Roland Yeomans's Blog, page 25
September 19, 2023
NOTHING IS BUILT ON STONE
In which Major Richard Blaine learns that in war, you do not catch a break ... you catch flak.
NOTHING IS BUILT ON STONE
“Your fate has not been writtenuntil you pick up the pen of ‘Today.’”
– Rabbi Lt. Amos Stein
I've always been impulsive. Mythinking is usually pretty good, but I always seem to do it after I do mytalking — by which time I've generally destroyed all basis for furtherconversation.
“Cloverfield!” I yelled. “Openthe window and jump inside as far as you can.”
“Why?”
“Do or die … literally.”
He did … and I heard a string ofprofanities from inside that I hoped Rachel had not.
She frowned, “Bloody hell! Someof those words I haven’t heard since my convent days.”
So much for hope.
It is anticipation andrecollection that fill the mind, never the sensation of the moment …that isfogged over by fumblings and fiasco.
Like now.
I looked down at Rachel. “Readyfor the last great battle?”
“You are foolish to speak of lastbattles, Richard. The Last Great Battle is always the next one.”
CLICK!
The lock was picked. She startedto open the door.
“OOFF!” went she.
Rachel scowled, “There’ssomething blocking us on the other side.”
“Three somethings, ah, someone’s onthe floor opposite this door, melded into one enormous nightmare of a corpse.”
“What?”
“When Reinhardt König triggeredhis devises, a breach in nearby contiguous realities occurred. Their differinglaws of physics clashed with our own, resulting in disastrous schisms.”
Her translucent face was one bigquestion mark, so I continued,
“Imagine a huge jar of waterhaving three other jars of different colored thick inks dumped into it … andthen swishing that mix about and throwing it onto a blank canvas. What wouldyou get?”
She scowled, “A mess?”
“Now, imagine the water is notwater, the inks are not inks … but all are volatile substances just waiting fora spark to ignite. And the immersion of these liquids is sparking as we speak.”
“God.”
“Yes, and worse ….”
“There’s worse?”
“I have no idea how to put outthe explosions to come or how many aberrations and resultant splintering’s ofrealities are fouling our world.”
Cloverfield cried out, “Would youtwo stop nattering? I have real issues in here!”
I smiled at her. “That tunnelthat was not a tunnel transformed us into what Reinhardt König hoped would bethe Master Race.”
“Did it?”
“We’re about to find out.”
With a push of my open righthand, I shoved open the door. Even before the tunnel, Sentient had boosted mystrength threefold.
Wrapping my left arm around herwaist, I hoisted her off her protesting feet and leapt over the monstrositythat once was three separate human beings.
They, at least, had the decencyto be truly and irrevocably dead.
A very pale Cloverfield slowlyapproached us, keeping a wary and wise distance from the horror sprawled behindus.
“You could have at least warnedme not to look at what remained of those two guardsmen by the window.”
“It would have only tempted you tolook even more.”
He smiled like a wolf. “Trueenough. But you could have given it a go anyway. Now, I might take updrinking.”
Paler than Cloverfield, Rachelmade a brave attempt at a smile. “You mean you don’t already?”
“Luv, all my life, I’ve gotteninto so much trouble, I had to keep both wits and body sharp.”
Cloverfield looked all around atthe blood-splattered walls with their humming and sparking devices and dials.“Love what König did with the place.”
Rachel cleared what obviously wasa closing throat. “Then, your taste must run to Salvador Dali.”
“Alberto Vargas, actually, Luv.”
She smirked, “How notsurprising.”
I realized they were both tryingfor humor to avoid the gruesome, elongated, inside-out steaming corpse of ReinhardtKönig … what was left of it.
“The King is dead; long live thenightmare he left behind,” I said low.
Sentient sighed within my mind:
‘The machinery of the world isfar too complex for the simplicity of men.’
Then, because my day wasn’tfouled up enough, the strange radio on the wall crackled into life:
“! König! Bist du da? Gib mir eine. Antwort, du unbotmäßiger Trottel! Das istGeneral Verner!”
Sentient took control of my righthand, sweeping it up and around in an intricate pattern.
The mangled body of ReinhardtKönig slowly faded from sight. I recognized the way it disappeared.
Sentienthad nudged the monstrosity several layers back in time, leaving the commandchair free from him and his blood and gore.
I sat in it, much to the dismayof both Rachel and Cloverfield.
I reached up and switched the transmitter to“Send” and spoke in König’s voice, using immaculate German.
“Reinhardt König is no longermere Oberführer. He has attained godhood, swine of a general.”
Rachel and James both choked,letting me know they understood German.
“What? You dare talk to me inthat manner?”
“Feel honored that I talk to youat all.”
“,you blind, egotistical fool! You did it! You conducted your damn experiment!”
“Several actually. Sadly, all thevillagers and all of my men did not fare so well as I. In point of fact, theydied most horribly.”
“As will you, for along with SSSonderkommando Dirlewanger, I have sent three Panzerkampfwagen VI Ausführung H’s!”
“Three Tiger tanks will beinsufficient, swine. And the less said of your pet psychopathic murderer and hisinept rabble, the better.”
“You will die, König! Die!”
“We all die, General. Some soonerthan others. But not me, swine. I have evolved. Have a miserable remainder of alife.”
With that, I switched the radiooff.
Cloverfield stared at me. “You’reinsane.”
I forced a smile. “Of course. Ithought you knew.”
“Nothing is built on stone. Allis built on sand, but we must build as if the sand were stone.”
- Jorge Luis Borges
September 18, 2023
A SINGLE MOMENT
Major Richard Blaine has just escaped a deadly booby-trap, but now, he and two other Spartans are separated from the others.
How will he protect them ... any of them? Is he capable of doing so?
A SINGLE MOMENT
“The headwaters of Merde Creekare a cruel and treacherous expanse.”
– Major Richard Blaine
Theo called up to us. “Are youthree all right?”
Rachel, who wasn’t fooled at all,(nor were any of the other Spartans), laughed down. “Yes, Sergeant-Major, Iam perfectly fine.”
There was the beginning ofchuckling, but Theo’s glare evaporated it.
I fumed. One lone female amongsta group of men would sooner or later spark dissension. I would have to dosomething.
‘Of all the things about whichyou have to worry, my champion, that is not one of them. I will take care ofthat presently.’
Great. Now, I had another thingto worry about. Sentient had a unique way of “dealing” with things.
‘Why, thank you.’
“Any decade, old boy,”Cloverfield called over, still precariously clinging to the eggshell smoothwall.
“I have all the trip wires dealtwith, ” he said, “but I do not want to enter alone. Pick that door lock, andlet’s be about our business, shall we?”
Rachel, being of Pandora’s lineage,asked, “Where did that cable come from, and where did it go?”
I shook my head. “After I pickthis truly enormous lock, I will tell you.”
“Is picking that lock safe?”
I sighed, “Nurse Reynolds,nothing we will do from here on out will be safe.”
“Not what I wanted to hear.”
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“Real truth seldom is.”
“Any decade!” remindedCloverfield. “I’m beginning to slip here.”
I set about following Sentient’sinstructions on how to manipulate the strange skeleton key which had sproutedfrom my right forefinger once again.
To vent my frustration at theflashes of things to come Sentient was showing me that in no way would calm theSpartans, I muttered,
‘This whole damn needless war islike watching two bald men fighting over a comb.”
Rachel studied me as I worked thelock open, “What is truly bothering you, Richard?”
I almost sobbed,
“This whole madness has beenforced on me. I am not up to the challenge … and those I care about will sufferfor it.”
She gripped my left arm hard.
“Oh, Richard! None of us chosethis damnable war or our place in it. It is your doubt that will kill us notyour lack. I have seen you at your worst … at death’s door literally.”
She sniffed back tears.
“I have seen you dig deep withinyourself when you thought others needed you, when they had no one else. I sawyou dig so deep that it was etched in lines of pain and determination on yourface.”
Rachel wiped away those tearswith an angry swipe of a hand.
“You found your anchor of greatstrength. It was not your Sentient … not your love for your Helen.”
She pounded a forefinger into mychest.
“It was there. There! Call itwhat you will … your heart … your soul … that which separates you from thebeasts who call themselves men.”
Rachel turned my chin to faceher.
“Well, you bloody well find thatanchor now. You find it. You hold fast to it, and you rise. Damn you, you rise!We need you. Your Helen needs you. Bullocks, your Sentient needs you.”
I smiled weakly. “Yes, ma’am.”
Sentient murmured in my mind:
‘All the energy in the universeis evenly present in all places at the same time. We don’t get energy, werelease energy.
The triggering mechanism torelease energy is desire.
When you have a strong enoughdesire to do something, you will always have the energy to do it.’
Cloverfield cried out, “I’mslipping!”
I smiled wearily to myself.
Showtime.
“Any life is made up of a singlemoment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.”
- Jorge Luis Borges
WHAT TO REMEMBER
DO NOT FALL IN LOVE WITH THE SOUND OF YOUR PROSE
Writing is communicating to the reader in a fast paced world.
Get to the point and it best be one worth the time of your reader.
DITCH THE SELF-DOUBT
Confidence is appealing, not just in romantic partners, but in the prose of writers.
Certainty in how you express your story is winning.
A joke told haltingly dies before it is finished ... so will your story.
Be bold. Be sure. Your story captured you ... it will capture your reader ... if only you believe in it.
LET TRUTH BE YOUR GUIDE
Your reader will "buy" your outlandish premise if only your characters ring true.
THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE hit hard because you "believed" in each family member. You could see they were flesh and blood.
ADVICE IS LIKE PEPPER ... GOOD IN LITTLE DOSES
I can tell you how I would write your story, but only you can tell it your way.
Read the masters of your genre and see how they did it ... then do it YOUR WAY.
MAKE MISTAKES YOUR TEACHERS
You will learn more from them than you ever will from your successes in prose.
Miles Davis once said, "If you play a wrong note, play it loud and everyone will think you did it on purpose."
FAMILY AND FRIENDS ARE NOT YOUR AUDIENCE
They will either love your work or pick it to death. Neither response tells you anything useful.
KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE?
If you craft a story you think certain people will enjoy, you may well misjudge them. You may actually guess correctly.
But if that story did not flow organically from your soul, it will be a chore to repeat it again.
Rather write a story that entertains you. If it sells, great. If not, at least you have grown by writing a full novel.
READ EVERYTHING YOU CAN
A paragraph in a boring article in a magazine found while waiting for the doctor to finally call you in
so you can wait for him for yet another hour in a cold room getting sicker
can spark a wonderful piece of dialogue for your WIP.
Nuggets of obscure information sowed in your unconscious may provide a bountiful harvest when least expected.
LISTEN, LISTEN, LISTEN
Not just to the words spoken around you but to the cadence of them,
the tone of them when emotions run strong, seethe with acid, or lower to the depths of a broken spirit.
Watch how the wrong words can slice deeper than a scalpel, how the right ones strike to the core of a hurting heart to heal.
DO NOT LOSE HEART
Your writing journey may seem long, but the horizon of better things beckon. Keep on writing.
September 17, 2023
NEW WAYS TO DIE
Major Richard Blaine is leading his Spartan 300 through an accursed village in hopes of finding the laboratory of a SS scientist who has mangled his experiments
without triggering the deaths of all those who trust him.
NEW WAYS TO DIE
“We travel, some of us forever,to seek other states, other lives, other souls.”
―
Anaïs Nin wrote:
“Each friendrepresents a world in us, a world not born until they arrive, and it is only bythis meeting that a new world is born.”
In that sense, the Spartan 300had spawned twenty-one worlds. And each of us was the richer for it.
Sentient admonished,
‘I would not mention the eroticauthor, Anaïs Nin, in what is now quaintly called “polite society,” thoughNurse Reynolds might enjoy chastising you for it.
Besides, that particularquote is from one of her diaries not yet published.’
‘Then how do I know it?’
‘As I moved you up and downlinear time to acquire those useful hands, your consciousness plucked odd itemshere and there at the whim of your mischievous unconscious much like an errantXanthium strumarium.’
‘A what?’
‘Oh, if you insist on the crudeterm, a cocklebur.”
Cloverfield interrupted myconfusing talk with Sentient,
“Not to be disrespectful, mate, but you look damnodd, leading us with that bandaged left hand held up high like the staff ofMoses.”
“I get the best reading of whereto go this way.”
“Does this ‘leading’ cause you anypain?” asked Rachel in a concerned tone of voice.
“It’s … not pleasant. But if St.Marok taught me anything, it is how to endure.”
Theo snapped like the veteransergeant he was,
“Less talking, more looking. We’re knee deep in hell-watershere.”
“You’re right, Theo. Sorry.”
He snapped even harsher.
“You’rea major. You don’t apologize to a nom-com.”
“I do to a friend.”
That got everyone quiet. Out ofembarrassment or deep thoughts, I couldn’t tell … and didn’t want to.
That eerie fog returned … butonly teasing us from the far corners of blackened buildings.
I figured Mr.Morton was playing with us as a cat with a helpless mouse.
Let him. An amused enemy mademistakes. Though I would be hard-pressed to remember him making even one.
‘You still live. He was foolishto let you leave New Orleans not his slave.’
‘Maybe. Or maybe I am doing hisbidding without realizing it of my own free will.’
‘There is that. It would amusehim more.’
‘Great. Even when you tell me Iam right, it goes down hard.’
I put my left hand down.
“We’re there.
Cloverfield huffed,
“Thistwo-story building is unblemished. How is that possible?”
“Probably like the eye of thehurricane.”
Taylor muttered, “Probably?”
“Hey, I am making this up as I goalong.”
I turned to Theo.
“I’m going upthose steps alone. You, ah, make sure my back is ….”
He sighed a gush of pent-up blastof frustration at my not talking military jargon.
“We’ll set up a wide perimeterwith recon scouts at either end of this street.”
He walked directly in front ofme.
“But you are not going up there alone.”
“Of course not, silly,” laughedNurse Reynolds. “I’m going up with him.”
“No, Rachel. I am.”
“Hush, Master-Sergeant Savalas. Weare not yet married, nor are we like to be if you keep barking ultimatums atme.
Besides, Theo, I am lighter than you, far lighter than any of the Spartans.I will go up the steps in front of the Major, tripping any trap before he goesup.”
“I don’t want that,” I said.
“Oh, bother!” she laughed andwheeled around me and up the black steps with all the grace and speed of agymnast.
I held my breath along with Theo,but she made it to the landing without any explosions. My Sergeant and I bothlet out a sigh of relief.
Cloverfield chuckled,
“And since Iwas a MI6 operative before I was assigned to you, I will take the high road.”
Though the front of the buildingseemed egg skin smooth, he scaled it easily like a mountain-climber born.
He laughed as he paused at thewindow.
“If the cards are stacked against you, reshuffle the deck. Hello, thereseems to be a trip wire or three here.”
“A half dozen Sentient informsme. There is a master lock pick set on the right side of your helmet where yourear would be.”
He reached up and found it. Hetwisted it and took it off his helmet, studying it.
“Oh, ho, now this lookspromising.”
“Be careful, James,” called outRachel, “there is a massive lock on this door I may need your help with.”
I shook my head, holding up my rightforefinger from which sprouted a nasty-looking skeleton key.
“I’ll be rightthere.”
I walked cautiously up thestairs, remembering how Mr. Morton had rigged a bomb to go off only when hisintended victim’s brain waves triggered it.
‘Nothing in life is certain. Fatedoes not owe you anything, and if it decides to take something from you itwill.
You must accept this truth. Accept the dreadful possibility that yourblind optimism is merely a fancied lie.’
‘You’re a real beacon in thestorm, Sentient.’
I took a deep breath and moved upthe stairs, trying not to clench up with each step. It was slow going.
Step.
Deep breath.
Step.
Fighting not to swallow hard.
Step.
Flinching a bit when the woodcreaked.
Step.
Nearly jumping out of my skinwhen Cloverfield snapped,
“Hold on there, mate. What’sgoing on?”
I managed to swallow with a drythroat.
“Mr. Morton once devised a bomb that would only go off when the exactset of brain waves of his intended target were within a foot of it.”
“Bloody Hell!” cursed Rachel. “Then,my little ballet act was for ….”
My clear visor on my Spartanhelmet went bright arterial red. Sentient took over my body, flinging my right armup high.
A flexible metal cable shot out ofthe palm of my bandaged right hand.
With a rasping hiss, the cable lassoed out.
It looped around the metal landing railing where Rachel stood open-mouthed.
‘Hold onto it tight! You’re goingfor a ride! Tuck up those big feet under that rump.’
My back snapped painfully as I waswhipped quickly up through the air.
The winds of my flight made me want to sneeze.
‘Don’t you dare! You must lookheroic. Sneeze, and I drop you!’
I heroically fought the sneeze …and won.
The step hiding Mr. Morton’sdeadly bomb went off, deafening me for a heartbeat.
The bomb had been a smallone. He only wanted to kill me in front of my still alive demoralized men.
Sentient took over my body again,making me land like a human cougar beside Rachel.
I had to appear unfazed. I winkedat Rachel.
“Think MI6 taught Cloverfieldthat trick?”
He looked over at me. He lookedas shaken as I felt.
“So, those hands were worth the pain, right?”
I didn’t hesitate. “No.”
He snorted, “Didn’t think so.”
I smiled at Rachel. “Makes youeager to pick that lock, huh?’
“Do I look like a ruddy fool?”
September 16, 2023
THE TOWN THAT HATED GOD
Major Richard Blaine is leading his Spartan 300 into the cursed village of Oradour-sur-Glan.
Sentient, the alien entity who shares his consciousness,
tells him that nothing natural lives on these smoking streets and within these seared buildings.
But something lies in wait. Their lives are the least they have to lose.
THE TOWN THAT HATED GOD
“We have come to a turning pointin the road, my friends. If we turn to the light perhaps our children and ourchildren's children will go that way.
But if we turn to the Dark, generations yetunborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word.”
– Rabbi Lt. Amos Stein
We stepped on the seared rubbleof what was left of the cobblestones of Oradour-sur-Glan.
Our footsteps sounded hollow and loud nomatter how hard we tried to be quiet. Even Agent Cloverfield failed at silence.
For a heartbeat, I was whiskedback to lethal New Orleans to that alleyway bordered by delicate iron laceworkterraces.
Helen stood defiant and strong,her petite revolver held firm in her slender fingers.
Her silken hair tickled myleft ear. Helen always stood on my left, the side where my heart beat.
Loathsome creatures werefollowing the scent of our souls. No masking them possible.
It appeared Mr.Morton would have his final checkmate against me.
Helen smiled warmly up at me.“Death will not be so terrible with you at my side.”
The bright light that hadsuddenly enveloped us at that moment seemed to amazingly bathe me and mySpartans where we stood.
“Whoa!” cried Reese. “What wasthat?”
“The remembrance of Love past,” Imanaged to get out.
Taylor grunted, “That don’t makeno sense.”
Rachel murmured,
“Love doesn'tneed a reason, Stewart. It speaks and manifests from the irrational wisdom ofthe heart.”
Taylor mumbled,
“And that don’tmake any sense neither.”
Evans sneered,
“For a guy whoasks so many darn questions, you don’t seem to know what to do with the answersonce you get them.”
I said into my helmet’s speakersso that all the Spartans would hear,
“Answers are like pieces of ajigsaw puzzle. They often don’t make sense until you get enough of them to fittogether into a coherent whole or a sense of the whole picture.”
Johnny Knight whistled as we gotcloser to the seared and cracked buildings.
“This town must have hated God forHim to allow this kind of madness to happen to it.”
Amos said sternly.
“We mustn’tprejudge. The very opposite may be true: this town may have in fact lovedElohim, and for that it was punished by His Adversary.”
Cloverfield said,
“I think it ismerely side-stepping personal responsibility to blame all mankind’s atrocitieson the devil.”
He laughed harshly,
“I look backon my life, and I see my earlier selves as different people, acquaintances I haveoutgrown. I wonder how I could ever have been some of them.
At the time, Imight have consoled myself with the lie that some of my darker acts were merelymistakes.”
Cloverfield’s voice hardened,
“But even then, and most assuredly now, I knew that they were just plain wrong.
No satanic whisper made me do them. I did them of my own free will. I was myown devil.”
I shrugged. “Only makes youhuman, James. We live. We make mistakes. We learn from them or die when wedon’t.”
Porkins yelped. I turned in hisdirection. I was spared yelping myself by his warning.
I had seen strange sights in NewOrleans, but none like the one flowing with a life of its own towards us oozingdown the steps to our right … the side away from our hearts.
If Hell breathed, this eerie foglooked like it had barely escaped from its congested lungs.
My mouth dried, and every orificein my body shrank to the size of a pepper seed.
Its color was like vaporous candycorn. But the flickering flames within it promised no treat but only thedeadliest of tricks.
Somehow, it gave off the aura ofravenous hunger. As it neared us, the undulating mists sped up as if afraid wewould run away.
“Don’t run. Don’t even move. Standyour ground, “I urged.
Words came out of my lips, and I knewthey were not Sentient’s but Someone else’s.
“Fear not! Stand your ground. TheLord himself will fight for you. You have only to keep still and see Evil doesnot always win.”
Amos breathed, “The words ofMoses. You are he born again.”
I shook my head. “Rabbi, I am justme.”
As if in denial of my words,Helen Mayfair’s velvet voice arose from nowhere yet from everywhere like awhisper from the Gateless Realm:
“Bind me—I still can sing—
Banish—my mandolin
Strikes true within—
Slay—and my Soul shall rise
Chanting to Paradise—
Still thine.”
Helen had read those words ofEmily Dickinson’s to me long ago in that dark hour when all seemed lost in St.Marok’s eerie library.
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Against all odds we survived thatHalloween.
My spine firmed. I and my Spartan300 would survive this day as well.
I believed that deep down without confirmationof my eyes like I knew the sun still shone above the hurricane’s howling.
The first tendrils of thatloathsome fog reached out for me, then recoiled with a hissing much like mistmakes when touched with a heated fireplace poker.
With a heart-wrenching whimper, theiridescent fog bled back up the steps away from us.
Even after it disappearedaround the corner, I could still hear the moaning of the mist as if it stillhurt by merely getting close to me.
Reese cleared his closing throat,“Major, before I met you, my life made sense.”
“I envy you, Trent,” I said.
“Why?”
“Because at some point, life madesense to you. It never has for me.”
Porkins grumbled, “Where are allthe bodies of the dead Nazis?”
“Oh,” I smiled sadly. “They arein the courtyard yonder in the direction that mist took.”
“Why there?” asked Rachel.
“Because that courtyard is wherethe Nazis herded the poor villagers to be the target of Oberführer ReinhardtKönig’s experimentation.”
“All of the Nazi soldiers arethere?” wondered Cloverfield. “It took all of them to herd weaponlessvillagers?”
I sighed, “There were 642 men, women,and children, James.”
“Children?” gasped Nurse Reynolds.
“Yes, Rachel. Though James, itdid not take all 200 soldiers of the Panzer regiment Der Führer to herd theterrified villagers.”
I was so mad that I growled therest of my sentence. “The majority of those bastards just wanted to watch.”
“Are any of those Nazis stillalive?” hissed the usually peace-loving rabbi.
“No, Amos. rushed through his calculations, eager to impress Hitler. He disregarded any hinthis equations would not produce the effect for which he was aiming.
He cut corners and forced the equations to come out as he thought they should.”
I shook my head.
“Sentient tellsme that he should have paid attention to his calculations. His weapons anddevises are more potent than he intended.”
Theo grunted harshly,
“Let meguess? He fired on those villagers and killed, not only them, but all of hisown men.”
“Yes. But the coward wasn’t amongthem. He was in his laboratory and fired from a distance.”
I pronounced it the British wayas had Dr. Frankenstein in one of the only movies I had ever seen. No onelaughed. Not even me.
The rabbi eagerly asked, “So thatrat is still alive?”
“No, Amos. According to Sentient,his insides are smeared all over the walls.
The only thing that remains of him thatyou can recognize are the two oak leaves on the uniform collar rank patches.”
Cloverfield nodded to the suspiciouslyunmarred signpost.
“I can read German, too, Major. That sign points to König’sheadquarters.”
“I want his laboratory, James. Andthat sign is too clean not to be a plant from my enemy.”
“Then, how are we going to findit, Major?” asked not too surprisingly by Taylor.
I held up my left bandaged hand.
“Insidethis artificial hand are devices and instrumentation from 413 years in the future.
They have been reacting to the … let’s just say the unnatural residue from thatexplosion which killed König.”
Theo asked, “So, you can lead usthere?”
“Yes, but it will not be pretty,and it will be dangerous.”
“We are not expecting roses, Major,”said Rachel, “only a road that will take us the fastest to an end of this nightmare.”
I remembered the words of NiccoloMachiavelli:
“There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to theadvantage of others.”
But to avoid a small war with Rachel,I kept silent.
Was I a coward, or was I awareshe had the right to her own hopes?
Every day, no matter how youfight it, you learn a little more about yourself, and all most of it does isteach you humility.
September 15, 2023
DEADLY HARVEST_A Tale of the Son of Lucas and Ingrid of the DARK HOLLYWOOD series of books
Yesterday, a ring of evil looking mushrooms appeared in the grass in front of my apartment door.
No other apartment had them across the entire sprawling complex.
None did today.
But my mushrooms had multiplied ...
and gotten closer.
Cue the spooky music
For Increased Effect read
accompanied to music below post
(How you live is how you will die.) – Basque proverb
Scofield studied me with eyes holding all the warmth of a hawk’s.
“ I’m unsettled by the mushrooms.”
We were playing chess not eating her cooking. Not that I would be so foolish as to eat her cooking.
Her last name wasn't Scofield any more than mine was Templar.
Her beauty when young was legendary, leading to the death of many of her assignments.
Even in her sixties, Scofield was striking.
Her voice cracked with fear.
“Those black mushrooms just appeared at the farthest mansion …
their ring sprouting at twilight, circling a dead cat, though by dawn the cat was gone.”
A black cat strolled lazily out from under the table to rub against my leg.
Scofield paled.
“When did you get a cat?”
I turned up the corners of my lips. “There are worse things awaiting the living than death.”
Her thin lips tightened. “I was enjoying the south of France until the Service forced me to move next to you.”
“You could have said ‘No’.”
The cat moved as if to rub against Scofield’s leg, and she rose quickly.
“I have to go.”
I watched her almost run to the front door, flinging it open,
revealing a full moon against a stark night sky as if it had hungrily devoured all the stars.
‘Later’ in Dakota.
It looked up at me with hungry eyes.
“Soon,” I promised.
Its eyes said it had better be damn soon. Emphasis on the damned.
In the following days, I went about keeping my word.
I built one Dakota Burial Platform after another on the front lawn of my estate
until the grounds bristled like some grotesque beard.
***
I was putting the finishing touches on the last platformwhen the black cat flowed out of the deepening twilight shadows.
“Osiceca.”
“I know. The storm is almost here. We’ve run out of time.”
Scofield appeared as if out of nowhere, holding a bowl of liquid. I sniffed.
Mushroom soup.
Her voice was still her own.
“The lights have gone out all over Dunwich Estates. Only your estate and mine have lights on at night.
One manor after another has been swallowed up by those damn mushrooms.”
“Doesn't explain that soup.”
“Arthur’s grounds were taken over last night. I took these mushrooms from his front yard.”
“The President of the Community Board?”
and saw him and his wife standing motionless in the front room just staring at one another,
their lips wiggling but no sounds coming out.”
I shrugged. “At least none that human ears could hear.”
“Damn you! You know something, don’t you?”
Not just any Dakota burial site, mind you, but one whose spiritual energies blocked the way to ….”
I trailed off, not having the words that an assassin bred in the “real world” would understand.
“Dakota? I thought you were Basque.”
I nodded. “My grandmother was full Basque.
My grandfather didn’t stay around long enough to tell my father just what he was.”
“He was Dakota?”
“Apache. But Elu's ability to inhabit dead animals helped him get around.”
Scofield asked as if to a madman, “Was that his name?”
I nodded to the black cat studying her like a red-tailed hawk would a lame mouse.
“Is his name. Meet my uneasy ally. Everyone from the Service who've tried to kill me already have.”
Scofield dumped out the soup with a hurried flick of a wrist.
The cat laughed in a very unfeline way. She paled.
“H-Help me.”
“You sowed the seeds. Now, comes the harvest.”
“Please!”
“If you run fast enough, you might make it to your front door before our possessed neighbors drag you down.”
Scofield watched the growing black mushrooms with ever-widening eyes for a heartbeat, then raced away into the night.
“Spry for her age.”
The cat grunted: “Hiya Onsi La?”
In the darkness beyond my gate, Scofield cried out.
Once.
Its eyes said there was a justice not written in books nor found in any court.
In the 19th century, the railroads exterminated the buffalo to force the Dakota onto reservations.
After a harsh winter, the Minnesota government withheld food and payment for their lands.
“Let them eat grass,” said one trader.
Bloodshed ensued, ending with the largest mass execution in U.S. history, 38 Santee warriors,
after a trial of five minutes with neither attorneys nor witnesses allowed.
I looked up at the diamond dust of the Milky Way, the Hanging Road, which led to the Camp of the Dead.
Trudging through my gate, the possessed of Dunwich Estates silently swayed and suddenly stopped.
Glazed eyes studied my 38 burial platforms for long moments.
Flying whips of fire hissed down from the sky to consume those platforms.
What emerged were grim-faced figures of living flame.
The Wana’gi Elu called them.
In Karmic retribution, the Wana’gi sprang at the mushroom-controlled humans
dispossessing the bodies and claiming them for their own.
More darts of strange fire sizzled down from the stars toward the houses beyond.
“Come, Grandson,” gruffed Elu’s voice from the cat.
“As a White, you will not be welcomed.”
I nodded, walking into that darkness which never forgets … nor forgives.
September 13, 2023
ON THE CUSP OF MADNESS
Major Richard Blaine and his Spartan 300 have just survived a meeting with a mocking all-powerful entity.
Why did it let them pass?
ON THE CUSP OF MADNESS
“I have harnessed the shadowsthat stride from world to world to sow death and madness.”
- Oberführer Reinhardt König
“Who the devil was that?” gaspedEvans.
“You just answered your ownquestion, Eric,” I managed to get out.
André stepped even farther fromme. “átkozott vagy!
I nodded. “Sometimes it does feelas if I am damned.”
Rachel lightly touched myshoulder from behind.
“The angel who saved you earlierdid not think so. Whether she was your Helen or someone else entirely does notmatter. The angel thought you worthy of being saved.”
She squeezed my shoulder. “And sodo I.”
Amos clamped a hand on my othershoulder.
“So do we all, Rick. We all lookat your bandaged hands and see the flinch of pain on your face when you thinkwe aren’t looking, and we know ….”
His voice thickened, and Theotook over for him,
“That the worth of a man is not from what people call himbut from the pain he’s willing to suffer for others.”
I cleared my throat.
“Thank you.But we have some miles to cover before we reach Oradour-sur-Glane. And trustme, Spartans, we want to reach it long before sundown.”
The mottled undergrowth andtwisted trees thinned as we marched. Unseen things crawled and scurriedin the branches above us which seemed to reach down like gnarled fingers.
A clearing teased us from yardsaway. I didn’t know if I was glad or sad to be nearing the martyred village. Itdidn’t matter.
We had to cross that Rubicon andresign ourselves to survive the consequences. Destiny beckoned … along with alot of death I was afraid … past and future.
Vincent said, “Did, ah, your DarkPassenger tell you how soon that unit of Nazi psychos will reach us, Major?”
“No, Ant. She tells me a lot ofthings … but not everything. But she did tell me the German High Command is nothappy with Senior Colonel Dr, Oskar Dirlewanger.”
Risking a thump aside the head,Taylor asked, “Why, Major?”
“He’s a psychopath, Stew. It’snot something you can turn on and off like tap water. They ordered him and hisunit to come here from Poland weeks ago ….”
“Weeks ago?” blustered Floyd.“They should have already been here.”
I nodded.
“Yes, but the SeniorColonel is a slave to his compulsion to kill. He’s stopped from time to time tofeed his addiction and those same ones of his men.”
Taylor squeaked, “So, he could behere anytime.”
“That’s about the size of it,”growled Theo, “so put the muscle to the hustle and let’s get to that damnedvillage. Ah, pardon my French, Rac, ah, Nurse Reynolds.”
“Pardoned, sergeant,” laughedRachel, “if you gentlemen will pick up the pace.”
“You heard the lady,” I said.“Pick up the pace.”
The land seemed to slope oddly asif our eyes were viewing it from the wrong end of a telescope.
Worse, our feetfelt all tangled up in waves of gravity like the force had become tangible in some high tide manner.
My head felt light, and mystomach felt at high tide along with the strange gravity tugging at my leadenlegs.
“Watch your steps, men,” urgedTheo. "You do not want to fall down in this cursed forest."
Amos muttered to me, “Is the airstarting to smell … odd to you, Rick?”
“Gentlemen!” I snapped, “takeyour helmets from off your belts and put them on?”
“Why?” grumbled Dimitri.
Theo said harshly, “Because the Majorsaid to do it.”
Dimitri did it, but he hated thecooped-up feeling it gave him despite the cool oxygen jets and other stimulantsit breathed into his nostrils.
"Because what we are about to find in the air in that stricken village may be poisonous to breathe unfiltered."
"What of me?" asked André. "I have no helmet."
“The camera Sentient gave youwill act as a filter.”
“If I die anyway?”
Cloverfield drawled, “We will alwaysmiss your sunny disposition.”
André gave the British agent a look he usually reserved for me. Cloverfield actually seemedamused.
Rachel and I kept our Spartan helmets on that only looked Greek whenever we marched.
They were futuristic as well and acted accordingly. So we simply watched the others dontheir futuristic helmets that looked nothing so much as fancy deep-sea gear.
We edged around the last grove ofnightmarish trees and stopped dead in our tracks.
The ground no longer seemed to slope,it dipped down dramatically into what must have been a lush valley but was nowcovered in seared, burnt grass.
As sometimes happened with mySentient-altered helmet, I saw a map over my right eye which indicated thatthis land had always been even and flat.
I even saw an image of what this landonce looked like beneath the map.
“Be very cautious, Gentlemen.Sentient has shown me this has always been flat land.”
Taylor rasped, “Wh-What changedit Major? How?”
“König. When he opened a door betweenrealities, our dimension recoiled at the unnatural intrusion.
Feeling raped, the very landrebelled and thrust itself away from the touch of what it felt unclean andloathsome and vile.”’
Amos forced out, “Is that whatkilled the Nazis and the villagers?”
I shook my head.
“Even Sentientdoes not know. But when you open a door to the Great Darkness, its denizens scurryin like hungry cockroaches … or worse. And they came in ... hungry.”
I shivered, “Be on guard,friends. We are deep in enemy territory in more ways than one.”
September 12, 2023
HELL OF OUR OWN MAKING
Major Richard Blaine leads his Spartan 300 to a cursed French village 310 miles away from any other Allied troops.
If anything goes wrong, they are on their own. Can anyone say "Custer's Last Stand?"
HELL OF OUR OWN MAKING
“The human soul is mysterious aswell as terrible. God and devil are fighting there, and the battlefield is theheart of man.”
– Helen Mayfair
“I didn’t sign up for this,”groaned Jace Mercer as he rearranged his pack for the thousandth time.
Johnny Knight, who had marchedbeside him all through Sicily, grunted, “You didn’t sign up period. You wasdrafted.”
“As you repeatedly reminded usall through boot camp,” snorted Eric Evans.
“Well, blazing summer sun andlong, dusty roads sure wasn’t what the enlistment posters promised,” insistedMercer.
“Kit” Carson snapped, “You weredrafted!”
Cpl. Wilson shook his head,
“And these woods have started tofeel more like October than summer ever since we rounded that bend back there.”
Dee Stevens shifted the weight ofhis own pack and looked to his friend,
“I just hope that when we reachthat spooky village of the Major’s, it doesn’t turn into Halloween.”
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I called back to Dee,
“It’s not mine. It’s notanyone’s. Not since Oberführer Reinhardt played fast and loose with the Natural Order with his experiments.”
“Then, why are we going there?”muttered Taylor.
Since Evans hadn’t slugged him,he wanted to know, too. Merde, all of the Spartans probably did.
I listened a moment to thedisturbing things Sentient told me.
I groaned inside.
How was I going to phrasethat to men whose world had always made sense before they met me?
Simple. Start with survival,then, move on from there.
As furtive wild things rustled inthe mottled undergrowth, I said,
“There are … weapons there thatwe can use against the Nazi’s heading our way.”
“How do they even know about us,Major?” yelped Taylor, who promptly got slugged by Evans.
“They don’t. They were sent bythe German High Command to chastise König for disobeying direct orders. As oddas it may seem, there were some things too foul for even the SS.”
“How many does your DarkPassenger say?” asked Cloverfield.
“She didn’t give me an exactnumber. Just the name of the unit: SS Sonderkommando Dirlewanger.”
“Oh, bloody hell! Stones andBlood! Not them!”
“They’re that bad?” gulpedTaylor.
Cloverfield grunted,
“Bad doesn’t cover it, mate. Ledby Senior Colonel Dr. Oskar Dirlewanger, a violent alcoholic psychopath andmurderer. Many of the men in his brigade were common criminals and sadists withprior convictions for rape, murder, and even worse crimes.”
Cpl. Wilson whistled, “Worse thanrape and murder?”
Cloverfield nodded,
”Having sex with the dead and forcing therelatives to watch qualifies in my book, mate. The brigade became so notoriousfor their atrocities in Poland and Byelorussia that even other senior SSofficers complained to Himmler.”
Amos, his face stone, husked,“And they’re headed here?”
Cloverfield turned to me. “Yousure there are weapons in that damned village we can use against them.”
“Yes.”
Theo stepped out of the ranks androared at the men,
“You heard the Major and Cloverfield! Put some muscle to thehustle. March like your lives depended on it ‘cause it sounds like it does!”
They marched.
The fear of the men made oursurroundings blur in their minds obviously for the Spartans paid them no mind.
I, however, did pay them mind.
So, did André.
He pulled backfrom beside me as if I were as diseased as the densely fungus-covered trees wepassed.
He husked out one word as he glared at me.
“Megszállott!”
“Yes, I am possessed … just notin the way you think. Why do you hate me … and don’t bring up your lost love. Ihave one, too.”
He took his time answering.
It was morning when we startedout, but shadows lurked thick here. I had an uneasy feeling they were alwayshere no matter the time of day.
The trees grew too thickly, andtheir trunks were too thin and twisted for any healthy French woodland.
There was too much silence in thedim paths between them. Strange, deep-set tracks of cloven hooves dotted them.
I had no desire to see where they led. My dark fears were too sure of theirdestination.
The floor beneath my boots was soft with thedank moss and mattings of seemingly infinite years of decay.
Finally, André started to speaklow, putting a cigarette in the corner of his lips.
I snatched it out of his mouthand threw it into the woods. “Let’s not advertise our presence to any unseen….”
I stopped when a mottled, tinyhand shot out from the undergrowth and snatched up the unlit cigarette.
“Nicotine is a nasty habit,” Imanaged to get out.
He paled and rasped, “Átkozottvagy!”
“I do feel accursed. But that isnot why you hate me. Spill it.”
His dark spaniel eyes glitteredwith anger.
“I! I get to choose if … if! … Iplace myself in danger. No one else. I get to choose to be hero, to be coward!No one else! But, no! You pluck me from the deck of that ship where I wassafe.”
“You promised Life Magazineyou would go on Omaha Beach to photograph ….”
“Yes! I promised! Not you! Notyou! Now, those eleven photographs I gave my word to give them are not there.”
He pounded the camera hangingfrom his neck and froze, suddenly realizing it was not his old camera.
“Yes, Sentient kept your word foryou ….’’
He tapped my forehead roughlywith his right fingertips.
“Cseszd meg! There is noSentient. Only this … this diseased brain of yours.”
I shrugged. “No matter. Thoseeleven negatives are already on your editor’s desk.”
“I did not take them! They willnot have my style, my vision.”
“Your paycheck will still be all yours.”
“I will not have earned it!”
“How delightful,” mocked a voiceI had never wanted to hear again. “Cain and Abel arguing. I so missed it.”
Mr. Morton, hidden in the shadowsto my right, chuckled, “What took you so long? I was getting bored.”
His voice became hollow as ifspoken from a cavernous crypt. “And you know how dangerous I become whenbored.”
I turned.
An opening slowly formed in thevery shadows, blood oozing along its edges … as if he had torn a hole inreality itself … which was not beyond the entity I called Mr. Morton.
André husked, ”Nem, nem, solia!”
Mr. Morton laughed as if dry icehad been given voice and turned to me.
“Never say never. Isn’t that theinane rallying cry you have given the French Resistance?”
He continued to laugh in hisimmaculate, elegant SS uniform.
The portal abruptly closed.
Mr. Morton was gone.
The steamingblood from reality’s wound, however, remained bubbling on the forest floor.
The shivers stayed, too.
WHY ALL GREEK MYTHS ARE TRAGEDIES
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Major Richard Blaine is at a loss on how to handle the maelstrom of his own emotions, much less the fearful confusion of his Spartan 300.
WHY ALL GREEK MYTHS ARE TRAGEDIES
“Is it better to out-monster themonster or to be quietly devoured?
- Friedrich Nietzsche
People never pay attention to advice.This, I believe, is a constant factor in man’s psychological makeup. Itprobably stems from an ancient tribal distrust of the shaman.
You want them to be wrong. Ifthey’re right, then they’re somehow superior, and this is even moreuncomfortable than getting into trouble … usually.
Irritating fact was that no onewas giving me advice, either good or bad. Not even Sentient.
Oh, yes, there was one.
Me.
I was telling myself that I washeaded in the wrong direction … towards trouble.
I suddenly realized why all theGreek myths were tragedies: the “hero” walked into Hell with his eyes wide shutby pride.
Of course, we were no longer inmyth ….
‘Delude yourself as you would, mychampion. You are walking into it as we speak.’
I paid Sentient all the noticeshe was worth … which was none at all.
Oh, where was I?
The Hellenic world did not viewthe passage of time as we do. History was considered in an episodic sense, asthe struggles of an unchanging mankind against a relentless and unchangingfate.
The slow process of organicevolution had not yet been fancied as fact, and the grandest model for a worldview was the seemingly changeless pattern of the stars.
‘Yawn.’
Stew Taylor braved a cuff fromEvans and asked, “How far is this spooky village from Omaha Beach, anyhow?”
That he didn’t get his earwhacked meant that Evans was curious too.
“Three hundred and ten miles,give or take a flap of the crow’s wing.”
I received a chorus of “What?”from the Spartans, even from Theo.
“Ant” Vincent gasped, “We can’twalk that far, Major!”
“Speak for yourself, city boy,”snorted Link. “I was raised on a farm. But 310 miles ain’t gonna be done in aday.”
“And we’re deep in enemyterritory,” moaned “Kit” Carson. “The Jerries will find us long before we findthat village.”
Theo was watching them with drilyamused eyes. He had been through all this with them before.
Amos, the ever-tolerant rabbi,shook his head at them. “When did you not know the Major to have a plan?”
He leaned in close to me. “You dohave a plan, right?”
This was an old routine with him done more to ease his own doubts than anything else.
I smiled and nodded, speaking to my grumblingSpartans.
“Time, Space are not the linearconcepts you’ve been taught. ,the wunderkind scientist, played fast and loose with the Natural Order.”
Alfred Kent, the former Harvardarcheology professor, scowled, “And this has just what bearing on the 31o mileswe have to march?”
“That tunnel we just survived wasnot a tunnel.”
Again, I was assaulted by a tidalwave of “What?”.
I sighed at Sentient’s mentalbarrage of things my Spartans could not possibly be expected to understand. Norwould I subject them to such a bombardment.
“Consider it a crosswalks ofsorts … between dimensions, realms, planes of existence.”
Their faces all looked like they hadbitten into a living, squirming slug. Sentient was right. I was a lousy teacher.
The exotic apricot perfume of Helen’ssuddenly filled my head like an invisible, billowing cloud, and in my left earcame her low, tickling murmur,
“You were ever more than you believed,my Richard. Speak to them through their senses, for Man believes what toucheshim more than mere words that only tickle his ears. Close your eyes. What do yousense?”
I closed my eyes, hearingCloverfield bark, “Leave the man be for a heartbeat, will you?”
Reese snapped, “You heard theman. Quiet!”
I kept my eyes closed, reachingout with all my senses. It was as if I had been transported to another place. ButI knew I had not been.
I was simply becoming aware of achange in the world around me.
I had a sense of being in anactual place instead of merely going through the motions of the world as I expectedit be.
I could swear that I heard thecrackle and rustle of fallen autumn leaves beneath my feet,
that I breathed asharp, crisp, wine-like air heavy with leaf bonfires, of ripened apples hangingon a laden bough, the faint scent of late-blooming flowers and a touch of froston withering vegetation.
I thought I heard the rustle of adried patch of corn, the patter of hickory nuts falling from trees, the sudden,far-off whir of partridge wings,
the soft, liquid singing of a lazybrook carrying on its surface its cargo of fallen autumn leaves.
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There was color, too.
Though my eyes were closed, I saw the lush goldencolor of a walnut tree, the purple of an ash,
the shouting yellow of an aspen, the blood of a sugarmaple, and the rich red and brown of oak.
Over and above it all was the bittersweetfeel of autumn, the glory of the dying year when your work was done, and aquiet season of rest settled upon you.
I felt a strange abiding peacewithin myself.
The peace that comes at the blistering end of summer, the peaceand quiet before the chill bite of winter.
The brief time of respite, thetime for resting and for thought, for binding up old wounds and forgetting themand all the nastiness of life that had inflicted them.
I opened my eyes.
“Gentlemen, close your eyes.Listen and feel with all of your being. Then, you will understand. Trust me. Youwill understand.”
I watched them. I also watchedthe surrounding woods. They trusted me. I would not let them down.
Slow minutes passed.
Then, as one,they opened their eyes. Some of them staggered for a moment but quickly righted themselves.
Amos looked to me with weteyes.
“You are like Daniel of old.”
I smiled sadly. “No, more likeUlysses of today.”
I pulled up straight and gavethem the bad news.
“Gird your loins, Gentlemen. Aroundthat bend is the hell Oberführer Reinhardt König has made of the once beautifulvillage of Oradour-sur-Glane.”
The groans they made didn’t come closeto my internal ones.
Helen breathed in my left ear.
“Youwill not fail. You may let yourself down but never others. Never others. It isnot in you.”
I felt the press of invisible lipson mine, and the sense of Helen was gone.
Winter had come.
September 11, 2023
ORADOUR-SUR GLANE, THE MARTYRED VILLAGE
The Spartan 300 are naturally loathe to go to an accursed village ... especially the war photographer, Andre ... who wants to pick when to be heroic and when not to be.
ORADOUR-SUR GLANE, THE MARTYREDVILLAGE
“An honorable man is fair even tohis enemies; a dishonorable man is unfair even to his friends.”
– Marcus Aurelius
At the end of the season ofsorrows comes the time of rejoicing. Spring, like a well-oiled clock,noiselessly indicates this time.
But spring had passed us by aslife had passed so many thousands on Omaha Beach.
We were in the blistering seasonof testing.
How much testing I was yet to discover.
pushedout his bottom lip. “I am not going to this accursed village.”
I sighed, “No one gets tosidestep the season of testing, photographer. Ask Gerta.”
He rushed up to me. “You willnever again foul her name by letting it pass your lips.”
I nodded.
“Low blow on my part. I will never again utterher name. But you will accompany the Spartan 3oo to that village … for you arenow one of us.”
“Are you insane?”
“Yes, but that is not the point. Lookat your upper left sleeve.”
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He did, seeing the Spartan 300patch, and exclaimed, “Ez őrültség!”
“Madness, no. Sentient, yes. Youcome with us, or she will bring you to the moment Ger …. Your love steps onthat mine and have you repeat seeing it over and over and over again until yourelent.”
“Cseszd meg!”
“Damned? Of course, I am. I thoughtyou knew.”
I stepped up to him. “But you arecoming with us.”
Rachel, her face paler than I hadever seen it, was looking at me as if sensing that André was right: I wasdamned.
Sooner or later, everyone endedup looking at me that way. Except for Helen Mayfair …
and loving me had done somethingto her. What I did not know. And the not knowing was eating me alive.
‘You know, Sentient?’
‘I am conflicted to which is worse: meknowing or me telling you what I do know. So, I will remain silent.’
The Spartans were looking at mein various stages of Rachel’s and André’s expressions.
I shrugged. Let them all renounceme. I had lived all my life alone. I always knew I would die that way, too … alone.
Cloverfield loped beside me andshook his head.
“Mate, you may be as daft as the Cheshire Cat and as damned asColeridge’s Ancient Mariner, but I have your back now and always.”
Reese took my other side.
“I never asked why you were inthat Calcutta hellhole of a prison. I ain’t asking now.
All I know is that youdidn’t ask me neither. You just waded into those attacking me and saved mybacon. If that damned village of yours leads straight to Hell, I’m marchingthere with you.”
Porkins took Reese’s other side,turning to the remaining Spartans.
“You heard Trent ….”
Reese jerked as if not realizing his bullied friend knew his first name as Porkins kept on,
“ … you can all stay here safeuntil the Jerries find you. But me and true Spartans are going with the Major.”
Cpl. Sam Wilson, tugged on histight collar showing the rope burns, and walked on Porkins’ other side.
“Whoyou calling not a true Spartan? I got picked by the Major his own self. I even gotstretched a full inch taller before he did it, too.”
Dee Steven took up beside hisblack friend.
“Hey, if we are going to Hell, I might get me some inspiration,become another Gustave .”
Jace Mercer strolled to Dee’sside. “He draws Flash Gordon, right?”
Chuck Dickens took up behind him.“You, Philistine! That Sunday periodical is illustrated by Alex Raymond.”
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He patted Dee’s shoulderapprovingly.
“Your pick of artists, young man,is quite appropriate for your career desire. Doré in the late 1840s and early1850s, made several text comics, like Les Travaux d'Hercule, Troisartistes incompris et mécontents, Les Dés-agréments d'un voyaged'agrément , and L'Histoire de la Sainte Russie.
“Oh, them,” snorted Cpl. Wilson.
There was a sharp whistle. We allturned around. Sgt. Theo Savalas pointed to a mound of discarded back packs.
“Aren’t you forgetting something,Spartans?” he smiled drily.
Cloverfield held up his Sig SauerSpear rifle. “I remembered this.”
Rachel moved in front of me withthe grace of a river given life. “How not surprising, agent man.”
She locked those disturbingemerald eyes on me. “Now, in which direction is that accursed village of yours?”
My eyes burning with the tears I darenot shed in front of grown men, I said,
“Second star to the right, andstraight on till morning."
And with Helen’s exotic apricot perfumeall around me, the Spartans 300 and I marched to Hell.
