Linda Maye Adams's Blog, page 64

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 30

[image error]CHAPTER 30

The landing party looked beaten up, but not whipped.  Their faces were fierce, eyes determined.   Jian and Brooks crowded around Mel and Dr. Sanger protectively.

Jian was hunched over in a strange way.  Brooks had a broken arm.  Mel had a frightening cut on her forehead.  Sanger cradled his arm … maybe shoulder or collarbone.

Hope hugged Jian, carefully, because she didn’t want to hurt the officer.  Jian gave her a wan smile.

“Colonel Graul can hear us,” Hope murmured.  “We do have a plan.  How bad are you?”

“I think I’m the worst,” Jian said.  “I got hit by one of their bullets.  The CTU deployed, but …”

Yup.  Hope knew how that felt.  Jian would have a massive impact bruise.

Hope resisted an urge to glance over her shoulder to see what the 49ers and the ghosts were doing.  She knew there wasn’t much time before the 49ers got impatient.

“We’re going to play some music.  When it gets to the crescendo, be ready to run.”

“You’d better go,” Mel said.  “The aliens–”

She broke off, then grabbed Hope’s arm.

“Eric, I love you.”

“You can tell him that in person,” Hope said.

She turned away, reluctantly and walked out into the middle of the square.  A nod at Zuver.

A moment later, a speaker crackled.  Then a drumbeat.

Please work, please work.

Zuver had found the music on one of the planets he visited.  It was a tribal piece, both primitive and eloquent.  Drums, and then kind of flute, notes trilling in the desert air.

Hope stomped one foot in time to to the beat, then the other.

As the music rose around her, she became to move.  Dance was not what she would call it.  She spun, the scraps splaying out around her.  One fell off, ground into the dirt beneath her boots.

She stretched her arms to the sky, shaking her wrists so the bells jingled.  A part of her brain told her this was absolutely, totally, crazily insane.

The ghosts watched, hunger replaced by puzzlement.

Pluck.  She snatched a handful of scraps free and hurled it at the 49ers crowding along the edge.  The scraps fell short.

Hope allowed the music to carry her away.  Three 49ers surged at the scraps, passing them back through the crowds for tasting.

Across the square, Jian watched the faces of the aliens, and the hope that seemed to light them up.  She drifted a few steps closer to the shuttle, while trying to look like she was just getting a better look at Hope’s dance.

A gun barrel blocked her.  The guard was definitely still watching.

A tentacle snaked towards Jian. Mel smacked it.  Glared at the three eyes.

The 49er backed up, but kept watch.

The music continued its drumbeat.  As Hope tossed more scraps at the aliens, one of the ghosts appeared in front her.

Angry.   It wanted to talk.

She circled around it.  The aliens couldn’t see it.  But in time to the drumbeat, she stretched her arms out dramatically at the ghost.  She made a throwing motion like she was tossing sand on the ghost.

The 49ers were stamping their feet to the drumbeat.   All eyes were on her.

Hope tore off more scraps, hurling it at the crowd.

The aliens pounced on them, fighting to grab it.

Like groupies.

She shuddered.  The music carried her away, bumping up against another ghost.

She tried not to look too closely, but she could feel the anger.

“Why you not kill?” the ghost demanded.

The ghostly energy was building up.  As if the air was charged from a lightning storm. Not just this ghost, but all the ghosts out here.

She spun away from the ghost, jingling her bells.  Trying to hide her fear.

“Signal them to go now,” she said, praying Graul heard.  “We’re out of time.”

The ghost energy swelled.

The 49ers fell silent.  The only sound was the music.

Then one of the buildings facing the town square exploded.

Filed under: Thoughts

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 29

[image error]Chapter 29

Graul planned for the same showmanship that Hope was, this time through the shuttles.  All four shuttles landed right in the town center, in a formation that one of the Marines called “just dare fuck with us.”

Hope had the computer up, showing her an image of the town.  She found the missing people right away.  They were in the town square, in an animal pen.  They were all on the ground, in the limited shade provided by the buildings, but staying away from the fences.  Armed 49ers patrolled the fence line.

The Marines went out first, armed with their jumbo-sized weapons, forming a line out in front of the shuttles.  Their faces were grim.

Then it was Hope’s turn.

Her stomach took a hard lurch.

She felt a hand on her shoulder.  “It’s all right.  I’ll be out there with you,” Zuver said.

She stuck her hand in her pocket, checking that the comm link was still on.  Graul would be monitoring this.

Then she checked herself one last time, more out of nervousness than anything else.  She was adorned with every scrap of cloth they’d been able to buy and reeked of the cheap dyes.  The scraps were fastened onto her uniform with cloth tape, Velcro, and even paperclips.  The myriad of ghastly colors confused the CTU; it couldn’t figure out what camouflage it was supposed to be.  The result was like a wall that had too much graffiti.

Bells on her wrists–the ones from Orson’s door–finished it.  She jingled when she moved.

Orson waited outside for her, looking very unhappy.  He hadn’t wanted to do the translation, but Graul’s payment had been too generous to turn down.

She had a sudden urge to run back into the shuttle and hide.  This was her show.

Steeling herself, she straightned up and moved in front of the Marines.  Orson was on one side with his chalkboard, and Zuver on the other.

The 49ers had all come out of their buildings to gather on the sidelines.  Their tenacles were a blur as they talked.  The snapping of them filled the air.

Red Stone and White Crystal parted from the crowd and approached.

Hope tried to picture herself as a fierce warrior woman.  She wasn’t sure she was managing.

Red Stone pointed at the chalkboard.

“No.”  Hope shook her head.  “No.  I talk first.  Tell them release the hostages and I’ll perform the Dance of the Ghost Veils.”

Orson gaped at her.  “The what?”

“Just tell them.”

He scratched out the message on the chalk board and held it up.

Red Stone shook his head.  His turn at the chalkboard. “No.  Dance first.  Then hostages.”

“Then you can fix your own problem,” Hope said.  “We’re leaving.”

While Orson struggled to translate that, Hope and Zuver turned and walked back through the Marine line.

It was the hardest thing she had ever done.

Zuver was helping her up the big step into the shuttle when Orson called out, “Wait.”

She stopped.

White Crystal took the chalkboard from Red Stone and wrote out a message.

The silence seemed longer than it was.

Orson translated.  “They’ll allow you take the ones who can’t walk.”

She kept her face averted to hide her smile.  A small battle, but a big win.

“What about the others?”

More chalkboard scratching.

Finally: “They’ll let them out of the pen, but they stay in the square.”

“What do you think?” she murmured to Zuver.  She didn’t want to be seen looking at the square like she was planning something.  Which she was.

“It would put them out in the open where the aliens could shoot them,” Zuver said.  “But also make them accessible to us.”

Might be the best they would get.

“And I want to talk with my friends first. Make sure they’re all right.”  Hope raised her voice. “They better be all right.”

“Talk only,” came back the translation from Red Stone.

Hope did not budge from her spot, watching from a distance as the aliens opened the pen.  The walking carried the badly injured, handing them off to the medical personnel who ran out the help.  Most of the injured were Mel’s Marines, though Lewis had taken a pretty good beating.

Zuver squeezed Hope’s hand.  “Tell Sanger we’re–”

He broke off. Hope nodded, understanding.

Bells jangling, she walked across the town square.  She felt every one of the aliens’ three eyes watching her.

Eagerly.

Ghosts began appearing all around the town square.  Too many to count.  Hope was glad she was the only one who could see them.

They watched her, too.

Hungrily.

Filed under: Writing in Public

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 28

[image error]CHAPTER 28

Graul hated Hope’s idea.

And conceded that it was crazy enough that it might work.  Or everything could go to hell.

But it was better than attacking the 49er city, where it was highly likely he would lose lives.  While he coordinated with the pilots who would be flying the four shuttles, Hope went into town with Zuver and a pair of Marines.

The Marines brought with them the extra deluxe devil blasters.  They scared Hope just looking at them. She didn’t want anyone to make more ghosts.

The town was curiously vacant of the aliens.  It made the streets look deserted, though humans were going about their business.

“Have you ever been to town, Doctor?” Hope asked.

Zuver shook his head.  “No.  To be perfectly honest, the idea of the 49ers tasting me—”

Hope nodded.  She thought it was the reason the aliens hadn’t figured out where they were.  The Marines were there in case any aliens were about, but it looked like they were all back home.

Waiting for her.

As she and Zuver walked down to the scrap store, the ghost appeared in front of her.  The three eyes were angry.

Hope stopped, mainly because she hated walking through ghosts.

“What are you doing?” the ghost demanded.

The Marines were looking around, wondering why Hope had stopped.

“It’s all right,” Zuver said.  “She’s talking to a ghost.”

“No, I’m not talking to a ghost,” Hope said.  “I’m ignoring a ghost.”

With determination, she circled around the ghost.  The Marines follow dubiously, but separated at the spot Hope had avoided.

Hope stopped to peer through the glass on the store.  No aliens that she could tell.

The ghost appeared in the doorway as Hope was about to enter.  She scrunched her eyes shut and walked through the ghost.  It was only a little bit creepy.

Orson came out to the counter at the jangling of the door’s bells.  He’d had a hopeful expression on his face, but that dropped away fast.

“Why did you get involved?” he blurted.  “You can’t stay here.  The 49ers won’t like it.”

This was just too much.  Everyone expected Hope to fix their problem, like she was some kind of ghost fix it machine, and then blamed her when she couldn’t.  Didn’t anyone take responsibility for their actions here?

She lit on him.  “Excuse me.  I’m having a really bad day.  I came to do a favor for the people here.  I didn’t have to do it.  I put up with heavy gravity and got bruises everywhere.  And all I get is grief from everyone, even the ghosts.”

The ghost appeared in front of her, trying to interrupt.

She waved at hand at the ghost.  “You go away.  I’m not talking to you.”  To Orson, she said, “Whatever you heard, it’s not true.  The aliens attacked our camp.  They took everyone.  They hurt my friends.  Now I’m having to fix a problem that can’t be fixed and I’m probably going to fail and my friends are going to die.  So excuse me if the aliens aren’t happy.”

Her finally words fell on silence.  The Marines stared at her.  Orson stared at her.  Zuver stared at her.  The ghost?  He glared.

“What are you doing?’ the ghost asked.  He started to sound a little panicky.

Hope glared at the ghost, too, then turned to one of the tables to gather up scraps.  Zuver unstuck himself from his surprise and filled his arms with scraps.

This time it was Orson’s turn.  “What are you doing…with all those?”

“Saving my friends,” Hope said.

She prayed.

Filed under: Thoughts

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 27

[image error]CHAPTER 27

Graul folded his arms across his chest and stared at the image of the 49er city near the GALCOM camp, wanting better answers than he had.  The red night lights made it look too bright over the top of his executive conference room table.

The door swooshed open behind him.  The smell of chicken came with it.  His stomach rumbled.

He glanced over his shoulder.  Marotta.  She held out a plate of drumsticks and greens.

“You need to eat, sir.”

He took it without comment, glad for food with a handle.  He didn’t want to deal with a fork.

“Any ideas?” she asked.

“No.  We’re very limited in our options.  Look where the 49ers are holding our people.”  Graul pointed with his pinkie finger to the stationary green dots.  One of those was Mel.  He’d looked at all of them, but he couldn’t tell which.

“Everyone’s still alive,” Marotta said.  “But all the CTUs deployed.  Doctor says some of the injured aren’t going to be able to walk out on their own.”

“Which means Hope’s going to have to walk into the city to even get near our people.  Chances are, the 49ers are going to just grab her and try to force her to kill the ghosts.  She can’t do that.  What’s going to happen to our people?”

#

Graul had insisted that Hope and Zuver eat and rest while they waited for the additional reinforcements to come.

“An army can’t fight on an empty stomach,” Graul said.  “Right now, you’re my front line troops.”

Hope didn’t feel like a front line troop.  But she dutifully dug out two meal packets and passed one over to Zuver.  She didn’t even look at the label to see what she was getting, or if it was even spicy.  She just tore open the entre packet and ate, hardly tasting it.

Somehow, she must have dozed off, because the next thing she knew Zuver was frantically shaking her.

“There’s someone outside,” he whispered.

Hope sat up, alarmed.  It was just after dawn, the sky still topped with gray.

But then she heard a familiar sound, a male voice: “Hey!”

She grinned and scrambled to the window, the blanket tangling around her legs.  “The reinforcements are here.”

Two shuttles were parked nearby.  Outside, she found the additional Marines Graul had sent breaking down the tents and folding them up.  Three others took a hammer and muscles to pull up the tent pegs from the sand’s grip.  Two Marines grabbed an end of a large box and carried it to their shuttle.

All the activity only served to remind Hope what she was going to do today—and she still didn’t know.

“Miss Hope,” Zuver said from the shuttle doorway.

She joined him.

“Do you want a crazy idea?” he asked.

“I’ll take crazy, because I don’t even have a dumb idea,” she said.

He squatted in the doorway, which put him close to her height.  “I’m a scientist.  I like gathering facts and evidence to show something exists.  It’s hard for me sometimes because I think that everyone should see those facts and evidence and give it the same credibility I do.”

Hope wished he would get to the point, but held her words back.  She needed all the help she could get and muscle power wasn’t going to be enough—at least not without more lives being lost.  She wasn’t sure what the angry ghosts would do if they couldn’t get the 49ers.  They might tear apart her friends’ ghosts.

Zuver hunched his shoulders.  “Some people need a story or a show to believe the science.  And sometimes they hear the story and if it’s good enough to them, they’ll believe it over the facts and evidence.”

He fell silent, watching her face.

Hope folded her arms across her chest and paced, turning his words over in her head and looking at them this way and that way.

“Like the patent medicines in the eighteen hundreds?”

Hope remembered reading that in the ship’s library on her off time.  ‘Female complaints’ were a common ailment patent medicine treated—though it was anybody’s guess what was in the medicine.  But men sold it with charm and flair, and desperate people bought it.

The 49ers were desperate.  And better still, the ghosts couldn’t talk to them.

Maybe.  Maybe.

Filed under: Writing in Public Tagged: GALCOM Universe

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 26

[image error]Note: I’m having to skip over the scene I wanted to do and will have to come back to it.  It looks like it might need some scenes written after it to figure out what I should do with it.

CHAPTER 26

The silence outside stretched so long that Hope’s teeth ached with it.

No one came to check on them.

No one came to take them prisoner.

“We have to look,” she said.  Not too loudly.

“Yes, we have to look,” Zuver said.

Neither moved.  They’d been crouching in the alcove for so long that Hope’s knees cramped fiercely.

Hope shifted the wrench to her left hand.  Gave her right hand a good shake.  It ached from clutching the wrench for so long.  She peered around the doorframe.

Expected to something to leap out at her.

Started when the shuttle was empty.

“Clear,” she said.

She uncurled slowly, shaking her knees out.  On her elbows and thighs, she dragged herself out into the main cabin.

Listening.

The silence itched.

Zuver leaned out of the alcove, his hammer ready.  His eyes were too wide.

Hope levered herself up into the nearest seat on the port side.  Eased up to the bottom of the window.

Zuver crawled clumsily out of the alcove, keeping low to the deck.  “What do you see?”

“Nothing.  No movement, no people.”

She had to go outside.

She didn’t want to go outside.

She didn’t want to see what was outside.

#

The air stank with decay.

Bodies.

Everywhere.

Hope’s legs folded up under her.  She sat heavily.  Started to cry.

Everyone dead.  Because she couldn’t do what they wanted.

She felt a warm hand on her shoulder.  Zuver.

“Do you see any ghosts of your friends?” he asked.

Hope blinked.  Wiped away the tears. Startled that she hadn’t noticed.

“No,” she said.

Her brain now registered that the bodies were all alien.  Not a single human.

“I would think,” Zuver said, “that if any of your friends had died, they would be here to see you.”

Two 49er ghosts wandered around, confused at what had happened to them.  One came over to Hope, offering a tentacle.  When she didn’t response, he tried touching her.  The tentacle went right through her.

“Sorry,” she said.  “I don’t know what you’re trying to say.  One of the alien ghosts,” she added for Zuver.

Hope stood, though her legs were shaking.  The other 49er came over and tried the tasting thing with his buddy.  While they could touch each other, it looked like that sense had been lost with death.  They touched each other frantically, discovering they were both mute.

The air rippled.

Hope shivered.  Even Zuver felt it.  The temperature dropped twenty degrees in seconds.

Five new ghosts appeared.  They surrounded the two 49ers.  Their eyes gleamed with menace.

The 49ers scrambled, trying to get away.

The other ghosts pounced.  Like a football pile up.

Ripping. Clawing.  Scratching.

Light sparked.  A ghostly tentacle flew out of the pile and vanished.

Ghostly terror clogged the air.

“No!” Hope screamed.  “Stop!  Stop it!  What are you doing?”

Her words fell on ears that ignored her.

She ran at the ghost pileup.  Her hands scrabbled at empty air, going right through the ghosts.

She couldn’t help the 49ers.

She sank to her knees and couldn’t watch.  She listened as the air sparked.  Again and again.

Until silence.

The 49ers were gone.  Had their souls been destroyed?

One of the new ghosts turned to her, that sick grin on his face.  “You kill.  So we can kill.”

The ghosts where there, then they weren’t.

Hope threw up until her throat was raw.

To his credit, Zuver didn’t do anything but stand there and wait until she was done.  He handed her a bottle of water to rinse her mouth.

Hope swished a mouthful of water around in her mouth, then it out.  She dumped the rest over her head.

Didn’t help.

She lurched to her feet, dripping, and felt like she was filled with lead.

“Is there anything I can do?” Zuver asked.

Startled, she realized he’d stood there the entire time while she’d talked to empty air.

“You probably thought I was ten kinds of crazy,” she mumbled.

“I felt the temperature drop.  It’s almost back to normal now.  I could come up with scientific explanations…” Zuver pushed up his glasses.  “But they would be trying to explain something I can’t explain to myself.  Can you contact your ship?”

Of course.  Hope had blanked on that.  She’d have thought of it eventually she told herself.

Stump-legged, she made her way back to the shuttle.  It felt safer in there, even though it wasn’t.  She contacted Kangjun on her comm band and then collapsed into the seat.  Zuver came in and sat down across from her, pale and pinched, as Graul’s image sprang up between them.

Hope found herself comforted by his solidity.

He was behind the plot table.  “I’m sorry.  Our orbit put us out of range.  We couldn’t do anything.  We’ve got help coming for you, but—”

“It’s my fault,” Hope said.  “I should have been able to do something more—”

Graul was already shaking his head, his voice firm.  “No.  It’s not your fault.  Talk to me.”

Hope and Zuver went over what had happened.  Hope finished with telling Graul what the ghosts had done.  The words sounded insane in her ears.

“Ghosts aren’t supposed to be like that!” she blurted.

Graul leaned forward, resting his arms on the plot table.  “We thought it was just because the 49ers killed everyone.  I think there was something else going on between both of them, long before the final battle.”

“Like a feud?” Zuver guessed.

“Maybe,” Graul said.  “Humans can get so angry that they lose sight of what caused the disagreement.  Then it becomes about being right, and they use it to justify the anger.”

“And anger hides fear that maybe they aren’t right,” Hope said.

Too many people feared her because of the ghosts.  She could feel her spirits lifting.  She knew this fear.  She knew this anger.

Graul nodded.  “I doubt if we can talk to either the living or the dead.  All we can do is get our people out.”

Filed under: Writing in Public

A Veteran/Writer Looks at History: Leesylvania State Park

It’s off to Leesylvania State Park for another round of checking out the local history of the area

Leesylvania State Park is south of Washington, DC, about twenty miles or so.  It’s probably better known for boating because it’s on the Potomac River.  But the park also has a pocket of history–I only found it because I checked out the park.

Leesylvania means “Lee’s Woods.”  In this case, it was General Lee’s father who owned a plantation on the land, along with a family named Fairfax.  Both of those are common names around Virginia: Leesburg (city), Leesburg Pike, Lee Street, Lee Highway, Fairfax county, Fairfax (city), Fairfax Street. I like looking at street names because they often tell a lot about the story of a place.

Map of the park is here if you want to check it out and see where I’m going.

First stop is Free Stone Point Beach.

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It looks like a bunch of trees, but it’s actually a bluff.  It’s more obvious during winter after the leaves have fallen.  This bluff was a landmark for ships navigating on the Potomac River during George Washington’s time.

This was Confederate territory during the Civil War.  It’s strange to feel that between the last place I visited and this one, I crossed the battle lines.  But time has a way of smoothing those lines out and blending them together.

The Confederates had an artillery battery here.  It was actually used as a decoy by General Lee while he built batteries at Possom Point, Cockpit Point, and Evansport.

But that didn’t stop a skirmish from happening at Free Stone Point.  On September 25, 1861, a Union gunship fired on the Confederate battery.  They exchanged artillery.  Didn’t do much to either side.

War is strange, isn’t it?

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It was a nice walk out here.  I waded into the water–it was surprisingly warm.  The currents were quite strong–a constant slushing sound coming to shore.

I decided to walk on the fishing pier.  Note the Maryland sign.  This was about 30 feet in, so I crossed the state line into Maryland on the river.  When I was growing up, I thought crossing a state line would be more dramatic.  If I hadn’t noticed the sign…

This border was pretty important in 1957, because Virginia did not allow gambling or drinking.  But Maryland did.  So an enterprising person moored a “recreation resort” boat named the S.S. Freestone on the Maryland border.

Off to the Lee Wood’s Path.  That’s about two miles round trip, and I spent most of my time repelling all borders from bugs and cobwebs.

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Ah ha!  Ruins.  These are from the Fairfax family’s house.  The chimney’s all that’s left, with warning signs all over that the bricks are unstable.  This was the Fairfax Plantation house, one of the places George Washington stopped by to stay when he was coming into DC.  Even though Mount Vernon was 14 miles away, they were neighbors.

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This is the path I took through Lee’s Woods.  It was steep in some places and had me sweating.  Much better to take it in winter.  It made me wonder what this place looked like when the plantations were here.  How did people get around?  How big were the plantations?

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The sign marks where the Lee House stood, but time didn’t leave much behind.  If the sign hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have know the house had been here.  There used to be a foundation, but a road building project (now gone) destroyed the foundation.

But the Lees had a garden nearby.  One of the interesting bits here that I like for stories are what they did with the trees.  The nuts from the American birches were ground up for flour, pressed for oil, or roasted for coffee.  And, of course, eaten whole.

White oak trees were used to make barrels for wine, and the dogwoods were used for tool handles.

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You can’t tell with this photo, but that’s a steep drop off.  And it’s where a railroad was built, going from Neabsco to Powells’ Creek.  It was completed in 1872.  Doesn’t look like a place for a railroad, does it?

The railroad company had a lot of problems with the location.  They had to do a lot of work to maintain the grade so it was more level.  Because of the terrain, there were landslides and derailments.  One train had to be hauled back up the side with tree!

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This was at the end of the path.  I knew I was getting close to the end because I could hear the buzz of boat motors coming from the river.

The chimney is what remains of the Freestone Point Hunt Club.  It was established in 1926 by businessmen from New York.  They hunted ducks on the Potomac and hunted so many that the population declined.  The club closed in 1957, and this is all that’s left.

More information on the park is here.

Filed under: History, Thoughts Tagged: Alexandria and Fredricksburg Railroad, Civil War, Confederates, Freestone Point, George Washington

Adventures Around the Web August 19-25, 2017

The Passive Voice

A Check Girl

This is a quote from a Raymond Chandler story.   Wow.  Just wow.

Susan Elia MacNeal on Signature

These Six Incredible Women Served as Undercover Spies During World War II

When I was in school, history that was taught wasn’t particularly interesting.  It was dates and events, not about the people.  Finding things like this on the internet gives history a very different perspective that’s often lost.  And well…spies.  Shared from Gail Reid in the Desert Storm Combat Women Facebook group.

Bored Panda

10+ of the Best Shorts of the 2017 Solar Eclipse

Number two is awesome!

Fossil Guy

Mallows Bay Ghost Fleet Along the Potomac River, Maryland

This is a ship graveyard in Maryland.  I would check it out, but it’s only accessible via the water.  But the story about it is pretty cool.

Kristine Kathryn Rusch

Business Musings: Eclipse Expectations

Kris was was in the starting place for the eclipse, so it’s got a lot of good details.  But it also talks about how hyped it was and people planned for big business in the totality areas–and didn’t get enough business.  Which slides right into what publishers do with books, like assuming everyone will buy a book because it’s like another book.  Very interesting post on marketing.

 

Filed under: History, Photos, Writing Tagged: Mallows Bay, Marketing, Maryland, Publishing, Raymond Chandler, solar eclipse, Spies, World War II

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 25, Scene 1

[image error]CHAPTER 25 (Scene 1)

The sounds of footsteps continued to approach the shuttle alcove where Hope and Zuver crouched.

Sweat poured down Hope’s face.  The wrench was slick in her hands.

Zuver shifted his grip on the hammer.

They both knew it wouldn’t be much against the aliens, if they were armed.

Her knees cramped painfully.

The footsteps drew closer.  Stopped, with a shuffle. Cloth rustled.

Poking at the blankets on the bed?

A rapid sliding sound cut through the silence.  They were talking.

She wished she could understand what they were saying.

After a moment, the footsteps began to move away.

Move away?

Klunk!

Hope’s nerves were so taut that she started badly, a squeak coming from her mouth.

Zuver laid a hand on her arm.

They waited.

Hope’s stomach twisted into knots.  Couldn’t even breathe.

And…nothing.

Were they gone?

Or just waiting?

Did she dare look?  She inched to the edge of the alcove.

Two ghosts walked through the shuttle, cut off at the legs by the deck.  Not 49ers.

They knew she was there and stopped in the door.  They had the same cat-satisfied smile as the other ghost.

Filed under: Thoughts

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 24

[image error]CHAPTER 24

“Get Hope to the shuttle,” Jian barked.

Hope felt a hand on her arm and glanced back.  Zuver had followed her out.

“ Come with me,” he said.

Mel and the other two scientists were arming up with spare devil blasters.  Hope wished she had a devil blaster.

“Go!” Jian bellowed.  “I can’t worry about you.”

Hope jumped.  She and Zuver ran to the GALCOM shuttle.  She stopped inside, fear paralyzing her a moment.  Where would they hide?

The rear of the shuttle had an alcove for supplies.

“C’mon!” she said.

Fear pushed at her back as she ran to the alcove.

The alcove was three feet wide.  The sides were partitioned.  Not much protection if the aliens came in here, but better than the seats.

Zuver found a toolbox and opened it.  He handed Hope a big wrench.  He took a hammer.

Hope hefted the wrench.  It’d do.  The 49ers weren’t going to take her without getting whacked.

As they dropped down behind the partition, the first shots rang out.

#

Jian watched the line of 49ers approaching.  They were smart.  They’d known to wait until Kangjun’s orbit had carried the ship past.

And they’d brought more people.  At least three to one.

She pitched her voice so all her people could hear her.  “Aim at the biggest part of the body.  Shoot to kill.”

Maybe, with luck, they could make the 49ers turn tail and run.

She hunkered down next to Lewis.  The scientist was sprawled in an ungainly position on the sand, but had her eyes on the aliens.  Mel was on the other side.

One of the aliens raised his rifle.

“Fire!” Jian called.

Blue blazed out of the devil blasters with a sharp report.

The flaming rounds struck the first group of 49ers, dropping them to the ground.

The 49ers behind scattered.

And still came.

Sweat ran into Jian’s eyes.

“Don’t let them get close!” she yelled.

A blast from Mel toppled one alien into his buddy.

Jian squeezed off a round.  The round zipped past a 49er’s arm.  Dust rose up where it hit the sand.

Damn.

The 49ers dropped to their knees, firing before they aimed.

A bullet whizzed over Jian’s head.

Lewis fired back, hitting the alien in the shoulder.  It fell over.

Another one took its place, pressing forward.

Mel: “They trying to get around behind us.”

Damn it.  They didn’t have enough people to cover their camp.

#

Hope crouched in the alcove, sweating, needing to pee, and every muscle locked tight.  Zuver pressed close to her, gripping his hammer so hard his knuckles had turned white.

Neither dared breathe

Bang!

Something hit the doorframe.

Like a gun butt.

Hope shook her head.  Pressed a finger to her lips.

If it was one of their people, they’d call out.

Sweat trickled down her spine.

It itched.

Footsteps.

One.

Two.

Three.

Not boots.

A sticky, shuffling.  Tentacles.

The aliens were in here.

Filed under: Writing in Public Tagged: GALCOM Universe

Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 23

[image error]CHAPTER 23

Jian joined the Marines to help move equipment.  Hope retreated into the meteorite tent to help pack up the notes.  Sanger and Lewis had a big box on the table and were packing notebooks into it.  There was a surprising number of notebooks.

They also kept looking inside the notebooks and trying to organize them as they put them in the boxes.

Zuver was on the other table, dumping handfuls of notebooks into the box.  No effort to organize them whatsoever.  Hope liked that better and started passing over notebooks.

“People can be foolish in danger,” Zuver murmured.

“Like running back into a fire for a photograph,” Hope said.

“There’s nothing you can do to help resolve this?”

Before Hope could answer, the ghost appeared next to Zuver. One second not there, the next there.

The ghost looked nearly identical like the 49ers, except that it didn’t have the tentacles.  The hands were a different shape, too, which three big fingers rather than shovel-like ones.

“Not yet,” he said, his three eyes blazing.  His voice sounded like gravel being tossed together with water.

“What do you mean?” Hope said.  “What’s ‘not yet’?  Why haven’t you talked to me before?”

Hope’s belly jerked.  She had a bad feeling about this.  She forgot that there were three scientists with her.  Not noticing that they had all stopped to gape at her because she had started talking to empty space like a crazy person.

The ghost walked through the table.  He stood taller than her, and was only a foot away.  He stared down at her.

The menace in those three eyes made her shudder.

“Not finished,” he said.

“What’s not finished?”

“You fix.”

No, no, no.

“You fix,” the ghost said again.  “They came and they came and they killed us.  They killed us.  You kill them.”

Hope blinked.  Then outrage soared.  What was it about these aliens that they all wanted her to kill each other?

“No!  Have you lost your mind?”

“No choice.  You will fix.”  And this time she heard the chilling satisfaction in his voice, like a cat contemplating its prey.  “You will fix after what they do.”

“No choice?  What’s the mean?”

Then—

Lord.

She launched out the door, adrenalin pushing her through the heavy gravity.  She was vaguely aware that someone had followed her out.

She didn’t bother to look around.  She bellowed like a drill sergeant.  “We have to leave NOW!  The 49ers are coming back!”

It was only then that she noticed that it was too late.  Jian was a fierce warrior, back behind the line of Marines.  Brooks was at the end of the line, along with the pilots of both shuttles.  All lay in the sand on their bellies, devil blasters aimed and ready.

In the distance, the 49ers marched, and with a lot more reinforcements.  There wasn’t going to be time to run to the shuttles.  There might not be time to stay alive.

She smelled the mildewy smell of ghost.  He was behind her.

Watching.

Smiling.

Filed under: Writing in Public