Moe Lane's Blog, page 629
December 5, 2021
Want to help out the content creators in your life?
Welp, those of us who are Amazon associates (hi!) always appreciate it when you use one of our links to go buy stuff. It helps. It really does — and since I use that revenue to pay for publishing services, it helps you, too.
Also: you know what makes for a great Christmas gift? My books! (I almost wrote ‘me,’ but I didn’t want to make it weird.)
12/05/21 Snippet, THE DOOM THAT CAME TO LUNA CITY.
So this is maybe not a cheerful story.
Patreon!“There a problem, sir?” Joe-Bob. “We’re stopping.”
“No, we’re not, Sgt,” Tobias said without batting an eye as the bus came to a complete stop. “We’re not stopping at all.”
The two soldiers and the civilian contractor got it right away, but Dr. Peters looked around in confusion. “No, Commander, I’m sure the bus is no longer moving.”
Tobias shook his head. “No, ma’am. We haven’t stopped,” he repeated. “And if anybody ever asks, that’s what you’ll tell them. We just drove straight on through.”
Jillian thought about it, opened her mouth, and thought some more. “Who’s left to be doing the asking?” she finally said.
12/05/21 Snippet, TINSEL RAIN.
Banter!
Patreon!Except that the famous Shamus luck laughed and went with option three: having the rope snap just as I was trying to get both feet on the balcony ledge. Which meant no feet on the balcony ledge, and I came close to instead trying to grab it with my face. Somehow I managed to kind of flop myself until the ledge was under both my armpits, and then I was fine. Except that it hurt, dammit. And I couldn’t move forward, because I had Dory on my back now. I figured she was basically okay, though. After all, I had broken her fall.
“Ow,” I noted.
“You all right, Tom?” Her voice did sound a little ragged. And muffled. Which made sense.
“Moonbeams and charm.”
“What’s that, Tom?”
“Never mind. Can you get on the balcony?”
“No.”
“Can you try to get on the balcony, Dory?”
“Again, no.”
“Why not, Dory?” I asked, trying my best to be cheerful about it.
“Because I hope I twisted my ankle, Tom.”
“You hope… right. Because otherwise you’ve busted it.”
“Yes. It hurts like hell, by the way.”
“Taking that into account, Dory. But they’re gonna be through that door any minute now, and this is starting to hurt, so you’re gonna need to grit it out soon…”
“I’m aware, Shamus.”
“Just keeping you informed of what’s going on in my life, Dory. I know you like that.”
“Yes, thank you, Tom…”
“Pardon me, senores?” came a voice from below. “Are you in need of help?”
12/05/21 Snippet, THE STARS ARE WRONG.
I wonder if this guy will be important?
Patreon!The apprentice looked both ways. “My master was at first ashamed. And, now that the shame has festered, he seeks revenge. The Kee that humiliated him, his name is known. They call him Jefsin-Fankin. You know the name?”
Jak and I exchanged glances, for we did. The scum that floated at the top of the Razor District was like the tides; eternal, but ever-changing. But Fankin’s name had been bandied about there for over a year now. He was known to the Guardians, but never for anything worth risking a fight over. But if he was shaking down and stealing from folk not his kind… “The name is known to us,” I said. “But he is the business of Guardians, not honest traders.”
“I know that,’ the apprentice said. “My master does not. He is wild to take us, and whoever is willing to go, and go lynch Jefsin-Fankin on the nearest gallows. ‘Just like the old days,’ he said last night, while in his cups. ‘We taught the Kee how to mind us then, we did.’”
Patreon Microfiction: ‘One Chance.’
Heh. You get the feeling that the protagonist in “One Chance” has had this happen before, and is now thinking of doing a few Horrible Examples to discourage it from happening in the future. Can’t say that I blame him. Death cultists must be exceedingly tedious to be around.
Patreon!December 4, 2021
‘Silent Night.’
#commissionearned
12/04/21 Snippet, THE DOOM THAT CAME TO LUNA CITY.
Suburbs!
Patreon!Of the six people on board, only Tobias and Josef had been outside more than once or twice since the horrible day when Earth went mad. They knew what to expect, and they were prepared to see incongruities. The other four were considerably less hardened, and at first they crowded the window-screens of the bus to get a real look at the aftermath of… The end of the world, I guess, Tobias thought as he watched them. We don’t have the best words to describe it.
The scenery for the first ten miles were the Lunar equivalent of suburbs: industrial shops, cargo depots, supplementary housing, and what had been a burgeoning collection of retailers catering to the people who worked outside the dome. All underground, of course, but LED units were cheap on the moon. A year ago, this entire stretch would have been aglow in the colored, blinking lights of a thousand signs and advertisements.
These days, the power was out, and the only light was from the bus’s headlights. They showed wrecked lunar buggies and buses, some smashed, others half melted, and one that had been cut clean in two. Debris too small to be worth salvaging was strewn everywhere, except for a cleared path on the road that Josef followed at a steady twenty-five miles an hour.
Book of the Week: Leviathan Wakes.
I say, old chaps: this Expanse series is quite the thing, what-what? Leviathan Wakes, and all that. It’s rather good, really.
#commissionearned
12/04/21 Snippet, TINSEL RAIN.
Banter!
Patreon!“Don’t rub it in, Tom,” Dory snarled as she looked through her desk and drawers. “Where the hell is everything? No knives, no saps, no morningstar…”
“Morningstar? Really?” I said as I patted down Fake Doc for incriminating papers and other things that weren’t there. “Why would you want one of those?”
“To intimidate muggers. Obviously.”
“You know how to use one?”
“No, Tom. That’s why it’s intimidating. And not here. Dammit, somebody’s trying to assassinate me.”
I was now going through Fake Doc’s bag, looking for whatever clues I could look at on the way. “If it makes you feel any better, Dory, they’re probably trying to get us both.”
“True,” Dory said, brightening a little. “At least it means that it’s nobody at court. I’d hate to think I had offended anybody that badly and not even noticed.”
