David G. Shrock's Blog, page 12

Holiday Sale: Raven Memory

Raven Memory cover

Raven Memory is the first novel in the Draco Torre world featuring two individuals with memory problems. Amnesiac Steve Reynolds accepts his identity and the nature of variable memories. His new assistant, Julie Walsh, experiences "black-outs" mixing up her memories and she begins questioning her identity.

Julie is a construct wrapped in darkness dripping the blood of a memory.

Purchase Raven Memory for 50% off (US$2.50) at Smashwords using code: QV83S

Holiday Sale: Shadow Memories

Shadow Memories

Shadow Memories is a collection of 9 shorts featuring 6 from the Draco Torre world including "Memor Mora" and "Dunston Monster."

Purchase for free at Smashwords using code, XZ67K until January 5, 2011.

Update

A story is coming up for 12days2010 hosted by Jim Bronyaur. Look for it in December.
Kandy Fangs returns on 28 November over at www.KandyFangs.com, and the ebook will be out early 2011.

I've been working nearly non-stop at MotiveQuest for the last few weeks. It's an exciting time watching things fall together, building for the future, but also a very busy time. I am also studying iOS (iPhone/iPad) development in my spare minutes. I'm terribly behind, but hopefully I don't get strangled for being late.

All this means I haven't done much reading or writing. There's a stack of books waiting for me. Winter is a great time for reading and writing. It is also a time for reflection and planning. There's a few projects I've been thinking about, and if things start falling in place then exciting adventures could be on the horizon.

Kandy Moved

The serial continues at the new site: www.KandyFangs.com

I'm not a fan of serializing short fiction. Longer stories make more sense. Even then, many readers prefer reading at once and even better if it is in a completed ebook. The problem with hosting a long serial on a blog is navigation made even more problematic if shared with other posts. For Kandy Fangs, I solved the problem by moving her to her own place and setting up an episode index always visible on the side.

Setting up a WordPress site is so easy there is no excuse for creating a separate space for the serial. WordPress 3 even allows managing multiple blogs on one installation. Writers with technical skills can setup a better book-like experience by removing the blog completely, but let's keep it simple. Besides, the blog features allow for bonus content. Decorate the site for the story.

Open up www.KandyFangs.com in a window to see how it works.

Instead of opening to blog posts, the site starts at the Welcome page. This gives the new reader a synopsis and information on what to expect. Once the serial is over, new readers may read all the episodes and returning readers may read new stories about Kandy. A link on the welcome page takes the new reader to the first episode.

Under the menu, you'll find "Novella" and "Kandy" selections. Clicking one of these shows the categories in the normal reverse blog post order. This is nice for returning visitors, but not new visitors. Another option is to change the post order to start with the first. See Crooked Fang for an example.

I gave Kandy's home a look consistent with this blog. If Kandy likes it, then my job is done.

Dance with the Dead

a flash story by David G Shrock

This marks 1 year since my first Friday Flash post, "Young Secret," my 100th post on this blog, and my 25th flash story.

____________________________________________________

The thunderous beat, stomping feet, wiggle the wood floor rattling lights. The blue-haired vocalist screams about love and pain while the band thrashes about working their instruments into furious fits. Before the stage, the human sea writhes into a torrent, arms waving glowing bracelets, bodies splashing together, bounding and swaying in currents. Piercing through the heavy fog, red spotlights splash the crowd like blood raining inside Club Necropolis.

On the pedestal beside the band stage, Kandy grooves to the music. She snuggles close to the backside of the lovely Zypher. Arms in the air, hips swirling, they move as one. The waving currents flow around their feet, a cloud of orange-red body heat, except for a nearby bouncer dressed black, a dim red simmer, the only other Itoril in the club. Seeing all the pairs of beady orbs, it seems nearly half the guests wear special lenses glowing in the black light. The wannabes gather around the pedestal, and Kandy snarls showing them true fangs.

Someone watches her. Glancing over, she spots a pale form slinking into the dark sea. Turning with her partner, Kandy loses sight of him behind a fan of blonde hair. Cold rushes down her backside. She steps into shadowy folds of time.

Music fades into the background. The fan of hair slows into wispy haze, nearly transparent. The crowd dissolves, apparitions dancing in slow motion within the silence.

Stepping around a nearly frozen Zypher, Kandy gazes over the sea of ghosts. The pull of time draws her back, and the world becomes more tangible. Searching the still faces caught within the constant beat, she finds nothing unusual. Facing her partner, she falls back into the dance of life. Sounds explode, stomping feet, music, working into the pedestal, into her legs.

Eyes popping wide, Zypher stumbles and regains her groove again moving closer, arms wrapping around. "Stop showing off. They're watching us."

Kandy dances into a storm, and Zypher presses in tight, their black lace waving about them. They move together, wriggling like dark fire. Slipping from hard cries into angelic hymn, the vocalist tells her tale about dancing with the dead.

Falling into a gentle swirl, she latches onto Zypher, cheeks pressed together. "I'll go easy on you, sweetie. I promise." Hands sliding down over her partner's hips, she grasps the bottom of the skirt and lifts. Hearing the roar of delight from the men gathered around the pedestal, she laughs.

She slithers down into a squat grasping Zypher's warm thighs. She spots the nude-colored tape hiding the blood pack. Baring her teeth for the audience, she glances around finding ecstatic faces. Cold sparks rush up her spine. Something is out there. Not human. Not Itoril. Something cold watches her. She dives in biting the pack squirting red syrup running in rivers down creamy legs.

Zypher shrieks for the performance.

Unsatisfied, Kandy lifts the blonde up and slams her down onto the pedestal. Crouched over, she bites into thigh, tasting blood slithering about her tongue. The scream is a treat to her ears. Peering up over the trembling leg, she spots a familiar buzz of hair and chiseled chin, a face from the dead.

Dressed in a light-colored shirt, the man glows like a beacon in the dark sea. Reaching out, he claws at the pedestal, pulling himself to shore. Leaking from his cruel eyes, violet smoking wisps curl up over his buzzed hair.

Waves of cold splash inside, and she shudders. A single thought rises from the abyss: run.

Lunging into the folds of time, Kandy leaps over the nearly frozen apparition of Zypher and onto the dance floor. Hands latch onto hers, pulling her into a spin, twirling through insubstantial dancers, warm waves splashing against her. Never having gone this far, she cringes at each ghost passing through her leaving a wake of hot prickles on her flesh.

Spinning and gliding through the hazy cloud of ghosts, they dance to the frozen silence. Gazing at the cold expressionless face, the violet smoke pouring from dark eye sockets, is like looking at Death. As he turns, he leaves a trail of smoking bits. He tugs her deeper into the fold, and time pulls at her sending them into a lumbering dance.

Watching creeping shadows eat at the floor, she claws at the arms holding her trying to break free. As the abyss closes in, she reverses her fight.

Meeting the rhythm, Kandy dances with the dead. Turning with her lead, she adds her own groove complimenting his steps. Time rips at her, but she dances through the shadows between worlds beneath a storm of lavender and azure clouds. As her insides begin to tear apart, she breaks the beat rushing into time.

Music slams into her, perspiration and leather attack her nose, and a person knocks her spinning sideways. Pushing against bodies, she stumbles through the crowd. She punches a man square in the face and escapes the dance floor. Spinning around, back against stone wall, she scans the club.

Glowing bracelets wave above the waving currents of the human sea, but nothing unusual stirs within. She imagines the wraith lurks deep within the folds of time or somewhere between this world and another.

Finding the rhythm, Kandy walks to the beat of life, up the steel stairs and out the door into the crisp night air leaving Club Necropolis behind.

_____________________________________________________

Kandy is part of the Draco Torre world (see tag.) This stand-alone story is not included in the novella or serial. Kandy Fangs serial continues Tuesday with episode 6 followed by the All Hallows Eve episode on, crazy enough, Hallowe'en.

Dance With the Dead

a flash story by David G Shrock

This marks 1 year since my first Friday Flash post, "Young Secret," my 100th post on this blog, and my 25th flash story.

____________________________________________________

The thunderous beat, stomping feet, wiggle the wood floor rattling lights. The blue-haired vocalist screams about love and pain while the band thrashes about working their instruments into furious fits. Before the stage, the human sea writhes into a torrent, arms waving glowing bracelets, bodies splashing together, bounding and swaying in currents. Piercing through the heavy fog, red spotlights splash the crowd like blood raining inside Club Necropolis.

On the pedestal beside the band stage, Kandy grooves to the music. She snuggles close to the backside of the lovely Zypher. Arms in the air, hips swirling, they move as one. The waving currents flow around their feet, a cloud of orange-red body heat, except for a nearby bouncer dressed black, a dim red simmer, the only other Itoril in the club. Seeing all the pairs of beady orbs, it seems nearly half the guests wear special lenses glowing in the black light. The wannabes gather around the pedestal, and Kandy snarls showing them true fangs.

Someone watches her. Glancing over, she spots a pale form slinking into the dark sea. Turning with her partner, Kandy loses sight of him behind a fan of blonde hair. Cold rushes down her backside. She steps into shadowy folds of time.

Music fades into the background. The fan of hair slows into wispy haze, nearly transparent. The crowd dissolves, apparitions dancing in slow motion within the silence.

Stepping around a nearly frozen Zypher, Kandy gazes over the sea of ghosts. The pull of time draws her back, and the world becomes more tangible. Searching the still faces caught within the constant beat, she finds nothing unusual. Facing her partner, she falls back into the dance of life. Sounds explode, stomping feet, music, working into the pedestal, into her legs.

Eyes popping wide, Zypher stumbles and regains her groove again moving closer, arms wrapping around. "Stop showing off. They're watching us."

Kandy dances into a storm, and Zypher presses in tight, their black lace waving about them. They move together, wriggling like dark fire. Slipping from hard cries into angelic hymn, the vocalist tells her tale about dancing with the dead.

Falling into a gentle swirl, she latches onto Zypher, cheeks pressed together. "I'll go easy on you, sweetie. I promise." Hands sliding down over her partner's hips, she grasps the bottom of the skirt and lifts. Hearing the roar of delight from the men gathered around the pedestal, she laughs.

She slithers down into a squat grasping Zypher's warm thighs. She spots the nude-colored tape hiding the blood pack. Baring her teeth for the audience, she glances around finding ecstatic faces. Cold sparks rush up her spine. Something is out there. Not human. Not Itoril. Something cold watches her. She dives in biting the pack squirting red syrup running in rivers down creamy legs.

Zypher shrieks for the performance.

Unsatisfied, Kandy lifts the blonde up and slams her down onto the pedestal. Crouched over, she bites into thigh, tasting blood slithering about her tongue. The scream is a treat to her ears. Peering up over the trembling leg, she spots a familiar buzz of hair and chiseled chin, a face from the dead.

Dressed in a light-colored shirt, the man glows like a beacon in the dark sea. Reaching out, he claws at the pedestal, pulling himself to shore. Leaking from his cruel eyes, violet smoking wisps curl up over his buzzed hair.

Waves of cold splash inside, and she shudders. A single thought rises from the abyss: run.

Lunging into the folds of time, Kandy leaps over the nearly frozen apparition of Zypher and onto the dance floor. Hands latch onto hers, pulling her into a spin, twirling through insubstantial dancers, warm waves splashing against her. Never having gone this far, she cringes at each ghost passing through her leaving a wake of hot prickles on her flesh.

Spinning and gliding through the hazy cloud of ghosts, they dance to the frozen silence. Gazing at the cold expressionless face, the violet smoke pouring from dark eye sockets, is like looking at Death. As he turns, he leaves a trail of smoking bits. He tugs her deeper into the fold, and time pulls at her sending them into a lumbering dance.

Watching creeping shadows eat at the floor, she claws at the arms holding her trying to break free. As the abyss closes in, she reverses her fight.

Meeting the rhythm, Kandy dances with the dead. Turning with her lead, she adds her own groove complimenting his steps. Time rips at her, but she dances through the shadows between worlds beneath a storm of lavender and azure clouds. As her insides begin to tear apart, she breaks the beat rushing into time.

Music slams into her, perspiration and leather attack her nose, and a person knocks her spinning sideways. Pushing against bodies, she stumbles through the crowd. She punches a man square in the face and escapes the dance floor. Spinning around, back against stone wall, she scans the club.

Glowing bracelets wave above the waving currents of the human sea, but nothing unusual stirs within. She imagines the wraith lurks deep within the folds of time or somewhere between this world and another.

Finding the rhythm, Kandy walks to the beat of life, up the steel stairs and out the door into the crisp night air leaving Club Necropolis behind.

_____________________________________________________

Kandy is part of the Draco Torre world. This stand-alone story is not included in the novella or serial. Kandy Fangs serial continues Tuesday with episode 6 followed by the All Hallows Eve episode on, crazy enough, Hallowe'en.

Books by Friday Flash Authors

Support authors. Buy a book (or three.)

Below is my incomplete list of ebooks by Friday Flash participants. The best part about Friday Flash is diversity, and the same is true for this list of books. There is something for everyone.

I have read several of these titles, and the rest are on my reading list. Sure, ebooks don't impress people like print books sitting on a shelf, but you're a reader! (You could always take a snap of your digital bookshelf like I did.) Even if you don't have a fancy ebook reader, you can enjoy their books on your PC, phone or iPod (and some are available in print.) Smashwords supports many formats or read online.

If you're creating an ebook for Smashwords, consider formatting working contents supporting PDF, epub, mobi, and iPad. See my post on formatting.

Books are cheap. Buy them all! (At least sample.)

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13 Horror Stories by John McDonell (McDonnellWrite.) Sample on Smashwords.

A Breath of Life and Other Stories by Eric J. Krause (ericjkrause) is a collection of shorts. Find it at Smashwords or Amazon.

Deadlands Hunt by G L Drummond (Scath) is part of a world of stories. Sample on Smashwords.

Don't Fall Asleep by Laura Eno (lauraeno) begins the Dream Assassin series. Find it on Smashwords or Amazon.

A Fine Cast of Characters by J. Dane Tyler (DarcKnyt) is a collection. Sample at Smashwords.

The First Tale by Icy Sedgwick (icypop) takes place in her Vertigo City from her serial shared on Tuesday Serial available at Smashwords.

From Dark Places by Emma Newman (EmApocalyptic) is a collection available on Smashwords.

Must Love Dragons by Monica Marier (lil_monmon) is a novel available at Lulu.

Password Incorrect by Piotr Kowalczyk () is a collection. Sample on Smashwords.

Prophecy Moon by Laura Eno (lauraeno) is a fantasy novella about love, wizards, and worlds. Sample at Smashwords or Amazon.

RealmShift by Alan Baxter (AlanBaxter) is a novel. Available at Smashwords and Amazon.

Something's Not Right by Trevor Mcpherson (3S_stories) is a collection of shorts. Your biggest disappointment might be how short this book is, but the stories pack a punch. Available at Smashwords.

Strange New Feet by Shannon Esposito (soesposito) is a science-politics novella available at Smashwords and Amazon.

You'll also find some of your favorite Friday Flash authors in these collections:

Best of Friday Flash – Volume One available at Smashwords .
The Yin and Yang Book at chinesewhisperings.com

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Screen shot of iPad bookshelf

Kandy Fangs – 5

fiction by David G Shrock

This is episode 5. Start at the beginning, return to episode 4, or find your place in the menu, Short Fiction-Kandy Fangs.

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Steve marches on the sidewalk leaving the sanctuary behind. He sees Kandy in his mind, a memory consuming his thoughts. Her grin reveals her serpentine fangs. Can a forgotten memory come back into reality, experienced for the first time like the Sanctuary of Sin?

The gun barrel, his first memory if there is any order, tells him that Kandy is a professional killer. She takes good care of her gun. Kandy is Itoril, a descendant of Ithuriel. And she knows him.

His name, Steve Reynolds, feels as strange as the interior of the sanctuary—ghostly. It is the name Kandy mentioned, as did the young naked man, Torx, from the apartment. What brought him to the apartment? Who was the rock star leaning against the door? There is no memory between the nightclub and the police station.

Bright yellow catches his attention, and he finds police ribbon taped over dark double doors set in a brick building. Peering up, he sees a sign extending out from the building displaying a skull beside the name of the establishment, Necropolis. Inside is Detective Silver's crime scene where someone found an unconscious Steve Reynolds after the forensics team finished their job.

Glass shatters against the doors, fragments from the bottle fly in different directions. Laughter explodes, an engine roars, and a car speeds off down the road. Steve watches the tail lights of the car disappear around a corner. The scent of alcohol rises, a cheap national brand.

Nothing about the building stirs his memory. Made of gray stone around brick, it appears much like the other buildings in the neighborhood. The bottom two floors are windowless, and the windows in the upper six floors are all dark. Or blackened. The lowest windows reflect the city glow like dark mirrors.

Continuing around the corner, he notices the streetlights dim. Like walking into a black fog, the world darkens. Stone steps lead up to glass doors with brass handles. The same skull-with-fangs design hangs above the door. Light beyond the glass reveals red stairs climbing up to black curtains.

Glancing around, Steve finds an empty street. The silence is unnatural, but not disturbing. It feels like the quiet after a heavy snow storm, peaceful. He claps his hands. Hearing nothing, he claps again noticing not even the air moves through his fingers. The cold is gone as well. Watching cracks of darkness chomping away the cement, he recognizes the pattern. Like at the sanctuary, he steps out of time. His beating heart reminds him he is alive. He listens to his heart thumping in his chest, the sound traveling up into his head where the double-patter finds his inner ear. The thump followed by the patter is familiar music—comforting. His heart slows as he watches the darkness creep beneath his feet. Peering up, he finds a sky filled with raging purple clouds, the deepest violet crashing with the lightest amethyst. The buildings still stand around him, but they appear nearly transparent.

Climbing the steps, he watches the building fade out and back in like a passing shadow. He reaches for the brass handle, and his fingers pass through. Shadows eat the door, the brass frame crumbling into a dust before disappearing. After a day, this ghostly shadow world feels natural. He enters Necropolis.

The red carpet on the stairs intensifies, vivid red, the shag standing up removing imprints from passing feet. Cracks in the black painted walls smooth over sealing themselves. The room at the top of the stairs is nearly empty. An aluminum ladder leans against the wall on the left, and a pile of plastic gathers at its feet. In the far corner, a light hangs from a hook in the ceiling. Half the room is black. Streaks of black paint extend into the dingy yellow half on the far side.

A doorway catches his attention, the one between two others within the black wall. Masking tape splattered by black paint runs around the doorframe. The light reveals the shape of door hinges within the varnished wood. None of this is familiar, but the darkness within the room calls to him.

Light cuts across the room to a pile of tarp in the corner. The entire back wall is dark glass reflecting the doorway. Shadows creep up from the floor, hazy blobs taking shape. An etherial sofa rests before the glass and another on the left against the wall. Between them, the shadow-shapes become a round table and two ghost-like wine glasses sitting on top.

This is where it happens. This is the place Kandy points the gun at him. He imagines her standing back towards the glass wall. But Kandy is not here, not even her ghost, only the memory of her consuming his thoughts. He looks at the ghost-table and the ghost-goblets. Are these memories? They seem to be, but these ghosts belong to the room. Even rooms have memories.

Approaching the glass, Steve stops short afraid that touching the ghost sofa might extinguish it. He steps around the end. Peering through the window, he finds a large room illuminated by a purple bar running from the ceiling down to the floor nearly a dozen meters below. Eyes adjusting, he realizes it is a strip of black light connecting to a stone column. Other columns appear within the shadows. At the bottom, the wood floor stretches out to a stage. Gazing at the dance floor, he searches for crime scene tape or anything that might mark the investigation. Nothing but dust lit by a single strand of purple.

Movement catches his eye. At first it appears like a reflection on the glass, an illuminated fog. Individual shapes rise up out of the haze. Ghosts, over a hundred of them, move about on the floor below. A collective mass, they writhe near the stage where speakers surround a band of specters. The ghosts dance in slow motion. Their hands wave above their heads as they twist at their hips. Heads bounce sending hair into a blurred fibrous etherial fans. Movement draws his gaze up to his reflection the glass and another figure behind him.

Spinning around, Steve finds a woman standing in the center of the room. She wears a short dress made of steel rings, like armor but with rings far too big for protection. Her smile is menacing. The slender fangs barely extend beyond the row of teeth, but there is no mistaking them. Her blue eyes light up with recognition. Looking over her long blonde hair and pale face, he tries to place her. The woman is as unfamiliar as the surroundings.

Gliding up beside the leather sofa, the woman purrs. Placing a hand on the backrest, she gazes through the glass at the dance floor below. No longer ghosts, people dance at normal speed to the music pulsing through the glass, the walls, and the floor. The woman taps her fingers to the beat. A red ember burns within her iris, the unmistakable characteristic of an Itoril.

"I bought this club recently," says the Itoril woman. "I renamed it Necropolis."

"The city of the dead." He tries to pull his gaze from her, but her near perfect breasts peeking through the steel rings prove too much for his willpower.

"Can I get you anything?" She speaks with a purring whisper. "A drink? A dancing girl?"

"No." He realizes he stares at her nude body within the shimmering rings, but what else is he supposed to look at? The woman dresses for attention, and she has it. "Thank you."

"We recently added the special lenses." Lifting her hand from the sofa, she motions out the window. "Most of my employees are human. The black light on lenses causes their eyes to glow."

Tearing his gaze from sin, Steve peers down. Some of the dancers wear glowing bands around their wrists. White shirts glow near the slender purple rods. He spots a pair of glistening green eyes on a man in black. A woman carrying a tray holding drinks has red eyes.

"It's all part of promoting vampires. Books. Movies."

"You're trying to become accepted." Unusual eyes and sharp teeth tend to encourage violence.

Spinning around, she leans against the glass. "When it's cool to be a vampire, we will be the rock stars." Her grin appears cruel, the sort of smile a child makes after getting away with something sinful.

"Careful you don't become lost within your own fantasy." Steve watches a woman dancing within a big birdcage hanging from the ceiling. Her hands grip the bars, and her hips throw her skirt around. The city of the dead appears more like the city of sex appeal.

"You don't remember me." She turns to the window and places a hand on the glass. "I was just a girl. A teen with attitude. You wore a dark suit with a blue necktie."

Steve looks at the side of her face, at the strands of hair pulled back over her ear. He has no memory of her. Nothing. Instead of feeling lost, like a part of him is missing, he feels normal. So what if his childhood is nonexistent? Yesterday is there as it always has been.

"Yasmine," says the woman. She touches her head to the glass, and peers down. "My birth name was Jasmine, but Auntie pronounced it like Yasmine."

Leaning closer to the glass, Steve peers down. He sees the top of a woman's head bobbing as she dances, her arms swinging. She stands on a black pedestal above the dance floor. Even from this angle, he recognizes Kandy. The woman is everywhere.

Steve steps back. "Excuse me. I need to meet someone."

"Decided to enjoy a dancing girl, after all?" Yasmine remains at the window watching her guests.

The back staircase twists within a narrow shaft, a door blocking the floors above. This is not Torx's building. The steel groans under his weight as he spirals down.

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Continue reading 22 October

Kandy Fangs – 4

fiction by David G Shrock

This is episode 4. Start at the beginning, return to episode 3, or find your place in the menu, Short Fiction-Kandy Fangs.

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The directions are easy to follow, and Steve finds a brick building with large black letters spelling out the name, Roseland Sisters of Sorrows Sanctuary. Roseland is a city resting in a valley between two mountain ranges. The area is known for its microbrews. Why recall such a thing? He knows the city like he knows the value of a dollar and the basics of a combustible engine propelling the cars on the street. The real mystery: who is Steve Reynolds?

As he opens the door, Steve imagines a number of possibilities waiting on the other side: standing in line for evening soup, waking up from a dream and telling his wife about his strange adventure, a woman at the front desk recognizing him, or angels descending the staircase to guide him home. Even a Sister smacking him across the head with the bible shaking his memories back in place seems more likely than what he finds. Somewhere in his groggy state standing before the arched doorway, stumbling into the shadows between the cool outside and the warm indoors, the world swirls around him sending his head sloshing. Then everything orients within his thoughts, and he finds the unexpected.

Three apparitions occupy the room. In the back, lounging on a sofa, a ghost smokes a cigarette held between her fingers. She wears a white top and matching short skirt. She sits at an angle, legs crossed, foot kicking the air. White boots hug her legs all the way up to her thigh. On the right, a bartender wears a white vest barely hiding her breasts, and white bow tie around her bare neck. Hand held out, she serves a martini to an apparition dressed all in black. Like the first, the third ghost wears boots that are too long and a skirt too short.

High on the wall, the lamps within red glass cylinders cast an eerie glow within a haze of smoke. In the back corner, a curtain of beads hangs in the doorway. Sparkles dance down the beads catching light and movement beyond the curtain. The black-and-white tiled floor reminds Steve of a chess board. The two women, one in all black and the other all white, are chess pieces. Two queens command the battlefield in dark smoky ruins, a sanctuary of sin.

The apparitions move in slow motion. The black queen takes her martini glass, and the bright red lips on the bartender's face curling into a smile. Even the smoke spewing from the white queen's sparkling pink lips moves against time.

Steve steps inside, his shoes silently gliding across the tile. Taking in a deep breath, he notices the lack of a cigarette scent. Stopping in the center of the room, he spins around. The hands on the clock above the bar indicate three minutes before ten. His watch shows nine minutes after nine. The second hand on the sanctuary's clock turns at a constant rate, nearly half too slow. Not constant, he realizes watching the slender second hand pass the twelve. Movements increasing in speed, the pair of ghosts at the bar come alive, less transparent. The black queen's hips rock to each side as she lifts the martini glass to her lips.

The floor shudders, and shakes again. It is a beat increasing in speed, and he realizes it is a drum, music from the room beyond the beads. The black queen's hips move with the beat as she dances in a circle, holding her glass up, spinning around, appearing less like a ghost.

Sound crashes the room, music pounding into his head. He breathes in the heavy cigarette smoke and coughs. Watching the black queen dancing in a circle facing him, he meets her cruel gaze.

The black queen looks like Kandy.

Her face darkens. It is the look of a predator spotting easy prey. The sinful smile reveals terrible teeth, two fangs on top and a smaller pair on the bottom. Her eyes appear iridescent, red burning through hazel.

The music fades into the distance, and the room grows darker. Kandy becomes transparent as her movements slow. The bartender and the white queen are ghosts again. Darkness creeps over the room eating the furniture and the walls. The shadows eat away at the floor, a storm of dark purple clouds erupting in its place. Retreating from the disappearing floor, Steve races for the fading exit. Without reaching for the knob, he runs through the insubstantial door.

Sounds attack his ears, a nearby car engine and the background roar of the city. A chill settles upon him, and he shivers feeling streams of sweat slide down his face. Headlights glare then fade, a car passing on the street.

Looking back, he finds the building as before. Hanging on the bricks the sign reads, Roseland Sisters of Sorrows Sanctuary. He touches the door feeling the rough wood. Kandy knows him. He wants to go back inside and demand answers, but his stomach churns from the disorientation of time in slow motion. Is amnesia playing with the senses stirring up memories? Opening the notepad Detective Silver gave him, he reads the directions verifying this is the correct address.

"No way in hell I'm staying here."

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Continue reading 16 October.

Kandy Fangs – 3

fiction by David G Shrock

This is episode 3. Start form the beginning, go back to episode 2, or find all in Short Stories – Kandy Fangs .

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Like I told you." Leaning back in the chair, Steve Reynolds folds his arms. "I don't remember."

Sitting behind the wood desk, the detective looks up from his notes. His bushy eyebrows scrunch down. He appears to fall into deep concentration, his head bouncing as if considering different options.

Growing tired of the scrutinizing gaze, Steve looks through the window behind the detective. Police officers sit at desks, some of them writing and others talking on phones. From somewhere at the far end, a radio squelches and a scratchy voice mumbles an announcement about an incident on Tenth Street. Whatever it is, nobody responds.

Eyebrows bouncing up, the detective nods. He swipes a hand through his dark wavy hair ruffling the silver flecks matching his name. "Amnesia, then."

"Yes, Detective Silver."

"I'm very sorry." Silver leans back, and the chair groans. "For someone at your age." He shakes his head. "I mean, you're at the prime of your life. You might have a family. Someone worrying about our absence." His eyebrows clamp down as he leans closer. "You don't remember anything at all?"

"Not my childhood." He feels as if he has been over it a thousand times, at least five with the detective after hours of pouring through his thoughts back in the waiting room. "Not last week. Nothing until that apartment."

Silver waves a hand motioning his acceptance. "I'll do everything I can to help you find your identity, but I need you to think."

"No." Steve stands sending the chair smashing against a cabinet. "I don't know anything about that street."

"Washington."

"The last thing I remember is a club. A dance club."

"Necropolis."

"City of the Dead?" Dropping into the chair, Steve slumps over and buries his face in his hands. His memories are not here. They are out there somewhere. Maybe with Kandy.

"The nightclub," says Detective Silver. "My crime scene."

Rubbing his face, Steve takes in a deep breath. He sits up, and continues in a calm voice. "I'm uncertain how I even arrived at that club." Falling. Dropping through purple clouds into a room of ghosts. "I was helping a young woman. Sabrina. I helped her out to the stairs and I lost her."

Silver glances at his notes. "From the mystery apartment. An old building you don't recall the location of."

"That's correct."

"Help me understand, Mister Reynolds. Minutes after forensics packs up." Silver grabs his pen and taps the end on the table. "Among a dozen officers. You somehow lose consciousness between the officers and the exit."

"No." Steve shakes his head. "Like I told you before, people were dancing. There were no officers. I never heard any gunshots." Folding his arms, Steve meets the scrutinizing gaze. He has had enough. He wants to go home, but home resides beyond his memory. Anywhere is better than the police station.

Breaking the gaze, Silver lowers his head. He scribbles something on his paper. "Fair enough, Mister Reynolds. Without an address of this apartment, we don't have much to work with. My team is going back over the crime scene. Something will turn up."

Detective Silver opens a desk drawer and tosses a small notepad on his desk. He opens it and writes on the first page. "Directions to a shelter. I'll contact you there."

Steve takes the pocket-sized notepad and reads the directions. None of the names mean anything to him.

"And here's a pen in case something comes back. About the apartment or about Necropolis. Anything at all."

Taking the pen, Steve slides it into his shirt pocket along with the notepad. He promises to stay in contact and exits the office. The radio squelches, and this time two officers respond climbing to their feet. Finding the main entrance, he pushes on the glass door.

The cool night air reminds him he has no jacket. He wonders how many hours have passed inside the station. He supposes without any memories, a day is forever like a child with nothing behind him and a lifetime to imagine.

He listens the sound of his shoes clicking down the steps onto the sidewalk and the cars rumbling on the street, all familiar as if he knows them without really remembering the sounds from anywhere in particular. Even the dampness in the air seems familiar. He recognizes a coffee shop as a coffee shop, but the name on the glass door means nothing. He considers going inside. Hunger should have taken him by now, but he feels fine. Of course, he has no money to pay for food.

Spotting a woman on the others side of the glass, Steve grabs the handle and opens the door releasing warm air and the scent of coffee. He stands to the side and flashes a smile. The woman returns the smile and strides away, her heels clicking on the sidewalk. Steve breathes in the coffee aroma and releases the door listening to the squeak of the hinge and the smack of the frame. Scents and sounds are all recognizable and familiar. If only his home address would materialize with the same familiarity.

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Continue reading 9 October.