The Alleyway (Skid – GTT character sketch)

Skid stood in the mouth of the alley that ran behind the Westminster church.  His languid gaze casually strolled both ways, trying to pierce the damp fog that shrouded the London nightlife around him. He couldn’t see any flatfoots patrolling the area, and if he couldn’t see them then they couldn’t see him.

A hooker quickly walked past him, wrapped in a thick fur coat with her shoulders slumped, giving the impression that she was ragged and beaten, and not caring enough to show her wares on this cold night.

Her jaded and tired eyes quickly looked him up and down – sizing him up as she passed.  But she saw only a fourteen-year-old street kid wearing torn jeans, a ripped shirt, and a frayed gray trench.  He was definitely not John material, at least not for a few more years.  Then she looked back to the pavement before her feet, not wanting to stare too long – afraid of baiting him into attacking her.

He thought about rolling her for a moment, but shrugged the idea off.  Juicing whores always pissed off the pimps and they were real trouble.  Those guys where colder than ice and they would as soon slit your throat as look at you.  Besides, she had obviously been at her job for far too long and was loosing what looks she may have once had. The hag probably wouldn’t have much dough on her anyway.

Ugly whores were always fairly broke – but they stayed alive because there was always some schmuck who couldn’t afford to buy anything better.  Once she was a bit further down the block he reached into the depths of his faded and beaten trench pulling out two cans of stolen spray paint.  One was black and the other red.  Now: to do the job that he was really here to do.  He grinned and turned into the alley.

The Alleyway was dank and smelly.  The fog was dampening everything there, and as a result the fine layer of dew was covering the trash.  The added moistness only made the trash rot – which added to the putrid stench.  Skid grimaced and tried to only breathe through his mouth.

As thoughts ran through his head he began to get a bit giddy from the adrenaline rush – which made it easier to ignore the fetid smell.  Tagging the house of God.  There was no act deemed greater in Skid’s skewed reality.

Skid hated God, and his hatred coursed and flowed in his veins with a dark passion love could never know.  He had grown up mostly in orphanages and catholic charity boarding schools.  His parents hadn’t wanted him, so had given him up – and he hated them too for not loving him.

But the lord of mankind held a special place in Skid’s blackened heart… But the way he figured it his heart was no worse than anyone else’s.  After all: look at all the messed up thing people do to each other every day.  But God he definitely hated most of all.  It was hatred so deep even Lucifer Morningstar would envy it and place it on display for all in Hell to see.  God had hurt him more than every other.  God had given him every piece of pain in his life.  Every shard of Skid’s shattered soul, every wasted tear, shed only to mingle with his own blood, was God’s responsibility.

Throughout his entire childhood the nuns had all beaten him for reasons he couldn’t understand.  Three of the priests had raped him and then, feeling guilty over the act, had him beaten for being the temptation that led them to sin.  He remembered the faces of all the nuns and priests.  In fact, he remembered with a perfect clarity every single face that had ever caused him pain over the course of his brief life.

Someday he would… he would get even.  Someday he would do much worse to them than they had to him.  After all, was he not taught that what you cast unto waters you receive tenfold?  He would have his revenge.  And right now he was starting it.  He was going to tag this church with his name.  He was going to make this house his spiritual property and take it away from a useless God… and he would do it to every church in London.

He quickly scanned the alley.  It was filled by cardboard fantasies of homes never had and visions of a soulless future.  It was obvious that homeless often tried to camp here but were booted out by the coppers.  Right now the only life sharing this space with Skid was a homeless old man, dirty and pale, asleep under a pile of newspapers.  Skid walked up to him and planted his steel tipped toe right into the old geezer’s ribs.

“Oi, grandfather.  Shove off!”  Just to make sure his point was gotten he planted another kick into the man’s midsection.  Much to Skid’s surprise the old man didn’t budge.  He didn’t even groan at the force of the kick.

Skid was young – he knew that he didn’t have much muscle –but his life had made him tough.  He knew how to throw his entire weight into a kick so he would break bones – a trick he learned quickly so that whomever he was fighting with would not be getting back up.  Skid looked again at the man, this time much more closely, and realized that his chest wasn’t moving.  Well, the skagger was stone cold dead.  What d-ya’ know, it was turning out to be Skid’s lucky night.  He could roll the body and at least come away with a decent pair of boots.  If he were really lucky the old-timer would have a half-consumed bottle of booze.

Skid knelt next to the man and started pulling the newspapers off.  One of the headlines, briefly glimpsed, amused him.  It read “London’s Abused Homeless Population: Death Rate Up By Twenty Percent.”

Sure enough the man was clutching something to his chest.  He began to pry at the man’s cold stiff fingers, eager to see what prize tonight’s treasure hunt would reveal.  But the corpse’s fingers – locked as tightly as they were – wouldn’t budge despite Skid’s best efforts.  Skid braced himself and yanked with all of his fourteen-year-olds strength, not caring if he ripped the guy’s hand off.  He wanted whatever it was the old man had valued so dearly.  He wanted it very badly.  And finally the death embrace of the old man’s hands broke – without tearing off any body parts.

Skid looked in awe at what he saw revealed.  The old fart had been hiding a fragging sword under his trench.  The blade was some type of blue gray metal and it looked sharp and really old.  The hilt was leather wrapped, and there was some writing etched into it in a language Skid didn’t even recognize.  It looked vaguely like Sumerian, or at least what Skid vaguely remember Sumerian looking like from the ancient history course he had been in right before he ran away last time.  He couldn’t even begin to read the fragging letters.  Talk about luck! This was an awesome find – hell, this was probably his best find ever.

Skid’s greedy little eyes lighted up – he should be able to pull at least fifty or sixty pounds out of this find at the right place – and that was a whole lot of money to someone like him.  He reverentially reached down and let his fingers wrap around the hilt.  It was cold to the touch and seemed to slightly vibrate almost like a heartbeat.  The old man’s eyes fluttered open and his hand shot out faster than lightning and seized Skid’s lapel.  Skid jerked back in surprise, and the fingers of his free hand tore at the old man’s fist.  Again Skid found that he couldn’t break the bum’s grip.

“Let go of me you old asshole!  I’ll cut your hand off and fucking kill you if you don’t let go of me!”  Skid was panicking – this guy should be a corpse, not alive and stronger than Skid – but he remembered enough to not shout.  Never do anything to attract the attention of the coppers.

The old man’s voice sounded like the creaking of an ancient door, rusty and feeble but with faint hints of golden times that were so much greater.  “Listen to me…  please…  please… Oh gods…  the caves… I remember them so very well.  You were so young… so innocent… so naïve and trusting… So simple – and yet you were so beautiful.”

Cloudy, dull eyes, which should have been blind, drifted to Skid’s hand and locked their feeble gaze onto the sword.  “Please… You can have the sword; just listen to my story.  I have to tell my story before it passes from this world.  Please.”

Greed instantly overcame Skid’s panic, calming him.  His hands stopped shaking and he stopped fighting the iron grip holding him down.  “All right.  You got three minutes.  Then I got work ta do.”  Fifty pounds to listen to some dying old man rant for a few minutes…  hell; Skid could be generous and do him a favor.  This was easily earned money for him, so why not.  Besides, he was pretty sure he couldn’t break away from the hand gripping his lapel, and he didn’t want to loose his jacket.

The old man imperceptibly nodded his acknowledgement.  Skid had accepted the terms so a bargain was struck.

“Thank you.  You do honor to the needs of a dying old man.”  Came his feeble voice.  “How well I remember it all – looking at you humans in your youth.  You were so weak and helpless…  But you had such strong minds, willing to believe with a force even we did not posses.  We decided to help you to rise above the caves – to nourish your type and give the gift of enlightenment.  We saw a way to gain for ourselves a much longer life span by insuring the continuance of your race.  By giving you something to focus that powerful belief on.  Ah…” The man’s voice sounded pained.  “How brightly the Morningstar shone for your sake.  How brightly…  for it was his idea to help you – and his idea how as well.”

Skid didn’t really understand what the hells this guy was talking about and finally realized that the guy was seriously deranged – a total fucking loony.  He must think he was some alien or something.  But then again a lot of the old farts eeking out a pitiful existence on the foggy streets of London were mostly delusional anyway.  Skid shifted his weight to make himself little more comfortable and waited for the story to continue.

The old man drew a ragged breath then continued.  “First came the paintings…  such bright and vivid pictures… and how wondrously you sang our praises for us.  But how very quickly you became clever too…”

Skid saw a tear forming in the old man’s eye.  “Why?  Why?  You could have given us forever…  and we would have given you everything you wanted…  We would have gifted you everything you could ever hope for.  Life immortal and every other desire your hearts had ever dreamed of…”

Skid was beginning to feel the overwhelming pressures of panic again.  What if this crazy wouldn’t let go?  What if he died and rigor mortis set in?  He’d have to cut his fragging jacket and man it was too cold out to rip up his jacket.  But again greed showed its ugly head and he managed to settle back down – after all the money made would more than pay for Skid’s troubles.  He’d go ahead honor the rest of the three minutes.  After all, there is a shifty type of honor amongst thieves and criminals… and by Skid’s reasoning anyone the cops hassled was a criminal – and the cops hassled the homeless more than anyone else.

The old man seemed to realize that whatever internal struggle Skid had been facing was finished.  Sighing, he continued.  “But you are all fickle.  Even more so than us…  And you had no idea what it was that you actually wanted.  You’ve never known your own hearts.  Oh, Morningstar I loved you so.  You were brighter than any of us…  brighter than all of us combined.  Why did you have to die out?  Oh why did you have to leave us?  We needed you…  Why did I have to witness you fall to a mere human?”

The man bit back a sob.  He seemed to be talking to someone out of the past, someone only he could see.  “You taught them to write, to read, to think.  And they killed you.  We guided you through your lives, your so short but so bright lives…  And in the end you betrayed even us…  We gave you the gift of immortality, a way to live after even death…  to be a part of the universe.  And you threw it away.”

Sorrow deeper than any Skid had known passed across the old man’s face  “All we ever asked was your praise and love – in such a way that we could find strength and will in it.  We guided your kings and princes.  We led those whose love flowed most freely to the greatest victories.  We allowed them to lead other men and conquer nations.  They were allowed to inspire the hearts of thousands.  What a small price to pay…  only a year or two from each life.”

Skid felt Goosebumps crawling up the back of his spine.  The last thing this guy had said…  hadn’t life spans been going up over the last few centuries?  This guy was really starting to creep him out.  He didn’t – and couldn’t – really understand what the old man was saying.  But deep down, in the tarnished soul that Skid held in nothing but contempt, the words resonated with truth – and that scared Skid even more than when the old priests had told him about the little ‘games’ they would be playing.  These words scared Skid more than anything ever had.

Numbness spread throughout his brain but he heard his own voice quietly echoing in the space between them.  “But what changed it all?”  Some deep part of Skid’s brain seemed to be comprehending the story being told to him.

A deep chuckle came from the old man’s throat.  He was seeing some grander joke in Skid’s words, but still retaining his iron grip on Skid’s collar.  “One of yours did it.  He shone brightly, that one did.  He had the fire and passion to rival any of us – with a mind to match.  He almost burned as brightly as the Morningstar himself…  But young Jeshua did not understand the depths of our love or the tenderness of our compassion.  He told me once that he felt like a slave – destined to live by the decree of another.  He could not understand the gift we gave both him and you…  We tried to teach him the ways of the universe – but the dedication we showed was invisible to him.”

The old man stopped talking and began to cough.  The fit seized him and racked his entire body, rattling deeply in his lungs, but he never released his vice-like grip.  The old man obviously only had a few moments left to live.  Skid was so lost in the man’s words he didn’t even think to try breaking free and didn’t realize that the three minutes had elapsed.

Once the coughing fit subsided the old man hungrily sucked air into his lungs and then continued with his confusing story.  “So he turned against us.  He betrayed the ones who had loved him so – and we had shown him a love greater than any of you ever has or ever will know.  He left us… and once he had left he used the fire and beauty of his vision to attempt to lead our children against us.  The monks called him the great teacher and gifted him the title of Christos.  So he led them and he taught them his warped version of the truth inherent in us…  He used the very concept that we had created to benefit you – the greatest of beings who watched over all – against us.  He tried to turn and warp that worship to himself, or at least away from us, to reap the rewards of ages of our workings and take it away from those that loved you all so much.  He tried to destroy us to free humanity and never realized that so doing would eventually destroy humanity as well.”

The man’s voice wavered with sorrow and regret.  “Oh that our most beloved son would turn against us so…  The pain it caused within us all – that such beauty and tranquility in one of you could turn to such hatred and loathing upon us.  It was a heartbreaking time for us…  We were all so unsure of what our course of action should have been…  You see, we wanted so badly to save him, but in the end we simply couldn’t.”

“We all mourned so much for him, but he left us no choice – If we were to survive we had to take his essence.  It had to be done, and publicly, to stop him and his followers.  It was necessary to stop him before it went too far… before he could succeed.  We mourned so at doing this terrible deed, but should he have triumphed in usurping us it would have meant all of our deaths.”

The old man’s mouth twisted into a bitter smile.  “But In the actions we took we only managed to sow the seeds of our own downfall.  The Morningstar tried to save us all – he foresaw what none of us could have…  He assumed our beloved son’s form three days after his death – thinking to spread a new gospel through our dead son’s disciples.”

A chill ran through Skid’s body.  He was finally beginning to understand…  and with his dawning comprehension a wave of nausea slid over him.  His hushed voice came out barely audible and filled with a dread chill.  He feared what the answer to his next question would be.  “And what did the Morningstar tell the disciples… what did he tell them when he came back as Jeshua?”

The old man coughed for a moment more then refocused on Skid.  “He sacrificed himself in the attempt to save the rest of us.  That was what his words brought.  How noble he was…  but how naïve – although I suppose we all were back then.  He named himself as the true evil, as the counterpart to the one we had created, hoping that fear of evil would get humanity to love the rest of us that much more…  he fed himself only hatred and disgust.  It was such a foolish sacrifice.  How twisted and dimmed he became before he… before he finally died.  He was only the dimmest of shadows compared to the intensity with which he used to shine.  Even so, with corruption and hatred eating at the very essence of his being, only I amongst my kind actually outlived him.”

Tears were now running unfettered down the ancient’s face.  “His last attempt at survival spawned such evil…  He used the visage he assumed to twist the minds of millions and plunge the world into one of its darkest ages… to kill millions upon millions more… and he turned against the ones who were our first children.  Plunging the entire world into war was not enough for him.  He created camps of slaughter, trying to reap as much hatred, fear, and death as he could.  In death and corruption he hoped to find the power he lost when he gave up the love of your kind to try to save the rest of us.  And that much death is what ended up killing him.  It almost finished me too – and I was half the world away, hiding from it all.  Despite my hiding it would have killed me too, had it not been for my particular aspect…  Throughout the ages I have become used to the mass death of your kind.  It is why I have found the strength to continue as long as I have.”

Yet another coughing fit racked the man’s body and Skid gazed down upon him.  The ancient one was standing one the threshold of death’s door.  The puzzle pieces of what he was saying were finally clicking together and reaching the greatest depths of Skid’s mind and soul – and something that was not a part of him was burning deeply inside of him.  Skid felt the beginnings of a sickening vertigo – a sense of loss that was coming from him – and was slowly seeping into the depths of his soul.

Hatred and rage boiled inside his twisted heart and they were slowly worming their way through his being and into his every level of consciousness.  His mind was swimming and his thoughts were becoming numb – forlorn with knowledge unbearable by even the strongest man.  He was slowly understanding that his greatest enemy did not exist in a way which he could wreak his vengeance.

The old man looked up through fading eyes – greed and recognition shone from behind those eyes.  He began the final stretch of his tale.

“The Morningstar’s great plan failed.  None of us could see past the need for love… the need for essence.  It burned in us and consumed us.  In a way it twisted us all.  We created an image that humanity could love, and stole the love for ourselves by placing us as His seconds.  But the only one of you to ever shine like one of us undid everything.  For he had found such a burning hatred for our kind that it easily bested all of our love.  But a few of us learned to live on the hatred instead, forsaking love, even though it only twisted and blackened us.  We did it – though it drove most of those who learned how insane.  The need for survival was far too great.  And then the need for vengeance became to strong to forsake by dying off…”

The old man burned with an inner rage of his own and his words came out like fire, forever searing themselves into Skid’s head.

“I curse you and your kind.  We loved you.  For aeons we loved you.  And you killed the God we made for you… you killed Him.  And then you fed us nothing but hate and in the end you took even that away leaving us to die… we shall have our revenge…”

And Skid snapped.

Years of hatred and fear – years of being the underdog, forced into action by the whims of others – welled up in his spiteful little mind and took over.  Ripping his jacket free he stood up, towering above the dying old man, sword raised high above his head.

The old man looked up with mutual hatred shining in his eyes and a smile crossed his face.  “You’ve spent the last two thousand years killing us off and now I am the last.  But I will survive… In one of you if I must!”

Spittle flew from his mouth as he rushed to get his last words out.  “You alone still hate.  Why?  What do you live on?  I must know.”

His eyes locked with Skids but found only emptiness.

And Skid brought the sword down as hard as he could.  Every muscle in his young body focused into that single stroke of the sword.  There was a sickening crunch as the sword sliced through skin and crushed the ribs in its way.  Blood splattered over Skid and the wall he was going to tag.  The blood was gold and icy to the touch.  As it hit the wall frost formed around it.

Unseeing and unthinking Skid began to kick the body.  Over and over again he smashed his boot into the corpse while tears streamed down his cheeks.  Years of hatred, fear, and self-loathing had snapped his mind – and his innermost psychological defenses could not find a way to heal the fracturing.

Skid had walked into that alley to make the house of God his own.  But now all that stood in the alleyway was an empty husk slowly filling up with something else, kicking over and over again, the tears streaming down its face the last vestiges of its humanity.

And finally the body broke down.  There was no energy left to continue.  It slumped to its knees and started rocking back and forth.  He curled into a ball, sobbing and letting his frail human psyche try to rebirth itself.

But finally there was not even energy for that.  His body shut down and he slept.

Much later he woke.  It was still dark.  A faint smile played across his lips.  He stood up, tall and proud, lacking his usual slouch.  He hefted the sword and gazed thoughtfully at it.  A dim golden glow was barely visible in his pupils.  Suddenly the blade burst into a bright and warm flame.

His eyes wandered to the sky as he savored his newfound essence.  The sun was just peeking over the horizon, adding a rich red glow to the encompassing fog.

“I finally understand.  Your fear is so great you have only apathy to survive on.  Your race hides from its own passion…” He said in a voice that was not Skid’s.  The figure seemed to ponder this for a moment.  “Even Morningstar never foresaw this.  But I can survive with this.”

And the Archangel Uriel, flame of God, the angel of transformation, stretched his new body and strode into the foggy London morning to avenge the death of his kind.

Barking Up The Wrong Tree, Pt 3, Conclusion

They were uncharacteristically silent as Josh drove them back to the storm drain that Amber had found.  Each was dealing with their own thoughts, getting ready for a terrifying experience.  Drew alone didn’t sit still, instead taking the time to stretch and limber up his muscles.  Stripped down to just his shorts, crisscrossing lines of scars could be seen across his torso, arms, and back.  It took Josh a moment to find a spot to park the Bus at, but finally they were ready.  The group piled out, walking carefully and quietly over to the drain cover.

Tabitha looked around at everyone one last time.  “The second you’re in the dark, I want you shifted. You’ll need your extra senses.  Got it?”

Everyone nodded.

“Good.  I’m going down first.  Drew, pop it for me.  You take rear guard.”

Drew nodded. He reached down with his right hand and grabbed the cover of the drain.  His  muscles seemed to ripple, his arm elongating and getting thicker as he flexed it, then the storm drain cover popped off and he was fully human again.

Amber gasped.  “How the hell did you do that?”

Drew grinned wolfishly.  “Later, little girl.  Now’s not the time.” He grunted a little and got his shoulder under the drain cover, holding it up with his entire body.

Tabitha grinned, then got serious.   “All right.”  She took a deep breath.  “Lets do this.”   With a light splash her backpack landed in the sewer below.  She tucked her knees up, and hopped in, spinning around and kicking down onto the ladder rungs, catching herself right at the lip of the entrance.  “Discipline and calm kids.  Keep your heads, and stay focused, okay?”

Everyone was nodding yes as something flashed in the darkness below her and she just… vanished.  No scream, no noise.  One second she was there, the next she wasn’t.

“Shit!”  Drew threw back the cover with so much force that it dented the dumpster it crashed into. “Follow me in.”  He hopped forward and was in wolf form before he landed in the sewers. The pack could hear him growling as they followed him down.  As each of them reached the bottom of the ladder they shifted obediently to wolf form, except Eliot.  He dropped down, slung off his backpack, and started rifling through gear.

Jenna put her nose down to try to catch Tabitha’s scent, and almost fell over whimpering when she inhaled.  No scent. she growled.  Can’t smell anything down here.  Use your ears and eyes.  Nose is a bad idea.

Drew spun around snarling as blood splattered across the rest of the pack.  His left flank was torn open, but he had a vampire’s wrist in his jaws, and was jerking his head back and forth.  A wolf has a jaw capable of tearing out a man’s throat in a single bite, and werewolves are even stronger than normal wolves.  But Drew was fighting against supernatural strength and losing.

As the rest of the pack leapt forward to join the fight, they saw Drew’s hind leg buckle under him.  The Vampire started to lunge forward, but he reversed his momentum and pulled back instead as he saw Amber’s black form come sailing over Drew.  She snarled and snapped at his neck, forcing him to bring his arm up to try to deflect her, but she had purposefully overshot her jump and sailed past him.

Seizing the distraction, Jenna and Josh darted in low on his flanks, ripping gouges of muscles out of his calves.  Jenna spun and darted back to protect Drew, who was pulling himself back, still snarling.   Josh kept his momentum, ripping at the Vampires leg, and spinning the creature around like a top as he loped up to Amber.

The Vampire hissed, exposing its fangs, and in a barely human voice spoke.  “Dogs.  Eat your blood dogs.  Come play dogs.”  Tradition should have made the Vampire’s voice sound like the opening of an ancient crypt, or possibly cobwebs should be heard in his voice while it made spiders creep down the listener’s spine.   In truth though, he sounded like a junkie in detox who got clubbed in the head; kind of a jittery loud whisper, slurred, without a lot of capability to think behind it.

His eyes kept darting back and forth as he twisted his torso to keep all four wolves in his line of sight.  Looking into his eyes, the pack saw nothing but a rabid animal inside.  And there was only one thing to do to a rabid animal.

Put it Down. Drew growled. Carefully though.  Harry it, and don’t give it a chance to close with any of you.

Aye, aye, captain obvious. Wuffed Amber.  It sounded like a sneeze, with her trying not to laugh, and was so out of place that the Vampire spun around to her, suspect an attack at his back.  Josh lunged forward, ready to strike and fade.  And that’s where it all went wrong.

Tactics like that only work when a creature is trying to preserve itself, but the Vampire was insane; its soul was stripped away and ripped to shreds when it had been turned and lost its mind.  All that was left was a beast that was driven by hate.  When Amber didn’t attack him, he charged her and Jenna instead.

Josh’s jaws closed over empty air as the Vampire took Jenna and Amber by surprise.   There was a sickening crunch as his claws sunk into Jenna’s chest, ripping through her fur and muscles.  He sunk his hands into her ribs and swung her around, smashing her into Josh and sending them both crashing into the sewer wall.  They landed in a heap and neither moved.

While his back was exposed Amber leapt forward with a snarl and landed heavily on his back, latching her jaws around the back of his neck.  He started whipping around, howling in pain, trying to dislodge her.

Drew hunkered down, getting ready to spring into the fight despite his bad leg, when a hand lightly touched his shoulder and a barely visible shadow moved forward.  He paused, and the shadow moved in front of him.

“Hey, asshole.”  Eliot’s voice floated calmly through the darkness. “Don’t ever touch my friends again.”  There were two clicks as the triple cell black-lights he was holding in each hand sprang to life.  The Vampire screamed and fell to its knees sobbing, his skin starting to smolder and the torn up clothes he was wearing bursting into flame, finally lighting the underground battlefield.  Amber sprang back off of him.  The Vampire slumped forward and fell face first into the water, his life-force drained, burnt out of him.

The wolves didn’t have time to relax though, before Tabitha’s limp form came hurling out of the darkness behind Amber and smashed into Eliot, shattering the black-lights.

A woman’s voice, rich and deep, obviously used to laughter, came rolling out of the darkness.  “Oh well done, my pretties.  I didn’t expect you to be able to take my pet so easily.  Yet you managed.  I must applaud the elder.”  The voice sighed.  “How she has aged.  Those delicate young features lining with age.  If only she had my secret.”  Laughter drifted down the dark sewer.

Amber backed up, hackles raised, till she was poised between Drew and Eliot.  Eliot wasn’t paying attention to the voice, focused instead on getting Tabitha settled and checking her vitals.  He found a heartbeat, which seemed to be enough for him, then he stood up, pulling a gun out of his pocket.  Dull oranges and reds highlighted the passageway, a flickering dance of macabre light from the smoking remains of the feral Vampire.  Without a word he pulled the massive chrome monstrosity to shoulder height and started squeezing the trigger.

Burps of flame flashed in the tunnel as he shot bullets at the source of the voice, slowly walking forward.  The gun clicked empty and he dropped the clip, slapping another into its place in under a second and continuing to fire.

Amber sprang forward to his side, man and wolf calmly walking forward, towards the voice.  Tabitha’s voice sounded weak, but she struggled up and said “Stop.  She’ll kill you.”

The Vampire woman’s voice cut through the darkness like a katana through silk. “Oh, pet, you are ruining my fun.”  There was a blur in the edge of the ember glow, and two wet thuds.  Eliot and Amber went flying backwards, bouncing off the tunnel walls and landing in broken heaps behind Tabitha.  Drew growled and limped forward.

The elder vampire woman was finally standing in the light, languidly relaxing in by the crisped remains of her feral companion.  She was about five foot five, but carried such a presence that she seemed to fill the murky corridor from floor to ceiling.  Dark hair cascaded in lavish curls down her pale, heart shaped face, and the rich velvet red an black gown Victorian gown she wore seemed to glow with the power that surrounded her.

With an elegant gesture of her hand, the corpse at her feet simply slid to the side, clearing a path between her and the two elder werewolves.  She crooked a finger and beckoned to Drew.  “Come child, lets dance, shall we?”

Drew was only too happy to oblige her, spring from his crouch with a snarl.  She reached out, lightning fast, to catch him by the throat, but his form rippled in midair.  He snaked his head out of the way, reached forward with an arm and landed a vicious slice with half formed claws across her chest.  But then her hand was clamped around his wrist, pushing him to the ground until he was kneeling before her.

Glancing down at her shredded gown, fangs poked her bottom lip as she frowned.  Twenty feet away Tabitha was struggling to get to her feet.  The vampire’s elegant gown was ruined, hanging in strips from her waist.  She sighed.  “And this was a brand new gown too.  Do you know how expensive it is to get my wardrobe crafted these days?  Insolent pup?  Still…”

Drew looked up through the pain and noticed her nipples were erect.  This was obviously exciting her.  “Who the hell are you?” he gasped.

“I, sir,”  She smiled languidly. “am her Excellency, niece to the King of Poland, Countess Elizabeth Bathory.  And you… well, as I like to say, Vini, Vidi, Vita Vaci.”  The countess swept her left hand up across Drew’s torso and chest.  Blood sprayed against the walls on either side of them.  A gurgle escaped Drew’s throat as he slumped to the ground.

Tabitha had managed to pull herself up.  “Do you really see yourself as Caesar?  I came, I saw, I took life?”

“Oh dear no.  Caesar was a small minded, cruel little man who tried to make up for great insecurity with great feats of conquering.  I am a force of nature.   An immortal.  Its just a little affectation of mine.  But you.  You get to live again.”

Holding on to pipe bolted high on the wall, Tabitha narrowed her eyes.  “Why me, bitch?”

“Oh, you are just so cute I could eat you up.  Of course, that wouldn’t help in keeping you alive to feel your pain, now would it?”

Tabitha was thankful that Bathory was evil.  A good hearted person wouldn’t have talked, wouldn’t have gloated, and wouldn’t have given her a chance to gather her willpower together.

“Tabitha, your blood is the answer.  Your line.  If you go back in the family tree, you will discover that you are of the same blood as Istvan Magyari.”  She practically spat the name.  “That fool minister was the sole reason I lost my estate and was imprisoned in that damned tower.  If it hadn’t been for my dear friend Vladimyr, I most likely would have died in there.”

She delicately wiped Drew’s blood off her face.  “It is for his sins that you pay.  As will your descendants.  You will die alone, as I extinguish any life that comes too close to your own.”

Bathory stopped walking forward and the two women were face to face, with maybe five feet separating them.  Tabitha focused as she saw the Countess’s eyes start to swirl, red and lavender.  Tension ripped at her shoulders forcing her hands apart.  She recognized the feeling, and knew that they were sharing mindspace, battling with will alone.

But old dogs can learn new tricks…  This time, as Tabitha felt the wood of the crucifix scrape roughly against her back, she fed the fire.  All of her hate, all of her sorrow, everything that had built a lifetime of pain she fed to the fire.  And it burned.  It burned like nothing in the real world could, consuming the pain, consuming the hatred, consuming the weariness… until all that was left was steel, forged in a mind of power, by an opposing will.

Tabitha snapped open her eyes and smiled.  Bathory reeled back, shocked by having her will resisted.  Human arms, augmented by lycanthrope strength, snapped forward, and claw tipped finger closed like a vice around Countess Bathory’s throat.

The Countess, in turn, realized that she wouldn’t get back into Tabitha’s mind, so returned the favor and started choking her.  The two were locked in a struggle to see who would go unconscious first.  Both were doing their best to crush the other’s throat.

“I’m impressed, child.” Gasped the Countess.  “But you can’t win this.  Vampires can retain consciousness in much more dire circumstances.”

Not..  Fucking… Fair… Thought Tabitha, as her vision started to swim and go black around the edges.  Can’t end… like…  this…

A boy’s voice, dripping with a heavy British accent, one she didn’t recognize, came from behind Countess Bathory.  “And so it shan’t, noble werewolf.”  Three feet of steel ripped through her chest and burst into flame.  The Vampire shrieked, blood flying from her mouth.  She leapt forward, bowling over Tabitha and away from the threat behind her.

Tabitha looked up.  Surrounded by the faintest golden nimbus was… a boy.  He was dressed street punk, had a shaved head, and couldn’t have been more than sixteen years old.

The Countess hissed at him. “You!”  She spat.  “How dare you interrupt?  I will seek you, ambusher, and I will kill you!”  As suddenly as he had appeared, she was gone, without a trace.

The boy sniffed the air.  “The stench is gone.  She has departed. Your pack will need medical attention.  Lucky for you, she wanted to save their killings until you were enthralled, to leave the mark of their deaths on you, eh?”  He reached down and offered a hand to help her up.

She blinked.  “Who..  what..  wha..   the…”

He smiled impishly and sheathed his sword in a dusty looking old scabbard hanging under his London Fog trench coat.  “I’m Skid.  Shall we skip the formalities until we have your friends under the lord’s sky?”

Around them, groaning, the pack started to get to their collective feet, nursing injuries as they pulled themselves up.  She took his hand.  “Yes.  And… Thank you, Skid.”

Writing and wishing… the instant manuscript

Sometimes, I wish life was a little more like Harry Potter..  You know?

So that I could just tap a wan against my temple, say something like ‘Creatus Manuscriptus!”

and..  poof…   there it would be!

sigh.  Back to typing :p

Spyke! – GTT Character Sketch

This is the puppy of the main character (Winnie’s) best friend- Jenny.   He is a black Chihuahua named Spyke – who wears a spiked leather collar.   In the scene that Winnie is dying in, Spyke is whimpering and licking Winnie’s face…  and ingests vamp blood.  Below is the scene which introduces the dog as a vampire Chihuahua instead of as a normal dog.

I do plan to get a black Chihuahua to attend signings with me and leave ink-paw prints as a sig in books.  He will wear a spiked collar and be named Spyke, of course.  I’m also going to try to franchise out stuffed animals based on the character, and possibly T-Shirts with a pic of him and the quote ‘Sometime the bite is worse than the bark.’

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

Chrprrrdrk watched the apple core intently.  Moonlight glinted tantalizingly off of the juicy remains, promising a full belly and making his taste buds sweat in anticipation.  An average squirrel might see a feast this delicious six times in the course of their lives.  Chrprrrdrk waited patiently though; oh yes, he had learned that virtue well.  An encounter with Razorclaw, a leanly muscled, evil- as-Mussolini neighborhood tabby cat had left him his veteran’s stripe – a scar that ran diagonally across his face from the left ear to the right side of his nose.

So he hung onto the trunk of the old birch tree, tucked upside down in the shadow of a branch – well off the white bark that was so readily reflecting the moon’s calm glow.  Carefully, he watched…  waited…  Minutes crawled by like hours, and still he was patient.  Finally he was sure that Razorclaw was nowhere to be seen and with a quick scrabbling of claws he darted down to the apple core, ready to claim his prize.

‘PREDATOR!!!’  screamed his instincts as a flash of silver glinted off of something shiny to his right.   A muffled ‘Yip” was the last thing Chrprrrdrk heard as Spyke’s fangs sank into his neck and shuffled him off this mortal coil.  Spyke drained his victim dry, licked his chops, and contentedly
padded back to the doggie door to find Jenny and cuddle.

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

The Entire first ‘chapter’ of Second Paradigm

So, I’m not particularly skilled at coding blogs, and I offer my apologies in advance if I messed up the formatting so that it breaks any sentences or chops any words up. :X   Without further ado – here is the first section of ‘Second Paradigm.’

Epilogue

The crowd screamed in panic. Police, trained as they were, had guns drawn but pointed to the ground to gun down the shooter if they could spot him. The man stood back up from where he had fallen, looking slowly around himself in wonder. Silence encapsulated him, a pinpoint beacon of sanity amongst the contagious panic.

Something had hit him from behind. Pushed him to the ground. Right before it had happened. The weird thing to him was that he felt the other outcome, sitting painfully in the back of his mind, gnawing at his memory. Hidden like a viper was the knowledge of what might have been. He filed it away for later, fighting to push it to the back. Right now he was too confused to deal with that weight sitting there.

He looked around again, standing still amongst the whirlwind of motion surrounding him. “No man is an island.” He spoke it like a mantra, reminding himself that he was a part of all this. Someone was pointing up and behind him, so he looked back. There was a window, it seemed to leap out of the background for him the second his eyes lit on it. In the window was an empty tripod, some type of clamp attached to the top of it, lazily spinning in its joint. His gaze slowly wandered down to the ground below the window.

There was a body lying there. It was a woman that he knew too well, and she obviously had been defenestrated. The fall had also all too obviously broken her neck. On the ground next to her was a pistol. It was a Glock, lying there with a shattered scope affixed to it. The gun pushed at his memories of what might have been and understanding started for him in that moment. He reflexively squeezed his empty hand. It did not come to him as an epiphany, it was not a cataclysmic opening of his mind to the truth. Rather, it was like a thief in the dark of night sneaking into his mind then settling in as though it had always been there. And once it was there it had always been there.

He smiled and calmly walked away from the crowd. What had been done was now undone. And the Origin… was once again safe. And now he understood what that was, and that it existed. With a simple motion, just pushing another man down, he had determined exactly what that future was to be. Hard though the choice had been, understanding had come that there truly was no other choice.

He left and went back to living his life, walking through the reflections of the origin into the future that was his that was his alone.

.. .. Relativity Synch Phase 1…. .. ..

2003: The Pawn Sacrificed .. ..

“I…” Chris felt himself flush, the anger slowly rising in his blood. But looking to the Jury and seeing sympathetic eyes staring back at him helped to calm and stem that rising tide of anger. “…I don’t remember. I’m sorry.”

The prosecuting attorney, James Garrett, flashed a small but humorless grin at Christopher Nost, and his eyes cold gray eyes bored into Chris’s, seeming to speak directly to his hind-brain. “I’ve got you. There’s no way out for you this time. This has to finish it.” Chris felt bile rise in his throat. He was afraid that he was going to throw up all over the witness box.

“What exactly do you mean, you don’t remember, Dr. Nost? Do you or do you not have an alibi for the night of August thirteenth, nineteen ninety-seven, or was it, in fact, you that murdered Lucille Frost at the office building you both worked at?” Garrett’s voice slowly gained volume as he turned towards the Jury. “How can you know you are not guilty? Your mental condition seems awfully convenient – something which you could easily take advantage of in a situation which played out exactly as this one has for you. I urge you to look deep inside yourself. Simply put, you ca-”

“Objection, your Honor.” Chris’ defense attorney, Alan Dunwich rose, both fists planted firmly on the long oak table in front of him. “Dr. Nost’s memory loss condition has already been established to the Jury. At this point the prosecution is just badgering the defendant and building straw men!” His face was flushed and he looked truly livid as he gazed at the prosecuting attorney.

“My client has a rare form of mental defect here documented by Dr. Eric Jorgensen, one of the world’s foremost neurologists. As was previously explained-” he drew out the words while staring at Garrett as if speaking to a young child, “—Dr. Nost can remember concepts and ideas, hence his ability to continue his work in the field of Aerospace Mechanics and Astrophysics, but new experiences and faces fade after a little more than a year, rendering his long term memory useless. The court has already heard Dr. Jorgensen’s testimony. I request that the prosecution’s question be struck from the record.” Dunwich waved a manila folder toward Judge Miller, but he was still glaring at James Garret.

Chris’s head swam and Garrett seemed to blur for a second as his vision went fuzzy. Hold it together, he fought the fear rising in his gut in a wave of nausea, here is not the time or place to break down.

“Objection sustained, defense. Recorder, please strike the last question from the record. Mr. Garret, you have been warned once already about bringing up Dr. Nost’s disability in this courtroom, as it has no bearing on this trial. And if you continue to treat this trail as a farce I will hold you in contempt of court. Now, do you have any other questions for the defendant?”

Dunwich looked at Garret in triumph, but the Prosecutor only shrugged lightly and said, “No, your honor. The prosecution rests.”  Garrett walked back to his seat at the prosecutor’s table and sat down, trying his best to hide the smug smile flitting across his face.

Bastard, Dunwich thought.  Inadmissible or not, he had planted suspicion in the minds of the jury.  The defense attorney could see it in their faces, the seed of doubt would grow.  Where five minutes ago he could see sympathy for Chris plainly etched in their eyes, some now looked at Chris in doubt, others in loathing – the ones that had already made their decision.  The damage had been done, and right when Dunwich thought he had this trial clinched.

The Jury’s verdict was already obvious in their expressions.  He ground his teeth together and clenched his jaw in frustration, then reclaimed his seat as Chris returned to the defense’s table, his gears already spinning on how to turn this around in the closing statement.  Damn him, Alan glanced at Garrett, an unknown who relies solely on playing dirty.  How did this asshole land this case?  Is the District Attorney stupid?  I can nail him in an appeal and it will be easy.

Judge Miller looked around the courtroom, his gaze lingering on Chris.  “Then this court will adjourn for a one hour recess.  We will reconvene at—” he glanced at the round, institutional clock hanging above the jury, “—three-thirty for closing statements.  Bailiff, please take Dr. Nost to his holding cell.  Dr. Nost, you will not be summoned to this courtroom again until the Jury’s announcement of the verdict. Do you understand that?”

Chris nodded slowly to the judge.  He did understand.  It meant that he would have to suffer alone in a cell until the jury was done debating his verdict.  As Chris was led from the courtroom he saw a man stand up from the audience benches and pushed his way through the milling crowd, waving to Judge Miller.  He wore a plain blue suit and the thick black rimmed glasses known in the military as birth control glasses.  The last thing that Chris noticed as he was gently pushed from the courtroom was that the man clutched a small stack of folders stamped with a red “CLASSIFIED” across them.

Do I know that man? Chris thought.  There was a spark of recognition there, and he wracked his brain, but couldn’t remember.

*                                      *                                      *

Chris waited in the holding cell for just over three hours, staring out to the world through a three inch thick Plexiglas window.  The glass, besides obscuring what he could see because of its thickness, also had some sort of thin metal woven through it in a diagonal pattern that formed diamonds in it.  ‘Just in case I can break through three inches of Plexiglas they had to reinforce it with metal’ Chris bitterly thought to himself. Every moment of those three hours seemed to drag by like an eternity unto itself as he watched the seconds creeping by on the wall-clock behind the guard, who was sitting at a desk reading a science fiction novel.

It looked like the same clock that was hanging in the courtroom.  How long will it take them? He thought over and over.  He fantasized about moving time forward, just to get it over with, but soon gave up on the idle daydreaming,  knowing that it was futile to try and distract himself.  It could be days, he thought …Or even weeks.  Anger welled within him again at this unfair situation, but was slowly eaten away by a corrupting fear.  Conflicting emotion ate at him until he was so lost within himself that he didn’t even notice as tears started to run down his cheek.

Abruptly Chris’s stomach lurched as the external door opened.  His hopes and fears were being answered as the bailiff walked in and with a quick glance at Chris began speaking to the holding cell guard.  He took a deep breath, trying to make the nausea settle.  It’s not going to be good. He tried to banish the cancerous thought, but it was firmly entrenched even before they opened his cell door. It was a certainty lying in his stomach like a lead weight.  It’s not going to be good.

As the holding cell door opened the guard noticed the despair in Chris’s eyes and handed him a small stack of napkins.  “Here.  Wipe your cheeks off.”  The guard looked away for a moment to give Chris a chance to compose himself.  “I know it’s scary for you right now, but don’t give up.  Me and the other guards have been watching your case on the tube and none of us think you did it.  We’re all hoping you’ll get off.”

Their eyes locked for a brief moment and Chris realized the man was being sincere.  There was truth gazing back at him from those eyes and with crystal clarity Chris realized that his life was over.  Hope… they know I’ve lost too.  It’s not just me. As he focused on centering himself; trying to retain some shred of his dignity he looked once more to the guard.

“Thank you.”  Was all he said.  There was no emotion in his voice, though, no hope.  As they walked down the hall to the courtroom the guard once again became all business, but as Chris entered the courtroom and started walking towards his attorney, he felt a slight, reassuring pat on his back from the bailiff.  He knew it should be consoling, but it only served to reinforce in his mind that this was hopeless.

It was almost as though he was just an actor who had been through this scene a dozen times prior – and nothing he could do would change the scripted outcome of this play.  As he took his seat Alan Dunwich, a man who was a surprising gift of humanity and friendship to him in these times, leaned towards him.  The man was older, possibly in his sixties with pure silver hair.  He was a large man, not necessarily fat, but definitely headed in that direction.  In many ways, Chris noted, he was truly larger than life.  “Something has happened,” Dunwich excitedly whispered to Chris.  “I don’t know what, but as soon as you left a guy came in to talk to Judge M…”

“All rise.  The honorable Judge Miller is presiding.”  The bailiff interrupted, and Chris and his lawyer stood.  Judge Miller emerged from the antechamber looking troubled, sat, and banged his gavel.  Solemnly he looked around the hushed courtroom then sighed and turned towards the Jury.

“Foreman of the Jury, have you reached a verdict?”

“We have, Your Honor,” a wormy man with a greased comb-over and a Freddy Mercury moustache stood and handed the bailiff a slip of paper.  The Bailiff in turn relayed it to the judge, who unfolded it and read it.  His eyes gave away nothing.  My life is on that paper, Chris thought.  My continued existence hangs balanced on a thread of twelve people’s interpretations of the words of two men…  A man who loves me, and a man who hates me.

Judge Miller frowned once as he looked again at the slip of paper, then handed it back to the bailiff who returned it to the foreman.  “Please announce your verdict to the court.”

The foreman of the Jury looked nervously at the watching crowd and cleared his throat “We, the Jury, find the Defendant, Dr. Christopher Nost, guilty of the charge of First Degree murder in the case of Lucille Frost.”

Chris’ mind went blank as a wave of numbness crashed into his soul.  He felt like he was still waiting for something.  He could almost see it, hurtling toward him in time, something that he could not quite grasp.  Looking deep inside himself he knew that this was not something he had done.  A susurrus swept through the watching crowd as people excitedly started to whisper their opinions to each other.  Christopher Nost looked up to the ceiling and realized that his life was now forfeit.  It took everything he had to stop himself from bawling like a child in the middle of the courtroom.  Even so, he felt a few solitary tears making their way down his cheek.

Judge Miller banged his gavel again, calming the stir of the courtroom.  Chris was not been aware of the noise until it once again fell silent.  “I am now in a position I have not before found myself in twenty years of serving as Justice of this state.  I recently was paid a visit from someone who has shown me evidence that the likelihood of Dr. Nost’s guilt is very small, indeed.  This evidence, however, remains inadmissible in court.  Therefore, this court will waive the lifetime sentence and reduce it to the minimum of ten years.  Furthermore, this term will be carried out in a minimum security prison in which Dr. Nost can continue to work with his employer, GeoTech, Inc., and will be provided with any and all equipment necessary to carry out his duties.  Also, Dr. Nost is to continue his sessions with Dr. Jorgensen in an effort to find a cure for his condition.  And one last point.  As a ward of the state all of Dr. Nost’s medical expenses will be paid by the state of Colorado.”

Judge Miller looked at Chris.  “I personally very much hope that someday you will find your memories returned to you, and I wish you the best of luck, Dr. Nost.  This court is now adjourned.”

So that’s it, then. Chris thought as he weakly nodded to the Judge in thanks.  His lawyer was saying something about an appeal but Chris wasn’t listening.  The feeling of waiting wasn’t gone.  If anything, it had intensified.  The sentencing is over, he told himself.  The waiting is done.  You got of with your life, which is a hell of a lot more than you expected.  Relax.

Got off how? Another voice within him asked.  I’m sure I didn’t do it.  I couldn’t do anything like that.  I’m going to prison for ten years for a crime I didn’t commit. The feeling of shell shock just wouldn’t go away.

Chris was marched into the high, marble hall that led to the front doors of the courthouse.  Despite the judge’s lenience, he noticed there were six guards escorting him to the waiting prison van.  Do they really think I’m that dangerous? He wondered.  Yes, he answered his own question, in their eyes I am a convicted killer.  I am a dangerous person to them.

Then he began to hear something over the empty echo of their footsteps on the checkered black and grey marble floor, and Chris saw in the light at the end of the hall (end of the tunnel he thought, grimly) more guards, facing outwards.

He heard someone shout “Here he comes!” and the footsteps were entirely drowned by the roar of the media circus outside.  Dozens of voices, all clamoring to be heard over each other.  Dunwich stepped in front of Chris to attempt to fill in as crowd control to the impending mob of media.

Funny, he thought, You’d think that in a city like Denver a simple murder wouldn’t draw the attention it has. But the world didn’t work like that.  Because of his memory condition this case had become somewhat of a sensation.  Chris grimaced as his memory flooded with the headlines he has read about himself.  No family, no memory… the mystery murderer…

One of the guards leaned in and tried to reassure him by squeezing his shoulder, “you might want to put this over your head… you know… they can attack like vultures when they smell blood.” The guard tried handing him his jacket, but Chris was lost like a deer in the headlights and didn’t hear.  He was waiting, watching this unstoppable, unnameable event hurtle towards him through time.

What’s happening to me? His head was starting to spin as he felt something beginning to awaken in him.  What is this…

Chris stepped out into the brilliant sunlight and was immediately assaulted by questions and cameras.  Why didn’t they give me something to cover my face? He wondered, and waived his hand in attempts to still the mob, the feeling of something about to happen churning his stomach as he did so.  Dunwich stepped up to the forest of microphones and the cacophony quieted.  “I would like to remind those gathered here, and the viewers at home, that Judge Miller personally offered his condolences to my client after sentencing – so convinced was he of Dr. Nost’s innocence.  Furthermore, I would like to point out…”

The waiting was over.  Potential had become real.  Chris saw a glint from behind one of the crowding news anchors—a woman wearing a red dress and matching lipstick, a permanent, plastic smile molded to her face even as she jostled those around her to catch Dunwich’s words.  This was the pending event that had been hitting a harmonic in his soul.

I can stop this. The realization hit him below his conscious mind and he felt a primal power begin to surge through his veins.  His heartbeat gained a crescendo and the rest of the world faded into silence.  His blood seemed to catch fire and pump through his body; surging and ebbing like the tide, orchestrated to the rhythm of his heart.

Duck! Chris felt his blood scream to him, and everything began to move in slow motion.  His knee buckled, and he was falling down the stairs.

At the same moment he heard a loud crack and he felt something hit him hard in the face.  And the perfect moment was lost.  Whatever had been fueling him fled, chased off by the gunshot.  The world sped back up and the cacophony of the city hit him full force, in a way harder than the bullet which had just lodged itself in his brain.  “Murderer!” someone was shouting.  “Murderer, murderer!”  a familiar voice… and all went black.

2873:  Discoveries

Garret sipped on his luke warm coffee and studied the results of the latest tests.   Garret was a handsome man in his late forties.  His body had not started to go to fat yet, but he was also not heavily built.  Close cropped grown hair, lightly streaked with silver framed his cold grey eyes – eyes which flickered back and forth across the data on the papers in his hand.  This made no sense at all.  Whatever methodology he used to produce the nano-machines it should yield the same results – a temporal circuit machine that piggybacked the body’s mitochondria.  The entire effect should produce an internal machine that linked all of the body’s cells together and give them the ability to manipulate temporal energy.  In short, time travel.  But this last batch which he had engineered with his new process was not passing the performance benchmarks.  More specifically, they weren’t jumping as they should be.  He sighed and put down the papers.  In all honesty, they wee pushing out no energy at all.

He popped in his steel grey, the same as his natural eye color, control contacts and injected a test batch into his arm.  The hypo hissed and there was a brief sting in his forearm as the injection pierced his skin.  The contact lenses tossed up a Heads Up Display and outlined the circuitry for him, creating a floating ghost image in the air which only he could see.  With a small effort he activated his primary system travelers, engineered in the traditional methods of the time, and hopped back one day into his safe window.  As he appeared in his isolation chamber, the HUD threw up a diagnostics on how the new nanos handled the jump’s energy spike.  Nothing seemed out of the ordinary in the programming, except that they were not contributing to the jump.  The new system he had just injected should have fused seamlessly with his old system. Rerunning his isolation routines he separated out the new nanos and ran a brief energy spike through them to hop back forward to his “home” time.

And time froze.  His HUD showed time running at a ratio of four to one Terra to personal.  Garret gaped.  If this was right he was moving very, very fast.   He cautiously opened the chamber’s door and walked into his lab.  There he was, back turned to the chamber, moving at about a quarter of the speed he should be.  Garret grinned and pushed on the new system hard…  He sped up to an incredible speed.  Everything around him appeared to be frozen.  The light coming through the large bay windows of his house shifted from light blue to a more purplish color.  Garret decided to stress test the new system and leave the closed environment of the house.  His mind was moving even faster than his newfound speed as he did so.  The implications of what he had discovered were truly staggering.

Blue light shimmered around of him as he jogged down the highway, passing cars that should be going over a hundred miles an hour like they were standing still.  He turned off on a country exit, leaving the city behind for a more rustic area to perform some experiments in.  As he trotted off the road into a field a he stopped for a few moments to think things through.   That was when he made his next big discovery.  He was moving faster than the air around him.  Standing still too long depleted the supply of breathable air and forced him into motion again.  Once this discovery was dealt with, he got back to his main line of thought.

The big question running through his head was what would happen if he interacted with an inert object then reintroduced it to the environment.  Nothing for it but to try, he figured as he picked up a rock.  With a quick flick of his wrist he threw the rock then watched in amazement as about two inches from him it slowed to a stand still and very slowly started turning red.  On instinct, and with a few ideas about what might happen when he released accelerated time he stepped back about 20 feet then phased back into normal time flow.  The rock immediately exploded in midair, violently throwing shards in every direction.   Garret threw himself to the ground and escaped with only a few minor scrapes.

Thoughtfully he stood back up, reviewing the physics of what had just happened on his HUD.  Needless to say, the reaction was not fully what he had expected to happen.  But, it did make sense.  It was his own short sightedness that had nearly caused him to be badly injured.  He resolved not to make that mistake again.  Stretching his will again he phased back into “fast” time.  Picking up another rock he glanced over it with the HUD and imprinted its structure on his nano’s object orientation subsystems.  The HUD contact lenses had been one of his more inspired inventions, created one day when his wife was arguing with him abut how much paper he left lying around the house.  Time to redo the experiment with a few altered conditions.  This time around he transferred a small batch of his nano machines into the rock first, and then threw it as hard as he could.  Sure enough the nanos in the rock acted as a field extension and the rock moved like a bullet through the frozen landscape.  He pushed with his mind as hard as he could, increasing the rock’s ratio of time acceleration.  Turf rippled in slow motion as the rock sliced through the earth, burrowing a hole about thirty feet long.  Ripples in the ground continued to slowly spread like aftershocks after the rock stopped moving and Garret phased back into standard time to watch the results.

Dirt and grass exploded upwards as time snapped back to its normal passing, the after affects of the high speed stone leaving not only a burrow into the ground but somewhat of a crater.  Garret walked up to the point of impact and started digging until he was holding the rock in his hand again.  He stared thoughtfully down at it, then called the nanos back into his systems.  Filled with warring thoughts over his discovery, James Garret jogged back towards his laboratory, moving into the future about a hundred times faster than any one else on the planet.  But his eyes were on the past.

Time:  Classified

Location:  Classified

Operation:  Classified.

Wanda Garret was a damned good time traveler and she knew it.  Besides her husband being the best causality control theorist in the world and her personal trainer in causality theory – she herself was the best hopper ever tested.  She was only thirty-four, and she alone in the world was skilled enough to transfer her grid points on a three dimensional plane instead of having to utilize the fourth.  Effectively this gave her the ability to teleport herself on the world grid without hopping forward or backward through the time stream.  She also had the type of good looks, strong jaw and cheek bone yet still with a soft face, luscious amber hair that was almost brown and warm eyes, which helped her fit into any era as a good looking woman.  And good looking got you far.

So it made a certain amount of sense that she had been the one given the mission to assassinate the most important figure in history at the time he was meant to die.  If, for any reason, this mission was messed up then the paradox she had been sent back to fix could possibly shatter history.  Once again she reviewed the mission dossier.  The target somehow survived an assassination in the late nineteen hundreds, surviving through an indeterminate time afterwards and destabilizing the time stream.  For almost nine hundred years the world hand been hanging under the modern equivalent of Damocles’ Sword.  Truly, history was hanging on the brink of destroying itself in one nasty moment in time.  And finally the brass in the Time Corps had managed to isolate the incident which had created the instability in the time stream.  This was the alpha and the omega of all paradox.  It was the first, and possibly the last of the paradoxes.

But she still had doubts nagging at her concerning this assignment.  Undoing nine hundred years of history in order to undo a class six paradox seemed like it just might be more harmful to history.  Even though since the incident nothing greater than a class two paradox had occurred.  There had to be something missing from her files.  Once again she did the math on the situation, and again it returned results in the positive.  Just like the countless other times she had done the math on this since accepting the mission.  She sighed and rubbed her temples.  If only she could disclose this to her husband and have him review the results.  Deep in her gut she had a feeling that there was something about the equation that she, and everyone else, was missing.

But then again, according to the algorithms the computers were spitting out this guy was meant to die here and now.  And when it came to simplicity of form and action there was a certain beauty to it.  Mainly, it didn’t leave you a lot of choice. She settled down in her seat to watch the trail and try to piece together the reasons that the missed death of the man that created time travel was the greatest paradox in all of history.

2620:  The Fine Line Bar, Tucson Arizona.

Little chunks of wheat floated through the beer, catching rays of the evening sun shinning through the window and refracting the light through the dark amber beer.  Alexander Zarth watched the play of light with fascination.  Subtleties of the environments he was in, little details that so many people missed were always a source of amazement to him.  He sighed contentedly and took a sip of the thick beer, enjoying the chill and the thick weight of it on his tongue.  Putting the glass down he leaned back in his seat and looked at the man across the table from him.  He was a comfortable looking man.  Leaning slightly back in the booth Alex could see that underneath the blond hair and boyish features the man had piercing eyes and a lot of muscle mass.  Alex carefully lowered the beer.  Someone was watching them both from the kitchen.  He extended his senses and felt a time traveler’s signature there.  And he recognized the signature all too well.  He smiled lightly to himself and leaned back.

“So let me get this right.  Twelve commandos from two C’s up the line from me have all taken failed shots at me, and you” here he pauses to look into the eyes of the man across from him “manage to find me faster than any of them.  On top of this, you have an out of time “mission” you’d like to hire me for.  A mission which puts me back in the crossfire, by the paradox standard of those commandos out to get me, and makes me killable.  If I accept this I have to leave the safety of my own time, when they cannot kill me, and go somewhen else – which makes me a target.  Do you think I’m stupid friend?  Or is it greed that you think motivates me?”

Alex locks gazes with the man sitting across from him, a man who looks to be in his early thirties but whom Alex suspects as being much older than that.  Those boyish features that frame an innocent and friendly face are deceptive.   His eyes are what gives him away.  There is a surprising depth to them, their pure emerald seems to catch Alex in an almost hypnotic spell.  Alex is having trouble reading this man, and that in itself is a rare thing.  The man nods. “That is, looking at the smallest possible picture, correct Mr. Zarth.  It does make you ‘killable’ by their standards.  And no, I do not think you are stupid or greedy.  If I did then I would not have bothered coming here.  Frankly – you are the best there is in the time travel business.  I’ve been up and down the line from C forty-five back to C twenty and there is no one else who can do this.  Not even me. And please believe me when I tell you that I am the second best ‘dox spinner ever.  So please do not accept that compliment lightly, or think that it is flattery.  All it is for me is a statement of your resume, and why I am attempting to hire you for this task.”

Alex took another sip of his beer, finishing the glass off, then with a quick burst power switches the empty with the full glass he had been holding fifteen minutes ago.  He was thinking, and hard, about the term the man had used.  ‘dox spinner he had said.  It was a term Alex had never heard before, but which he was too familiar with regardless.  He made his decision, mainly guided by the presence of the traveler observing from the back room.  “Here is to paradox, Mr. Smith.  And the free beer it entails you.  All right, I believe you.  But why should I accept the job?  My odds of survival are low and frankly, money is not a problem for me.  And, you should know, there is another who is as good as me.  If this situation is as big as you say then this man will be someone opposed to me in all likelihood.”

Smith smiled at Alex, and there was something odd hidden in that smile.  “To be frank with you, you don’t survive the mission.  You change the objective and die in the process.  But somehow, it all ends up working.  Whatever it is you do – it works.  And I’m not good enough to figure out what exactly it is that you do.  But as to why you accept the mission, I can only suppose that it is because it is the greatest challenge you will ever face,” Alex raised his eyebrow on hearing that. “and because Mr. Zarth, as trite as it is, only you can save the world.  And your trick just now, circumventing the block I put on your ability to travel, only goes to reinforce the point to me that you are the best.  That you can do what I could not.”

With a grunt Alex raised his fresh glass of beer to his lips then set it back down without drinking it.  Thoughts were running through his head very quickly.  “Your honesty is refreshing.  So I’ll share this with you in return.  You might as well drop the block you have on me.  I’ve slipped by it three separate times already that escaped your notice fully as well as the trick you just saw.  You are just wasting your energy on blocking me.  Leave the dossier with me.”  He was gratified by the look of surprise in the other man’s eyes, and he made his final decision at that point.  “Trace my last jump and you’ll find a list of what supplies I need and when I need them dropped.  If you can’t trace the jump, find someone else for the job Mr. Smith.”

Memes, replacing the genetic model with an organic model.

I usually use myspace to blog, but I’m trying to start being more wordpress conscious

Definitions (provided by Wiki):

Meme: A meme (pronounced /meem/ – rhyming with “cream”), is a postulated unit or element of cultural ideas, symbols or practices that gets transmitted from one mind to another through speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena. The etymology of the term relates to the Greek word mimema for “something imitated”. Supporters of the concept of memes believe that they act as cultural analogues to genes, in that they self-replicate and respond to selective pressures.

Memetics: The discipline of memetics, which dates from the mid 1980s, provides an approach to evolutionary models of cultural information transfer based on the concept of the meme. Memeticists have proposed that just as memes function analogously to genes, memetics functions analogously to genetics. Memetics attempts to apply conventional scientific methods (such as those used in population genetics and epidemiology) to explain existing patterns and transmission of cultural ideas.

Viral Growth: The buzzwords viral marketing and viral advertising refer to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives (such as product sales) through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of pathological and computer viruses. It can be word-of-mouth delivered or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet. Viral promotions may take the form of video clips, interactive Flash games, avergames, ebooks, brandable software, images, or even text messages. The basic form of viral marketing is not infinitely sustainable.

Harmonic Consonance: In music, a consonance (Latin com-, “with” + sonare, “to sound”) is a harmony, chord, or interval considered stable, as opposed to a dissonance (Latin dis-, “apart” + sonare, “to sound”) — considered unstable (or temporary, transitional). The strictest definition of consonance may be only those sounds which are pleasant, while the most general definition includes any sounds which are used freely.

“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts…” ~ William Shakespeare

The Great Barrier Reef is composed of over 2,900 individual reefs, created by billions of coral polyps, and it’s 1,600 mile length can be seen from outer space. The Aspen tree grows in groves connected underground by a single root system – with each tree in the grove being genetically identical. Yet as each tree grows into its microclimate it is shaped differently from each other tree in the grove and carries the appearance of individuality. The largest Honey Fungus in the world covers over 3.4 miles and is thousands of years old…

However, the oldest and largest living organism on the planet is human consciousness. Some would argue that a civilization is not a single organism, nor is a species – but I’m not talking about us as a species or a civilization. I’m speaking of the fear of what lives under the bed, the monsters hidden in the darkness of an unlit room, the tentacles and teeth swimming up for you from really deep water… The memories that live in the space behind the eyes and below the brain.

Our memes resonate with each other. Each idea propagates; and we remember the dissonances and the consonances of those ideas all too well. Much like an individual’s growth from childhood to maturity, we have lost many of the details of the human consciousness’ infancy, but the fear of the T-Rex and the joy of a fire are still there, buried as murky memories. The study of history is a racial pursuit to rediscover our childhood. Napoleon? Hitler? The Spanish Inquisition? Teen angst.

What can we look forward to as we reach the legal racial drinking age? The beginning of conceptualization of ‘mature’ and ‘sophisticated’ ideas? Will we be able to pay the racial electric bill? Or did we party too hard and wake up in an apartment filled with empty beer cans, a killer hangover, and a pink slip?

Hopefully we didn’t party too hard. Our growth is starting to show fruits, and we have to water them. A terrific example is viral marketing. As we, as polyps, are beginning to get more sophisticated in the construction of our coral reef we learn to communicate more constructively in order to build more durable structures. A Viral Product is partially defined by its shortness of life – but breadth of impact. An important concept – but somewhat lacking in the mental picture it builds. When humans thing of a virus they think of something destructive, even deadly. While it is true that Viral Market spreads rapidly, it is not inherently destructive – just the opposite, it is a creative force. Yes, some people attempt to misuse it, as with any creative force, however that does not change the nature of the force.

A Meme is an idea which is passed along and propagates, creating new Memes and evolving itself. Though a Darwinistic approach has been applied to Memetics, the musical model is much more fitting. Each ‘idea’ is a frequency, it carries through our voices till the signal peters out, and interacts with other frequencies along the way, creating new consonances and dissonances, which themselves are Memes. And the acceleration of ideas (Memes) is not viral, it is a ‘perfect’ consonances – or a consonances that is pleasing to a large number.

Darwinism does not apply to a single lifespan of a species, but rather the generational growth of a species. Looking at human consciousness as a single as the single lifespan it is makes modern communication and the growth of ideas much easier to understand, and provides a much more stable platform to grow the idea of Memetics & Communication. The world is a stage; we may repair it, or break it, but it is a single stage; and we have known it for centuries – we just haven’t realized it yet.