Kevin L. O'Brien's Blog: Songs of the Seanchaí, page 34

Next eBook: The Temple of Ubasti

The next story in my schedule to be published through Smashwords will be:

The Temple of Ubasti

Eile and Sunny decide to raid a legendary ruined temple for treasure, with the help of Medb hErenn, but a booby trap separates Eile from the others. She now must find a way to rescue them before they are sacrificed to Nyarlathotep, but she'll need help, and it comes from the most unlikely of sources.

This will be another free ebook.

New eBook: Desperate Acts

I have just published my latest ebook:

Desperate Acts

In the Dreamlands, the Cats are probably the most powerful political, military, and social force extant. Even mighty rulers, such as King Kuranes of Celephais and Queen Elishat of Karchedon, bow to their will. They go where they want, do as they please, and answer to no one, except their Queen and her Council of Elders. They are quick to punish any wrong done to them, and their retribution is as brutal as it is swift and final. They fear little, and run from only the gravest of danger.

So, when they summoned Medb hErenn to their council in the town of Ulthar, asking for her help, she understood that only sheer desperation would force them to call on outside aid, especially her own unique abilities, and that it likely involved great danger.

The only thing she couldn't know was that it could destroy them all.

This ebook is free and can be downloaded from Smashwords.

The One True and Only Way -- To Become Published (Part 1)

When I was a member of the Horror Writers Association, the Actives on the discussion board promoted a method of writing that nearly all swore was the best way to be published. I don't remember all the details, though the ones that stand out are: do not use adverbs; know how the story will end before you start writing; and don't make excuses, just put your butt in that chair, start writing, and don't stop until the story is finished.

Now, there's nothing particularly wrong with that method; in fact, I follow most of its rules myself, but I don't agree with all of them, and in fact the three I mentioned above are the ones I disagree with the most. Which is probably why I remember them. The admonition against adverbs (and speech qualifiers other than "said", "replied", and the occasional "whispered") is understandable. Many writers use them as crutches to avoid showing rather than telling. However, the complete elimination of one-third of the English language for so minor a reason seems like overkill. I prefer to follow Ramsey Campbell's advice and use them when they can convey crucial information, as in "I hate you!" she said laughingly.

Likewise, it is certainly true that many writers are unable to finish their stories because they cannot figure out how to end them, but it is by no means certain that this is the primary reason. I've often found that, if I start a story without knowing how it will end, an ending comes to me in time, usually one that emerges from the evolving story. If instead I waited until I had an ending I might never start the story in the first place.

It's the last rule that I have the most problem with, and that's the point of this little tirade.

Before I get into that, however, what really bothered me about their promotion of this method was their insistence that it was the ONLY way to get professionally published. I remember debates between the Actives and the Affiliates on this issue, and whenever the latter claimed that there might be other viable methods, the former invariably responded with some variation of the following:

"We know this method works because we've all become professional writers using it. If you think you have another, prove it by becoming a professional, and then use it to show others how to become professionals as well."

Implied was the belief that no one who uses that other method will become professionals (which they defined as becoming Active members of the HWA). In fact, this insistence that there was only one true way to write was reinforced shortly before I left the HWA when it was announced on the board that they were considering a change in posting rules: that no one could post writing advice unless it was based on the One True Method and had been pre-approved. I don't know if they ever put that change into operation, but it indicates just how wedded they were to that one particular method.

To be continued next Saturday.

Money in the Dreamlands

With Humans as the predominant inhabitants of the Dreamlands, money, commerce, and banking have assumed an importance not present in previous ages.

Surprisingly, there is very little precious material in the Lands, the exceptions being gold deposits in the Tanarian Hills in Ooth-Nargai, silver in the Dolinar Hills of the Six Kingdoms, precious gems and stones found scattered throughout the Lands, and treasure hoards. Copper is relativey abundant, but is mostly reserved for industrial purposes. Platinum is the rarest of the rare and thus the most valuable of all, literally worth its weight in diamonds.

Because of this, there has been very little currency in the history of the Lands, the major exception being the Celephaïsian Crown minted in Ooth-Nargai, which contains a full ounce of 24-carat gold. Instead, barter was use for trade, backed by an exchange system that accurately determined the worth of all goods and services relative to each other, and the Crown was simply a convenient means to carry around large quantities of gold.

This changed with the discovery of a huge silver strike in the Dolinar Hills. The mining town of Joachimstahl began minting coins containing an ounce of .999 fine silver, which became the standard currency for trade and commerce. They were called Tahlers after the town. Banks soon arose, not only to act as supply and clearing houses for large caches of silver and gold, but also to make loans and control circulation. The rate of exchange between the Tahler and Crown is now fixed at 50:1, respectively.

This influx of ready cash has stimulated trade and industry on an unprecedented scale, which has in turn increased the wealth and standard of living of most inhabitants of the Lands, with investments of a few Tahlers burgeoning into a fortune almost overnight.

Sir Differel's Honours & Decorations

The tenure of Sir Differel Van Helsing as Director of the Caerleon Order was more active than that of her predecessors, both due to a general increase in incursions and other paranormal events, and because she enacted the policy of actively intervening in other Commonwealth states and elsewhere throughout the world instead of relying on the local militaries and governments. As well, she adopted the practice of personally leading combat and reconnaissance missions, as well as performing investigations on her own.

As a result, she is also the most decorated Director in the history of the Order. This page describes the honours, decorations, and medals she has won to reward her service to Sovereign, Church, and Country, and to all Mankind.

Read the rest of the article.

Totally (Team Girl) Spies

Maela Hiver and Oda Gabrielle Jaegar, Sunny's parents

Oda Gabrielle Jaegar was born in 1959 to a poor farmer and his wife somewhere in the German Democratic Republic, more popularly known as East Germany. She was orphaned before she was even a month old, taken as a ward of the State, and raised in a state-run orphanage and school. When she was twelve, she was taken by the Ministry for State Security and trained for intelligence and police duties, and informally inducted into the Stasi when she was sixteen. Having acquitted herself well in her initial assignments and "apprentice" training, she was formally inducted at 21 and began a career as a spy and assassin.

Though she was given standard espionage and assassination missions, including the killings of Lutz Eigendorf and Maureen "Cats" Falck, her primary duty was to track down spies who stole GDR secrets, recover or destroy the information, and kill the spies. Her skill and dedication has often been cited as one of the reasons the Stasi were considered to be so effective and repressive. Even so, while she preformed her assignments with ruthless efficiency, she had her doubts about the rightness of her cause. Her travels to the West introduced her to ideas that at once repelled and fascinated her, and her ability to compare its social makeup and material wealth with that of her own Eastern Bloc gave her pause, despite her public disdain for Western decadence and excess. It wasn't lost on her that Eastern austerity was fueled, not by virtue, but by lack. Then too, her ability to state exactly what she fought for when asked, as opposed to the vague responses of Western agents when asked the same question, filled her with smug superiority, until the day a chance encounter with Medb hErenn taught her that the ability to parrot a litany was no substitute for deeply-held convictions that cannot be adequately expressed, and which she did not feel.

She lived her life as a loner, with no lovers or friends, just colleagues, most of whom she despised or feared. She rationalized that as best, as having emotional ties, even casual ones, could be a liability, and disdaining the belief that she needed anyone's support. Then, in 1983, she was assigned to recover the formula for a biological weapon. She tracked the papers to Brussels, killing anyone who had come into contact with them, and learned they were in the possession of a wealthy arms dealer. She infiltrated a party he was giving, isolated him, and through torture forced him to reveal where the formula was kept before killing him. She then went to his bedroom where he had a wall safe, but she found another guest had gotten it open first. She grabbed a fat envelope and fled as Oda took a shot at her. When she examined the contents, she didn't fine the formula and assumed the thief had taken it.

Over the next several weeks, she tracked the thief through a dozen European cities, finally catching up with her in Venice. There she cornered her, but a Soviet KGB agent ambushed them, wounding Oda. The thief could have gotten away, but instead she dragged Oda to safety and misdirected the agent, then got Oda to a safe house and treated her wound, removing the bullet herself. She nursed her as she convalesced for a few days, and introduced herself as Maela Hiver.

==========

Maela Hiver was born in 1961 to the courtesan mistress of Herve Guillaume Hiver, a wealthy French industrialist of Breton descent. When she revealed she was pregnant she asked that he pay for an abortion. Instead, he set her up in a private clinic until a baby girl was born. His intent was to adopt her out to a childless couple, but his mistress took her and extorted money from him, threatening to reveal her to the world. Once she had her money, she abandoned the baby in a garbage bin and disappeared. Fortunately, the baby was found by Aourgen, a street vendor who operated a makeshift shop and sold trinkets to tourists. Though she was considered half mad, she was merely eccentric, who affected derangement as a way to protect herself on the streets. She named the baby Maela and raised her as her own.

Maela grew up on the streets, engaging in petty theft, pick pocketing, and burglary, but she also helped Aourgen out in her shop. She found she had a talent for convincing people that worthless junk was really valuable merchandise, and she gradually turned to grifting. At the same time, she devoured books, teaching herself how to read and write and how to do math, then afterwards learning whatever subject she needed to better steal or fleece people out of their money. One area she excelled at was cooking, and she thought about opening her own food stand when she was older.

When she was eleven, she talked her way into a job at a swanky spa. Having a thin body and a low voice, she was often able to pass herself off as a boy. She worked in the men's locker room, gathering and washing towels, cleaning sinks and toilets, and performing other minor tasks. The pay wasn't bad and she received tips, but she was there to steal valuables and money. After a month casing the patrons, she made her move one weekend. She picked the locks of the lockers of a dozen of the wealthiest patrons and took watches, rings, cufflinks, key chains, money clips, wallets, and cash. She left when her shift was over before anyone returned, picked up her paycheque, and never looked back.

She was more interested in the wallets themselves than their contents, and she bagged the IDs, photos, business cards, and credit cards to turn over to the police, anonymously, though she pocketed any cash they contained. One ID, however, caught her attention. The face in the photograph looked enough like her to intrigue her. She noted the name — Herve G. Hiver — and after a few days managed to track him down. She watched him for a couple of weeks, even breaking into his apartment a few times. On one occasion she found his journal and took it. Reading through it, she learned about his mistress and her baby, and how much he regretted losing her. He wrote about how he would give anything to find her, if she was still alive, and make things right with her. She also discovered he had narrowed the search for the abandoned girl to the neighborhood where Aourgen had her shop. That gave her a great idea for a long con: she would pose as his daughter and take him for everything she could. It was perfect, because she didn't have to know anything; all she had to do was avoid taking a blood test.

She let him encounter her in a carefully choreographed manner that still seemed spontaneous: she picked his pocket and let him catch her. As she hoped, once he got a good look at her, he didn't call the police. She masterfully manipulated him by playing suspicious and skeptical of his claims, but she provided enough tidbits of information to reinforce his belief that she was his daughter and thereby string him along.

The next six months went smoothly. He set up a bank account for her and deposited monthly sums for her upkeep. He bought her dresses and jewelry, got her a tutor to educate her, and took her on tours all around Europe. She enjoyed herself immensely, but whenever she could she sold the gifts and took the money out of the account to hide it away in an account of her own. She wanted to be ready in case she had to run. As time went along, however, she found herself liking him. He was generous and affectionate without being sexual. He just seemed to be genuinely lonely. She found herself wishing she really was his daughter. Nonetheless she successfully resisted taking a blood test, feigning a phobia of needles.

Then, in Vienna, she was injured in an accident. Though it wasn't serious, she had to have a transfusion, and a sample of her blood was taken for cross matching. She figured he would have a blood test done, so she arranged to get away as soon as possible. Before she could, however, he confronted her: the test was positive, she really was his daughter. With that news, she broke down and told him everything. To her surprise, he wasn't angry or upset. He then confessed that he could never acknowledge her. He had children from a marriage, and though divorced from his wife, they would inherit his fortune. Nonetheless, he wanted to do everything he could for her, and if her chosen career was to be a thief and conman, he would help her become the best.

He began by sending her to a boarding school until she was sixteen to complete her education, while also having her tutored in additional subjects, paying her tuition to Le Cordon Bleu and a couple of other cooking schools, and having her trained in gymnastics and martial arts. He even managed to find professional thieves and conmen who were willing to teach her what they knew. When she turned sixteen, he set her up in her own bistro as a cover for her operations. He even bankrolled her first several operations and helped her find ways to dispose of her loot. By the time she was eighteen, she was pretty much on her own, a successful professional who also had a thriving restaurant business, but she visited with her father whenever they were in the same city. When she turned nineteen, he died of a heart attack. She didn't expect to receive any part of his inheritance, not that she really needed it, but she was surprised when a lawyer contacted her to tell her he had left her the sum of 10 million Francs in a Swiss bank account. She withdrew the money and combined it with her own savings to invest, giving herself both a steady if small income and a nest egg, and became a fulltime professional.

For the next three years she thieved and conned her way around Europe, slowly building up her savings and investments with an eye to semi-retiring in another few years. In 1983, she conned her way into the party of a wealthy arms dealer in Brussels with an eye to stealing a hundred million dollars worth of bearer bonds. She expected it to be her big score, which would allow her to semi-retire earlier than she planned. She had learned through a contact that the bonds were kept in a safe in the dealer's bedroom. However, once she had the safe open but before she could search it for the bonds, she was surprised by another guest who broke into the room. She grabbed what she thought was the envelope containing the bonds and fled out the window as the woman shot at her. She managed to get away, but later when she examined the contents, she discovered they were scientific notes written in German. She recognized just enough to realize it was the formula for a bioweapon based on an animal toxin. Later, through her contacts she learned the woman who had surprised her was an infamous Stasi agent who recovered stolen secrets and killed those who had them. She realized then what she had accidentally become involved in, and that her life was in great danger.

She fled, trying to evade the agent all over Europe, but she always seemed to find her. Finally in Venice she trapped her, but before she could act, a Soviet KGB agent ambushed them and shot the Stasi agent. Maela could have escaped, but for reasons she didn't understand, she dragged the Stasi agent to safety at the risk of her own life, then lead the KGB agent on a wild goose chase before evading him. She then returned for the Stasi agent and got her to a safe house, where she treated her, removed the bullet, and then nursed her. During that time, she introduced herself and learned that her pursuer was Oda Gabrielle Jaegar.

==========

When Oda had recovered enough she joined forces with Maela to defeat the agent. Maela then returned the formula to Oda and Oda decided to let her go rather then kill her. Her superiors in the Stasi were not happy with her decision, particularly with her sense of gratitude for Maela saving her life, but she was too valuable to do more than reprimand her. Maela meanwhile found out where she lived and visited her one night in her apartment in East Berlin, to thank her for sparing her life. Oda was surprised, particularly since she had done so out of her own sense of gratitude, but she accepted it with good grace and thought no more of it.

Maela figured it should end there, but for some reason she found herself intrigued by Oda, and began following her on her missions. It didn't take long for Oda to notice that Maela kept turning up whenever she was on assignment. At first suspicious, once she realized Maela was not stalking or spying on her, she became annoyed and irritated, but no more. Over the course of a year, Maela occasionally gave her signal service or minor help, usually in the form of information or timely warnings. Then on one assignment, Oda had a particularly hard time figuring out where some documents were hidden. Maela deduced that, found them on her own, and burgled them. She then showed up in Oda's hotel room one night and handed them to her. When Oda asked how she got them, she just smiled and gave an evasive answer, but Oda realized she could be a valuable asset.

As such, Maela became Oda's unofficial partner, helping her in whatever capacity seemed best, except for killing. Though hardly squeamish, Maela simply refused to help Oda kill anyone, no matter how reprehensible, but she never denigrated her for it either. For her part, Oda respected her feelings and never tried to coerce her, but it wasn't long before she began to question why it was necessary, and occasionally, when she had the opportunity, she didn't take it, claiming instead that the target got away. Her superiors in the Stasi were suspicious, and concerned about Maela, but Oda vouched for her, and once again her value was too great for them to take anything more than mild disciplinary action. Besides which, there was no denying Maela was becoming a valuable asset, and she could now be used as a form of leverage if necessary. Even so, they started watching Oda much more closely.

Over the next couple of years, Oda and Maela worked closely together on all of Oda's assignments, and occasionally Oda helped Maela with one of her schemes. As a result, they grew closer, with respect turning to friendship, and friendship turning to affection. Oda began to realize that she was perhaps getting too close to Maela, that she was becoming an emotional attachment that could get them in trouble. Though Maela could take care of herself, Oda nonetheless became concerned she may have made a mistake. For her part, Maela suspected that she might be attracted to Oda ever since she saw her naked in her apartment. When younger, she had been celibate, despite the good money people were willing to pay her, because she had no desire to become involved in prostitution. As she grew older, it became a habit, but Oda had knocked her complacency all out of kilter. She wouldn't have minded experimenting with lesbian sex, except that she didn't know how Oda felt about her. She did, however, notice Oda was becoming uncomfortable, and she considered breaking off their partnership before something blew up.

Before they had a chance to reconsider, however, Oda and Maela worked an assignment that required them to go undercover as lovers at a swingers club. When the management became suspicious of them, they decided to have sex to reinforce their cover. Their intent was to simply engage in physical pleasure, but the experience brought their repressed feelings to the surface, and they realized just how much they meant to one another. After the assignment was completed, they discussed their mutual attraction. They made love again to see if the first time had just been a fluke, and discovered it hadn't. Despite the risks, they decided to give a relationship a try.

Through the following year they worked hard to make it succeed. They continued working together, but also spent every available free moment with each other in secret. At the same time, they did everything they could to give the impression to anyone watching that they were just colleagues, even faking arguments and making a show of living separately. Maela orchestrated most of that, treating it like a long con whose ultimate goal and conclusion was unknown. Their efforts succeeded wonderfully, and yet the fear of discovery was always present. Ultimately, they realized their best hope for happiness was to defect to a Western country, but they had no idea how. The risk of being deported back to the GDR and subsequent execution was too great, and there was also the worry that even if granted asylum, they could be tried for their various crimes. Even in the best of all possible outcomes, they knew the Stasi would come after them, just as it went after all defectors, especially from its own ranks. Yet they could not go on as they were indefinitely, because it would only be a matter of time before some enemy would discover their game.

The one who finally did, however, was not a member of a criminal organization or the espionage fraternity, but a mad scientist named Dr. Mabuse. In 1987, they were at a resort in the Swiss Alps under assumed identities, and fell asleep after sex. When they awoke, they found themselves captured by her, paralyzed with drugs, and strapped to examination tables. Mabuse explained that she had learned abut them through her contacts, and became impressed with their extraordinary talents and abilities. She considered the possibility that their talents could be passed on to a child, while at the same time wondering to what extent nature versus nurture played a hand in their development. She decided to test this idea by taking their eggs and combining them to form zygotes, and implanting them in their wombs. She would then take however many children were born and raise them under controlled conditions, to determine which abilities they developed were inherent and which were due to their environment.

She used drugs to enhance egg production, then removed an ovary from each of them. Later she implanted six embryos into each of them. Eleven spontaneously aborted, but one in Oda quickened and began to develop normally. At that point, Maela was no longer needed and Mabuse offered to let her go. She was sorely tempted, and there were many practical reasons why she should accept, but she realized none of that was important: she loved Oda and she couldn't leave her, so she refused. Oda insisted, saying that on the outside she would have a better chance to rescue her, but Maela still refused. Though angry at first, she realized that Maela was motivated by true love, which isn't rational, and she came to value her presence as a way to stay sane.

Mabuse kept them at her lab for two months as she monitored Oda's progress. During that time they were unable to find a way to escape, much to Maela's frustration, and they came to an accommodation with Mabuse for the sake of the baby. Then one day, they realized something was amiss. Though they heard little, they occasionally felt trembling, as if from explosions, and they both hoped and feared the installation was under attack. Finally the door to their room opened, and in stepped Medb hErenn. She was surprised to see them, explaining that she was after Mabuse and hadn't expected to find any human subjects on the premises. Nonetheless, she paused in her attack long enough to get them out, but when she returned, Mabuse had fled.

Medb took them to Zurich, and they explained who they were and what they were doing there. She offered to help, but she needed to know what they wanted to do. Oda and Maela discussed it in private. It was very tempting to have the child aborted and return to their old lives, but Oda couldn't do; after ten weeks she had grown attached to it. She wanted to keep it, but she knew the Stasi would never permit it. That meant defecting. Her only concern was what Maela wanted; her only fear was that Maela would abandon her. Maela realized this was her point of no return. Whatever she decided, there was no going back, but she realized she had already made her decision when Mabuse offered to let her leave. So she told Oda that she wouldn't leave her, ever. She also told her that however it was conceived, it was still their child, and if Oda wanted to bear and raise it, she wanted to help, as any "father" would. It was then that they both realized just how much they loved one another.

Medb agreed to get them into the US and arrange for them to defect. The main problem was how they were going to support themselves. Both had saved considerable amounts of funds, though Maela's was greater, so they expected to live off that, but Medb knew it wouldn't be quite so easy. The Stasi were bound to have their accounts under surveillance, in case they withdrew or liquidated their assets in preparation to fleeing. Even so, they had little choice, and Medb also knew that the Stasi had already put out an extermination warrant on them because of their disappearance, fearing they had defected. Medb secured false IDs for them and got them to Copenhagen, in preparation for the flight to the States. She suggested that if they were going to live together as a couple and raise a child together, they should get married. As such, in 1988, they acquired a license, and participated in a civil ceremony while in Denmark. As soon as they were on the plane, Medb then withdrew their savings and liquidated Maela's portfolio, and placed the money in an account of her own, using enough financial slight-of-hand to prevent the Stasi from tracing the transactions. She later used the money to make new investments, so Oda and Maela could live off the dividends and interest.

Upon entry into the US at Washington, DC, they surrendered to American authorities and were granted temporary asylum. Though the GDR contested their petition for permanent asylum, through Medb's influence their petition was granted, and in exchange for immunity for their crimes, they provided a full account of their activities, while Oda told the Intelligence Community all she knew of Stasi and GDR activities, and Maela did "favors" for the CIA, DIA, and FBI. Their child was born in July, and Medb placed them in protective custody, giving them new lives in Fort Wayne, Indiana. However, she did not change their names, mostly because it would have been futile; the Stasi would have found them anyway.

They named their girl Sonne Aourgen Hiver: Sonne, German for sun, because even at birth she had bright golden hair; Aourgen, after the woman who had raised Maela when she was abandoned; and Hiver, because they decided Oda would be her mother, making Maela the father. For two years they lived with the threat of the Stasi coming after them, but in 1990 the Ministry for State Security was dissolved amid the reunification of the two Germanys. When civilians stormed Stasi headquarters to stop the destruction of the records, Oda worried that public revelation of her activities could damage her family and possibly lead to her being put on trial, but afterward Medb presented her and Maela with their files. She had been part the crowd and had entered the building for the express purpose of finding and stealing their files to protect them. Still, Oda worried that other files might implicate her in the killings she did, but Medb assured her that all other files mentioned her only by codename, and without her main file, it was highly unlikely anyone would be able to identify her.

To be safe, Oda decided to destroy her personal file, but she read it first to see what it might contain, and received the shock of her life. She had been told her parents had been killed in an accident. However, her file revealed that they had sold her to the State for desperately needed money, but when they later tried to get her back, the Stasi had murdered them and disposed of their bodies. The revelation almost destroyed her. Her entire life was a lie, and her service and devotion to the State and the Socialist Cause a sham. Maela understood that she had to work through her grief and trauma herself, but she gave her all her love and support, and ultimately Oda realized that what was important was her love for her family. She decided from that moment on she would devote herself entirely to her family. It was at that time she began calling Sunny "mein wenig goldenes Sonniges"; my little golden Sunny.

Oda and Maela wanted to give Sunny a normal life, filled with school, family adventures, plays and recitals, and friends. That meant living publicly, but that put them at risk. Though the Stasi and the GDR were no more, they had made other enemies, and it was always possible that former East German security agents might seek personal revenge for perceived slights. They were especially afraid Mabuse might return. As such, they adopted the tactic of splitting up whenever Sunny had a public performance. One of them would go to see it while the other stayed home in a safe room in the basement. In that way, if an attempt was made to capture or kill the one in public, the other would be safe and free to either come to a rescue or get Sunny away. The one who attended would record the event using a camcorder and upon their return home, she and Sunny would replay it for the other's benefit.

Their concerns also limited Sunny's activities, though they tried to impact that as little as possible. They had to let Sunny go out in public, sometimes alone; however, they never let her be away from them at night or for longer than a day. That meant no summer camp or sleepovers, but they compensated with similar activities, such as slumber parties at fancy hotels or family camping trips in wild, remote areas. The only exception was when Sunny was dying to attend a horse camp and there was no adequate activity they could substitute, so they let her attend with Medb's assurance of safety. Medb had in fact been watching over them from the beginning, but she seldom visited, and she stopped when Sunny became old enough to begin asking her questions.

Then, too, Oda and Maela found that they needed to keep a low profile within their community. Though the nineties and early two thousands were somewhat more liberal than the eighties, and getting more so, Fort Wayne was still a rather conservative city. Though their neighborhood adopted a kind of 'don't ask, don't tell' policy, they found that their neighbors nonetheless were rather wary of two women living alone and raising a child. Though they did nothing to reveal that they were lovers, they found that people tolerated them better when they were alone with Sunny rather than together. The fact that they did not explain about Sunny only made matters worse. Nonetheless, they participated in neighborhood charities, often donating large amounts, helped out in community events, and were churchgoers, which did much to alleviate their neighbor's suspicions. In fact, the only time that they broke their rule about one staying home was when Sunny was confirmed at the Lutheran church they attended. Oda went with her, but Maela went alone at a different time. She sat apart during the ceremony, but afterwards joined them at the reception, and no one seemed to mind, or at least showed no evidence that they did. In any event, they were both able to stand with Sunny when her picture was taken.

However, the only thing they did for themselves to further their own relationship, was that in 2004, while on vacation in Boston to show Sunny the sights, they renewed their vows in a religious ceremony while Sunny was at a spa. They never told her about it, preferring to keep their sexual relationship as secret from her as they could.

However, that was also the year things went south. One Saturday in August, Sunny went off to spend the day at the mall with her friends. Oda and Maela planned to use the solitude to get in a little romance time, but even as they were getting started, armed men broke into the house. They managed to evade the first wave and get to weapons, but they were cut off from the safe room. Instead, they fled out a secret tunnel and managed to escape. They tried to contact Medb, but she was out of the country. However, an escape plan was already in place. They went to a safe house to get clothes, emergency funds, and fake IDs. They wanted to retrieve Sunny, but the plan called for them to get away; the government would protect Sunny.

They proceeded to the rendezvous point where government agents met them and whisked them away. That was when they were told Sunny had already been taken to safety. The agents took them to a military airbase where they were met by Medb. She was planning to take them out of the state, but when she told them Sunny couldn't come with them, they surprised her by agreeing that that was for the best. As long as she was safe, she still had a chance at a normal life. However, they created a DVD in which they explained that they were on a secret mission for the government, and asked Medb to send it to Sunny. Though Medb was dubious about the lie, she agreed to their request.

Medb got them out to Colorado and hid them in a cabin in mountains, the location of which was known only to her. She would get them whatever supplies they needed, and they could explore the mountain they would live on, but otherwise could not leave. They took advantage of the isolation to reinvigorate their relationship, which had become strained while Sunny was growing up, but they otherwise tried to occupy their time with exercise, martial arts and weapons practice, and hobbies to keep from getting bored. Oda took a job analyzing intelligence information for the NSA, and Maela analyzed FBI cases trying to decipher how the crimes were done. Their greatest joy, however, came whenever Medb sent them news of Sunny, no matter how meager. Later, when she told them that Sunny had discovered the online role-playing game Otherworld, they created their own personas and adventured with their daughter in secret, along with her partner, the warrior-thief Braveheart.

By 2008, Medb was confident enough that whoever tried to attack them had been thrown off the scent, that they and Sunny could be reunited and relocated. Oda and Maela made plans to make up the past four years to Sunny, when Medb reported that Sunny's guardian had been killed and her government escort attacked. She managed to escape, but then disappeared. Oda and Maela wanted to come out to search for Sunny, and only the fact that it was December and they were snowed in kept them from acting rashly. They nearly went crazy waiting for news, but finally Medb reported that she had tracked her to Denver, but that again she disappeared. This time Oda and Maela insisted upon helping search, and though Medb refused, when they threatened to walk down off the mountain if necessary, she relented, but only on the condition that they coordinated incoming information and leave the actual legwork to her. They agreed, and she retrieved them and brought them to Denver.

It was they who deciphered a number of seemingly unrelated reports and discovered that Sunny had made contact with a girl on the 16th Street Mall. They traced the credit card number used at Johnny Rockets cafe to an address in Aurora. They coordinated police and news reports and discovered that Sunny and the girl had been captured but had gotten away again. They took the call from Pastor Sjauken that he had the Girls at his homeless shelter, and they alerted Medb. They almost broke their agreement and went after Sunny themselves, but they managed to tough it out, and were relieved when Medb informed them she had them at a safe house and would be bringing Sunny to them later that day. It wasn't until later that they learned the other girl had been kidnapped and Medb and Sunny had gone to rescue her. However, Medb assured them the situation had finally been contained and Sunny was safe.

Medb's original plan was to get Oda and Maela with Sunny out of the country, but now that the threat had passed, she decided that it would be best if Sunny remained behind. Oda and Maela were reluctant, but they ultimately saw the wisdom of Medb's argument. Medb arranged for them to meet with Sunny at the Denver Zoo, and that's when they met the other girl, Eile. Maela was overjoyed that Sunny had a friend to look after her, but Oda was unhappy and suspicious. She recognized that there was something special between them. She didn't know what, or perhaps she didn't want to believe it, but she felt Sunny's association with Eile was inappropriate. Nonetheless, there was little she could do about it at the time, and later when she described her misgivings to Maela, she was upset to discover that her spouse found the idea appealing. For her part, Maela didn't care who Sunny fell in love with, as long as she had someone to love and who loved her back.

Medb took Oda and Maela to her resort on her private island in the Bahamas. There she made Oda Head of Security, which also served a hosting function, and Maela her casino floor manager, in charge of supervising all the game pits. They are quite happy in their new lives, doing work that matches their talents even if they no longer practice their chosen professions. They keep careful track of Sunny and Eile through Medb and send them money each month to help them support themselves. Oda is still concerned over Sunny's friendship with Eile, and hopes that someday she will "come to her senses" and grow out of it, but the longer she lives with Eile, the less certain Oda is that that will happen. Maela continues to believe Sunny's relationship with Eile is beneficial, but she is concerned Eile may leave her and break her heart. For now, though, all they can do is offer support and advice and hope for the best.

Oda is highly intelligent, with an analytical mind that can spot trends and patterns others miss. She can be coldly efficient and methodical, and is a natural-born killer, but she is loving, tender, and gentle with those she genuinely cares about. She also has a temper, but those she feels comfortable enough being around to show it rarely take it personally when she rails at them. She is normally very suspicious of strangers and their motives and does not easily trust, but when her trust is earned, her loyalty is unswerving. However, she can hold a grudge nearly forever and rarely forgives.

Maela is keen witted with a sharp mind and a mischievous nature. Her thought patterns tend to be more intuitive, and she makes many leaps of faith, but that also allows her to improvise and think fast of her feet. She is more mercurial, lighthearted, and fun-loving, seeing life and events as challenges to be overcome, not obstacles to be destroyed. She can be ruthless, and where Sunny's or Oda's safety is concerned she can become quite coldblooded, but she is not a killer, and has killed only in self-defense. Despite her talent for grifting, she is actually trusting of people until they prove themselves unworthy of it, but she is sufficiently street-smart to carefully examine all motives and claims for hidden falsehoods and deceptions. She is, however, more forgiving, especially of events long in the past or which had beneficial, if unintended, outcomes.

As a final note, because of the drugs Mabuse gave them to stimulate egg production, their aging has slowed. Though they now bracket 50 years of age, physically they are more like thirty-five, possibly even thirty.

The Irish Bardic Tradition

The debt that Western Civilization owes to the Irish has been well established, but tends to go unacknowledged (Cahill p.5). Indeed, Thomas Cahill subtitled his seminal book, How the Irish Saved Civilization, as "The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe". He makes no bones about his opinion: "Without the...Irish...our own world would never have come to be" (Cahill p.4). Even accepting that this conclusion is hyperbolic, there is nonetheless overwhelming evidence that demonstrates that this often maligned people virtually single-handed reintroduced literature and literacy, not to mention Christianity, to barbarian, pagan Europe in the centuries after the collapse of the Roman Empire.

Yet even Cahill neglects what could possibly be an equally important contribution, specifically Irish music. He can perhaps be forgiven this oversight; after all, who would deny that literature is more important than mere song and dance? But this is not a matter of what is more important, but of giving credit where it is due. It is also a matter of recognizing that music is both a reflection of a people’s culture and a shaper of that culture (Hast p.22). Much has been written about the effect of Christian liturgical music on the development of Western classical music, which was itself based on Greek, Roman, Hebrew, and Syrian styles (Machlis p.77; Flood I.php). If there was also a strong Irish Celtic influence, we should acknowledge it, if for no other reason than that it would certainly shed new light on the nature of European culture.

However, caution must be exercised in how far we can assert this claim. Just as it would be inappropriate to conclude that every significant literary development in Medieval Europe came from the Irish, so too would it be wrong to say the same about the development of European music. This would be especially true of music, because unlike books, music was not unknown in Europe before the coming of the Irish, as was noted above. However, as with Latin literature, the Germanic invasions that toppled the Roman Empire also destroyed much of the existing Greco-Roman secular musical styles, and drove the liturgical musical styles into seclusion. And being as they were illiterate, little is known of the musical styles of the Germanic tribes, so their influence — if any — on Western music cannot be accurately ascertained. In contrast, there is a great deal of evidence that Irish musical styles did have a profound effect on Western music, and so by extension on Western culture. While it would be presumptuous to declare that without Irish music "our own world would never have come to be," nonetheless it can be asserted with some certainty that it would be a rather different world from the one we are familiar with.

Even so, some grandiose claims have been made by early twentieth century scholars which cannot be substantiated, but to paraphrase one modern text, while they cannot be conclusively proven, neither can they be conclusively disproven (Hast p.207). Being as these claims are particularly thought-provoking, they will be mentioned, but no great weight will be given to them.

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Next eBook: Desperate Acts

The next story in my schedule to be published through Smashwords will be:

Desperate Acts

The Council of Cat Elders and the High Queen of All Cats need vital information concerning a possible threat by the Fomorians of Hazuth-Kleg, but all their other sources have yielded nothing. So they call upon Medb hErenn to perform an act of desperation, one that could destroy them all.

This will be another free ebook.

New eBook: Inseparable

I have just published my latest ebook:

Inseparable

Donall Ruad Mac Roibeaird and Somhairle Duhb O Nollaig love each other more than their lives and honor. They eat together, fight together, and sleep together, and are closer then husband and wife. They have even sworn an oath, that should either of them fall in battle, the other would willingly surrender his life, so that even in death they might never be separated.

Yet when Somhairle was killed in a war with tribes from the south, Donall was too grief-stricken to fulfill his oath, and so he continued to live. That one act of betrayal destroyed him, and he withdrew from life even as he clung to it.

Now Ireland is being ravaged by a horde of the walking dead, driven to scour the land of all human life, but only Donall knows that the revenant that leads it is his long-dead beloved. The Morrigan, the goddess of war and death, has charged him with destroying Somhairle, but his love for his companion of old is stronger than ever, and he cannot make himself do it.

This ebook is free and can be downloaded from Smashwords.

Mad Scientist Inventions

Dr. Elizabeth Rebecca Mabuse is the quintessential mad scientist, always inventing grandiose scientific devices that harken back to cartoon and pulp stories. She’s literally got her hands in all sorts of projects, but perhaps her two biggest accomplishments are the Proteinaceous Computer and the Decoherence Decompiler.

The ProCom grew out of research she did in college, and is a true quantum computer. This in turn led to the development of the Artificial Brain, which she uses in her robots, and true Artificial Intelligence. The Decompiler, however, is a bit more involved and will take some explaining.

In quantum mechanics, all particles are thought of as being standing waves. That’s a wave that doesn’t move, but just sits in one position and oscillates. This also means, however, that any particle can be described by a wave equation, which in turn means that anything made of particles can also be described by such an equation, from atoms to people to the whole universe. The generalized equation for all particles is known as the Schrodinger equation, and its solution, when used to calculate the properties of a particle, is called a wave function. This wave function not only describes the particle’s current properties, but also provides information on what those properties were in the past and what they will become in the future, as well as what the particle’s properties could be under any set of circumstances. And a wave function can be calculated for anything made of particles, from atoms to the whole universe.

The thing is, in quantum mechanics the wave function not only tells you what a particle’s properties could be like, it also tells you that that particle possesses all of its possible set of properties at the same time. We only see one possible set of properties because the act of observation causes the wave function to collapse so that only set exists, but until that happens, the particle actually possesses all possible properties simultaneously. This is called superposition, and a particle that is in superposition is said to be coherent. Decoherence is the process by which the wave function of a particle collapses down to just one possible set of properties.

Anything made of particles can be described by its own wave function, including people. A person is normally decoherent; that is, they have only one set of properties, established by the collapse of the wave function. However, all the other possible properties a person could have are not destroyed, but are buried within the structure of the wave function. What Mabuse’s Decoherence Decompiler does is read the collapsed wave function and reconstruct it to what it was before collapse. This can be done mathematically within a computer, but she has also developed a device that can do it within a person, making him coherent and possessing all his possible properties at the same time.

A coherent person cannot exist in normal space; his wave function would simply recollapse to one specific set of properties. Instead, the device creates a pocket of Hilbert space, which can support a coherent person. Within Hilbert space, a person isn’t technically alive, but he isn’t dead either, he just exists as multiple disembodied consciousnesses. At that point, Mabuse can then select from the other possible properties and force the wave function to collapse down to that specific set of properties by dissipating the pocket of Hilbert space, thereby turning a person into whatever that set dictates. She can also manipulate the wave function, reverting it back to an earlier form or causing it to evolve into a new form.

Mabuse’s development of the Artificial Brain pretty much resulted only in her robots, though she achieved her crowning achievements with the self-aware robot Xerxes and her own robotic replacement body. However, the Decompiler led to many other inventions. The first was a Transmogrifier, which she tested on Eile, turning her into a futanari, or shemale. She then blackmailed Medb into helping her perfect it so she could turn Eile back. Later, she created a Miniaturizer, and used it to reduce Team Girl and Medb down to the size of Barbie dolls. Eventually she was able to shrink a submarine and crew down to the size of a bacterium so it could save Aelfraed’s life.

It also led her to develop a Mind Recording device that could copy a person’s mind and imprint it into an Artificial Brain, which she did with her own mind into her new robotic body. That in turn led to true Mind Transference between living brains. Though she stumbled onto the principles of Time Travel through another source, the Decompiler allowed her to develop those principles into a true technology, by changing wave functions so that the traveler could only exist at a specific time in the past. The Decompiler in turn made it possible for her to invent Teleportation, by converting a person’s wave function into a signal that could be beamed to another physical location.

Another major breakthrough seems related to the Decompiler but was not derived from it. Building on research started by Medb, she learned that the universe, while infinite within its three spatial dimensions, was finite within four-dimensional space. This was because it was folded back onto itself, in the same way a sheet of paper can be crumbled into a compact ball. That also meant that various places in the universe, though uncountable light years away within the universe itself, might actually lie very close to each other across a fourth spatial dimension. Later she discovered, quite by accident, the ability to use vibrational frequencies to create breaches through this fourth dimension and access whatever points lie right next door. Known as Dimensional Breach technology, it allows her to locate and investigate other worlds that would otherwise be too far away to see, much less travel to.

The problem is, however, that all the worlds she’s found so far seem to be parallel versions of Earth, which defies statistical probability if they were just simply far away. This has led her to speculate that possibly the universe is not an infinite expanse of space as she originally thought, but a finite area with an infinite number of parallel quantum timelines, and her Breach device allows her to access these timelines. The point being, she really doesn’t know if these worlds are located in a different region of physical space or on a different timeline.

However, these were by no means her only accomplishments, just the ones that are the most grandiose. The majority of her accomplishments, while spectacular, are more mundane, in that they support her favorite work rather than being ends in themselves. To make her robots as sophisticated as they are required her to develop cutting-edge Cybernetic and Robotic technology. This in turn led her to develop Powered Armor and Mechs, as well as Bionics. The development of the software that led her to create Artificial Intelligence programs also allowed her to create a Matrix/Tron-style Virtual Reality system.

Most of her inventions require the use of materials with properties that do not exist and cannot be reproduced with existing material, so she has developed Material Fabrication technology to make what she needs. She is also an accomplished engineer, not only creating the machines and devices needed to create her other inventions and developments, but using these other inventions and developments to create a number of devices that are ends in and of themselves. These include a particle technology-based Death Ray, James Bond-style vehicles, a gigantic zeppelin, an advanced assault rifle, and hand-weapon rail gun technology. Most of these, however, are the products of hobbyist tinkering, created during times of relaxation.

While her robotics and applied quantum mechanical technologies are what she is most famous for, she is also a biological and medical genius. She proved that, if any proof was needed, when in 1987 she combined eggs from Sunny’s parents, one of which produced Sunny, and then did the same for Team Girl in 2010 to produce their daughter Connie. This Two-egg In Vitro Fertilization process then went on to become a very popular commercial method for helping infertile or same-sex couples have children. She found cures for Eile’s Vampirism and Sunny’s Lycanthrope, as well as viral and fungal Zombie plagues and a disease decimating the cats in the Dreamlands. Study of the Vampiric parasite led to medical breakthroughs that saved thousands of lives, as well as a serum that suppressed the parasite for short periods of time, allowing Vampires to be active during the day and resist the Blood Hunger, and a serum that temporarily suppresses late-stage Alzheimer’s symptoms. And study of an alien larva that gestated in Sunny’s womb led to the development of drugs and medications that saved tens of thousands of more patients. Finally, she combined her knowledge of proteomics with her protein-based computer to develop a form of Nanotechnology. Just about the only thing she hasn’t done is create Frankenstein-type monsters, though some people believe it’s only a matter of time.

Her crowning achievement, however, was the development of a Cloning system. It begins with placing the nucleus of an undifferentiated cell inside an egg, then placing the egg in an artificial womb, which accelerates the growth and development of the clone at a rate of about 2-3 years per week. The clone is kept unconscious to prevent the formation of a mind, then she uses her Mind Recording device to implant a recorded mind into the clone’s brain. When the clone is awakened, she needs just a few days to a few weeks to train, condition, and orient the clone, and then it’ll act like the original person. She used that process in an attempt to replace Eile with a clone, but later used it to replace Differel’s destroyed body.

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Here is a list of her various inventions and discoveries, and the stories in which they will appear.

Advanced Assault Rifle
----- Any story involving Type 1 robots

Alien Larva Medications
----- The Alien Husbandry; numerous later stories

Alzheimer’s Suppression Serum
----- Happily Ever After

Artificial Intelligence
----- Masie’s Mind; The Machine Who Would Be Man

Bionics
----- Differel has her failing eye lenses replaced by bionic lenses; also, Differel uses a bionic lower left leg in later years

Cat Plague Cure
----- Mabuse is sent to the Dreamlands to atone for the cats she killed by finding a cure for disease ravaging the cats

Cloning System
----- Mabuse replaces Eile with a clone; Differel gets a new body after her old one is destroyed

Death Ray
----- terrorists try to steal the plans and working model of a particle beam weapon

Dimensional Breach
----- the Zombie Apocalypse trilogy; Gratuitous Crossover; numerous later stories including the Doctor Who stories

James Bond-style Vehicles
----- Differel recruits Team Girl to help save her household staff from being compromised by alien creatures (cameo appearance)

Lycanthrope Cure
----- Sunny is infected and becomes a werewolf; background in numerous later stories

Material Fabrication
----- does not feature in any stories but is present in the background whenever special materials are mentioned, such as body armor used in the Zombie Apocalypse trilogy or the story where Differel and Henry are kidnapped by the Jigsaw Killer

Matrix/Tron-style Virtual Reality
----- Differel becomes trapped in a horror survival video game; Team Girl enters a computer world to help Masie

Mega-zeppelin
----- after Differel’s command zeppelin is destroyed, Mabuse builds her a bigger one

Mind Recording
----- Mabuse’s robot replacement has a copy of her mind

Mind Transference

Miniaturizer
----- Mabuse shrinks Medb and Team Girl down to Barbie size; Team Girl accompanies a group trying to save Aelfraed from a fatal infection; Aunt Mandy shrinks Differel and flushes her into the sewers, and Team Girl and Aelfraed go after her to rescue her

Nanotechnology
----- background in numerous stories

Powered Armor / Mechs
----- The Macroviral Contagion; Eile and Sunny test new mech and powered armor designs, which Marseilles Sheraton tries to steal

Rail Hand Guns
----- The Cabin of the Dead

Robots
----- appear in numerous stories such as The Cat’s Peril and The Alien Husbandry; The Machine Who Would Be Man; Medb and Team Girl activate Mabuse’s robot replacement

Teleportation
----- Differel and Team Girl are teleported to a world of Greek mythological creatures; Differel is split into her good and evil sides; background in numerous later stories

Time Travel
----- Stranded in Time story; numerous later stories

Transmogrifier
----- Mabuse turns Eile into a shemale

Two-egg In Vitro Fertilization
----- background in numerous stories; Connie’s conception story

Vampirism Cure
----- The Bloodthirsty Eile; The Girly Vampire; background in numerous later stories

Vampirism Suppression Serum
----- Uallach volunteers to test the serum; background in numerous later stories

Zombie Plague Cures
----- the Zombie Apocalypse Trilogy