl and badmouthing the teacher, but the truth was, Ms Riley was not only one of the good guys, she was a good teacher.  Sure, biology was going to be hard, but damn it!  Latasha was going to the Police Academy.  She was going to do something with her life and she was going to get ahead.  And maybe that meant she had to stop listening to her friends.  Maybe she had to close her ears to the whole culture in which she lived.  She did not know if she could do that, but she was going to give it her best try.

Latasha started to walk again and realized Keisha and Janet were talking about all of their teachers and classes in the most negative terms they could devise.  Staying out of it was not going to be easy.

When they got to the parking lot, Keisha pointed.  “Hey look, Bobby Thompson.”  She nudged Janet in the side.

Latasha looked, but all she saw was a drug deal going down.  “Hey!”  She shouted at the boys.  She started forward, but the boys noticed and ran off.  Latasha would have run after them.  Bobby Thompson appeared to be the one with the drugs, but Janet moved faster than Latasha thought possible for such a big girl and she got in front of Latasha to block Latasha’s way

“You leave him alone!”  Janet said with a wag of her head like her mother did when she meant to be obeyed.

“Bobby Thompson?  He’s dealing.”

Janet shook her head again and pouted her lips.  “I don’t care what he is doing.  You stay away from him.”

“Janet?”

“Janet is sweet on him,” Keisha stepped up.  She thought it was funny.

ac-lat-janetLatasha tried to talk sense.  “Janet, the guy is scum.”

“He is not scum to me,” Janet said.

“What, he was nice to you once?  He’s been nice to half the girls in school.  You are nothing special to him.”

“Fuck you.  I am.  You don’t know nothing.”  Janet’s hands went to her hips and she wiggled them for emphasis.

Latasha backed away.  She got out her phone.  She had to call Detective Lisa and she had to decide what she was going to do about her friends.  She wondered briefly if Janet was pregnant.

Elect II—1 Summer Fun, part 3 of 3

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

At five-thirty, Jessica began to pace back and forth between the refrigerator and the dishwasher.  She reminded Emily of the way Detective Lisa paced, and she imagined Jessica was pacing for the same reason.  The girl was anxious, and wanted to do something, but first they had to feed Melissa.  Melissa gave it everything she had and was utterly drained.  She was not tired.  She had slept well, especially after Maria gave her the sedative, but she was starving.  Apparently magic took a lot of energy.  Only Tyler kept up with her eating.

Emily leaned over to Melissa at one point and the girl stopped eating to look up.  She had missed all of the action Freshman year and felt like a bit of an outsider.  The others all accepted her, and Amina and Maria did everything they could to reassure her, but without Emily’s approval the rest did not matter.  Emily had run into a big, bad and real wicked witch last year and one of her friends was burned to ashes.  Melissa understood that Emily’s feelings toward witches were not good, even little witches such as herself.  She felt the churning begin in her stomach before Emily surprised her.

“Welcome to the club,” Emily said, and there was not the least hint of reservation in Emily’s words.  In fact, Emily leaned forward to give Melissa a little hug.

Melissa wanted to cry for joy as Amina and Mindy both interrupted with the same word, “Tribe,” and Amina added, “Not club.”

“Whatever,” Jessica said.  “Can we go?”

“So where do we go from here?”  Tyler asked between bites.

“Hidden beneath the spell of protection, Melissa set a simple tracer spell,” Maria explained.  “With any luck, it will lead us back to the bogyman’s lair.”

“We will have to be prepared to take on the bogy beast,” Mindy said between nibbling on her danish and twirling her red hair.  To the curious looks of the others, she explained.  “Like a bogyman’s dog, but the size of a grizzly bear, metal plated, big jaws, deadly claws and breathes fire.”

Jessica stopped pacing and stared.  She shook her head.  “Let’s find it first,” and she resumed her pacing.

ac-tyler-2“Awesome,” Tyler said.

“You’re not going,” Emily told her brother.

“What?”  Tyler protested with as many words as he could think of, but he ended with, “I’ll tell mom.”  At the moment, and for once Emily was not fazed by that.

“Tell her,” Emily said, as she got up to get her sword off the kitchen counter where she set it down when she got out the danish.  “She has no business pretending she doesn’t know what is going on.”

The girls followed Emily out to the car, and Emily looked at her sword and added a thought.  “I can’t drive with this strapped to my belt.”

“I’ll drive,” Jessica volunteered.

“No!”  Maria, Amina and Emily all shouted.  Jessica driving was a frightening thought.

“I’ll drive,” Maria insisted.  “Emily and Melissa sit up front with me.”

“Sorry, no room.”  Emily shrugged for her brother.  “Maybe next time.”

Tyler was still protesting.  “What if there isn’t a next time?”

The girls all laughed as they climbed into the car.  Maria started it up and they pulled down the street to be out of sight before Melissa activated her tracer.  She sat still for a moment before she raised her arms.  Then she moaned and doubled over, and Maria and Emily reached for her.

“I’m fine,” Melissa said.  “I just way overextended myself yesterday and I don’t need just rest and food, I think I need some healing time.”

“Like a pulled muscle on the sports field?’ Emily wondered.

“Something like that,” Maria said before she looked up at the street.  “I don’t see anything.  I thought you said it would be like a blue trail.”

ac-maria-driving“Yes,” Melissa nodded as she sat up.  She explained for the others.  “My magic tends to be blue in color.  I don’t know if the colors mean anything, but something like this should be blue.”

“Wait a minute.”  Maria turned the car around and went back by the house.  Melissa saw the trail there, like a dotted line of bluish lights going down the street in the opposite direction.

“I see it, but it is so faint.” Maria admitted.

“Same for me,” Mindy said, though she squinted with all her might.

“I see it bright and clear,” Emily and Amina both said, and Jessica added her voice.

“Looks like it crosses that lawn up ahead.”

“How do you see it?”  Mindy wondered.  Jessica shrugged.

“Bright, like Christmas lights only all blue,” she said, and Amina let out a slight smile, but said nothing.

After that, the seats got shuffled.  Melissa had to drive because of the ones who could see the trail best, Amina did not have a driver’s license and Emily and Jessica were going to have to get out when necessary to follow the line across yards to the next street over.  The car followed them around when that happened, but thankfully the bogyman appeared to stick mostly to the streets, especially when he got into town

As the sun came up, the bluish lights began to grow dim and Maria and Mindy could no longer see the line at all.  “I’m sorry,” Melissa apologized.  “I guess this is a magic better suited for nighttime.  I didn’t know.  I’m just learning.”

“We all are,” Emily assured her.

“I bet it is more of a temporal thing,” Mindy suggested.  “The spell was not going to last forever.  We probably spent too much time cleaning up and having breakfast.”

“But I feel we are close,” Amina said.

“Pull over here and park.”  Emily pointed.  The dim line was headed off down an alleyway between buildings.

Melissa pulled over, scraped the tires and paused to catch her breath.  She really needed healing time, that was certain.  Emily got out and checked her tires before she stood up straight.  They started down the alleyway, all six together.  They went by several dumpsters, a couple of loading docks and back doors, but the line stayed straight down the middle of the alley until at once it blinked and went out.

“Sorry,” Melissa said and Emily pointed at her.

“You need to stop saying that.”

“Now where do we go?” Maria asked.

“Keep straight and see if we can see some other sign of activity?”  Emily suggested, but Jessica interrupted.

ac-jessica-hunter“In here,” she said.  She was squatting and looking at something in the dust.  Emily leaned over, but could not see it.  “Bogy blood,” Jessica pointed at a little purple spot in front of a door.  Emily thought it looked like a drip of purple paint, hardly noticeable, but they had nothing else to go on.

“She is right,” Amina said and looked at the door.  “It must be in there.”

“J & Jr. Plastics,” Maria read the sign out front.

“The door is locked.” Mindy tried it.  Jessica stood and the two of them together put their shoulders to it.  Mindy backed away with the word, “Ouch.”  Jessica backed off and invited Emily to the front.  Emily easily kicked the door wide open and did not give it another thought.  “Ogre strength,” Mindy mumbled.

They stepped into a relatively empty warehouse room where pallets of plastic cups and plastic plates sat along the far wall, and rolls of plastic sheeting for wrapping up shipping pallets looked abandoned.  A forklift was parked by the pallets, but otherwise the floor was empty, that is, apart from the figure that stayed back in the shadows.  The windows along the same wall as the door looked very dirty, and though they let in little of the sunlight, clearly the bogyman was not interested in light.

“I was given instructions,” the bogyman talked, much to the surprise of the women.  “If I could not get you to drop out of school, I was to kill you.”  The bogyman put a hand to his back where he was evidently cut.  He shouted something unintelligible and unrepeatable and they heard the roar from the back of the building.  The bogy beast came to its master, and the master simply said, “Kill.”

 

***

 

ab-bogy-beast-1The bogy beast turned, roared again, and let out a stream of fire that made the women scramble.  Emily patted the knife strapped to her calf and pulled her sword.  Jessica pulled her fancy army knife.  Maria grabbed Mindy and Amina and took them to the wall where a fire hose sat curled up on its big red wheel.

“Melissa!”  Maria shouted.  Melissa was in a fog, but she could be trusted to turn on the water.

The beast swiveled its head to the left and right as Jessica and Emily separated.  It felt like the beast was trying to decide which morsel to gobble up first.  The beast was about twelve feet long on all fours.  It had more of a dog’s big mouth than a bear’s short snout.  It appeared to be covered in hairy scales which Mindy said were just about impenetrable.  Emily thought Jessica and her knife did not stand a chance, so she jumped first.  She used the reach of her sword to go for the eye, but the beast was quick.  She managed a deep cut on the beast’s nose, but that was all before she felt the back of the beast’s paw.  It knocked her through the air to where she crashed into a metal support beam just a couple of feet from the bogyman.  Emily heard her ribs crack against the pole, and the bogyman laughed.  She had not expected that level of enormous strength.

Jessica shouted and waved to distract the beast.  The beast responded.  It turned and sent a stream of fire in Jessica’s direction, but Jessica was ready and leapt behind a nearby support beam of her own.  Then the others got the water on.  It became a real battle, not the least to keep the hose pointed in the right direction.  The beast roared flame and the water attacked.  Steam filled the room, but at last the beast turned away.  It had swallowed enough water to put out a small house fire, and the beast could only smoke.  It decided it did not need the flame.  It charged the hose.  The girl’s dropped it, screamed and scattered, and the beast paused, once again not knowing which girl to swallow first.

Officer Marion burst into the room, gun drawn.

Jessica shouted.  “Go for the eyes!”

Marion fell to one knee and emptied her entire clip.

ab-bogyman-3Emily got up slowly with a hand on her ribs.  She looked straight at the beast, but her peripheral vision stayed on the bogyman.  When she faked a limp, the bogyman turned toward her and laughed, which was just what she hoped.  She spun and with both hand on her sword, she sliced through the air and cut the bogy neck cleanly so the bogyman’s head rolled under the forklift.  But instead of collapsing, the bogy body went in search of the head.  After a moment of shock, Emily began to slice off limbs.  She separated both arms and one leg before she felt the back of the bogy beast’s hand once again.  It roared, caught her from behind and threw her into the warehouse wall.  She crashed ten feet up, dropped her sword, and slid to the ground.  Now Emily was certain her ribs were broken.  Lucky for her, the bogy beast could not see her since that eye was the one Marion put out of commission

The bogy beast turned again to the others and that annoying woman with the gun, and while Marion reloaded, Jessica made a run and leap to try and stick her knife into the beast’s other eye.  The beast backhanded her, but Jessica fell to the floor and slid on her jeans and some plastic sheeting to the front windows.

Marion fired again, convinced that her bullets were not penetrating that scaly hide, but then the beast did something that surprised them all.  It stood on its hind legs like a bear, and it was at least twelve feet tall.  Marion shot the belly and tried for the neck, but the beast was as heavily armored there as everywhere else.  When she needed to reload again, Jessica came up beside her to stay her hand.  Somehow, Emily had jumped on the beast’s back from behind.

ab-bogy-beast-2Emily held on with her knees and grabbed the beast’s soft, pointed ear with her left hand.  Her right hand held her trusty knife.  It was the same knife she used to kill Pierce.  That thought, the thought the bogyman kept haunting her with night after night, made her enraged.  She jammed the knife into the bogy beast’s ear over and over.  She sliced the bogy beast’s good eye and rammed the knife deep into the back of the head where she could get between the scales.  The bogy beast tried to back up to crush her against the wall, but it could not move well on two feet.  At last it staggered and finally fell, and Emily had no strength left to jump free.  She heard her left leg bone crack as the full weight of the beast came down on her, but she did not care.  She was in tears.

Jessica and Marion rushed up to make sure the beast was dead.  Amina rushed to Emily and told her to hold on, and she hugged her.  Mindy kept screaming, ‘Don’t touch it!”  The bogy body had almost rebuilt itself apart from the head which was wedged under the forklift.  Melissa did not know what to do, but Maria got into the forklift and started it up.  She started forward with a shake and jump and the bogy head popped out from beneath, only slightly flattened.  Mindy’s scream changed to, “The sunlight will kill it!”

Maria caught the bogy body in the fork so it could not escape without being run over.  It tried to turn and scratch at the driver, but it could not reach and in a second, Maria crashed it through one of the front windows.  The body steamed, smoked, caught on fire in the light and quickly crumbled away to dust.  At the same time, the body of the bogy beast began to deflate like a balloon with a slow leak.

“The head!” Mindy shouted and Marion got up to fetch it.  “Don’t touch it!” Mindy screamed, and Jessica caught Marion’s hand and shook her head.  Marion stepped over to the wall where there were various lengths of plastic water pipe cut and waiting for a plumber.  She picked up a suitable piece about three feet long and used it to shove the head toward the broken window as Maria backed the forklift out of the way.

“No!  No!”  The head pleaded with them, but it did no good.  Marion stopped short of the sunlight, gripped the pipe like a club and with a shout of “Four!” she hit the head through the window.  It hit the light, screamed, fried, and went to dust, even as Lieutenant Anthony came racing into the building followed by a half-dozen police officers.

ac-anthony-4“What the hell is going on here?’  He yelled.

“Nothing.  All finished,” Mindy said as she looked around at everyone and got nods of agreement.

“What the hell was that scream?”

“Bogyman,” Mindy said.

“What the hell is that?”  The Lieutenant pointed to the deflated creature.

“Bogy beast,” Mindy said.

Lieutenant Anthony stopped to look at the little redhead who was doing all the talking.  “And who the hell are you?”

Before Mindy could answer, Amina spoke up from where she was kneeling beside Emily.  “I am definitely going to go on a date this year.”

It was so out of context, everyone had to stare.  Of course, Jessica had to say something.

“Got anyone in mind?”

Emily laughed as Marion came to kneel beside her, and she laughed again at the thought of a supposed Amazon tribe having an affiliate member.  She did not laugh long since it made her ribs hurt.

************************

Coming Monday, Elect II – 2 Amazons

Happy Reading…

 

Elect II—1 Summer Fun, part 2 of 3

M G Kizzia 2 Comments

Maria and Melissa got the twin beds in Tyler’s room.  Mom apologized, but both of them had brothers and said they understood.  Amina and Mindy got the twins in David’s room.  David was in the National Guard and currently deployed oversees in some place he could not talk about.  Jessica got the other twin in Emily’s room.

“Just like at school,” Jessica commented as she unpacked.  “This is a preview.”

“Except at school we won’t have Mom downstairs in the kitchen cooking way too much food.”  Emily yawned.  Now that the gang was there, her exhaustion started catching up with her.  She felt safe, whether she was or not.  Melissa freaked her out a bit when she sat cross-legged on the floor in Emily’s room, chanted and sprinkled what looked like dust all around.

“Mom’s going to get out the vacuum if you keep it up,” she commented.

Melissa also smeared some oil in a corner of every window and door in the house, and secretly to keep the window cleaner from coming out.  Melissa was satisfied that she had done all she could, until Jessica pointed out the heating and air conditioning ducts.

“It might get in through the roof and come down through the ductwork,” so Melissa applied some oil there, too.  It was odorless in the air conditioning of August, but it might have smelled in the winter with the heat turned on.  Once that was done, there was nothing else to do but go down to the living room where Dad had the Yankee game on.  He was an old time Clippers fan and offered to treat them all to a game at the stadium, hot dogs and all.  The Mud Hens were coming to town on Monday, he said, but the girls declined.

“I could go,” Tyler offered, and his dad agreed.  They had a date.

“And there are always some tickets at the box office if you girls change your minds,” he said.

ac-emily-5aPoor Tyler, Emily thought.  He was sleeping in the basement, but he could hardly complain about having his house invaded by all these young and good looking women.  He mostly sat and watched, and it was not the Yankee game he watched.  But he said little, like he was suddenly shy.  Then again, Emily did not have the strength at the moment to tease him, so maybe he got off lucky.

After supper, which Emily struggled through, the girls made various excuses to go up to bed early.  It was the plane trip and the drag waiting at the airports and a busy day of travel, and the family understood, even if Tyler was disappointed to see them disappear up the stairs.  Once up, Maria got out her concoction of anti-dream juice and then they had a schedule of sitting up through the night to watch over Emily.

“I feel like the helpless one for a change,” Emily said with a big yawn.

“You are,” Jessica responded.  “We’re a team.  Go to sleep.”

Emily nodded and had no trouble doing that very thing.

 

###

 

The banging started around midnight.  There was banging all around the outside of the house.  Mindy sat on watch and Jessica was asleep but sat straight up when there was a tap-tap on Emily’s window.  Mindy jumped out of her chair and switched on the overhead light.

ab-bogyman-5“Turn it off,” Jessica ordered, and when she did, Jessica peered out the window to see if she could glimpse something in the night.  There was nothing to be seen, so Mindy turned the light back on when Melissa came to the doorway.  She was sweating and trembling.

“I don’t have very much magic,” Melissa said.  “I won’t be able to keep it out.  I’m sorry.”  She collapsed in the doorway and Jessica and Mindy got her into Jessica’s bed.

Amina and Maria came last to the door and Amina spoke quickly.  “It has not gotten in.”  Emily’s mom came out of her room.

“I don’t mind the slumber party, but I would appreciate if you would keep it down a little.”

“Sorry to wake you.”

“Did we wake Mister Hudson?”

Emily’s mom shook her head.  “He could snore through a hurricane.”  She turned and went back to her room.

After that, Jessica found Emily’s old sleeping bag in the closet beside the bed Melissa was now occupying.  Jessica was not leaving the room.  Emily, and now Melissa were both asleep and unharmed as far as Maria could tell, but Jessica would not abandon them.  Maria took Mindy back to the other room, but Mindy swore she would not be able to sleep.  It was Amina’s turn to watch, but before she turned off the light, Jessica got out the army knife her dad bought her when she announced she was going into ROTC.  Then she found Emily’s sword, the one made by hand by the four hundred and seventy-year-old Heinrich Schultz.  Jessica had no idea if the sword had any magical properties, but she felt safer when she curled up beside it.

ab-bogyman-1The wind picked up at two in the morning.  It rapidly reached dangerous proportions around the house.  The windows shook.  Every door rattled, and if the women had been aware to notice, the doors rattled one at a time.

Melissa became a bucket of sweat and began to whimper in her sleep.  Jessica could not wake her enough to get a word out of her.  Maria came in and managed to get Melissa to swallow some liquid.

“A mild sedative,” Maria said.  “I would rather she sleep than be injured.”

The wind stopped.  Amina who was in the corner made her announcement.  “It has not gotten in.”

“Good thing,” Maria and Jessica spoke together.

Oddly, this time Mindy slept through the noise.  Emily’s mom also did not make an appearance.  Tyler did come up from the basement.  He decided to finish the night on the living room couch, with the kitchen light on, but the women upstairs did not know this.

ab-bogyman-4Four in the morning is when everything happened, only this time there was silence.  Maria was on watch.  Maria turned on the small light beside the bed to act like a night light.  Melissa and Emily were both asleep, and Maria felt like nodding herself.  Jessica’s eyes popped open, not because she had some sixth sense, she imagined, but because Emily’s closet door was slowly opening and pushing up against the bottom of the sleeping bag.

Jessica could feel the presence in the room and it frightened her, terribly.  She felt it pause over Melissa before it rounded the bed to Emily’s side of the room.  Emily had said that when she was little she took the bed farthest away from the closet door, and now Jessica knew why.

When she had her chance, Jessica leapt up and switched on the light.  Both Jessica and Maria caught a glimpse of the creature before it went invisible.  It did not look at all like the man in the movie.  This creature had absolutely no humanity about it.

As soon as it vanished, Jessica got grabbed by her hair, tossed to the ground, and the light got put out.  Maria’s chair got knocked to the floor, and the small light between the beds also went out.  Jessica grabbed Emily’s sword, and when Maria crawled to the door and switched the overhead light back on, she was ready.  She saw the indent in the rug where the creature stood, hovering over Emily, and she swung the sword as hard as she could.  The creature howled.

ab-bogeyman-2Emily and Melissa both sat straight up at that sound.  Emily punched, and connected with something that doubled over.  Melissa raised her hands, though it seemed to the others that Melissa was still mostly asleep.  There was a small gust like wind and they heard something crash into the upper corner of the room.  The howl came again from there, and they saw a purple smear, like bogy-blood spread across the wall.

Something ran between Maria and Jessica, shoved them out of the way and dove out the window.  The glass shattered and everyone in the house came running, except Mister Hudson who continued to snore.

“It is gone,” Amina announced.

“Where?”  Emily got up and avoided the broken glass

Amina shook her head.  “It is too powerful,” she said as she and Maria helped Melissa to her feet and carried her away from the broken glass.

“I never thought my little spell would stop it,” Melissa confessed in a sleepy mumble.

“A simple lock might confuse an ogre for a second,” Mindy said.  “But eventually the ogre will just rip the door off the hinges and without breaking a sweat.”

“I like that analogy,” Melissa said with a bit more strength.

Mindy screamed, “Don’t touch it!”  Emily and Jessica were staring at the smear of bogy blood up by the ceiling.  Emily at five-six would have had to jump to touch it, but Jessica at five-nine had her hand poised.  “Don’t touch it,” Mindy said more calmly, but with a strict to-be-obeyed voice.  “Unless you want to be haunted by nightmares for the rest of your life.”  She finished the sentence and Jessica snatched her hand back.

“What on earth happened here?”  Emily’s mom was aghast at the destruction.

“Maybe it was that big wind,” Tyler spoke over his mother’s shoulder.  “I bet it was that wind.”

Emily’s mom looked hard at the girls in the room, but none of them denied it so what could she say?

“Shoes,” Jessica said, and Emily echoed, “Shoes everyone,” while she slipped her feet in her sneakers which were by the door.  Emily was thinking about the glass, but Jessica was worried about the bogy blood in case someone accidentally stepped in it.

“Go back to bed, mom,” Emily said.  “We will clean up.”

“You think I can sleep?  Now I’ll have to call the window people first thing Monday morning, and that is going to cost,” she said.  “And your father is going to have to get some plywood in the morning.  He is not going to like that.  Sunday is his sleep day.”  She closed the door to her room.

“Your mom doesn’t know anything, does she?”  Jessica noticed.

Emily shook her head.  “She doesn’t want to know.”

“You’re welcome for the wind thing,” Tyler said, quick to point out that he lied for them.  “So what was it?”

“A bogyman.”  Emily spoke honestly.

“It came out of the closet,” Jessica added.

“Awesome!  You had a boogyman in the closet.”  They did not feel the need to correct him since that was essentially correct.  Instead, they went to get gloves and the strongest cleaners they could find.

“I like my closet,” Jessica said.  “Of course it is about as big as Emily’s room.”

“Beverly Hills,” Emily told her staring brother.  She looked up at the corner of her room and did not doubt that by the time they finished cleaning, the corner of her room would have to be repainted.

Elect II—1 Summer Fun, part 1 of 3

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

The phone rang.

Emily’s younger brother, Tyler was hiding in the basement.  Dad was outside cutting the grass because Tyler was hiding in the basement.  Mom was outside talking to the neighbor to avoid any serious work in the garden.  All was right with the world, Emily thought.  She could get a short nap if the phone would just stop ringing.  She had not been sleeping well.  Too many nightmares about Pierce.

The phone rang.

She loved Pierce, as much as she ever loved anyone.  She did not care if he was a genetically engineered super soldier, or what.  She loved him and he loved her, and that was enough.  Life was good, but then he got activated.  He was ordered to kill every student at New Jersey State University.  She died when she killed him.  It felt like stabbing a knife into her own heart.

The phone rang.

Emily did not want to be one of the elect anymore.  She did not want to be one in a million.  She did not want to be the woman warrior, empowered to defend home and community.  Whoever came up with that idea could stuff it.  Lisa said she was as strong as any man with an uncanny ability to fight with or without weapons.  She was hard to injure, quick to heal, coordinated, agile, graceful…  Emily just wanted to be Emily, not some freakish superhero.

The phone rang.

Okay, back at New Jersey State in Trenton, Detective Lisa and Latasha, a high school sophomore, were also elect.  That made three women warriors in one little city.  The odds against that were astronomical, but at least for Emily it was nice not being the only one in town.  At that moment, what felt more important was she would not feel too guilty about abandoning the city if she decided not to go back to school.

The phone rang.

How could she go back?  She would see Pierce everywhere she looked.  That was what her dreams were telling her.  That was what her nightmares were vividly pointing out.  Stay home.  There are good nursing schools in Ohio.  But, “Damn it!”  She promised Pierce she would go back and finish at New Jersey State.  She promised that right before she killed him.

The phone rang and someone had the nerve to pick it up.

“Emily!”  It was Mom.  Emily tumbled off the couch and walked grumpily to the kitchen.  “I think it is one of your friends from college.”  Mom smiled and held out the phone.

Emily nodded.  “Hello?”

“Emily!  Are you all right?  I have been worried sick about you.”  It was Amina, her own personal Sybil.

“You’re the seer,” Emily had no patience at the moment.  “You’re the one who sees things no one else can see.  You tell me.”

“The dreams.  You have been having terrible nightmares.”

Emily sighed.  She had not told anyone about her dreams.  The girl could truly see things.  Amina was a bit of a freak herself.  “Yes, I’ve been having dreams, but I think it is just my subconscious trying to talk some sense into me.”

“No, you must not listen.  It isn’t you dreaming.”

Emily paused before she asked, “What do you mean?”

“You are being attacked.  I have discussed it with Mindy.  She is looking for possible causes, what it might be that is attacking you.”

Emily swallowed.  “Attacked?”  If that was true, her attacker knew just where she was weak and vulnerable.  It was preying on her guilt and broken heart over Pierce and telling her not to go back to school in Trenton.

ac-amina-4“We are coming.  We will all be there on Saturday.  Melissa is finishing her summer classes and working on a spell of protection.  Jessica is anxious to find what it is and is harping on poor Mindy to identify it.  Maria will meet them at Newark airport.  She says she has been researching in her pharmacology books and may have something to help you sleep without remembering your dreams.

“And you?”

“Mindy will come up from Colombia, and I will come down from Chicago.”

“Your father is letting you go?  I thought he was going to keep you under lock and key until you were twenty-one and married.”  Amina was born in Chicago, but her family was from Morocco and strict beyond reason.

There was a pause this time on the other end before Amina spoke.  “My family knows I have the gift.  I told them it was a matter of life and death.”

“And is it?  A matter of life and death, I mean.”

This time the pause stretched out into an uncomfortable silence and Emily felt the chills of that silence in the back of her neck.  “I told my father I am going to go on a date this year,” Amina said.  “Meanwhile, we will all be there Saturday.  Please tell your mother not to make a fuss.”

“That will be like telling water not to be wet.”

“Try to rest, only don’t listen to your dreams, my queen.”

Amina hung up, and Emily griped.  Being elect made her some kind of Amazon queen to these women.  That was why at times they referred to Amina as the Sybil—the seer—and Amina referred to Emily as her queen.  Emily shook her head.  Despite the terribly prejudiced point of view, Emily’s picture of an Amazon was some big, weight-lifting, man hating woman with a moustache.  She could not help thinking that way, and that was so not her.  She went back to her couch.

“Oh, honey.  Don’t you have to go to work today?”  Emily’s mother began to dust around her.

“No,” Emily said.  “A day without French fries is like a day with sunshine.  By the way, Jessica, Melissa, Maria, Mindy and Amina are all coming here for a visit.  They will be here Saturday, and Amina said don’t make a fuss.”

Emily’s mother quickly calculated and looked at the clock on the mantle.  “I just have time to get some new bedding.”  She whipped off her gardening hat as she walked briskly to the basement door.  She shouted down the stairs.  “Tyler, as long as you are down there, pull out the bed from the convertible.”

Emily heard Tyler shout back.  “Is Aunt Matilda and the freak parade coming?”  Mother shut the door without answering.  She picked up her purse, paused by the mirror in the front hall and left.  Emily lay back on the couch and thought, at last!  Now she could get that nap, only now she could not get her eyes to close.  The dreams were bad enough when she thought they were her own, but the idea that someone or something was getting into her head and attacking her in her sleep made the chill return to the back of her neck.  The worst part of it was, given all she had seen and been through last year—her freshman year at New Jersey State, she did not doubt for one second that such a thing was possible.  Heck, if Amina said it, it was a virtual certainty, in which case she imagined she might never sleep again.

###

ab-fast-foodDad had to go into work Saturday morning.  The overtime was good, but that meant he could not pick up the girls.  Mom was too busy making beds, putting out flowers and checking the cookie supply to drive.  Emily was going to have to do it herself, but even as she got in the car, her manager called.

“I know you need the week off for police work.  You know me, cooperating with the police is my first choice, but I need you.  Can you come in for the morning shift?  Paul and Debbie both called out, but Alesandra will be in at two.  Please?”

What could Emily do?  As tired as she was, she needed the money.  Besides, she was not too sure about navigating the airport traffic lanes in her current condition.  Flipping burgers or running a register designed for idiots should not be a problem.  She called officer Marion.  The woman was instrumental in setting up department seven in the Columbus police force to help her stop an outbreak of vampires last Christmas.  At times, she felt like Emily’s own shadow, and Emily thought it was only fair to give the woman something to do.

###

ac-jessica-5Jessica was the first one off the plane from Newark, and not surprised to find a police officer waiting for them.  The woman looked about Detective Lisa’s age, around thirty-five or so.

“Where is Emily?”  Maria asked.  They had a half-hour wait for Amina to arrive from Chicago.

“Called in to work,” Mindy answered.  She had gotten there an hour earlier and spent most of that time sipping her latte, going in and out of the bathroom, fiddling with her long red hair and not talking.  She heard about the vampires, but offered little in return.

“Gee, Detective Lisa never offered us a ride in a police van,” Jessica said.

“I talked to your detective friend,” Marion said.  “She seemed to think if you are all gathering here, there must be something going on.”

“She is a detective.”  Jessica shrugged it off.  “Naturally suspicious.”

“So am I.”  Marion treated them to coffee and tea and then made them sit in a quiet corner.  “As I explained to Mindy, Captain Parker set up department seven last Christmas to help Emily and Anna Lee with the vampires.”

“Anna Lee?”  Melissa looked at her friends.

“Elect from New York City,” Maria explained quietly and Melissa nodded.

“Now, whenever Emily is in town, my job is to keep an eye on her.”  Marion hardly took a breath.  “I heard some of what you did at school last year.  I am sure you can still probably surprise me about things that a year ago I would have said are not real and you are mad, but I need to know what is going on or I won’t be of any use.  Besides, Lieutenant Anthony does not like surprises, so talk.”  The women looked at each other, but said nothing.

“Which one of you is in charge when Emily is not around?”  Marion tried again.

Melissa and Mindy spoke together.  “Jessica.”  But Jessica spoke otherwise.

“Maria.”

Maria shook her head.  “I am going to be a doctor.  The doctor is never in charge.”  She turned to Officer Marion.  “Jessica,” she said, emphatically.

“I don’t want to be in charge,” Jessica protested.

“That is just what Emily says,” Maria responded.

“Hey!”  Marion regained their attention.  “So Jessica, what is going on.”  Jessica just looked at Mindy who nodded to the look and finally opened up.

“I’ve narrowed it down to either ghouls or a bogyman.  According to my reading, though, it seems to me ghouls affect the vision and daydreams more than regular dreams.  Bogymen are the ones who turn night dreams into nightmares.”

ab-bogy“A boogyman?”  Marion had to ask.

“Bogyman.  Like Nightmare on Elm Street if you ever saw that movie,” Mindy responded.  From the look on Marion’s face it appeared she had seen the movie.  “Emily is having bad dreams,” Mindy offered.

Marion took a deep breath and her imagination almost took over.  She thought it wise to turn to Maria and change the subject.  “So you are going to medical school?”

“I haven’t applied yet.  I’m only a sophomore.  We all are, but that is the plan.”  Maria sipped her coffee.

“And you are in charge when Emily is absent?”

“Apparently,” Jessica said with a frown.  “And despite the fact that I am the blonde one.”

“You are going into ROTC with Emily,” Maria pointed out.  “You are going to be an officer.  And besides, you are the business major,” as if that had anything to do with it.

“Antiquities,” Mindy interrupted and offered her own major.  “The research information in Columbia is slim, but did you know New Jersey State has one of the biggest collections of old books, parchments, scrolls including papyrus and fragments in North America.  There are clay tablets at the school from Byblos, Nineveh, Babylon, and dating all the way back to Sumeria.  It is all such fascinating stuff.  Professor Papadopoulos—.”

“I am sure it is fascinating,” Jessica interrupted and Mindy quieted.

“And what about you?”  Officer Marion turned to Melissa who had said only that one peep to Maria about the Chinese woman from New York.  “What is your part in all of this?”

Melissa spoke quietly and in a very shy and unassuming manner.  “I’m the witch.”

Marion widened her eyes for a second before she appeared to shrug with those eyes.  “Did you think maybe a witch is giving Emily the nightmares?”

Jessica shook her head.  “Amina said whatever it is, it isn’t human.”

“Amina?”

“The one we are waiting for,” Maria spoke up.

“Our seer,” Jessica said.

“Our Sybil,” Mindy said.

“Sybil?”

“Amazon term,” Mindy explained.  “Amina says we are Emily’s Amazon tribe since she is…special.”  Jessica stared at her again.

“We think of it more like a club,” Maria said.  “You could be like an affiliate member.”

“Amazons,” Marion mused as the announcement blared over the speakers that Amina’s plane was at the gate.  Marion wanted to see this so-called seer, and while she waited she changed her mind.  Life still had plenty of stuff that could surprise her.

ac-amina-a1Amina had short cropped hair that cupped her face nicely and set off her deep set dark eyes.  Her hair was black, like Emily, but her skin looked extremely well-tanned, like she spent every day in the tanning salon.  When she got close and began to hug each girl in turn, Marion realized that this was the girl’s natural skin color.

Amina hugged Marion too, though they had never met, and she spoke.  “My family came here from Morocco.  I am glad the others explained things to you.  That saves me a lot of trouble.”

Marion turned to Jessica as they left the airport.  “Your seer?”

“Sybil,” Jessica nodded.  “It’s her job.”

Starting Next Week… Don’t Miss it …

M G Kizzia 2 Comments

The Elect, Book II, Sophomore Year

ac-emily-3Emily Hudson is an elect, a one-in-a-million warrior woman charged and empowered to defend family, home, and community against whatever might rise up out of the dark.  When Emily arrived at New Jersey State University for her freshman year, she discovered two other elect in town.

ac-latasha-7Latasha LeBaidu, a local high school transplant originally from New Orleans, is young, and learning, but determined to live up to her potential and do her part in making the world safe.  She wants to be a police officer and follow in the footsteps of Detective Lisa.

ac-lisa-7Detective Lisa Schromer is a mother of three beautiful children, and also the person on the Trenton police force that deals with all that spooky stuff.  When Emily showed up for her freshman year, Lisa needed her, and in time, the local girl Latasha, to deal with the super soldier contest being conducted by the Pentagon and the biology department at New Jersey State.

No spoilers here.  The Elect, Book I, Freshman Year will be available as an e-book by Christmas.

Now a sophomore, Emily hopes for a quiet year.  Latasha, a high school sophomore, also wants to focus on her studies.  She needs to turn her ‘D’s into ‘B’s if she hopes to go to the community college and study law enforcement.  Detective Lisa wishes them luck, but she understands why Trenton, the capitol of New Jersey, is located right across the river from Philadelphia.  It is like the hub of the wheel.  All of the energy from Boston and New York, from Philadelphia itself, and from Baltimore, Washington, and Richmond goes right through Trenton.  And these days, most of that energy is negative, and growing.

The Elect, Book II, Sophomore Year begins Monday—the first Monday in October.  Each chapter (mini-episode) will be three parts long and will post Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday each and every week for the next 22 weeks.  Somewhere on campus, a door has been opened to Avalon and some of the golden apples of youth are missing.  Just that would be bad enough, but Emily and her tribe of friends will be busy.  It is never just one thing.

************************

Speaking of Avalon… Avalon, Season Three is now available at your favorite e-book retailer for the low price of $1.99.  Check under my author name, M G Kizzia at Amazon, Smashwords, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo, etc.

as3swv2a

Also, the newly revised and expanded Pilot Episode is an easy way to get to know the characters in the Avalon series and see how this group of travelers got stuck in the past having to get home the hard way, across the time zones and through the time gates.  It is not an easy journey when they are not the only ones lost in time.  Most of the the others that are lost are not human, and most of them are now hunting the travelers; and it is a long way back to the twenty-first century.

apeswv2

The Pilot Episode, complete with a new cover, is only .99 cents, and a good read.  Remember, whatever you read, Happy Reading

a-happy-read-3

Avalon 4.4 part 6 of 6, Insufficient Answers

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Ulrik, Channa and the travelers all sat around the fire built in the Ishtar gate.  The travelers set up their own tents and Alexis passed out several thousand bread crackers, many of which she herself turned into loaves of bread.

“And we never run out,” Boston explained to Channa, while Alexis reached into her bag for another handful.

“Yes, but multiplicity magic works best when you are not looking at it,” Alexis said.  That was why she never pulled her package of crackers out of the dark bag.channa 1

Meanwhile, Channa had something else in mind.  She reached up and touched Boston’s ears.  “They really are pointed.”

Boston checked to make sure her glamour of humanity had not slipped before she spoke.  “That he loves you is certain, and you must love him as well or else you would never be able to see through my glamour.  My Lady,” Boston said it and tipped her head, and it felt so good to say it, she wanted to say it again.

“The stew is good,” Alexis interrupted as she sat to join the women.  It was mostly roots, grasses, and things that crawled under foot, things that you would rather not think about, but it had a nice spicy flavor and was filling.

“Shh,” Katie said.  She wanted to hear what Ulrik was saying.

“Marduk and Assur separated centuries ago, and over something so trivial, I cannot imagine anyone even remembers, except one of my lives, if I dig for the information,” Ulrik said.  “Assur went north and Marduk moved south, and Marduk won the first round when Sargon conquered Assyria, which isn’t yet called Assyria, by the way.  Now Assur is planning his counter attack.”

“You mean all those years, centuries we studied and the struggles for control of Mesopotamia and the near east was really no more than two gods, two brothers, twins having an argument?” Mingus was astonished to think that.

“Not entirely, but that was a big part of it,” Ulrik said.

Decker came back from one direction and Lockhart came back from the other.  “I can’t claim they wont fall asleep on watch,” Decker said.

“Ditto,” Lockhart agreed, and turned to the women.  “Katie, would you like to come with me to check on the horses?”

Katie 6Katie looked at the other women.  They told the men they were talking wedding with Channa, and did talk wedding a little, but mostly they were keeping Alexis company and keeping Mingus away.  The women all nodded to say it was fine with them, and Channa got a big smile as she recognized the signs of love, being so filled with it at the moment.  Katie got up and went to walk beside Lockhart, and Decker had a comment

“Aphrodite said they were still cooking.”

“They look pretty well cooked to me,” Ulrik said.

“They are in love,” Channa voiced her observation.

“Yes, but after being touched by Ishtar, I’m surprised you don’t see love everywhere and in everything,” Alexis said.

“Oh, I do,” Channa admitted.  “I really do.”

Lockhart took Katie’s hand as soon as they got out of the firelight, but he also had something to say.  “I have thought a lot about this.  I worry about you, but I understand you are gifted in ways.  You are not exactly helpless.  If I am going to be your boss, that complicates things.  Sometimes I have to make decisions, and you just need to go with it.  You can tell me when you think I am wrong.  I respect your opinion.  The thing is, I probably go overboard trying to keep you from situations where you might get hurt.  I don’t want you to feel you can’t show initiative.  I’ll try to be better about it.  We all need to go with our strengths if we expect to get home safe and all.  But you are military trained, you know, chain of command and all that.  Sometimes you need to do the part you are assigned, that’s all…”  He stopped speaking.

Katie hugged him.  “That took a lot.  I understand.  Ever since I found out I was an elect, super strong, super fast, and all that, I have kind of gotten carried away.  I sort of felt like I had super powers, in a way.  Intoxicating.  But I know I need to calm down.  I need to use my gifts, not abuse Dwarf 1them and stretch them to the limit.  I want to do my best and what I am capable of, but pushing myself too hard is a good way to get myself killed, I know that…”

Katie’s voice trailed off as Lockhart kissed her.  After a time of silence, they turned together and stepped toward the horses that were given a space where they could both graze and be guarded.  In fact, Lockhart and Katie took only two steps before they heard a voice in the dark.

“Halt who goes there—“

“Friend,” Katie interrupted.

“Friend of foe,” the dwarf finished and added an “Ouch.”

“She already said friend.”

“I heard what she said.”

“So you didn’t have to ask.”

“We are supposed to ask.”

“Hey, where did she go?”

“I can see the horses are in good hands,” Lockhart said as they stepped back into the light of the fire.

“Do you think Father Mingus will ever come down from there?” Boston asked.

Alexis 1“I hope he doesn’t try to sleep up there,” Channa said in all seriousness.

“The way he is rounding out, he will probably roll right off in the middle of the night,” Alexis said.

“Rolly-Polly,” Boston said.

“Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down,” Alexis said, and at least Lincoln caught the old reference and laughed.

###

The travelers set out in the morning, the Gutians having moved off in the night.  Boston estimated that they had two days to travel to get to the next gate.  They went slowly, surrounded by twenty dwarfs that Ulrik insisted they take, “To help guard them,” he said, but everyone knew he wanted them out of his hair for a while.

Decker and Elder Stow rode at the back, behind Boston and Mingus. They did not say much, but at one point after lunch, Elder Stow asked a question.

“What is wrong with all of you primitives?”

Decker looked to the sky.  “Where can I begin?”

“At least you belong here,” Elder Stow grumped.stow e3

“No.  Actually, we are both stuck in the human world for now.”

“What do you mean?” Elder Stow asked.  “You are human, just like the rest of them.”

“Believe me,” Decker said.  “If I had a choice, this is not the world I would have picked.”

Elder Stow looked thoughtful.  “I suppose Mingus and young Boston are not human either.”

“I suppose,” Decker said, and they rode in silence for a little bit before Decker spoke again.  “You were not there at the beginning.  We had a choice, to skirt around the edge of the time zones as fast as we could to get home or help the Kairos clean out some of the zones where unsavories had found their way in.  I remember the word, unsavories.”

“You made the wrong choice,” Elder Stow suggested.

Decker 5“I remember I said my job was to follow orders.  It still is.  My mission is to get everyone home alive, if I can.  But I think a secondary mission is to help in whatever way I can with whatever unnecessary events these bureaucrats get us involved in, war, spirits, aliens.  As long as we don’t stick around, like spend the next ten years fighting off Gutians, I will do what I can to help.”

“Why?”

“Duty.  Honor.  Loyalty.  These are things I believe in, and I know you do too.”

Elder Stow nodded, but he said no more.

Avalon 4.0: part 6 of 7, What Was and May Be

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“So,” Tien began his tale.  “I confessed to Mai-Lyn, the one who acts like Mother Lin’s right arm, that the caravan was not far away, but under attack from the people of the hills.  She ran to the empress and they grabbed their horses, which by some miracle were already saddled and ready to go.”  Tien paused to smile.  “They grabbed the thirty horsemen who were practicing sitting on a horse and stabbing a target with a spear at the same time, not that they were any good at it.  Together, we all rode out to the caravan, but like you folks had things in hand, the two elves and the witch had already driven off the hill people.”

“Two elves and former elf,” Lincoln interrupted.  “Alexis is a bit touchy about the word, witch.”asian boston

“Witch is a good thing in this day and age,” Tien said.  “But in any case, when we arrived, Lin and Mai-Lyn dismounted right away.  Poor Boston was stymied.  She knew the Kairos was a woman, but she could not tell which one.”

“You see, young Mary,” Mingus spoke kindly.  “When the Kairos is a human it isn’t always easy to tell her from the other humans around her.”

“But I should know,” Boston objected.  “I should always know.”

“But it doesn’t always work that way.  Sometimes the Kairos does not want to be known by us.”

“Sometimes it is a mystery,” Alexis added.

“But—“ Boston began, when Lin interrupted her.

“Boston.  Where are Lockhart and the others?”

tien 2“There is a ghoul ambush set up a few miles back,” Alexis said.  “The others went to ambush the ambush.”

“Lin turned to me.  “Tien?  Those ghouls have to go,” she said, as she opened her arms so Boston could run into them.  It was heart warming to see a god lavish such love on her charge, and very instructive.”

“Not a bad way to go about business,” Lockhart suggested, but quieted as they came to the camp and Boston ran straight into Lockhart’s arms for another hug.  Then he added a thought.  “Hugs also work for friends.”

Alexis and Lincoln also hugged, but said nothing as Lin and Mai-Lyn approached with five men.  Lockhart guessed one of the men was Gingsu, lord of the far western lands of the empire and defender of the border.  One was Shanjo.

“Elect,” Mai-Lyn spoke first and directly at Katie.

“Second in all the world, after Zoe,” Lin nodded, and Mai-Lyn got down on her knees and looked ready to prostrate herself before Katie, but Katie caught her arm and lifted her back to her feet.

“We don’t do that,” Katie insisted.  “We need to be more like sisters.”

“Mai-Lyn is my bodyguard,” Lin said proudly.Lin Mai-Lyn 1

“Good choice,” Katie responded as Lin got to introducing her commanders.  Gingsu they had heard of.  Yuan, the elf of the desert was there with a hundred unseen warriors, and Bogda was the dwarf king from the mountains.  He had the base of the foothills littered with his people, all prepared for war.

“And Captain Sushang has sixty men on horse, but I expect to lose fifty of them as soon as I send Shanjo and the opium to safety.”  Then Lin felt the need to justify herself.  “Try to understand.  What passes for medical treatment in this age is a joke.  The wounded rarely recover.  At least with the opiates, they should not have to suffer in their last hours.”  Lin looked ready to cry and everyone there offered all the comfort and sympathy they could.  Then she turned on her captain.  “That is why you must defend the opium to the last grain and get it safely to the capital, and for god’s sake, keep it out of the hands of the Shang.”

“Yes, Lady,” Captain Sushang bowed to her in a way that was almost worshipful, and well beyond respect.

Tien sighed and slipped his arms around Katie and Mai-Lyn.  “Would that I commanded such devotion,” he whispered.  Katie was uncomfortable under the arm of the god, but Mai-Lyn looked like she and Tien shared some other moments.  “Two elect in the same place and time.  It is a wonder the earth doesn’t explode.  Strong as any man, expert with or without weapons, hard to injure and quick to heal.  Made to protect all the women and children left behind when the men went off hunting or to war, but here you both are getting ready for war.

“No,” Katie said.  “I suspect we will be leaving with the caravan.  The Kairos usually won’t let us stick around and get involved with local, temporal problems.”

tien 1Tien nodded and vanished, but Katie and Mai-Lyn both read the look on his face.  Both concluded that the travelers might not have time to get away before things started.  They went to tell Lin, but she had taken Boston and Alexis down by the water.

“I named it lake Boston,” Lin said.  “I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, as long as I don’t have to die to have it named after me,” Boston said with a grin.

“Lady—” Mai-Lyn started to speak but Lin hushed her.  She looked at Katie and went away from that time and place so Doctor Mishka could fill her place.  All of the women had seen the Kairos trade places through time, as she called it, and become what appeared to be a completely different person.  They knew it was actually another lifetime the Kairos would live somewhere in history.  In this case, they all knew the good doctor, but even so, Boston and Katie gasped, while Alexis and Mai-Lyn briefly lowered their eyes, like a visual bow, in acknowledgement of one who was counted among the gods even when her life was completely human and mortal.

“Alexis, please open your medical bag,” Mishka said.  Alexis had taken to carrying her medical bag like a purse, like she first carried it before they got the horses.  She said she was carrying it to counter the men who carried their weapons everywhere.

“Oh, but I don’t think—“

“Hush,” Doctor Mishka hushed her, just like Lin hushed Mai-Lyn, a strong suggestion that Mishka and Lin were indeed the same person on the inside even if they outwardly appeared like two different persons.  “You will find in there three small packages, one for you, one for Boston, and one for Katie.  They each contain a small pill tailored to your unique chemistries.  I have made it soBoston 5 Boston’s will still work despite her becoming an elf.”  Mai-Lyn raised an eyebrow on that revelation, but did not doubt that Boston was an elf.

“But what is it?” Boston was the curious one.

“Birth control,” Mishka said.  “Barak in the last time zone said he was not going to get into it with the three of you.  He said that was a woman’s job, so Lin got the call.  I am just here to make sure you have no adverse reactions.”

“One pill?”  Katie wondered.

“Magic?” Alexis asked.

“Science,” Mishka answered.  “It is actually a contraceptive implant taken the easy way.  It will insert itself where it needs to go and be near one hundred percent effective for three years or until I give you what you might call the cure.  But magically guaranteed to keep you from becoming pregnant.  Please take them.”

Alexis did, but Boston complained.  “Roland is not here, and I have no interest in doing that with anyone else.”

“But you have been nearly raped a couple of times so far,” Alexis reminded her, and Boston took her pill.

“But I’m not sleeping with anyone right now,” Katie said, and everyone, even Mai-Lyn gave her looks which said they all knew better.  They watched her head turn to look at Lockhart.  Katie took her pill.  “If we were home, I would never have imagined spending time with him.  But I have gotten to know him, the real him.  I think he is my heart.”  She used that fairy expression, and all four women took turns giving her hugs.

“Everything appears normal,” Doctor Mishka smiled.  She had a stethoscope of some kind in her hands.  No one saw where it came from, but she was able to use it to check their hearts and pulse.  “I should probably check your blood pressure as well, but this early in the time stream I haven’t had the equipment built yet.  Everything seems normal, but I will be around.”  Doctor Mishka and her stethoscope vanished and Lin came home to her own time and place.

donkey packs 1“But shouldn’t we know what side-effects to watch out for, just in case?” Alexis asked.

Lin shook her head.  “There should not be any since they are tailored to each of you, individually.”  She hugged Alexis, Katie and Boston.  “I missed the hugging part,” she added as she started them walking back toward the camp.

Alexis and Katie said nothing.  They appeared to be thinking very hard as they walked.  But Boston had something to say, even if it was quietly mumbled.  “Now I really wish Roland was here.”

“Okay,” Lin yelled as the women walked up on the main counsel where the men were arguing about the best deployment of the various groups of soldiers  “Captain Sushang.  Shanjo.  You better get moving right now.  You can make it half way to the end of the lake by nightfall, and hopefully that will be far enough to prevent you being followed.”  Shanjo and Sushang looked at each other.  “Now.  Go.  Get moving.” Lin shooed them off.

“We should go too,” Lincoln said, and Mingus nodded, though he was not about to be caught agreeing with Lincoln out loud.

“The time gate should be in the same direction the caravan will be traveling,” Boston said, with a quick check of her amulet.

“I don’t think we are going to have time for that,” Katie said, and Mai-Lyn nodded vigorously, and pointed.  There were men coming down the hill, about five hundred of them.

pep army 1

The Elect 22, part 4 of 4: The End

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Pierce’s knife came out and flew through the air at a terrible speed.  Emily moved to her weak left side instead of her strong side as expected, and the knife whizzed past instead of gutting her.  It cut a small slice from her right arm before it stuck fast in the old wooden roof door.  Emily thought about pulling it out, but only briefly.  It was thrown with such strength it would probably take her time to yank it free, and she had no time.  Pierce was on her and she was running to her left.

Emily kicked at Pierce’s knees, but missed.  She tried higher, but he caught her foot.  He was incredibly fast and strong, and he tossed her over the edge of the roof.  Emily barely grabbed on to the lip with her left hand, and like a high diver twisting in the air, she contorted and used her a science roof 3momentum to swing herself back up on the roof.

Pierce was right there, but she hit him and knocked his head back.  He hit her and knocked her through the air.  She landed hard against the HVAC pipe and wondered why her neck was not broken with that one punch.  Again he was right there, and this time he had a knife pulled from some hidden pocket.  Emily moved in one motion, she got up, pulled her own knife and sliced Pierce’s hand so he dropped his weapon.  He kicked out and her knife also flew free.

She kicked him, this time in the thigh.  She saw he felt it, but then he kicked back and caught her in the ribs.  It felt to her like someone smashed her with a hammer and she had to back away.  Pierce made a grab for her, but she slapped his hands away.  He was too strong and too quick to wrestle.  They traded punches, but neither landed a clean blow, and Emily knew she needed a weapon.  She made the mistake of glancing at the ground in search of one of the knives, and  Pierce caught her.  He yanked on her hand and reeled her in for an embrace.

He lifted her a bit from the ground and squeezed the air out of her already hurting ribs, but she a science roof 1managed to box his ears and slammed her elbows down, which maybe broke his collarbone.  She went for his eyes while she squirmed to bring her knees up in an effort to break free of his grip.  He buried his face in her chest, but as she boxed his ears again and pushed with her knees, he let her go.  She fell, and he hit her again which sent her rapidly to the roof where she cracked the asphalt.  She was dizzy and broken, but managed to get to her feet once more and backed off, a bit surprised that he was not on top of her.  Maybe she hurt him.  Maybe it was something else, but she breathed through her ribs and spoke.

“Pierce, I love you.”

That appeared to anger him and he rushed her.  She fought like a tigress as they traded blow after blow, but in the end Pierce got in the telling blow and Emily was knocked to her back.  She closed her eyes, involuntarily, because the sky was spinning.  She was not entirely conscious, but by chance she landed on her own knife, and her left hand reached behind her back to grab it, like her hand had a mind of its own.

Pierce came up, cut, bleeding and hurting, but he did not go for the kill.  Instead, he went to oneac pierce 5 knee and lifted Emily so she sat up at the waist.  He laid her semi-conscious head on his upright knee and found a tear in his eye, though Emily did not see it.  They heard a sound by the door.  Emily came awake at the sound of two knives whizzing through the air.  Pierce ducked so the first completely missed.  He grabbed the second in mid flight.  Then he turned his head for a second to look back at Lisa.

Emily did not hesitate.  She whipped her left hand up and drove her knife deep into Pierce’s chest.  Pierce grabbed her hair and yanked her head back to expose her neck.  He whipped Lisa’s knife around and put it to her throat.  Then he smiled deeply and dropped the knife, and the words exploded in Emily’s head.

“He knew!  He turned away on purpose.  He could have stopped her.  He knew!”

Pierce bent down and put his lips to hers.  Emily felt the kiss for a second before she felt just lips.  She wriggled free and Pierce fell to his back.

“Pierce!”  She screamed and fell on him and wept until Lisa gently pulled her off.

END

************************

On Monday April 18, 2016, assuming everyone survives April 15th tax day, Avalon, season 4 will begin to post.

Each episode of the Avalon series is a complete episode, taking place at a different point in history as the travelers work their way from the distant past back to the present day.  Each episode will post over a two week period with three posts per week (occasionally two posts and a couple of times four posts in a given week)  so stay on your toes.  That’s two weeks per episode.

Avalon travelers 2

Avalon is the story of a group of travelers, three “Men in Black”, two marines, two elves and one Gott-Druk (a technologically advanced, space-faring Neanderthal) that get trapped in the deep past.  The only way home is through the Time Gates that surround the many lives of the Kairos, an unfortunate soul who is forced to be reborn every time he (or she) dies.

The Kairos, in many incarnations, remembers the past and, “remembers” the future, which is why she (or he) is concerned to make sure history turns out the way it has been recorded.  That isn’t always easy, especially with a group of twenty-first century lunkheads people stirring the mix.  As if it isn’t bad enough that the Kairos never lives a quiet life, certain other people, creatures, even nightmares have fallen into the past, and some have picked up the trail of the travelers.  Some are following them, but some are hunting them…

Avalon traveers on horseback

Avalon, Episode 4.0 through 4.12 (which is 13 episodes or a Japanese season) will post through the summer up until October.  Hopefully, come October, The Elect II, Sophomore Year will be ready to post.

Enjoy the summer traveling with the Travelers from Avalon, and wish them luck.  They are going to need it.

M G Kizzia

Under my author name, you can find the Prequel, the Pilot Episode, and Avalon Season One all available in E-book form, on Amazon, and through Smashwords at all major E-book sellers (Apple, B&N, etc.).  Season 2 and Season 3 are being formatted and will soon join the company.  Also, they are being formatted for CreateSpace, so sometime this summer they will be available as print-on-demand for all of you who prefer to hold a hard copy in your wonderful hand.  Stay tuned, and as always, whatever you read…a a happy reading************************

coverphoto01

 

 

The Elect 22, part 3 of 4: Explanation

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Emily got to the top of the stairs and paused to catch her wind.  She found the door to the roof open, but was hesitant to go through until she was ready.  She ran her hand through her hair and wiped the sweat from her brow.  She checked her appearance as well as she could without a mirror and wondered why that was important.  It was Pierce.  She knew why, but she did not want to think that way.  She tried hard not to think that way after the zombie lab and after Doctor Zimmer disappeared, but she could not help it.  She loved him.a science roof 1

Emily stepped slowly and carefully on to the big, flat roof.  When she closed the door behind her, Pierce stepped out from behind the HVAC unit.  She wanted to run to him, but he held up his hands, so she paused and looked.  He was dressed in black, his knife at his side and he wore a shoulder holster with a pistol.

“We have to talk first.  Don’t come any closer.”

“What is this?”  She pointed to him and at his weapons.  “I don’t understand.”

“First I need a promise, and then I need to tell you two things,” he said.  Emily did not say anything or move.  “You need to promise,” he repeated.

“Okay,” she said in an uncertain voice.  She was completely in the dark here.

“Promise if you survive this you will stay at this school and finish your studies.  This is a good school and you have—we have friends here, and real friends are hard to come by.”

“Survive?  Pierce?”

“Promise.”  He insisted.

ac emily 7“I do,” she said, and thought it better to say, “I promise, but what –“  Pierce held his hands up again so she quieted.

“Two things.”

Emily nodded.

“First, you need to know I am not human.”

“What?”

“Not like you, anyway.  I mean, everything about me is human, but I was not born like you.”

“What?”

“Doctor Zimmer.  He made me in a laboratory out of hundreds of mothers and fathers, hundreds of separate genetic strands all tied together.”

“But Pierce.”

“You know those old people who went missing and turned up dead?”  Emily nodded.  “Well, Doctor Zimmer was looking for clues to the aging process.  You see, I am not aging correctly.”

“What?  You are twenty-four, I thought.”

“Twenty-five now.  Physically and mentally, and I like to think emotionally I am twenty-five, but chronologically I am only twelve-and-a-half years old.  I am aging at twice the normal rate and Doctor Zimmer does not know why.”

“Pierce.”  Emily did not care about any of that.  She wanted to run to him, but he would not let her.

“I want you to know, I wanted to be with you since the first time I saw you.  You are all I can think about and all I dream about.  After we spent some time together, when I was ordered to spend time with you, it was moot.  I was already in love with you.”

“Pierce.”  Emily’s felt the tears come up into her eyes.  She loved him so much.

“But they ordered it.  As I told you, I am completely flesh and blood, but I was made to follow ac pierce 3orders.  That was why I couldn’t say anything about the zombie lab.  That was why I couldn’t tell you what I am telling you now.”

“But none of that matters, as long as we are together,” Emily spoke her feelings, but Pierce held up his hand again.

“Two things,” he reminded her.  “The second is they want to know if my feelings for you can overcome my programming.”

“I don’t understand.”

“They ordered me to tell you this much.”  He paused to take off his shoulder holster and gun.  He stepped over to the edge, but appeared to be thinking so Emily gave him time to frame what he wanted to tell her.  Pierce dropped the gun over the edge to fall to the ground below, and then he turned to her again and finished his thoughts.  “They have ordered me to kill you, and in case you are thinking of making some noble sacrifice, they ordered that after I kill you I have to kill every student on this campus.”

“Pierce.  Why?”

“Emily, I love you, but I have to kill you.  Please Emily, you have to kill me first, if you can.”