Tonya R. Moore's Blog: Tonya R. Moore, page 17

Guest Blogging Benefits Writers in These 4 Helpful Ways

Blogging has not, as some mistakenly argue, gone the way of the dodo. I spent quite a chunk of the last few days mining the internet and perusing some of the most reputable and helpful blogs and what I have learned is that blogging, when done properly, is still a great way to elevate an author’s profile online. Not only that, guest-blogging is still a legitimate way to build a community around one’s work and increase one’s online sphere of influence.

What’s
in it for You?

There are several great benefits
to guest-posting but the most significant is that it makes for great exposure.
When you guest post you are likely accessing an audience that has yet to know
about you and your work. It’s a great chance for you to let curious readers
know who you are and what you do. If they like you enough, they might also
become a part of your regular audience. Isn’t that a wonderful thing?

[image error]

You get great exposure.

When you guest post you are likely accessing an audience that has yet to learn about you and your work.

The next great benefit of guest
posting is that it allows you to build relationships with fellow creatives and
become more deeply rooted in the online 
writing community. I’ve been bouncing about the online writing world
long enough to have come to realize just how super-helpful, friendly, and
amazingly inspiring most online writers, artists, and other professionals are.
Given time, you might even meet a few wonderful collaborators and even friends
for life.

According to writer, Jeff Goins’ article, 3 Ways Guest Posting Can Help Grow Your Online Audience, guest posting can help to improve your own blog’s search engine ranking. Just imagine, if you have 20 guest posts on 20 different blogs, that’s a minimum of 20 different websites linking back to yours. Not to mention, readers of those blogs will invariably follow any links in your post or bio, back to your website, so that guarantees an increase in traffic to your website–and isn’t that the whole point of having a website?

[image error]

Build a Strong Network

Readers of those blogs will invariably follow any links in your post or bio, back to your website.

Guest blogging benefits both the
host and the guest. When you guest post on someone’s else blog, you tell your
own audience about it, right? So, you might tweet/share the link to the post;
post an update on your own blog, inviting readers to go check out that post.
That increases their website traffic. Additionally, the interaction in the
comments section is also valuable for online community-building.

With all of that in mind, it’s
easy to see that guest-blogging can be a great boon to both parties. The trick
lies in doing it right. The host must post on schedule, make it all look pretty
and easy on the eyes for readers, and include link back to your website and
social networks. You have a to write a decent post and you must do your part in
sharing the news about it. Sounds like quite the positively symbiotic
relationship, doesn’t it?

[image error] Guest blogging benefits both hosts and guests when best practices and basic etiquette are observed



Guest
Posting Best Practices



Heed the host’s genre or subject matter requirements. For example, in my Guest Post Guidelines , I stipulate that guest posts must be genre-relevant commentaries covering the realms of science fiction, fantasy, horror – we’re talking SF books, film, influential figures, and everything that fits in therein. In my opinion, that’s a pretty broad stipulation. There’s no end of possible topics. It also means, that if your post is promoting toothpaste or listing the reasons people should go to church, great topics as they probably are, this blog is not the place for them.



Craft a post well-worth reading. For more information on crafting a great blog post, see Bad Redhead Media’s article, This Is How To Write A Blog Post People Read . Submit original posts only, not cross-posted or duplicated content.



When you submit your guest post, be sure to include a short bio, your website URL, main social media profile links, and information about new or upcoming events or releases. An author photo/head shot should be included as well.



Submit
a Request to Guest Post Here

Send an email to guestpost[at]tonyarmoore.com stating your proposed blog post topic/idea, anticipated length of your post, and an approximate date/time frame that you would like the post to go live. Please include a link to your website, blog, or Twitter profile. I will respond to your email and we can discuss the further if I decide to accept your pitch.

Guest Blogging takes time and effort, but if you are willing to invest this much into your writing endeavors over time, you'll likely wind up reaping significant rewards.
Click To Tweet

For those who need a bit more guidance on how to construct a meaningful blog post, here’s a handy-dandy little Blog Post Template that I’ve compiled and made available for free download. Tweak as needed for your own purposes.

Download PDF

The post Guest Blogging Benefits Writers in These 4 Helpful Ways appeared first on Tonya R. Moore.

One Piece Will Likely End in Five Years

Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece manga will probably end  five years from now. So said Oda Sensei himself in a recent interview, according to Comic Book Review and Anime News Network, among other outlets. I know that to some of you, five years sounds like forever, but listen. For me, for any self-respecting One Piece fan, that’s merely the blink of an eye. My favorite anime in the world, a twenty-or-so-year staple of my life will likely end in five years time and the mere thought of it swamps my heart with all kinds of nostalgic feels.

I’ve been a fan of One Piece since somewhere between 1999 and 2003, maybe. I remember catching the first episode on Toonami (or was it Adult Swim?) by chance and I was immediately hooked. Back then, though, I didn’t have much of a chance to follow the series, as so had to wait an eternity until Crunchyroll started streaming the series. Once I started catching up, I went on a 300-plus-something episode binge-fest.

[image error]

The story of Monkey D. Luffy, a straw hat-wearing young man made of rubber, bent on becoming the King of Pirates totally tickled my shonen heart.

Girls have shonen hearts now, you may ask? The short answer is yeah. Yeah, we do. Pretty sure mine’s located somewhere in the vicinity of the left ventricle of my inner universe... but, I digress.

Luffy’s reckless determination makes him quite a star in my book.

He journeys to and along the Grand Line, picking up crew members along the way. I think that the amazing thing about One Piece is that every one of Luffy’s crew members was a trope-defying character at the time they surfaced.

The wanna be pirate king who can’t swim. The pirate hunter turned pirate with zero sense of direction. The damsel in distress who is actually a bold, cunning thief and brilliant navigator. The liar with a heart of gold. The elegant chef with a violent disposition and a mean mouth. The spy who is actually a royal princess. The shape-shifting reindeer that desperately wants to be human. The evil archeologist who turns out to be just a scared and lonely girl in need of a kind place to call home. The ship-building cyborg. The congenial skeleton with amazing swordsmanship and musical talents. The fierce warlord of the sea with the stalwart heart.

Curious yet? It might interest you to watch Crunchyroll ambassador (?) slash One Piece superfan, Tim slowly descend into madness as he hilariously… I mean expertly explains the One Piece anime’s timeline from 1999 thru 2019.

Those of us who have been watching this show for decades have laughed at the character’s antics, sang along with their merry making, and cried as their hearts were broken time and time again are immensely grateful to Oda Sensei for bringing this story into our lives. All good things must come to an end, as they say. Even so, whether it’s 5 minutes of 5 decades from now, a final ending to One Piece would be a bittersweet ending too soon. It seems we have 5 years left to watch this wonderful series, so we should make this most of this time to enjoy it for all its worth.

[image error]

I’ll be sad to say goodbye to Luffy, Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Robin Franky, and Brook… not to mention Vivi, Jimbei, Shanks, Sabo, and a slew of other memorable characters whenever the time comes. These characters, through their silliest of moments, righteous furies, and most tear-jerky traumas have grown, matured and found a lasting place within my heart.

The post One Piece Will Likely End in Five Years appeared first on Tonya R. Moore.

An Encounter with the Supernatural

Have you ever been scared witless, then felt like a fool
when you realized that there hadn’t been any reason to be scared at all?

Have you ever tried walking down a lonely country road, all
by your lonesome in the dead of night? If you have, you’ll probably understand how
the following tale from my misspent youth came about.

This is a story about that one time I thought I was being
chased by a creature called a rolling calf.

[image error]

Please, let me explain.

In Jamaican folklore, a rolling calf is a sort of demonic calf-like beast that roams along roadways, terrorizing hapless travelers at night. In the stories that I heard while growing up, anyone who encountered the rolling calf would hear the shudder-worthy clanking of its chains. During some telling, someone must have also included the cloppity-clopping of its feet among the terrifying sounds you would hear.

One night when I was in my late teens, I had one such
encounter.

It was dark and I was walking along a lonely, rural road. I was
on my way home from I-forget-where. Out of the blue, I heard this sound behind
me.

Cloppity-clop. Cloppity Clop.

Strange. I thought.

Still walking, I glanced behind me to see what was making that sound. In the dark, I could only make out the hazy shape of what  really hoped was a person. As this person or thing traipsed behind me, I could still hear the unnatural cloppity-clop of cow-like feet.

Unnerved, I whipped my head back around and started walking
faster. My follower stepped up the pace too.

Cue the Twilight Zone music.

I started silently freaking out. Whoever or whatever was following me so doggedly couldn’t possibly be up to any good. Was it even human? Would a human’s feet sound like the cloppity-clop of some demon calf?

[image error]

Was I being followed by a rolling calf? A freaking rolling calf in disguise?!

I didn’t dare look behind me again. For some reason, it
didn’t seem like a good idea. Maybe I was just scared of confirming my fear. I
shifted gear into my fastest power-walk, and wouldn’t you know? That damned
person or thing started walking even faster too!

The sound was getting closer and closer. I just couldn’t seem to get away from that rapid cloppity-clop sound.

Finally, my house was in sight. I ran into the yard and
slammed the gate shut behind me. I ran up the steps onto the verandah and
crouched low, peeking over the banister. There was a streetlight in front of
the house, so I knew I’d be able to get a good look.

Some woman in a red dress passed under the streetlight. She briefly looked up to where I was in utter confusion and kept walking. As she vanished into the night, I could still hear the cloppity-clop of her weird-sounding shoes.

The door to the house opened and someone inside asked,
“what’s going on?”

Feeling like an idiot I stood, smiled and said. “Oh,
nothing.”

So, what was really going on?

I have a pretty good guess, in retrospect.

You see, what must have happened was…

An innocent traveler was walking along a dark country road.
Unnerved by the creepy atmosphere, she was relieved to see another person
walking ahead of her. Figuring that a little company might help ease her fears,
she tried catching up to the person in front.

When the person in front started walking faster, she started
walking faster too, scared of the dark and still hoping to catch up. When the
person ahead practically started running, she desperately chased after that
person still.

So, this late-night comedy unfolded with neither party truly
understanding why they were chasing or being chased.

One Argument for Writing Everyday

Recently, I came across an article declaring that unless you write every day, you’re not a real writer. I’ll tell you right now that I don’t share this article’s sentiment. After all, writing is something you do out of love, not some twisted sense of obligation.

Doing what you love is worthwhile enough to warrant the time and effort it takes, purely for the sake of your own happiness.
Click To Tweet

Different people have different circumstances, though, so it’s never very clever to cast a wide net when it comes to what’s best for every writer out there. Having said that, I do believe that if you can carve out the time and summon the wherewithal to write every day, you should jump at the chance to do so.

[image error]

Write Every day for Love.

Those of us who write out of a genuine love for writing feel a certain need to write. Writing is how we stay sane. Writing is how we exorcise the madness brewing within us. We need it like water. Like a junkie needs a hit. We must be careful not to let this need go unfulfilled for too long.

In his book Zen in the Art of Writing: Essays on Creativity, Ray Bradbury wrote:

If you did not write every day, the poisons would accumulate and you would begin to die or act crazy, or both.

Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing: Essays on Creativity.

He also wrote the following:

You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you. For writing allows just the proper recipes of truth, life, reality as you can eat, drink, and digest without hyperventilating and flopping like a dead fish in your bed. I have learned on my journeys that if I let a day go by without writing, I grow uneasy. Two days and I am in tremor. Three and I suspect lunacy.

Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing: Essays on Creativity.

I’ll tell you something. Sometimes, I go weeks without writing, months even. The whole time, I’ll feel as if something is terribly amiss and the world doesn’t quite make sense. You may say, of course, there’s little about the world that makes sense these days but you know what? When I write it down, whatever I write helps me to put things into perspective. I can take a step back and release that tense breath I didn’t realize I’ve been holding. The world is no longer askew.

Do you know that feeling?

So, why not give it a try whenever the opportunity is within your grasp?

Write the world down. Breathe. Everyday.
Click To Tweet

There’s no other feeling quite like it in the ‘verse.

Hegira Has a New Home

One of the challenges that come with trying to serialize a
story on WordPress is keeping chapters organized. There are several ways to
work around this, including custom post types and taxonomies. I’ve decided,
however, to keep things uber-simple and host The Lore of Hegira on its own dedicated
WordPress site, eliminating the need for all the bells, whistles, and work that
would need to be done under the hood.

[image error]

The Lore of Hegira is now hosted at

www.tonyarmoore.com/hegira

CURRENT ARC

Slumfairy

Episodes Published so far:

1. The Undead Head2. Hell to Pay3. Juggernaut4. Birthright



READ ONLINE

The Lore of Hegira is also being cross posted to Wattpad. As most of you might already know, Wattpad is an online platform for posting works of fiction and comes part and parcel with a massive online reading community. Wattpad even has a mobile app, so reading on the go is super convenient. Click to Read The Lore of Hegira on Wattpad.

The thing with that though, is that it is very easy to get lost in the fray. With that in mind, I ask that if you like this story, please help me to spread the word.

How You Can Help



Share chapters on Social Media via the share buttons at the bottom of each postLink to www.tonyarmoore.com/hegira on your blog or via Social MediaRecommend the story to your fellow space opera loving friendsVote for story episodes on WattpadComment on entries that you like (or dislike)



Constructive Critiques are Welcome

Nobody’s perfect. I believe that writing is always a
learning process, both for reader and writer. I know I make mistakes. I know I’m
not the greatest writer in the world either, so while I cannot (absolutely will
not) abide by pointless verbal abuse, constructive critiques, questions, and corrections
are always, always most welcome.

Something Else to Keep in Mind



[image error]

I appreciate the time every single reader takes to peruse my
work. Thank you for reading the Lore of Hegira. I know not everyone who reads
and likes my work will want to leave a comment or make their presence known. I appreciate
it all. Thank you all for reading this. Thank you all for being here. Thank you
all for being you.

Episode 2: Hell to Pay

“Shut your trap, Mizer!” Bex warned.

“Look what you did,” the bodyless head uttered a nasal whine. “Didja really have to do this to me? It’ll take me ages to regenerate!”

“Why’d you run then?” The hunter demanded. “I told you not to run.”

Winny sighed. “Do you really have to go all out on the small fry too?”

“What are you grumbling about?” Agitated, Bex yanked off her. “We have to eat one way, or another, don’t we?”

“Maybe so but-”

A horrified shriek came from across the room. “Wh-wha-what is that horrible thing?”

Bex turned to glare at Sumida, the other bone of contention between her and Winny. In Bex’s book, Choktoi House’s latest denizen was a most unwelcome sort. Sumida seemed content flutter about as if oblivious to the fact that two of Hegira’s most violent factions were on the verge of starting a war, due to her disappearance from the Merchant Guild’s sanctuary.

Bex didn’t even want to begin to imagine what would happen if they learned that their missing ward was just slumming it with the locals.

As if tolerating the mere presence of her ilk were not enough, Winny had cajoled Bex into ignoring the massive price on Sumida’s head and instead, providing protection and shelter. In short,

Bex was harboring a fugitive, a fugitive who had both Koros and the Merchant Guild frothing at the bit to take possession. Playing breadwinner and bodyguard to a runaway brat wasn’t exactly a headhunter’s secret for success, was it now?

The fact that Sumida regarded her with a wide-eyed kind of anxiety and skirted carefully around her only served to irritate her more. What the hell was that about anyway? It wasn’t as if Bex was completely uncivilized.

The girl was carrying a watering pot nearly half her size.

Mizer shot Sumida a hideous facsimile of a one-eyed wink. A forked tongue flicked out of what was supposedly his mouth. “Mmmm’hey,” he leered. “You look kinda tasty.”

“Shut up,” Sumida spat. “You disgust me!” Water sloshed over the top of the pot as she scuttled away. Bex vaguely wondered why someone so clearly unaccustomed to physical labor could do something like that so effortlessly.

Sumida possessed an unusual kind of beauty. Unnaturally pale, she was like an elf from one of the old faerie tales. Bex figured she’d positively glow in the dark. This striking trait had been inherited from her hallowed progenitors, the starchasers. They were said to have been human once, but no more. They’d somehow left the blue world behind early in human civilization’s infancy. After sailing oceans of stars for thousands of years, they’d done so much and changed in so many ways that they’d become too different to be considered human.

“Put that down, Sumida.” Winny called over. “Come and eat.”

Sumida had a dazzling smile for Winny, which made something inside Bex boil.

“It’s alright, I’ll finish watering the plants and the choktoi’s water has to be changed before mid-morning or else,” Her nose scrunched thoughtfully. “Its growth will be stunted, right?”

Winny nodded approvingly. “Good child.”

Bex’s gut twisted. Why was Winny indulging her? Wasn’t this little twit responsible for the exile Winny’s own adoptee?

Laila was gone, exiled to some faraway place where they couldn’t touch her or even comfort her if she was crying. She was gone because people like Sumida and those she served made her feel like Hegira was no longer a place she could call home. Laila, who had never had any grand ambitions of contesting Sumida’s candidacy to become Hegira’s next pilot. Who’d never asked to be born starchaser’s kin.

Bex simply couldn’t abide by it.

“Is this really all it takes for you?” She grumbled. “As long as she has the right kind of blood running through her veins and looks like a starchaser. That’s enough, is it?”

“You think I’m betraying Laila.” Winny fixed Bex a look of consternation. “By helping Sumida?”

“Starchaser, you say?” Mizer’s words made all three women’s heads turn. “Hell to pay when the Guild gets wind of this.”

What was left of him rolled until he tumbled right off the counter and onto the floor with a sickening splat. The quivering eye started to glitter in a most unnerving way.

“Oh no,” Bex breathed, immediately realizing the mess they were in. She’d never even considered the possibility such a small-time nitwit could be an agent of the Guild. “Shit. Winny, I think

I really messed up.”

The beastly head started emitting a high-pitched, machine-like screech.

“Ohoh! Ohohoh!” Mizer’s voice rose singsongingly in tandem with the raucous signal. He eyed Bex with malevolent glee. “Toldja you’d regret being so nasty to me.”

Webserial Overview

Imagine a ship so huge, it could swallow Jupiter whole. A ship so ancient, it has witnessed the birth of stars and watched them burn and become black dwarfs. Hegira is a leviathan, home to thousands of sapient alien races. The ship of legend, left behind by a nearly extinct race of beings called Starchasers, is a behemoth barreling across galaxies. There are many who seek to take control of this rare jewel, but to rule this ship, one must control her pilot.

The Story So Far



SLUMFAIRY

Bex Atria is many things. Violent. Human. Mercenary. She is one of two billion sapient beings living aboard Hegira, a wandering world of horror and boundless beauty. Bex has lived in the slums of Hegira all her life. She’s done it all. She’s seen it all. Nothing can surprise her. Sumida is everything Bex isn’t. She is soft-spoken. Inhuman. Sheltered. She’s about to turn Bex’s world upside down.

[image error]

Bex Atria is many things. Violent. Human. Mercenary.

Episodes



The Undead Head



START READING

Episode 1: The Undead Head

Severed heads weren’t commonplace, even in one of the crime-ridden
shantytowns that sprawled along the rims of Hegira’s surface canals.

Winny frowned, her gut churning when Bex plunked the bagged, dripping
thing down on her counter. Just as Winny got to wondering whether her
human foster-sister had finally gone far enough ’round the bend to
forget that a headhunter’s job wasn’t supposed to be taken quite so
literally, there was a choked oomph, which suggested that something was,
impossibly enough, still alive in there.

Since Bex’s Lloran sibling was clearly the only living being who’d
dare threaten and, in fact, could slap her silly, Winny didn’t hesitate
to make her displeasure with the grisly gift known.

“Got a death wish, do you?”

Bex was hardly intimidated. She was blue, not a natural blue. Her
skin had been dyed in a pattern of planet-side ocean waves, decades ago
when skin re-pigmentation was all the rage among Llorans who fostered
human children. She was rough and wiry, armed to the teeth. The red fur
collar and tail of her jacket didn’t do much to soften that sharp
countenance.

Her voice was gravely, a souvenir from when a Merchant Guild metal-head had tried to crush her windpipe when she was twelve.

“Problem?”

“There’s a bleeding head leaking into my breakfast.” Winny’s charcoal
palm came slamming down, the embedded blue-gold intricate pattern
adorning her skin glinted. “Yes, there’s a fraggin’ problem! Plus, you
boarded the Koros Tower to catch a bounty?”

“Yea-why not?”

“… in the middle of a hostile takeover.”

“Attempted hostile take-over,” Bex qualified “I had to shoot a few Guild metal-heads too, so it’s not like I was taking sides.”

That wasn’t much of a qualification. The Merchant Guild’s hired guns
were famously violent and stupid, hence the metal-head nickname.

Bex had been nursing a lifelong hatred for both Koros and the
Merchant Guild, the two major factions vying for control of their shared
domain. The hunter’s parents had been murdered right in front of her
during a forced relocation by some trigger happy metal-head, back when
she stood just knee-high.

Indifferent to the turmoil raging within, the legendary ship, Hegira,
tumbled endlessly through the void. The massive ship was a great ghost
dreamed up by ancients obsessed with chasing the stars. Their kind had
mostly died out long ago. Their legacy was a wonder. It was old and it
was dark. Its fount overflowed with mythologies.

The aged behemoth spun a magical web of mysteries across galaxies. It
dipped its toes into slipstreams and toyed with wormholes like a child
playing jump-rope. It collected intelligent beings like rare jewels and
made its bones a haven for endangered creatures and conquerors alike.

Yes. Hegira was a wonder, but you couldn’t exactly call it paradise.

Winny palmed her face in dismay as Bex recounted her shenanigans aboard the Koros tower.

“You were party to a trans-provincial incident?”

“I wasn’t!” The hunter spluttered. “Not really.”

A beady-eyed monstrosity wriggled partially out of the opening in the
sack Bex had dropped onto the table. Its visage was dark-green like the
moss from the Molokai woodsea, mottled with yellow and orange spots.

“Oh yeh-yeh, she was!” It chortled maliciously. “I know!” it crowed. I was there.”

The Advent of Hegira

I remember the very moment that this story leapt to life as a tiny spark of an idea in my mind. Over a decade ago, Google Wave had just been opened to public beta and many creative writing netizens, myself included, descended in droves snagging and issuing invites just so we could jump in and see what exactly we could do with that brand spanking new social network.

Yeah, we realized pretty quickly that while ambitious and full of potential, the project lacked the functionality that would have made it the perfect platform for creative collaboration. Eventually, most of us hightailed it back to Twitter.

[image error]

Back then, in those days before all the racist lunatics discovered social media, Twitter was a truly a haven for creatives and just really awesome people to shout out, shoot the breeze and bounce really great ideas off each other… but I digress.

During the time before we got disgusted with Wave and skedaddled, there were those of us managed to form friendships and little cliques here and there and although we had originally crossed paths on Twitter, Brent Millis (Made in DNA / idiotandroid) and I got the chance to bounce ideas off each other and collaborate a little bit here and there.

The topic of one of our conversations turned to a possible collaboration on a scifi story, which got me thinking about a set of stories unfolding on a generation ship. Somehow, that lead to the topic of leviathan ships, i.e. behemoths.

[image error]

I think Farscape was still on TV back then, so Moya might have been fresh on my mind, which I’m almost sure was what spurred me in that general direction.

The Lore of Hegira

Right then, the idea of a ship so massive that it would dwarf even the biggest planet in our solar system sprang to mind. Well, for one reason or another, the idea of collaborating didn’t pan out, but the leviathan was stuck on my mind.

The First Arc

A year later, I wrote a really long short story titled SLUMFAIRY. As I recall, Brent was the first person I asked to read my crappy draft but his response was encouraging and his constructive critiques and suggestions were uber helpful.

SLUMFAIRY



[image error]

Bex Atria, a mercenary, is one of two billion denizens of Hegira, a wandering world of horror and boundless beauty. She’s done it all. She’s seen it all. Sumida is everything Bex isn’t. She’s about to turn Bex’s world upside down.

SLUMFAIRY got published in the Writers on the Wrong Side of the Road anthology in 2012. I wasn’t satisfied though. I was a bit mad at myself for stopping short at a novella, but in those pre-Adderall days, I really didn’t possess the wherewithal to write an entire novel.

The Second Arc

I wrote and self-published a sequel titled STARCHASER a few years later, and I actually got some positive reader responses.

STARCHASER



[image error]

Laila sets out across the galaxies alone, in search of the ultimate trump card to help her to wrest control of the leviathan ship, Hegira from those who would seek to steal her ancient birthright.

Even then, that darn idea just wouldn’t die. It’s been bouncing around inside my head for over a decade, so I figure why not rewrite the whole damned thing… and next thing I knew, a third installment was spawned.

The Final Arc. Maybe.

HEGIRA DESCENDS is the final installment of the series – I mean it this time – and this is where the two young starchasers get to reunite and their struggle for survival really intensifies.

HEGIRA DESCENDS



[image error]

The gang’s survival depends on Sumida’s courage, Laila’s talent for weaseling out of sticky situations, and Klang’s penchant for murdering anything that threatens the well-being of his beloved Bex.

THE STORY SO FAR

Bargaining

Beakman showed up at dawn.

He didn’t knock or call out for
Else. He just stood there at her door, silently waiting for her to notice him
staring at her through the glass.

He was an oddity. Else wasn’t sure
what kind.

The only form she’d ever seen him
take was of a man’s body with a bird’s black beak and eyes. He reminded her of
a heron, maybe a giant heron in a penguin suit. It wasn’t just his inhuman
freakishness that unsettled her. The guy was an arrogant creep; from his beady
little eyes right down to his sharp little toes.

He barged into her kitchen and took
a seat at the table when she opened the door. He regarded Else expectantly,
waiting while she grabbed the kettle and started filling it at the sink.

When she set the kettle down on the
stove, Beakman leaned forward. “So, let me see it.”

Else sighed. She gripped the edges
of her tee shirt, pulled it over her shoulders. She sat straddling one of the
chairs at the table, so that Beakman could examine her back.

The pattern there looked like a
tattoo, a very colorful glyph of a scarab spanning the breath of her torso. Its
strangeness was apparent only because she knew what to look for. The pattern
was slightly raised under the skin, giving the design a slightly
three-dimensional feel. It was hot to the touch. The veiny color patterns kept
changing. Clearly, the thing was very much alive.

“So, you met a scarab,” Beakman
mused. “When?”

“Yesterday morning, I think.” Else
tried not to cringe when his icy fingers poked at the flesh there. “It was on
the ground, upside down. All I did was help it along a little.”

She pulled the ends of her shirt
back down when he drew away. He took the lemon grass tea she offered. His
spindly fingers coiled around the glass. She watched him dip his beak in. A
thin, pink tongue came down, lapping at the warm liquid.

“A scarab in this climate is
ludicrous, you know?”

“Everybody makes mistakes,” Else
grumbled.

“Never met anyone who makes quite
as many as you.” Beakman snorted. “There’s supposed to be something inside your
brain that says: ‘one of these things is not like the others’ and you’re
supposed to walk away.”

Whatever that certain thing inside
the brain was, Else seemed to be in short supply. It was common sense, she knew
that, dammit. At the same time, she wanted to grab her shady guest by the beak
and snap it in half, for being obnoxious enough to keep pointing it out.

“What made you think something like
that needed saving, anyhow?”

“It was belly up, Beakman.” She
frowned over at him. “What else was I supposed to do?”

“I have a real name, you know?” He
was staring at Else intently. It made her skin crawl. “Why don’t you use it?”

“Who the hell is that stupid? No
thanks.” She shuddered. “Are you gonna help me get this bug off my back or
not?”

“There’s a price.”

“Isn’t there always?” She
countered.

She’d first met him when she was
twelve years old. Beakman had noticed her and her penchant for attracting strange
things, thereby needing to be rescued from them.

“What’ll it be this time?”

“I don’t know,” he smiled coldly.
“Maybe an arm and a leg?”

“What?” Else set her cup down with
a clatter. “Isn’t that more than your usual–”

“The price can only go up for the girl
with the thick head.” Beakman pointed at her accusingly. “What have I told you
about picking up strange things? At this rate you’ll probably go and become
something else’s prey.”

She snorted and took another sip of
tea. The fact was Beakman never denied being one of those strange things that
were always out to get her, just for knowing they were there.

He’d apparently decided that she
was more interesting to watch than whatever he could have planned for her,
though. Presumably, he didn’t have any intention of collecting on this
ridiculous debt anytime soon.

For the time being, at least, she
could trust that Beakman would be content with just biding his time.

The post Bargaining appeared first on Tonya R. Moore.