Ferrel D. Moore's Blog

Jesus Road II

An android, a woman and a boy are teleported to Jerusalem in the end times to try and prevent a supercomputer from being built that will be the Beast.

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Hemingway’s Chair

by Ferrel D. Moore

Chirac was a dangerous man, but at least he was civilized.  Alvin Jester wore his best writing jacket to the meeting.  It was the kind of jacket that Papa Hemingway would have appreciated.  Manly.  Thick tweed.  Twisted threads the color of scuffed bark. 

They discussed Proust, Dostoyevsky, Goethe, and Norman Mailer.  Alvin attempted to bring up Truman Capote, but Chirac fixed him with a grim stair and told him that he would prefer to sweeten his tea with lye soap than discuss aa writer who believed that failure was the condiment that gives success its flavor.  Embarrassed, Alvin took a quick sip of bitter, but expensive wine and returned to the topic of the chair. 

“You are obsessed,” Chirac had observed, and ran the tip of his left index finger across the edges of his moustache.  “But I understand obsession.  I respect obsession.  You wish to sit on the same chair that Papa did.  You dream of closing your eyes and imagine that you share thoughts with the great writer himself the way a lover breathes in the aroma of his beloved.  Yes, I understand obsession, my friend, but it is always an expensive habit.” 

“I have the money,” Alvin had said, taking another sip of wine.   

Perhaps he shouldn’t have had so much to drink.  Alcohol affected his judgment, making him prone to blurt things out without thinking, as though he were desperate.   

“But are you sure that you have enough?” asked Chirac with a smile that revealed only the edges of his tiny white teeth. 

Alvin stepped back and bit the inside of his lip.   

“How much?” he asked.  “You haven’t told me how much.” 

“Ah, then you must not have too little.  But I understand your concern.” 

“What?  I don’t know what you mean.” 

With a single stride, Chirac closed the distance between them.  He straightened to his full height and looked down at Alvin.  Like a father speaking to a son who has disappointed him, Chirac placed his hands on Alvin’s shoulders. 

“You doubt.  That’s it, isn’t it?  Will it work?  You would do it if you knew for certain when you sit in Papa’s chair his spirit would inspire you, even for only the briefest of moments.  If you believed that to be true, if you knew for certain that you, too, could write the words that could make a man feel like a man, then you would not even consider the cost.  If your belief burned as bright as your obsession, you would reach into your pocket and give me your entire billfold this very moment.” 

Alvin’s left hand moved to his jacket pocket to do just that. 

“To tell stories the way that Papa did,” continued Chirac, ignoring his guest’s intention.  “Think of it— how would it feel to know that when a woman read your stories she truly felt the earth itself move beneath her feet? 

“To be strong like Papa.  How much do you want that?  How much do you need that?  How much would you pay for that?” 

“I—” began Alvin 

“Be careful, you spill wine on my carpet,” said Chirac. 

“I’m so sorry,” said Alvin. 

His hands were shaking.  He looked down. 

“No, it’s all right,” he brightened.  “It’s only on my shoe.” 

“You poor man,” said Chirac.  “Look at yourself.  Go ahead.  Walk to the mirror over there.  Tell me what you see.  Tell me if you see a man of obsession, his eyes on fire, his heart pumping strength and confidence through his veins.  Is that what you see, my friend?  Or do you see an accountant, his hands shaking because he has forgotten to bring his calculator?” 

Alvin walked over to the mirror and did not like what he saw. 

Over his left shoulder, he could see Chirac appraising him.  Chirac with his tailored gray suit and light pink shirt and a tie that could have been designed by Matisse.  Chirac with his perfectly trimmed hair black and lustrous as shoe cream.  Sideburns tapered to a wicked point matched by the slight sharpness at the apex of his ears. His moustache was tightly trimmed, his eyebrows arched as though he were always amused.  He had a forehead wide and tall enough to write on but angled back like a tilted white-board.  His skin was pale, but his eyes were dark colored and disturbing.  He was a slender, formidable and polished man.   

Alvin looked at his own reflection, at his ill-defined chin and the fold of flesh that ringed it.  A double chin.  Perhaps a triple chin.   

My posture makes me seem shorter than I am, he thought. 

“The chair,” said Chirac, “will be the bridge to bring his spirit back from the other side.  It will allow him to step out from the shadows of death and into your mind.  Not many have the courage to give over their own body to a departed spirit.  I will understand, Alvin, if the man you see reflected before you pales before the task.” 

Alvin Jester reached for his checkbook. 

Monster Werewolf!

The city is destroyed by a monster werewolf, and an epic battle ensues between the monster werewolf and the military, with the werewolf holding the upper hand. Hauck and his friends are trapped underground by the werewolf and must fight for their lives.

The Ghost Box

         

This the first chapter of my book, The Ghost Box.

   They reached the bridge just before midnight. 

            Three vans, one truck pulling the RV and the twenty six foot long moving van.   Their headlights tunneled through the heavy night air as the sky flared with heat lightning and rumbled like a Harley. 

            “You’re sure the bridge can hold our weight?” asked Ashley.

            “Slow up,” said Michael.  “I’ll check it out.  Been a lot of rain lately and the water must be high.  I can’t tell if the bridge is under water or not from here.  Don’t want to get stuck at the bottom of this hill trying to find out.”

            “Be careful.”

            They were in the lead van, the rest of their nine man crew spread out through the remaining vehicles.

            “Aw shit, here it comes,” said Michael.

            The surrounding woods lit in jagged white light as a fireworks display of spidery lightning zigzagged across the sky.  Raindrops slapped the windshield seconds later.

            “Thunderstorms in October,” mused Ashley.  “Holes in the ozone and carbon emissions.”

            “Don’t start with the global warming stuff, will you?”

            Michael flicked on the overhead light and rummaged behind his seat for his raincoat.

            “Truth hurts.  You laughed at Al Gore.”

            He found the yellow slicker, wiggled into it and flipped the hood over his head.

            “I laughed at Al Gore even before he was accused of being a sex-crazed poodle, honey.”

            “Didn’t happen.  He says he’s innocent and I believe him.”

            “That’s what John Edward’s wife said before she heard about the sex tape.”

            She tried to backhand him but he covered the side of his face.

            “Knew it was coming,” he said.

            “Get out there and check that bridge.  I’m too idealistic to drown in a hick river.”

            He kissed her quickly on the cheek and hopped out into the rain.  A second later he opened the door again and said, “Throw me the flashlight will you?”

            She was ready for him and tossed it.  He caught it mid-air and vanished into the storm, slamming the door behind him.  Three years together and they knew each other like they’d been married forever.

            Rain pelted the van roof so hard she almost didn’t hear her cell phone ring.  She was too intent on watching Michael’s light circling and bobbing in the dark like a wobbly spotlight to answer it. They were maybe a hundred feet from the bridge, but even on high speed the wipers couldn’t clear away the raindrops fast enough for her to keep up with him.  She saw a brief vision of him slip on the muddy ground.

            “Be careful,” she yelled.

            She flipped the headlights to bright, which made it still harder to see.  Swore and turned them back to normal.  A glimpse of something like a man slipping and sliding in the wet mud.

            Get up, get up, get up, she thought.

            A flash of light in the tangled woods to her left and a startling crack as lightning exploded a tree trunk.  She covered her face and ducked instinctively.  When she lifted her arm to see how Michael was, he was already up and gone.  She hoped.

            Her phone trilled the “Men in Black” theme again.  She flipped it open, said, “Not now, damn it,” and quickly snapped it shut.

            Where was he?  What if he slipped and fell in the river?  Why didn’t he ever think things through before he did things? 

            More phone music.

            She picked it up and flipped it open while craning her head from side to side to catch a glimpse of her husband.

            “What is it?” she said irritably.

            “Don’t bite my head off,” Sheri said. “I’m calling to make sure you two are okay.  Why are we stopping on the side of this hill?  Way this rain is coming down we don’t get moving we’re going to be on a mudslide headed straight into the river and I for one don’t know how to swim.”

            “Michael is outside,” Ashley said.

            “Can’t he wait ‘til it quits raining to take a leak?”

            “He went down to make sure the bridge was safe.”

            “Larry says it’s too dangerous, honey.  We need to go back.”

            Like that settled it.

            “I’m not moving until Michael gets back.”

            And Ashley didn’t care what Larry said.

            “Can you see him?  Wait.  Larry wants to talk to you.”

            Before you she could tell Sheri No, Larry was on the phone.

            “How long’s he been gone?”
            “I can’t see him, Larry. Too dark and too much rain.”

            “Me and Bill are going out to get him.  We’ve got to move off this hill soon or we’re all going to be in trouble.”

            Larry wanted to be in charge.  Larry always wanted to be in charge.  But this was Michael’s documentary.

            “I’m going with you.”

            “You stay in the car in case we miss him.  We’re on our way.”

            Jackass.  But maybe for once he was right.

            “Take a rope, Larry, and run it down from the bumper so you can get back up.”

            “Good idea.  Bye.”

            Ashley flipped the headlights back to low beam, but still could see nothing but rain.  Water sluiced down the windshield like they were in for forty days and forty nights.

            She started when Larry’s bearded face appeared at her window.

            “Jesus,” she said.

            He held up a coiled rope, pointed to it then moved toward the front of the van.  Bill lumbered behind him like a B movie zombie.  She watched them drop out of sight long enough to tie the rope, then get to their feet looking like they’d just come from a mud wrestling match.  Larry gave her a thumbs up, took a step and fell, but Bill grabbed him by the back of his raincoat and kept him from landing face first in the mud.

            The phone rang again as they held onto the rope and walked backwards on the muddy road like they were rappelling down the face of a mountain.

            “What?”

            “Did they find him yet?”

            “They just got the rope tied and are going down after him.”

            “Men are such idiots.  All of them, I mean.”

            “I’ll call you when I know something.”

            “You want me to come up there with you?”

            “No.”

            “I’m coming anyway.”

            “Maybe you better.  I’m getting nervous.”

            “I’ll be right there.”

            Sheri drew a single card from the deck before they left.  She drew cards before she did anything important.  This time she drew The Tower.  Bolts of lightning blasting a stone tower.  Arrogance and death.  Destruction.

            They should have stayed home.  They should never have come.  The Tower was bad luck.  Sharkey’s Park was bad luck.  Really, they should have stayed home.  Ashley didn’t believe in Tarot, but she had a very bad feeling about Sharkey’s Park.  Michael just never listened and she loved him too much to say no.

            The passenger door swung open and Sheri climbed in, the wet wind slapping at her back.

            “God, what a storm, it’s like being underwater out there,” she said.

            She flipped back the rain hood and shook her red hair free.

            “Take this,” said Ashley. 

            She handed her a wad of paper towels.

            “Thanks, girl.”

            “Did you see anything?  Could you see them?”

            Sheri reached over and placed a hand over Ashley’s.

            “Give Larry and Bill a chance.  Larry was a marine, you know.  He’ll find Michael.”

            Ashley didn’t look at her.  She didn’t want to know if Shari believed it or not.

            “I talked to the others,” said Shari.  “Told them not to call.  I said we’d call them.  You don’t need any more stress.”

            “What if he’s hurt?”

            “If he twisted a knee or something, Bill can carry him back up.  Got shoulders as big as you and me put together.”

            Ashley nodded.

            The rain kept coming down.  She didn’t want to turn on the radio.  Didn’t want to hear about flash flooding.

            “Michael can swim,” she said.  “He’s a good swimmer.”

            Shari patted her hand.

            A sudden blast of wind hit the van so hard it shuddered.

            Ashley gripped the steering wheel so hard her fingers hurt.

            “Where the hell are they?” said Shari.  “The bridge can’t be that far away.”

            “Wait,” said Ashley, “I can see somebody.”

            Yellow movement at the edge of head lights beam.

            Head down, burrowing into the wind as whoever it was pulled themselves forward hand over hand on the rope. 

            “Coming down so hard it’s hard to see,” said Sheri.

            She leaned forward and peered through rain that came at them like a waterfall.

            “I saw a yellow slicker.”

            “There,” said Sheri, pointing at the windshield.  “I saw something like you said.”

            “A smoke,’ said Ashley.  “I need a smoke.  Wish I’d never quit.”

            A tree somewhere up ahead burst into crackly white light like a giant sparkler.  The trunk fell forward.

            “Oh, God,” screamed Ashley.

            Before the light was quenched by the driving rain, she saw the yellow slicker again, pulling up the rope toward them, head still bent over maybe twenty feet away. 

            “Michael, I see Michael.  See there, right there.  Michael, get your ass up here.”

            The head lifted as though in recognition.

            Ashley recoiled hard back against the seat and Sheri let out a low wail as they hood fell back.

            It wasn’t Michael. Beneath the yellow hood something squirmed and twisted as it continued its way up the rope.  Pulling hand over skeletal hand, coming toward them, coming for them.  Eyes that pulsed scarlet red.

            Ashley pulled the shift lever into reverse and slammed on the gas pedal.  The transmission shrieked and the wheels spun for a second before catching.  They crashed straight back into Sheri’s truck. 

            “Go, go, go,” screamed Sheri. “Turn the wheel, do something.”

            No traction, just spinning tires and the smell of something burning.

            A panicked grab for the shift lever.  Ashley yanked it back into drive and jammed her foot on the pedal again.  The van shuddered as the wheels spun.  Suddenly they caught and the van shot forward.

            Another flash of lightning and they drove straight through an empty yellow rain slicker.  It flattened on the windshield and suddenly they were speeding forward blind.

            “Stop,” screamed Sheri.

            Ashley stomped on the brake, pressing into so hard into the floorboards she stood up in her seat.  Her head bumped against the ceiling as the van began to turn sideways and over.  She felt her back twist hard right before she smacked against the driver’s side window and blacked out.  A metal rod crashed through Sheri’s window, piercing one temple and pushing straight through the other before she could scream.

            The van went up sideways and over.  Water bottles tumbled and CD’s flew from the visor rack.  Ashley fell back hard against Sheri’s body and water rushed in through the broken window. 

            She fell through heavy darkness for a few seconds, but the cold water shocked her eyes open.  The headlights still worked.  Straight ahead of her she saw two long blurry cones of light disappearing into the river.  Fear clamped her chest so hard she could hardly breathe.

            Going to drown, she thought.  Got to get out.

            The water came up to her breastbone and was moving higher.

            Her coat was tangled up in something.  The water was rising.  She had to get free.  Had to get out of the van.  She yanked and twisted, but she couldn’t get loose.  She would die there, she just knew it.  No room in her head for any other thought.  Pushing on her, pushing on her.  You’re going to die.  You’re going to die.  Like a crazy woman she reached up with her free hand and clawed at the door handle.  The van was lying on its side, but if she could get the driver’s side door open maybe she had a chance.  Finally she realized that her coat sleeve was tangled around the shift lever.

            Despair flooded over her like the cold water.

            Water rose as high as her heart.  Michael and his friends were missing and probably dead.  Sheri was dead.  Ashley didn’t know what was happening to the others. 

            That face, that hideous face.  That monstrosity she ran over.  Her face tightened with fear.

            It hit her before she could think of anything else.  Take the coat off.  Just wiggle out of the coat.  Then she could get the van door open.

            Sheri was dead.  Ashley wanted to live.  She kept struggling to get out of her coat.

            Water to her chin.  No room to look down.

            Suddenly her coat was off and she was free. 

            As she groped for the door handle, something large and dark slithered through the head light beams.  Suddenly, Ashley wished she had drowned.

            Two thuds and the van slid.  Her frantic fingers clawed to get hold of the armrest, or the door handle, or anything.  She found the window control buttons and pressed them til her fingertips hurt.  Nothing happened.  She tried to punch the door window but because of the water she couldn’t get enough speed crack it.

            “Get away from the window.”

            A warning shout hushed by wind and rain, but she knew she heard it.  Didn’t imagine it.  Knew what it said.  She tried moving away from the window, but there was really nowhere to hide.  The driver’s side of the van was now on top, and to get away from it she would have to take a big breath and maneuver to the back of the van or plunge downward into the passenger side of the car, where Shari’s body was held in place by something metal sticking out the side of her head.

            “Last warning.  I’ve got a—“

            She couldn’t hear the last part of what they were saying, so she took a breath and submerged, trying not to think how close she was to the body of her dead friend.

            Something smashed through the window with a sound like breaking bottles underwater.  Ashley recoiled but twisted her body to one side to avoid getting hit.  The flat edge of the axe slid along her face as someone pulled it back up.  Panicked, she grabbed at it, hanging on, yanking it, pulling on it until it broke free and moved. 

            She tucked her legs and pushed off after it.  Her head hit a crooked edge of glass.  The sharp warmth of a jagged cut.  She was bleeding. Air. Had to have air. She had her lips up near the airspace two inches from the door and sucked in a lungful.

            An arm hooked around under her shoulder, and she felt herself being pulled toward the broken window and hauled upward into the dark rain.

            “Hold on,” said the man’s voice. 

            He had a flashlight in his raincoat pocket that bobbed every time he moved.  She saw his face briefly in its spastic movements.  Hard to say who he was.  Ashley knew she was cold and scared and maybe going into shock.

            “Christ, you’re bleeding,” he said.

            “Glass,” she said and began to cough so hard she saw stars.

            “Come on, give me your hand.  Help me get you out of there.”

            Her hand was too slippery so the man grabbed her by the back of her shirt and finally got her through opening in the driver’s side window and up to her feet.  The van was slick and unstable.  Her feet went out from underneath her.  Pinpoints of light flashed.  Her back slammed against the van.  She would have screamed, but the air had been knocked straight out of her.

            “Easy, easy,” said the man.  “This thing ain’t stable.”

            She gulped in air, and tried to sit up.  A restraining hand pushed her back.  A noise of metal scraping along rock came from beneath them and the van shifted again.

            “Steady,” said the man. 

            Ray.  Lying on the ground looking up at his ridiculously thing face, she finally recognized him.  Ray was their electrical man.

            “Michael,” she gasped.  “Is he all right?”

            Ray coiled a thick yellow rope around her waist and cinched it. 

            “Just in case.  It’s tied to the winch-cable on my monster truck up the hill.  And I have that tied to a tree big as a telephone pole. You understand?”

            Ashley nodded as best she could.

            “Now I ain’t going to lie to you.  I don’t know where Michael is or where this shitty-ass weather came from or what’s going on here.  I’m just going to try and get me and you back up the hill before we drown.  You ready?”

            Ashley looked around at the rising water, the sudden bursts of white fire in the air.  She felt the slap of cold rain and wind trying to shove them in the water.

            “I said are you ready?  Because if you ain’t I’m taking you back anyway.”

            She remembered the feel of Shari’s hair tangling in her fingers when she’d ducked herself underwater to avoid Ray’s axe blade.  A sudden shudder shook her spine.

            “Get me out of here,” she yelled.

            Ray pulled her back to a sitting position, and then helped her to her feet.  He put one arm around her waist and she leaned against him as they moved step by step to the edge of the van.  Ray’s flashlight roamed unsteadily in front of them as they clambered over and into water that came only to their hips.

            The van had slid to the edge of the river, then a little further.  If Ray hadn’t gotten her out she would have drowned for sure.

            “Hold the flashlight,” he said.

            As he pressed the button on his CB radio-phone, Ashley played the flashlight toward the other side of the river. The noise of the rain was worse than ever.  She could see nothing beyond a few feet even with Ray’s flashlight.  Somewhere past the swollen waters was the haunted park they had come to investigate.

            “I said, turn on the damned winch,” Ray yelled into his CB radio-phone.

            Then, in the rain swept blackness on the far side of the river, Ashley saw red fires rise up into the night, as though the abandoned park were burning.  Flames danced and snapped.  Ashley cowered and stepped back. 

            Not real, not real, she thought.  Nothing burns when it’s pouring like this.

            She felt a sudden tug on her waist. 

            “Hang on,” said Ray.

            They made it up the embankment and ten feet into weeds and water up their ankles before she dropped Ray’s flashlight.  It hit the water with a splash and its light extinguished in the liquid blackness of the water.

            “Wait,” she yelled.  “I have to find it.”

            Ray’s hand fell on her shoulder.

            “No.  We keep going.  Look up there, look on the hill.  See those headlights?  That’s where we going, flashlight or no flashlight.”

            The darkness was all around them like a wet cape.

            “I’m afraid.”

            “We just keep moving toward those lights up there and we’ll be okay.  Grab my coat if it helps.”

            Ashley kept one hand on the rope and the other clutched tightly to Ray’s coat.  Together, they took step after sopping step through weeds and rocks that they couldn’t see.

            “We going to make it,” yelled Ray after five or ten minutes more of blind walking.

            A faint smell of roasted meat passed near her and, for just a moment, she thought she heard screams coming from Sharkey’s Park.

            “Did you hear that?” she said.

            “Keeping walking.  Don’t look back.  They want you to look back.”

            “Did you smell that?”

            “Don’t think about it.  They want you to think about it.”

            “Who are they?”

            “Things we don’t want to know.  Now keep up.  Keep walking.  Keep your eyes on the lights up the hill.”

            “What are you talking about?” she asked.  “What things?”

            He didn’t answer immediately.  The steady pull from the rope around her waist kept her moving through the wet darkness like a sleep\walker.

            “What things?” she asked again.

            “Just keep moving,” Ray said.

            More screams filled her head.  She was sure now they were from Sharkey’s Park.

            Ashley closed her eyes and kept walking.

The Dragons of Creative Writing

The Dragons of Creative Writing (bitchute.com)

Beyond the Porchlight

“It’s them,” said Kevin.

“You’re just hearing things because we’re alone,” Brian told his younger brother. “I’m going to graduate high school this year and you’re only in fifth grade. I know more than you.”

“I heard something out back, I know I did. I’m scared.”

“Noises in the woods are just noises in your head, Kevin.”

“I heard it.”

“Look,” said Brian, running his left hand through fine blond hair that needed trimming, “what I’m trying to tell you is that you might have heard a noise, but it could have been anything. Why does it have to be something bad? We live on the edge of town. Don’t you think vampires and werewolves and blood sucking aliens would be hanging out downtown where there’s a lot more people to eat?”

Kevin put his empty pop can on the counter near the sink, and craned his head toward the kitchen window as though another mysterious noise would come at any moment and validate his fears.

“Maybe it’s time for you to head to bed, little guy.”

“Shhhh,” hissed his brother.

“You say that real good; maybe if you keep practicing, I could get you a job in the library.”

“Be quiet,” said Kevin. “Mom said that on nights like this they make noises, but it’s a trick. It’s a red-moon night.”

As if that explained anything.

Brian opened the refrigerator door and scanned the contents. He and Kevin had eaten two large bags of potato chips, drained the contents of six cans of pop, and devoured two grilled cheese apiece. Seeing nothing that wasn’t healthy, he closed the refrigerator door and glanced at his little brother, whose body still bent toward the kitchen window, staring out at what little of the darkness that he could see past the staunch white glow from the back porch light that guarded them from the woods.

“You know, bonehead,” he said, walking over to the counter to stand next to Kevin, “Mom has been gone a while now. I mean, she’s watching over us and that, but I don’t think that she meant for you to take everything she said like it was, I mean, I don’t think that she wanted you to take it so seriously.”

“Listen,” hissed Kevin.

“Will you give it a rest?” asked Brian.

Then he heard the noise.

“What was that?” he asked.

“It’s them,” whispered Kevin.

“Them who? There are no monsters. There aren’t any werewolves, or vampires, or ghosts-.” He stopped mid-sentence when Kevin turned and stared at him as though he had committed blasphemy.

“Mom is a ghost,” said the ten-year-old, his eyes narrowing as though calibrating.

Dark hair, dark eyes, and a disturbing ability to focus were all packed into Kevin’s seventy-five-pound body.

The seconds slipped by as Brian struggled to find the right thing to say. Finally, he dropped his eyes and said, “I meant monsters. There are no monsters. That’s what I meant.”

Dad was away on business. He had called earlier that night from a hotel in Georgia to check on them. Brian wished that the old man wouldn’t travel so much, but with the bills from mom’s hospital and funeral arrangements, he knew that they wouldn’t be out of debt for a long time. Dad would have to keep traveling, and Brian would just have to learn to cope with Kevin alone.

“There are monsters,” said Kevin.

“You’re right, Kev, there are monsters. They’re called people. They’re called terrorists, dope dealers, and gangbangers. People that hurt people are monsters. You want more than that and you’ve got to watch a movie.”

“Listen,” said the younger boy, and he motioned his brother over to the counter near the windowsill. As the older boy approached, Kevin stretched and slid the window up as high as it could go.

“Hey,” protested Brian, “what’s that about?”

“I want you to hear.”

Brian shook his head as he propped himself up with the palm of his hand. He worried about Kevin, he really did. With mom dead and dad gone most of the time, Brian felt responsible for his brother.

A wailing screech clawed through the night air behind the house, from somewhere in the dark army of trees that hunkered down beyond the sphere of the porch light.

“Owl,” said Brian quickly. “It was an owl. I’ve heard that before.”

“No. It’s one of them, just like Mom said.”

A cool breeze shimmied through the window over the sink, and the blue and white-checkered curtains that their mother made and hung by herself floated uncertainly above the sink.

“Look, bad people are the only monsters. That’s it,” said Brian.

“Then where do they come from?” asked Kevin.

“Bad people don’t come from anywhere. They just are. Sometimes they seem okay when they’re kids but they’re not. Nobody knows why. Nobody knows what makes them go crazy. They don’t really come from anywhere; they just are or they just mutate or I don’t know what. That’s it, I guess.”

Kevin shook his head, his eyes locked onto those of his older brother. Brian thought that Kevin looked serious enough to grow up to be the next Pope.

“Mom said they happen on certain nights.”

“Yeah. Sure. Noises in the woods have got you spooked. I’m telling you, it was just an owl. Maybe it was a woodchuck that got caught in a trap. I don’t know, but there’s nothing back there to be afraid of.” He pointed his finger over his brother’s head and toward the woods. “Do you want me to take a walk back there and check it out?”

Small but surprisingly strong little fingers locked onto his wrist. “No, don’t go out past the porch light. It’s a Red Moon night.”

“Look, the moon color is caused by dust particles in the air or something. That’s all.”

“Mom knew where the bad people came from; Mom knew about the red-moon nights; Mom knew about-.”

“Mom’s dead Kev.”

Tears shined in the corner of Kevin’s eyes as he continued, “…and Mom knew that some nights you just don’t go out past the porch light.”

“You’re not going to be able to sleep at all, are you? You’re too scared, aren’t you? Don’t worry, I’ll go out and check out the backyard, and prove it’s just an owl making that sound so you aren’t so scared.”

“Mom would know what to do.”

“And I don’t? Okay, that does it; I’m going to check things out.”

“No.”

“I’ll just be gone a second. Mom would want me to protect you.”

“You won’t go past the edge of the porch light, will you?”

“I won’t,” promised Kevin.

“Don’t go.”

“I’ll be right back.”

Before Kevin could say another word, Brian was out on the porch. The door cracked shut behind him. The wooden stairs squeaked and protested as he took each in turn. When he was standing on the gravel at the bottom of the stairs, he said over his shoulder, “It was just the steps making noises, Kevin. Don’t get all worked up.”

Before taking another step, he turned and looked back for a second at the porch light, which now seemed bright as a street lamp. Savior of the porch, guardian of scared boys, and a beacon for lost lightning bugs thought Brian. You’re just a light. That’s all.

In the center of the yard was the maple tree, whose strong, friendly branches had supported the first treehouse he and dad built. It stood at the edge of the porch light’s circle end and the beginning of the darkness that grew deeper the further you went past it toward the woods. It was an old friend patiently standing guard against the terrors of the night.

I wonder what the other side of the tree looks like, Brian wondered suddenly, the side where the porch light doesn’t shine. I wonder what that looks like at night. Like the dark side of the moon, I bet.

He hesitated before finally walking forward and then stepped toward the tree, stopping just a few feet away from it. Kevin’s question bothered him. Where did all of the evil people come from anyway? He thought about it. What kind of a question was that for a ten-year-old to ask? He turned to face the house and saw his brother’s face framed in the kitchen window, a small sentry watching to see if something wicked did indeed this way come.

Brian’s back was to the woods, and the night air felt suddenly moist and hot, as though something was breathing down his neck. He spun quickly but saw only the tree and the darkness beyond the soft circle cast by the porch light. Overhead, the moon was red-black like a dying Valentine’s rose partially obscured by the tree. Brian had the sudden sensation that the tree was trying to protect him from its pale red light. His back and shoulders shuddered, but he shook off the fear like a dog shaking his back to throw off the dirty water.

I never want Kevin to feel like this, he thought. Mom would want me to protect him. I don’t know where bad things come from, but I’m going to keep them away from him.

“Wherever they come from,” he said out loud.

“From beyond the porch light,” he heard his mother whisper.

It sounded so real that he almost turned and ran back to the porch.

She’s dead, he thought. There’s no such thing as ghosts. It’s all in my mind.

“Everything’s great out here, Kev,” he said loud enough for his voice to carry back to the kitchen window where his brother observed his every move. “Not even an evil mosquito anywhere.”

He looked back. The face at the window did not move. His brother was too intense to be only ten years old.

He stepped even with the tree and kept going toward the edge of the light, which faded away at the back edge of their yard. Their yard was not fenced; there was no need with them living on the edge of town.

Don’t go past the edge of the porch light, he thought. But then how am I supposed to protect my brother from monsters if I’m too chicken to go where it’s dark?

He walked faster, moving deliberately toward the edge of the light. He could see little beyond it; the red-moon did little to reveal the nightscape. This was his own yard, though, and the woods beyond were where he had played when he was Kevin’s age. He knew where the broken beer bottles lay in shiny dark fragments and slivers, knew which trails through the woods were bordered with the big picker plants like trees lined on walks, and remembered where the biggest banana spider he had ever seen had spread its web to catch bugs along its sticky filaments.

There’s nothing beyond the edge of the porch light that I haven’t seen during the day.

Brian took a deep breath and stepped past the edge of the light and into the darkness. Another step into the darkness and then another. He stopped and listened, but heard nothing.

Noises in the woods are noises in your head, he thought.

The darkness was warm and wet, and when he looked up at the red-moon overhead, it made him think of a bloody hole. There’s nothing, he thought, to be afraid of past the porch light. He tilted his head, straining for mysterious sounds, but heard nothing. Nothing in the dark that he couldn’t handle.

Immersed in the darkness of the Red Moon night, he turned to face the house and saw Kevin’s face still framed in the window.

The stupid kid really was afraid of the dark.

I ought to slap him just to straighten him out, thought Brian.

The kid lived in the past. He needed a good punch to the head to bring him back to reality. Maybe a kick in the stomach. He could twist his little baby fingers until they snapped. Maybe he should just choke the little shit instead until his eyeballs popped out and his throat collapsed.

The night air felt good against his skin, and Brian realized that he didn’t want to leave the darkness. But he knew that he had things to do. He needed to find some matches. The house was made of wood and Brian felt the urge to burn something. He rubbed his hands together as he looked at his brother’s silhouette framed by the kitchen window.
Where did all of the bad people come from?

What a stupid question.

A better question was how many sharp knives he could find in the kitchen.

He began to walk back toward the house, keeping his eyes fixed on the silhouette of his brother in the kitchen window just to the right of the porch light.

Evil Little Monsters

by Ferrel D Moore

Here’s a little short story…

“You hear them?” whispered Robin as something metallic clanged against the inside of their apartment wall.

            Lea pushed back as though she had received an electric shock.

            “They can’t come through the drywall,” said Robin.

            “Bet your life on it?” asked Lea as she reached up to finger the totem on her neck.

            Robin pressed her platinum wire hair hard against her head to hold in the pressure of an impending headache.  “No,”  she said.  “I told you not to call him a homo.”

            “He’s not doing this because of me,” Lea said.  “Don’t lay that on me.  You’re the one that teased him.  You’re the one led him on.  I can’t believe you’re trying to put this on me.”

            Robin spun in the chair to answer Lea, who sat behind a sandbag wall of pillows, but before she could speak, a head the size of a golf ball poked through the wall with a “pop” like a gum bubble bursting just above the bed board.  It opened its round mouth and out shot a tongue thick as a number two pencil and the color of an eraser. 

            “Yibbiddee yibbiddee yibbiddee,”  it screamed.

            Lea cringed.

            Robin picked up the hardcover book titled,  “Guttersnipes and other Tripes” from her desk and slammed it against the little creature’s head so hard that her framed poster of the band “Offspring” fell off the wall and landed on the carpeting.

            “Did you kill it?”  asked Lea.

            “I think so,” said Robin as she started to pull the book away from the wall.

            “Don’t do that.  Leave it there.  What if it’s not dead?”
            “I’m supposed to hold this book here all day?  What’s wrong with you?  No wonder you’re flunking algebra.”

            “Everybody flunks algebra,”  howled Lea.  “Everybody is supposed to flunk algebra, but don’t you dare take that book away from the wall.”

            “If it’s not dead I’ll smack it again,” said Robin, and she pulled the book away from the wall and lifted it above her head with both hands.  Her t-shirt, an only-to-the-navel thin pink cotton that had the word “Naughty” painted on it in fluorescent blue, rose up an extra two inches to show a crescent lettered micro-tattoo.”

            “Oh my God, I’m going to kill you,” said Lea.

            The wall was flat and empty of monsters.

            “What was it?”  asked Robin.

            “It’s his way of saying he’s pissed,”  said Lea.  “We’ve got to get out of here.”

            Lea hopped off of the bed and heard a crack like a dry bone snapping as she stepped on a CD.

            “Shit,”  she said.  “I just bought that.”

            She stamped her foot next to the mirrored fragments of plastic and generated a Richter Scale 6 carpet quake.  Her purse lay on the floor, and as she snagged it her short black hair flipped to the other side of her face.  She stood up with it held out in front of her like a throwaway gun.

            “Let’s go,” she said.

            Robin stared at her but didn’t move.

            “What?  What are you looking at?  Come on.”

            “Too late,”  said Robin.  She closed one pale blue eye and squinted with the other as though she were peering through a keyhole.  “Unbelievable.”

            “No it’s not,” said Lea, and, with her lips compressed into a determined thin line, she turned to go.

            Lea freeze-framed for a full fifteen seconds on the carpet that only yesterday her boyfriend Brad had told her was the color of an albino’s ass. 

            Robin sat still and said nothing as Lea walked to the blank wall on the far side of the room and ran her hands over its surface as though looking for imperfections.  She leaned her head forward and peered at the paint.  When she was finished with her inspection, she glanced back at Robin and looked as though she were going to say, “But I thought it couldn’t happen if he wore a condom.”

            Instead she said,  “Where’s the door?  What happened to the damned door?  It was here a minute ago, I saw it.”

            “He deleted it,” said Robin.

            “Well, get back online.  Tell him he wins.  Tell him to put it back.”

            “No.”

            “What do you mean no?  Are you crazy?  It’s a game.”

            “Not to him.”

            Lea leaned forward and grabbed Robin’s shoulders.

            “Tell him I’m sorry I said he was a homo.  Tell him I’m PMS-ing.  Tell him I’ll screw him if he puts it back.”

            Robin stood up and Lea let go. 

            “I’m telling him to go straight to hell,”  said Robin.

            “You’re right,”  said Lea.  “We’ve still got the window.”

            She ran to the curtains that her aunt had sent her as a moving-into-the first-apartment present and yanked them wide open.  Instead of looking out onto the street, Lea stared at a blank wall.

            “That prick,”  she shouted,  “that ever-loving prick.  He took our window.  I hate him.  To hell with sucking up.  Let me at him.”

            Lea turned, pushed Robin aside, plopped into the ergonomic chair that sat before the computer, and began to woodpecker the keyboard.   Voice recognition was for AOL users.  So she typed and she typed and Robin leaned over her shoulder trying to keep up.

            “Will that really work?”  asked Robin, pointing at the code on the screen.

            “He had me going, he really had me afraid of his shit for a minute.”

            With an elegant flourish, she circled both hands over her head, jammed them straight down at the keyboard, hammered out a few more lines of instruction, then said,  “Eat fire you bastard,” and hit the “Enter” key.

            Rad Kastle hooked his thumbs underneath his wife beater t-shirt, leaned back in his chair, and put his feet up on his desk.

            “Come on, you sluts,”  he said.  “Your move.  What’s the matter?  Bucket of putrid testosterone?    Is that what you called me?  Come on, beam me up Scotty, I got a spaceship to run.”

            He laughed, reached over, picked up the Coke can and chugged down the last third of sugar-laced carbonation.  The aluminum folded over on itself as he clenched his hands into a fist.  With an experienced arc of his arm and a flick of his wrist, the crumpled can flew through the air and landed in the trash bucket near his desk. 

            “Two, two, two,”  he grunted.  “Two points male, nada for the bitches.”

            “Yeassssss,”  he said dropping on the floor to one knee and giving the power fist victory salute above his head.

            As he leaned back his head to give an animal belch, he bent over suddenly and grabbed his stomach.

            “Oh, Jesus, oh God,”  he said.  “God that’s rancid.  Shit, I must have dropped a smoke in it and left it in the can.  I swallowed a Marlboro.  I’m going to die.” 

            Rad folded his arms across his stomach and almost, but not quite, puked.  He could feel his stomach roil and broil like he was birthing an alien.  A gastric acid wave crested in his innards causing him to groan and fold over into a kneeling fetal position, but it passed before it could erupt up his throat and explode through his mouth and nostrils.  Instead it left him with that didn’t-puke-but-I-can-still-taste-it zero gravity nausea feeling, and he struggled to his feet and pulled himself along the edge of his desk past his computer to get another can of Coke to nuke the awful taste.  He needed one with the pull top in place so he would know it was safe.

            As he reached for the Coke, he read what was on the screen.

            “Ex-Lax?”  he choked.  “They put Ex-Lax and pepper juice in my Coke?  I’m going to rip their electrons out of their orbit.  I’m going to─.”

            A volcanic eruption built up in his bowels and Rad tried to beat Seabiscuit’s time to the porcelain bowl finish line, running with his butt cheeks squeezed together as hard as he could.

            “This is war,” he yelled over his shoulder as he burst into the bathroom that opened off his bedroom.

            He slammed the door shut behind him and unbuckled his belt.  His zipper went down an inch and then stuck like it was welded into place.

            “Oh shit,” he said,  “Oh no.”

            “High slap,”  said Robin.

            “You mean high five?”  asked Lea as she lifted her palms to meet Robin’s with the sound of a ruler hitting a desk.

            “High slap, high five.  Who cares?  You toasted, absolutely toasted his ass.”

            “Right there in black and white,”  said Lea pointing at the screen.

            “Excellent.  Now get out of the chair; it’s my turn next.”

            Lea stood up to walk back over to sit on the edge of the bed, but glanced up at the wall as she did so.  She shook her head and ran her fingers through her hair.

            “I can’t take this,”  she said.

            “What?”  asked Robin.  “We’re winning.  You showed him we’re better than he is.”

            “We still don’t have a door,”  said Lea as she jerked one thumb at where the door used to be.  “Or a window,”  she added as she jerked the other thumb at where the window used to be.

            “Yeah?  So what?”  asked Robin.  “Like we’ve got somewhere to be?  At least we’re not running around holding our asses like he is.  Cayenne and Ex-Lax in his drink?  That was outstanding.  Very G.I. Jane.”

            Lea plopped back down on the bed, coming to rest with her elbows holding her a little off the comforter while she reached over grabbed a pillow and wedged it beneath her head.

            “It’s his turn next,”  said Lea.  “He’s got to be dying.  This is going to be war.  I shouldn’t have acted so butch.  What’s he going to throw back to us?  It’s his turn again and maybe this time he’ll do something nastier than putting evil little monsters in the wall and deleting any way for us to get out of our room.”

            “Better grab that book anyway,”  said Robin, as she looked at the screen.  “Nothing going on yet,”  she said.  “He must still be trying to put a water hose up his butt to put out the fire.”

            Lea giggled, then she pulled her knees up and wrapped her arms around them.  “I can’t.  You do it.  If another one comes through the wall I don’t want to get near it.”

            Robin spread her hands.  “How can you be so tough when you’re mad, but such a wussy the rest of the time?”

            Lea rocked back and forth, but didn’t answer.

            “I hate this game.  It’s like something the devil invented,”  she finally said.  “I can’t believe it really works.  Whatever he types in happens to us.  Whatever we type in happens to him.  What if he types us in dead?”

            Robin shook her head.

            “Against the rules.”

            “What if those monsters in the wall tried to kill us?”

            “I don’t know.  I’d bet the game wouldn’t let them.”

            “Who is this asshole we’re playing?”  asked Lea.

            “Some creep.  One of those fifty-somethings that sits in his home office hiding from his wife stalking college co-eds on the Internet.”

            “A stalker.  He’s probably a gothic axe-murderer.  Some lecher in his sixties who doesn’t put on underwear when he plays on the web.  You should have never talked dirty to him.”

            “It’s not my fault if he’s a creep,”  said Robin.

            “How come we can’t make another move until he does?”

            “You know.”

            “Yeah, yeah,”  said Lea.  “Rules of the game.”

            Robin nodded.

            “What if we just close out?”

            “He wins.”

            “So?”  asked Lea.

            “Then he gets one wish.”

            “Shit,”  said Lea.  “You’re the one who read the rules.  What happens if we just save the game?”

            “Whatever happened during the game is permanent.  That’s the rules.”

            Lea looked at the wall that used to have a door.

            “We’re screwed,”  she said after a minute.

            Five minutes passed, but nothing happened.

            “Come on you old pervert,”  said Robin.  “Your move.”

            Rad stood inside the bathroom door with his head propped up against the knob.  He tried to straighten up, but each time he lifted his head, his lower intestines did the coiling python dance.

            “They’re going to get it,”  he said.  “Soon as I can move, I’m getting me some serious revenge.  I’m going to have the demons of hell strip their clothes off and rape them.”

            If he had just remembered to bring his cigarettes with him into the bathroom.  He needed something to calm his nerves.

            His hands were sweaty and his ass burned like he had launched a space shuttle out his rear end.

            “Think you’re so smart,”  he said from behind clenched teeth.  “Think you’re too hot for me?  Well I’m the king of role-playing games.   There’s not an RPG I can’t beat, including this one.  Nobody takes me down.  I’m going to show them who they are dealing with and they will seriously shit their pants.”

            Ten more minutes passed.  Robin clutched the book, ready to squash the life out of whatever evil little monsters he sent them.

            “You really must have blown his butt out,”  said Robin.

            “This game is scaring the crap out of me.  I’ll never play this thing again.  Ever,”  said Lea.

            “If I ever even look like I’m going to download a game from www.rpggamerwar.com again, cut off my fingers,” said Robin.

            “Website’s not there anymore,” Lea reminded her.

            “That,” said Robin, “should have been a clue.”

            Lea looked at the wall where their door used to be.  “Too late now,” she said.

            “Come on, you perverted old lecher,” said Robin.  “Give us your best shot.”

            Rad finally straightened himself up and taken a deep breath.  His insides were quieting down.

            “Time for devastation,”  he said.

            He was about to turn the knob and go back into his bedroom when he heard an unidentifiable noise, then a door squeaking on its hinges.

            “Oh shit,”  he thought.  “It’s the old lady.”

            “Rad?  Rad?  Are you in here?”

            He said nothing, but flicked off the bathroom light switch and stood waiting in the dark, his knees shaking and his nose filled with the thick, greasy odor of puke.

            “What’s that smell in here?  Oh, you bastard.  You’ve been smoking in here, I can smell it.  You can’t cover it up with this air freshener on your desk.  You’re in trouble, mister.  And you’re still on the Internet.  And beer?  Damn your white ass you’re going to be an alcoholic. It’s this being on the Internet all hours driving you to this.  I’ll take care of that right now.  I’ll fix your ass.  I’m yanking this out cord and all and taking this here computer out to the curb so’s the garbage men can take it away in the morning.  See if I can’t get a little work out of you around here.”

            She was yanking what out cord and all?

            More noises, more banging.

            “There,”  she said,  “You can just stay in that bathroom if you like it so much.  I’m taking this whole computer with me and throwing it in the trash.”

            There was a loud click beneath his hands and he realized that she had locked the door.  It had come with the lock on the wrong side and he had always meant to fix it to protect his privacy.  He imagined her thick arms hauling away his reason for living.

            “Wait,”  screamed Rad.

            The bedroom door closed behind her.

            “You cut me off- now they win.  I can’t believe you, you bitch.”

            He beat the door with his fist.

            “How could you do this to me?”

            Rad kicked the bottom of the door as hard as he could.  He was about to kick it one more time when his stomach started grumbling again.

            “Son of a bitch,”  he said as he reached for his belt buckle.  “I can’t take this.  When I turn thirteen, I’m going to live with dad.”

            “Oh my God,”  squealed Robin.  “You’re not going to freaking believe this.”

            Lea covered her face.  “Don’t.  Don’t tell me.  It’s been twenty minutes and it’s like he’s vanished.”

            Robin spun around in the chair like a top.

            “Yeah, but I’ve been in the help files,” she sing-songed,  “and according to the rules, the time limit between moves is only thirty minutes.  Ten more minutes and we’ve won, girl.  The perv is a toaster.”

            She stopped the chair so that it was aimed at Lea, and held her palms toward her.  Lea slid over and flat slapped them.

            “You’re kidding,”  she shrieked.  “Then what happens?”

            “Huh?”  asked Robin.

            “Move over,”  commanded Lea.  “Let me at those help files.”

            Robin hopped out of the chair and let her friend sit down.  Lea whipped the mouse around and clicked it a few times like she was counting out time.  Her head bobbed back and forth like she was listening to an invisible mp3 player.

            “Well?” asked Robin.

            Lea’s head stopped mid-bop.

            “This is wrong,”  she choked.

            “What?” demanded Robin.

            She leaned over Lea’s shoulder and read the text on the screen.

            “That can’t be,”  she said.

            “It can’t happen,” said Lea.  “The loser dies?  He can’t die.  No Gamemaster has that kind of power.  It’s just a game, isn’t it?.”

            Lea turned her chair and was looking past Robin.

            “Well Christ on a pony that just can’t happen,”  said Robin.  “It’s just a game.”

            After a moment, Lea said,  “It made monsters come out of the walls and disappeared our door.”

            Robin turned around and looked at the blank wall that used to be their door.

            “It’s just a game,”  she whispered.

            “We’ve got to get the perv back online,”  said Lea,  “or he’s dead.”

            Rad opened the bathroom door.  His face, round as a full moon and just as pale, was blanched and splotched intermittently with red blooms.  He stayed still for a moment, one hand on the doorknob and the other propped against the doorframe.  Like a zombie heading for a “Night of the Living Dead” shoot, he lurched forward to the Holy Ground of his computer desk.

            “Steady boy,” he said. 

            Step by unsteady step, he advanced toward the defiled altar.  Where the monitor had once stood tall and proud, he saw only candy wrappers, dust balls, and bent paper clips.  The electronic cowboy hat that he pieced together out of spare widgets and gadgets and a trip to the truckstop lay upside down and crushed on the floor like the broken crown of a vanquished Western king.  His mouse and keyboard— the scepter and orb of his digital world — had been hijacked by the Queen of Big Time Wrestling fans, and his desk look like a vacant pressed-wood parking lot the night after a concert.

            His stomach was on low boil and he burped acidic fumes as he placed one hand on his desk, then levered himself into his chair.  The desk was felt cool against his forearms as he lowered his head down to rest on the back of his hands and closed his eyes.

            “Shit,” he muttered.

            His head felt as hot and sweaty as an armpit.  He closed his eyes and swung his left foot forward.  The tip of his tennis shoe stopped with a soft metallic thunk.  His right eye opened.

            “No way,” he said.

            He swung his left foot forward soft enough to check if a big dog was alive, but not enough to wake it.  His foot stopped against a smooth, flat service.

            “Five dollah, five dollah, five dollah,” he grinned.  “Got everything you need in daddy’s bag of tricks.”

            From a launch position with his palms pressed against the edge of the desk, he sent his chair spinning backward in looping circles.  On the third spin cycle, he slapped his feet against the hardwood floor.  He threw his hands forward. His fingers splayed wide apart, he leaned his head back and howled, “You are healed.”

            Underneath the desk, its green power light shining like a tiny Christmas light, was his computer.  His mother had only taken his monitor, his keyboard, and his mouse.  He had a closet full of those. 

            Five minutes later, Rad had his mouse and keyboard attached and his monitor fired up.  He knew there was a time limit in between moves, so his fingers hovered like ten chick-heads preparing to peck for keyboard corn.  The monitor flared into life and he was about to unleash his counterattack when he read the message on the screen.

            “Well?” demanded Robin.

            “Nothing.”

            “That dumb fuck.  Maybe he’s already dead.”

            “Nope,” said Lea.  “Five minutes to go.”

            “We killed him,” said Robin.  Her eyes began to water.

            “Hold it,” said Lea. “We have a response.”

            “Crap” she said, wiping her forearm across her eyes.  “And I was going to cry for him.”

            “I just can’t figure this,” said Lea.  “What do you think?”

            Robin leaned forward and read the message sent by the their opponent.  It read:

Truce. 

Don’t freak out.  We’ve been had.

Something’s wrong with the game.

We’re in deep shit here.

For my turn I’m sending you my hat.

For your turn, you girls wish me and my computer to show up at your place.

Make sure you wish that my computer’s wireless modem is

instantly connected to your router.

That way I’m hooked to the Net and the game doesn’t kill me for disconnecting.

P.S. I could have beat you if this was a real game.

Rad

            “His hat?”  asked Robin.  “Why the hell is he sending us his hat?”

            “Forget that,” said Lea,  “is he stupid enough to think we’d wish him here?”

            Robin stared up at the ceiling for a moment and got that high-wire look on her face.

            “What?” asked Lea.

            Robin looked back at Lea and, with an evil little grin on her face, said,  “Let’s do it.  Let’s wish him here.”

            “Are you crazy?” asked Lea.

            “Yep,” said Robin.

            She told Lea what she had in mind.

            Rad’s hat disappeared from his desk.

            “Am I good or am I good?” he asked his room.

            He had beaten the thirty-minute time limit by about thirty seconds.  When he had read the last message from his opponent, he knew he was in deep trouble.  The change in game rules had tripped his wire. 

            Rad scanned the room and tried to fix the details of his life in his mind.

            “Should have smelled the bullshit the moment I opened that email,” said Rad.  “’Play the best Role Playing Gamers in the world.’  Should have known, should have known.”

            He drummed his fingers on the desk.

            “Come on, girls,” said Rad.  “Do the trick.  Get me out of here.”

            A minute passed, then another.

            “Come on, you sluts,” he said.  “Do it.  Make a wish.”

            He heard a heavy thud at the base of the stairs outside his room, and he darted his eyes toward the door.

            “Raaaaaadley,” his mother bellowed and his bedroom door vibrated as though getting ready to explode.  “Get your lily-white ass down here.”

            “Uh-oh,” he said.  “The witch woman cometh.”

            He got up, ran to the card table next to the side of his bed, dumped a pile of clothes, two CD’s of naked women photos and a quantum physics textbook off of a folding chair and onto the floor, then headed to his bedroom door.  With a scissoring maneuver he folded the chair closed and jammed it under the doorknob.  He stepped back and considered his makeshift lock— it wouldn’t hold against his mother’s bulk.

            “Come on girls,” he breathed.  “Wish me out of here.”

            He jumped back a foot when he heard his mother’s cantaloupe size fist pound on the stairway wall three times, as though she were summoning the demons of hell to burst through the floor of his bedroom and carry him screaming down the stairs.  He shuddered and looked around for something else to block the door with, and his eyes fell on his desk.  Like a ragamuffin Dutch boy looking to plug a dike, he ran back to the desk and was about to start pushing it toward the bedroom door when he remembered that the computer power cable was run through a hole in the desk’s back panel.  If he moved the desk, he would unplug the computer and automatically default the game.

            “Shit, shit, shit,” he muttered.

            Rad looked around the room and saw a vanilla colored three-shelf bookcase, and ran toward it.  Like a senior citizen shoving a shopping cart toward the sale aisle, Rad put his shoulder into the effort and moved it in fits and starts until he gained enough speed to slam it up against the door.  Books spilled off the shelves and he dove to the floor to pick them up and shove them back into place.

            “I’m coming to get you little man,” thundered his mother.

            “Piss on you,” said Rad in a subsonic whisper.

            “I heard that,” screamed his mother.

            “You did not,” yelled Rad. 

            His mother had huge shoulders and bulging arms and legs the size of construction barrels, but her ears were the size of flattened dandelion heads.

            “Fee, fi, fo, fum,” howled his mother, “I’m coming up to beat your bum.”

            “Oh shit,” said Rad.  “Where are you guys?  She’s going to kill me if you don’t save my ass.  Get me out of here.”

            From down the stairway he heard a sound like a bowling ball dropped from an airplane hitting a step.  It happened again.  It sounded closer.  It, the Terror from Beyond the Trailer Park, was coming for him.

            Rad reached over, flicked the light switch downward, fumbled his way through the dark until he reached his desk, and then crawled under it and closed his eyes.

            “He’s a freaking kid,” yelled Robin.  “He must be thirteen years old.”

            She continued to hold the brass curtain rod over her head like a Samuari ready to behead her captor.

            Rad opened his eyes and looked up at her.

            “You did it.  You saved me,” he said.  “You did the trick.”

            “You’re not safe yet,” snapped Robin.

            “And I’m twelve.  I’m not thirteen yet.  But you must be a 34 double D.”

            Robin turned to Lea.

            “Did he just say what I think he said?”

            “I think the little creep did,” Lea answered.

             “Wow,” said Rad.  “Amazon twins.”

            He was about to say something else, but stopped when he looked down in shock at his hands.

            “You wished handcuffs on me,” he said.  “Get them off.  What are you, crazy?”

            Robin whacked him on the behind with the curtain rod.

            “How do you like that?  Crazy enough for you?” she demanded.

            Rad tried to get up from his knees and make a break for it, but he made it no further than a foot when his forward momentum stopped and he dropped to the floor.

He hit the carpet with a thunk, then rolled on his side and looked back at his feet.  He saw an iron ball the size of a small car tire secured to two leg manacles by a thick iron chain.

            “Going somewhere, little boy?” demanded Lea.

            “You’re out of your feeble minds,” yelled Rad.  “We’re going to die if you don’t get me out of this.”

            Robin turned to Lea.

            “I think he needs another whack on his scrawny little ass, don’t you?”

            “Two,” said Lea.

            Rad rolled over on his back and held out his handcuffed hands.

            “Look,” he said,  “we don’t have all night.  The game is going to kill us.”

            “And why,” asked Robin,  “would the game want to do that?”

            “All right,” said Rad,  “maybe just me.  It’s after me.  You’re just girls.  It’s not afraid of you.”

            Robin’s eyebrows shot up.

            “Just girls?”

            “Young women?” ventured Rad.

            “Let’s flip him over on his stomach and flail his ass,” said Robin.

            “Freaking little chauvinist,” said Lea.  “Do your parents know you talk trash on the web?”.

            “You two don’t have a clue what’s gong on, do you?”  asked Rad.  He sat up and looked around in a panic. 

            “What?” asked Robin.

            “My computer,” said Rad, falling back onto the floor after seeing it plugged into a wall,  “I thought you forgot to wish my computer over, but hallelujah you remembered.”

            “We’re going to send you and your computer right on back to where you came from,” said Lea.

            “You can’t do that,” said Rad,  “my mother will kill me.  And I mean permanently kill me.  She’s insane.  And she doesn’t have a clue what’s going on either.”

            Robin waggled her curtain rod at him.

            “Once chance,” she said.  “You get one chance, little boy.  If you know what’s going on with this game, you tell us now or you’re going back with a few more welts on your ass.”

            “Can you take this crap off me?”  asked Rad, holding out his handcuffs.

            “No,” Robin and Lea said in unison.

            “You got any pop?”  asked Rad.

            “He’s like my freaking little brother,” said Lea.  “He won’t shut up unless you give him sugar.”

            Robin slapped her curtain rod against her leg.  “We want our door back,” she said.

            “Your door?” asked Rad.  “Oh, yeah, your door.  Sure thing, but you’ve got to help me.”

            “First you tell us what’s going on,” said Lea.

            “You got that pop?” asked Rad.  “And no diet, okay?”

            The two girls looked at each other.

            “You get it,” said Robin.  “I’ll stay here to flog the prisoner if he gets out of line.”

            The refrigerator, no taller than a double file cabinet, sat on the far side of the room.  As Lea walked toward it, Rad’s eyes stopped blinking so that he wouldn’t miss a single second of her rear-end in motion.

            “You got something to say?” asked Robin

            “Your friend sure has a great ass,” he said.

            “What is wrong with you?” exploded Robin.  “You’re only twelve years old.  You act like you’re some kind of a dog-in-heat-superstud, but you’re not even a teenager yet.  You’ve still got pimples.  You don’t even shave yet.”

            “When you’re naked, do you ever take pictures of yourself?”  asked Rad.  He held his breath while she stared at him.

            “You’re disgusting,” she said. 

            Lea walked back with the diet pop and said, “What?”

            “He says you’ve got a nice ass,” said Robin.

            “Yeah, I heard that,” said Lea,  “but I brought him a drink anyway.”

            She leaned over to hand it to Rad.  Her loose top with the scooped neckline fell away a bit as she leaned forward.  She pulled the can back from Rad when he held up his manacled hands.

            “Oh you poor baby,” she said,  “let me pop your tab.”

            “Are you feeling all right?” asked Robin.

            “She’s feeling fine,” said Rad.  He kept his eyes on Lea’s t-shirt neckline as she leaned over again with the pop-can.  “Leave her alone.”

            “Here you go,” cooed Lea.

            She worked the pop-tab ring loose with her right thumb and forefinger and gave it a yank as he reached up for the can.  It popped came away with a carbonated burst of cola spray that hit Rad directly in the forehead.  His hair drenched with soda, and a wet caramel stain spread down the front of his white t-shirt.

            “You bitch,”  he screamed.

            Robin and Lea howled, hugged each other, and danced around in a circle.

            Rad started to cough and spit since pop had gone up his nose, into his nasal passages, and was dripping down his throat.  Lea and Robin paid no attention until they heard him start a pre-retch ritual that sounded like a septic pump sucking sludge.

            “Don’t do that,” yelled Robin.  “O man, don’t do that you little shit.”

            Mount Rad erupted in with a shattering blast of noxious gas that forced its way into the girl’s nostrils lake an invading army of stench.  They covered their faces with both hands then ran together into the bathroom and slammed the door closed behind them.

            “Ahhhhh,” breathed Rad, as he turned on his sides and grabbed the edge of the bed’s comforter and began to rub his face and chest dry.

            When he had cleaned himself up as best he could, he spent a few minutes checking out his new environ.  The pitted iron ball bolted to his leg chain looked like it was an antique wrecking ball.  His ruined electronic cowboy had lay on the floor next to his computer.  His keyboard called to him but he couldn’t come out and play because he had a gazillion pound ball chained to his ankle.  On the plus side, he still felt slightly woozy, but was definitely less nauseous. 

            “Hey girls,” he called out after a few minutes had passed.  “This wouldn’t be a bad place if you had a door and a couple of windows.”

            The bathroom door cracked a half-inch and he heard one of the girls call, “You’ll pay for that one, you little shit.”

            That would be the one, he thought, with the wiry hair.

            “When we wish you back where you belong,” said the other voice.

            That would be the one, he thought, with the great butt.

            They were cute, but clueless.

            “Can we talk about this?” he asked.

            “No,” said the one with the wire-hair.

            “We’ve got to,” said Rad.  “We’re in deep trouble here.”

            “You’re in deep trouble,” said the other.  “We’re doing just fine.”

            “No,” said Rad,  “we’re all in deep trouble.  The game isn’t going to let any of us live. When it’s done with me, it won’t want any witnesses.”

            “Bullshit,” said the one with the wire-hair, but she opened the bathroom door.

            “Prove it,” said the other.

            “How much time do we have left?” asked Rad, and he sat up looking around at the walls.

            “For what?” asked the one with the wire-hair.

            “Before I die,” yelled Rad.  “You two made the last wish and I’ve only got thirty minutes all total to make the next wish.  And that’s if the rules are still the same.”

            The two girls came out of the bathroom and walked toward him, sniffing the air as they came.  The one with the wire hire moved to the computer desk, sat down, and began typing.  The other looked down at Rad and shook her head.

            “So you’re the Perv,” she said.

            “What’s your name?” asked Rad.

            “Lea.”

            “Lea what?”

            “Never mind, you little creep.”

            “Do you come here often?”  asked Rad.

            “What?  You are the weirdest kid.”

            “Who’s the sexy one with the hair?”

            “I’m going to strangle you when this is over,” said Robin over her shoulder.

            “Tie me up first,” said Rad.

            “Do your mom and dad know you talk like this?”  asked Lea.

            “She hits me if I swear,” said Rad.  “And her arms are like both of your legs put together.  My dad’s not around anymore.”

            “Then why do you swear?”

            “It pisses her off.  But she’s got to catch me.  It’s like a game, sort of.  An RPG where you get busted up if you lose.”

            “Kind of like now,” said Lea.

            “Yeah, like this,” agreed Rad.

            “Twelve minutes,” called Robin.  “You got twelve minutes to make a decision.”

            “Twelve minutes.  But I’ve got to get to my keyboard first, so could like one of you get me out of these handcuffs and legcuffs or whatever they are?”

            “First tell us what’s going on,” prompted Robin.

            “It’ll take too long,” said Rad, “and you’ll never believe me anyway.”

            “Eleven minutes,” said Robin.

            “Okay, okay— just bring my hat over and take a look inside it.”

            To Rad’s surprise, neither girl objected.  Robin went over and got the hat, and both she and Leah sat cross-legged in front of him.  Ahhh, he thought, the joys of tight shorts.

            “So what are we looking for?” asked Robin.  “All I see here is a bunch of smashed electronic stuff inside of a hat that looks like it came from Mr. Science’s head.  You trying to build your own robot or something?”

            If it weren’t for the ball, the chain, and the manacles, Rad would have barracrawled over to sit on her lap.  He could listen to her talk down to him all day.  Even if she was missing a few brain cells.

            “No,” he said,  “it’s my Portal Hat.”

            “You made that up,” said Lea.

            “Yep,” said Rad, “I sure did.  I never had a name for it.  All the wiring and stuff is part of the last present my dad ever gave me before he left town.”

            “Let me guess,” said Lea, “with his bimbo secretary.”

            Rad sneezed and wiped his nose on his forearm.  “Some dispshit chick shot a blast of carbonic acid up my nose.”  Before Lea could say anything back at him, Rad added, “He didn’t leave with anyone.  He was just afraid of my mom.  She’s like this huge hunk of woman and he’s this little wimpy runt guy and I don’t even know how they did it to make me.  I mean—.”

            Robin held up her hands.  “Don’t, okay?  Just don’t go there.”

            “You’d rather hear about the hat?”

            “Yeah,” Robin told him, “and the game.”

            “I’m not real comfortable here,” said Rad.

            “You’re running out of time,” said Lea and pointed up to the wall clock.

            The clock was as digital as Times Square.  Eight minutes left til death.

            “Here it is,” said Rad.  “Before my mother stepped on it and turned it into a piece of shit electronic pancake, I used to put that thing on my head, hook it up to my computer, and pop off into the Internet.”

            “Like a virtual reality helmet?”  asked Lea.  “So what?  Big deal.  What’s that got to do with anything?”

            “No,” said Rad, “it turned me into a bunch of electronic signals and moved me into the rodeo world of digitalized reality.”

            “You are one weird little kid,” said Robin.

            “Six minutes,” said Lea.

            Rad looked up at the clock and suddenly felt his blood began to crank through his veins.  “It’s true.  I can’t tell you in everything in the next six minutes, but the big deal is that the game is alive.  There’re all sorts of life forms wiggling around the energy world and most of the main ones just hate my ass.”

            “This is so lame,” said Robin. 

            “Unlock me and let me take my turn so the game doesn’t toast me,” begged Rad.

            “We don’t have keys,” said Lea.

            “What?  What do you mean you don’t have keys?”  He held his manacled hands out like a supplicant asking for grace and the chain links clinked and clanked like a ghost from Dickens.  “I’ll never vote for a woman president when I grow up.  Do you have a hacksaw?”

            “Well, no,” said Lea.

            “And we can’t go get one because some little asswipe disappeared our door and all the windows,” added Robin.

            Rocking back and forth as though he were a toy horse, Rad cried,   “Enough already.  I’ve got four minutes left and then it’s going to make me dead.”

            “Maybe we could ignore the deadline and see if the game does anything,” said Robin.

            “What?  Like killing me?”  yelped Rad.  “My mother is sane compared to you.”

            “Let’s move the computer to the end of its cord,” suggested Lea.

            “Too short,” said Robin.   “We could stretch him out to make it work.  We can’t move the ball and chain, but we could stretch out animal boy until his fingers reach the keyboard.  What do you think?”

An Interview with Jeff Howard

The Dragons of Creative Writing

The Jesus Road- 2056 Expedition

Data flew around the outside wall screens like hadrons screaming along the edge of the old European Super Collider. Madeline was using the full computing technology of the quark rings to track the treasonous disrupter known to the Security Authorities as J. With every massive computing surge, the lights in the Control Room would dim, then brighten, dim, then brighten again as though lit by the muscular beats of the room’s cyclonic heart.
“Bring it up on the screen,” said Andee.
The data nexi would erupt with pinpoint explosions of brilliant light, then blister across the world maps like lines of fire to disappear in another city then pop up in still another. It was as though the murderous enemy of the state J was everywhere at the same time. Madeline’s superior, Commander Andee L2, hovered behind her desk like a dark angel rippling with angry energy.
“Which screen?” asked Madeline.
A split second later, her head whiplashed back and forth like she’d been in a head on collision. Andee had slapped her on the back of the head so hard that five minutes afterward Madeline was certain she could still feel her brain rattling in her skull.
“The big screen,” said Andee in her dangerous voice.
The multicolored lights of the control room still bounced in front of Madeleine’s eyes like blurred birthday balloons. She struggled to focus on the giant holo as she brought up the latest message.

And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

J.

“Tracking? I need something I can keep up with up there,” snapped Andee as she pointed at the wrap around screens. “Hera lower the lights by eighty-five percent and raise the letter definition by forty percent.”
Immediately, Hera the invisible AI dimmed the microlights to twilight and the letters on the screen walls stood out as though carved with a diamond stylus.
“He’s all over the place, sir,” said Madeline. “Our systems can’t keep up with him.”
Madeline braced herself for another hit.
Instead, she heard the terrifying sound of a pistol being cocked, and felt a hard circle press up against the back of her skull as Andee’s firm grip held her forehead in place.
“Men,” said Andee, “are vague. Women are precise.”
The entire control room went completely silent except for the hum of the devices. All the women, human and variants both, felt the sudden buildup in tension as though the filtered air itself danced with terrible electricity.
“Do you understand?”
Madeline’s kept her eyes closed tight. She knew without opening them that no one in the control room was staring at her. They would be staring at the holo while Andee pulled the trigger. If blood spatter and pieces of bone from her exploding head landed on their desks, they would wipe them away with tissues while they pretended it was not blood. Andee was Level Two. No one questioned what a Level Two did.
They would not flinch at the sound of the gunshot, either. They knew better than to flinch.
“Yes, sir. I understand. Women hold up the sky while men fall to earth.”
“Good. Now, eyes on the big holo,” said Andee quietly. “Find where J is transmitting from or I will blow your skull apart. You have the best brain in Amazonia, but I will do what I must do to find and execute that traitor. Killing him is worth anything and everything.”
J.
The invisible man who sent messages to the remaining world about his return. J. Public Enemy Number One. J. A man not in captivity. No one knew how he forced his messages to appear to anyone digitally connected. No one seemed able to stop his revolutionary words. No one could even find him.
“He’s invisible, sir. His location keeps bouncing between nodes quicker than we can measure, so the equipment can’t determine where he’s at.”
Madeline felt Andee’s hot breath brushed her ear as the woman leaned in and hissed, “Nobody, I repeat, nobody is invisible. He’s somewhere in this world. Find him.”
“Yes, sir.”
The silence that followed was worse than the mechanical cocking of Andee’s pistol. Madeleine very badly wanted to wipe the sweat from her hands, but she was afraid that the visible act of weakness might cause Andee to pull the trigger. Her shirt felt suddenly warm and sticky, although the temperature in the room was maintained at a constant twenty-one point one Celsius.
“He’s a man. I can feel it,” said Andee. “We must have missed one. The Twelve are accounted for, so this must be someone else. The male species are like rats, people,” she said to the room. “When they smell danger, they hide.”
During orientation, Madeline had seen the Twelve faces pressed against the fifty-centimeter-thick microcrystalline transparency. The last living men on planet earth within the domain known as Amazonia, which covered one third of what used to be the United States. Caged nearly two kilometers beneath the serpentine caves of Townsend Mountain in Estell County, Kentucky. But Andee, the great warrior of the New World, now thought that they had missed one, and she was counting on Madeline to find him, to find the PSYOPS guerilla who filled the world with a terrifying new message.
“Wait. There’s a pattern,” Madeline said.
She almost fell to the floor with relief when she heard the sound made by Andee un-cocking her pistol. She drew in a quiet breath when she heard her superior slide the weapon back into its holster. She could make this work. She would make this work.
“Tell me more.”
Her commander’s voice vibrated with urgency.
“Rachel,” Madeline called to a white and blue spike haired woman whose face was lost beneath the virtual reality headset bolted to her skull.
Yes? flashed across the flat black screen that was her face.
“Next scheduled transmission?” asked Madeline.
Ninety seconds appeared on the screen.
Andee walked around Madeline and stood in front of her.
“Tell me,” she said.
She was the tallest woman in the room by six inches. She wore the uniform of a Level Two like a weapon; medals of the Amazon across her chest. Iridium razor epaulets pointed up from her shoulders. Wrapped around her neck was the Platinum Collar of the Purge, where the women of the world had joined forces with the machines to slaughter three and a half billion men in the space of one year. To have participated in the destruction of patriarchy was the highest honor a woman could achieve in the Purge, the very war that had taken Madeline’s husband and two sons and drenched the City of Chattanooga in blood as it turned the Tennessee River scarlet. To this day, the ground for one hundred eighty miles still reeked with its smell.
The war began while Madeline was on a covert mission for the underground church to recover what could be found in the Bible, after the first atheist President had ordered all written copies of Scripture destroyed and the Unified Body of World Governments had shown their solidarity by doing the same. A follower of the Way had been uncovering electronic fragments of the Word and hosting them on computers hidden within an old missile silo. She found out about the war as her elevator car descended past level five. By the time her car was passing level twelve, she learned that the state of Tennessee had been sterilized of all men.
“See for yourself, sir,” said Madeline and pointed to the floating hologram that dominated the room.
The new message scrolled:

For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.

J.

“Where is he?” screamed Andee. “Name your reward up to Level Three if you find him, Madeline. If not…”
Madeline sat up straighter and looked directly into the silver implants that were Andee’s eyes.
“I believe I have him,” she said.
She lifted her chin in triumph.
“How?” asked a shocked Andee.
On the floating hologram, the trace that followed the message was bouncing back and forth across a world grid from the Bering Strait to the Red Sea, from the Red Sea to the subcontinent, never stopping, always moving. Andee could not understand how her technical genius had tracked J, but Madeline was a true savant of the computing arts and she had just done the impossible.
“The first point is the key,” said Madeline.
She did not stand―that would be insubordinate―but she squared her shoulders as she continued.
“Once I established the times of transmission, I notched the first point. This last transmission confirmed the statistics. I suspected it after his ninth transmission. But now, I’m sure. His transmissions always originate from the same node.”
Andee’s smile would have frightened Madeline if she hadn’t ceased to think of her commander as human. She was not truly a woman, but a super-woman―part human and part machine. So advanced was she that it was difficult for Madeline to tell where one part ended and the other began.
“Where is he? Where is the one who seeks to bring the return of the patriarchy?”
“Rachel? Tell the commander where J is transmitting his lies from,” said Madeline.
Across Rachel’s screen-face flashed Atlas 576-A outside of Panguitch, Utah. 24 levels below ground.
“I’m going to carve my initials into his forehead,” said a clearly impressed Andee. “I will lead the team myself. Well done. Tell me your request.”
This time, Madeline stood and clicked her heels together as she executed a brisk salute.
“Yes, sir.”
“Name your reward.”
Madeline’s husband was named Eric. Her two sons were Andy and Palin. When the purge took them, her children had been nine and six, respectively. Now they were blood stains burned into the rocks of Signal Mountain.
“I would like to take charge of the neural restructuring of the Twelve’s cognitive functioning. I have an idea how to improve our access to and control of their thoughts.”
Andee did not respond at first. The glint of silver where her eyes had once been giving nothing away.
“Are you prepared to accept the modifications?” she asked at last.
The surgical removal of sections of her brain and replacement of those parts with the Level Three polymeric circuit webs was what Andee meant. Each level closer to the top, the more surgeries were required. Each level closer to the top, the less humanity remained.
“Of course,” she said. “I welcome them, sir.”
Andee nodded curtly, then said, “Good, they will be scheduled upon my successful return. And after we got the one called J, we will attack the Terrans.”
As she was about to leave, Madeline added, “Sir?”
“Yes?” said Andee without turning back to look at her.
“May you also bring me his head when you return?”
Now Andee turned and look back. Her silver eyes lit with pleasure.
“You surprise me, Madeline. But you have earned it. I will attend to it myself.”
What Andee and her team would in fact find in the basement of that abandoned silo was a radion bomb in an Indianapolis silo, which would bring the entire structure down on them, burying them beneath concrete and reinforcing rods until the Lord’s return.
Madeline and her covert team had built the system that broadcasted the messages the Amazonian world was receiving. She was the only survivor of the team. They executed the others for not being aggressive enough. They did not take well to gender re-orienting chemistry. Madeline had escaped their net and used her computer skills to mole her way into the computer security world of the Amazonian rulers.
Now that she had misdirected Andee and her forces to the other side of the continent, Madeline would set about freeing the Twelve.
All this time the Amazonians had been looking for J, the invisible man.
It never occurred to them to look right under their noses for Madeline, the invisible woman.
She heard the androgynous voice of Hera in her earpiece. We have now granted you access to the Twelve. Commander Andee sends her regards.
“Tell her good hunting,” said Madeline.
In a vivid flash of instant memory, she saw a picture of her husband and her sons seated around a picnic table near the remains of the Chattanooga aquarium. But she was too mission disciplined to cry in front of her co-workers. There was still more work to be done by the invisible woman. God had given her to free twelve men, and His was the one voice in a world drained bleak and empty of love that she would still listen to until the day He called her home.
Meanwhile, she had to find the Jesus Road—fortunately, she knew just where to look.