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Cur 2 Chapter 16 ‘There can only be one’

“I HAVE COME FOR THE LIFE OF ONE!” a strange warbling displaced voiced seemed to screech not from the head but from the hip of the rider. -“BUT I WILL TAKE ALL IF YOU DO NOT SEND OUT THE CREATOR!” The figure was tall and seemed abnormally proportioned under a set of tuathan mail. His head and neck were stiff and motionless as if carved from wood and wax to look like that of the former king of the Tuatha; Nuada Airgetlám. The waxen face glinting ominously in the light of the magical flame sword and the torches around him.

The imposter had taken Bres’s thrown and what was left of his army. Now he marched on the last living souls that knew he was not truly Nuada. Not the Nuada that had taken this isle and renamed it so but a crude copy that nevertheless shared his flesh and would seize it by force.

“YOU HAVE ONE HOUR BEFORE I BURN THIS KEEP TO ASHES!” The hideous guttural displaced voice screeched.

–

Bres walked for what felt like hours towards the cyclopean spire. In a trance it seemed his march in time to some tune that no human ears could hear. A steady heartbeat exuded from the tower. Before he could fully process his surroundings he was in a throng of strange creatures some not unlike those from the ship. But others far more hideous and monstrous in aspect. So much so he didn’t care to look at them at all and just pushed forward through them to the base of the spire.

As he approached it he could make out faintly, what sounded like blades clashes. Or perhaps teeth gnashing and inhuman warbling of a crowd made up of the denizens of this eldritch keep of unknown aeons.

The base of the spire consisted of a gaping oval maw that seemed much too large an entrance for the squat toad like creatures he had encountered so far. Were they perhaps not the original inhabitants he mused to himself dreamily as he approached the sounds of combat in a daze. Drawn to the dreaming spire as if the waves themselves propelled him.

He was slowly swallowed by the grand maw, inside the keep it was large and cavernous, sounds billowing off every unevenly cragged wall. The inside was half castle half cave but also seemed almost living like it was part of a reef of coral. Or perhaps the inside of some strange prehistoric beast all bones and cartilage fossilized for a thousand years or more.

Inside there were more of those toad like creatures but from then on the mass was more inconsistent. There seemed not to be one race down here but a collection of malformed denizens that seemed to ooze from the very walls. Some on two legs, some on just one, some even crawled on their bellies like vipers or eels. Every one of them was a vile experiment not of nature but of some twisted intellect beyond man’s comprehension.

Their attention was drawn to a crude yet well adorned arena. Constructed from what looked like bones and skin of some never before seen sea creature.

Inside the arena an amorphous mass of grey shapeless flesh bubbled like porridge in a pot. Something vaguely humanoid sinking into the mass as it gurgled and belched. The crowd gibbering louder as whatever it was sunk deeper into the mass until it was completely devoured.

Immediately after that the crowd swelled once more and suddenly the former king felt a sinister energy amassing around him. As if a million bulbous eyes were focused on him alone. Instantly he could feel their slimy appendages gripping him. Forcing him closer to the hideous bubbling mass of unnameable horror.

He struggled against the horde but their collective force was as crushing as the tide itself, immovable and irresistible. Before he could cry out in protest he was himself in the arena face to indescribable mass congealing in front of him.

Panicked the former king cried out “I am Bres, King of the Tuatha, I come to seek an audience with my father!” He rose his hand into the air to display the ring his mother had given him, the ring that he was meant to present to his father so he would know him. But the ring was gone. Undoubtedly snatched up by one of the many slimy sticky appendages that thrust him into the uncertain doom he now faced.

He had turned his back to the creature to display his now empty hand, he could hear it; it’s vile belching, as it shifted and changed. Bres turned, his body stiff with fear, standing before him was an exact duplicate of himself.

–

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Cur 2 Chapter 15 ‘Limbs’

Pain; the words lights up his brain like a falling star. Pain; the one thing that kept him alive, kept him clinging on, reminded him what he had to do, who he was doing it for, all the pain, the endless pain.

Pain. Gone. Pain. Gone.

The pain was gone.

Cur awoke from his dreamless sleep, feeling nothing. Not cold nor heat, the pain was gone. The pain he had become accustomed to, the pain that was so familiar, the pain that had become his friend and only ally, the reason he woke, the reason he slept. His constant companion reminding him that there was still life in him. Still love, somewhere buried deep down under all the pain, all the scars, the broken bones and blood.

But it was gone.

“Awake, marvelous” a voice above him cooed, and as he spoke the sound of metal implements jossling excitedly could be heard just out of sight. “So this is the one that made Ogma the silver tongued so pretty” The voice laughed mockingly “And shortened that silver tongue no less”.

There was a silence, the sound of a blade scraping against metal. Cur opened his eyes but could only look up and all he saw was a cold flat stone. The room was dark, it was night time perhaps. He could feel a slight chill coming from a crack or window.

“You came to kill me, did my father send you?”

Cur strained and grunted as he felt his bonds tightened at his wrists and ankles and neck. His wrists.

A strange feeling, a phantom hand reaching out for nothing. He cast his gaze down and to his confused horror an arm of flesh and bone replaced what once was silver and filled with pain. He felt dreamlike and painless and almost giddy.

“What did that whore give me?”

“She tried to kill you but it seems death has no sway, it doesn’t want you. And that whore is my sister”.

“Then you are already dead” Cur cackled. His booming laugh filling the dark low ceilinged dungeon.

“I’ve had some time to examine this weapon of yours.” He said as he walked around the table Cur was strapped to. In his hands he held the silver arm, a small lantern dangled from his hip and was the only source of light.

Cur strained to follow his path with his fierce feral stare, like a caged animal waiting for moment to strike. The walls were damp, almost dripping, stained red with rust or blood and he could see the tuathan’s breath hanging in the air. The barbarian saw out of the corner of his eye a table next to his head full of bladed tools and implements. He could feel air but from his limited vantage could see no windows.

“Funny isn’t it? That I would use the technique I planned to use on Nuada on the very man that took his arm and his throne and started all of this.”

“I also took his head” Cur laughed wickedly.

Miach swallowed that bitterly but tried to hide his disgust. He regarded the arm clinically as one might a piece of art or some kind of experimental device. “Still it is rather elegant” He looked at the giant laid out on the operating table “Far too elegant for something like you”

Cur strained against his bonds but his new arm was atrophied, it was weak and had little feeling in it.

“I think I’ll keep it, as a trophy” Miach said as his footsteps echoed out of the dark dingy room taking the only light source with him. Leaving Cur alone to painless black slumber.

https://www.inkitt.com/stories/action/300249/chapters/15

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Cur 2 Chapter 14 ‘She’s still suffering’

Outside Ethniu’s window in her tower on the dreaded Tory isle, a storm brew over the horizon. But her body was too weak for her to lift her head.

A cool white hand touched the Fomorian princess’s forehead above her one beautiful eye as she lay in her bed.

“You’re temperature” Birog said. Her hand slowly and gently snaked under the princess’ silken bed linen and came to rest under them on her mounded belly. Soft it was to the touch, but also firm with child. The belly hummed with an energy Birog had felt only in her dreams. She drew her hand away and said nothing. She turned to a small basin next to the princess’s bed where a sea sponge rested, soaking up the pure luke warm water in the bowel.

Birog wrung the sponge out and began to gently dab the princess’ forehead.

“The quickening draws near” She whispered.

“But my father” The girl gasped “When he finds out-!”

“Your father will never know until it is too late, I have seen it” Birog said coldly, certainly, as she dabbed the the girl’s worried brow. “He cannot see that hiding you in this tower also hides you from his sight. He believes you are ill as I have lead him to do so and thus I can care for you and hide the child of prophecy from him, my part in all this.”

The girl had been slightly prone and tense and now with some disagreeableness she lay down. Still awkwardly staring out the window at the churning clouds, feeling them as if they were in her belly not in the sky at all. “What will become of me seer? What is my part after the prophecy? Will I be free?”

“Your destiny is not written my dear, no one can say, not even I”

https://www.inkitt.com/stories/action/300249/chapters/14

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Cur Part 2 Chapter 13 “Rotgut”

Hey there, look content, see ya.

Haha ok, haven’t been super busy, just been in a weird place and my output has slowed to a crawl, I couldn’t even proofread. Just been feeling weird, all I’ve been able to put out is poetry. My emotions are just sort of all over the place. Could be the best time of my life, could be the worst, it’s hard to tell, only time will. So probably more of a content draught to come, just been spending hours not writing things, not being able to visualise it. I might need to take another break from it because I don’t wholey feel gripped by what’s happening right now. I dunno, just preoccupied I guess.

But hey gamepass is a quid again and I can play video games to distract myself yay. Sort of.

See you…

–

The snow crunched under foot as Airmed skirted the balding woods along the edges of the devil’s ladder. Taking the main path would leave her too exposed and liable to be set upon by bandits or ne’er-do-wells. But Airmed was used to the woods and knew them fairly well and could remain unseen and unheard taking her own path along the devil’s ladder.

The woods were stark and bare of leaves, the trees reaching up at the sun that blackened their bones. A bleaching white sun hung wearily overhead.

The girl was without fear as she hummed to herself calmly to distract from the cold and reddening cheeks. But there was something there on the tip of her tongue, some strange feeling. A twig breaking under foot caused Airmed to notice the stale silence. The whistle of the wind, no birds chirped or hare’s called, just the winds breath sweeping down the mountain.

She turned fitfully and saw nothing and then in the trees there sat a black crow, it cawed at her and flew away.

An unusual sound followed something akin to a wounded animal howl, a scream from a human garbled up in a bloodcurdling roar.

The girl instinctually drew a small short sword from under her furs as if she had her hand on it already. Expecting something evil and blood hungry to be lurking in midday sun stalking her steps.

“Come out now” She said almost to herself. Her eyes filled with fear but also a fatal resolve.

She looked about herself and seeing only snow and trees and dead leaves she relaxed for a moment. But then the noise came again and she could follow it. She trudged through the snow dropping her mead and the other liquid to give chase to the strange sound.

The horrible noise lead her deeper into the forest below the mountain. The noise sounded clearer as the forest became more dense with black ash trees. It lead her to a snowy copse deep in the forest. The sun was still out but it hung low and there was little light from the grey sky that would penetrate the forest. The trees stretching up like blackened skeletal fingers at the dull slate sky.

In the bushes there was movement at it lead the frightened girl to a small hollow or burrow dug into the side of a hill. From the hole blazed two empty white eyes staring at her.

–

The sound of sea lapping at the shore awoke the once king.

Bres awakened on a beach but where and whence he came he did not know.

“Am I dead?” He said as he opened his eyes and saw only water and sodden brown sand under him.

Bres rose to his knees and looking at the strange ring on his finger it all came back to him.

“Babd” He cried as he clawed at the wet sand.

He squeezed the clods of wet sand between his fingers. “I have nothing” He said “Nothing but this”. The ring seemed to hum strangely and he swore that it glowed for a moment.

Then an unusual sound like a ringing of a resonant bell but from under the sea. The ocean started to boil and bubble like a pot. The sea churning and turning white like that day he faced the last of the Firbolg on the beach and the sea ran white with the blood of his kinfolk. Half kinfolk, ex-kinfolk. He knew then that he should not have backed them into a corner, like he should not have done so with the people of Inish veil.

Something like a fish tail poked out of the water but did not disappear. It continued to protrude getting longer and stranger as it didn’t seem to move. It almost seemed as if it were a carved statue rising out of the unsettled water.

Then it seemed to fan out and get wider as if it were some tiny piece of some giant sea creature covered in a lacquered black shell.

As more and more of whatever it was rose slowly from the water it became obvious to him what it was. In fact seemed ridiculous to him both in not recognising sooner but also recognising it at all in it’s bizarre context.

There was no doubt that now he looked upon the bow of a ship but queer in it’s movement and incredulous in it’s rising. For it seemed almost like Bres was witness to it sinking but in reverse.

The former king of the Tuatha almost felt like a child, dumb struck. Wanting to rub his eyes in amazement as he witnessed the strange ship emerge from the sea. A ship of a design he had never seen before but also somehow seemed familiar to him.

It was black and slick like a deep sea fish and had no sails that he could determine, for why would it need them? Only fins and oars to traverse the sea.

The strange vessel broke ground abrubtly. Shifting it’s bulk on the sand like some sort of huge toad before coming to a stop a foot from where the former king was kneeling. He recoiled slightly and waited in the brief moments of silence that followed. Bres listened cautiously for movement or voices but none came.

A rope ladder was dropped from the port side of the ship, it appeared to be made from seaweed and hair. And for a moment Bres just stared at it.

–

Read the rest of this chapter and more weird shit here.

https://www.inkitt.com/stories/action/300249/chapters/13

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Cur Part 2 Chapter 12 ‘Unearthed’

Hemlo humans.

Not much to report really just been writing and thinking, more poems and prose from your boy. But yeah been feeling really good, like better than I’ve ever felt.

Not just because I’m in love but I feel like I have some direction, a real sense of purpose. I dunno, it’s hard to process, I think if I tried to to lay it all out and really think about it I’d lose my mind.

I feel a pull from something or someone that I can’t explain and it’s so real and good and wonderful, I just don’t ever want it to end. And part of me doesn’t even want it to start because it’s so big and so powerful I feel like it might swallow me, like I might lose myself but then I think maybe that isn’t such a bad thing. Maybe that’s how it was always meant to be, to be one with someone and become something greater isn’t that how it’s supposed to go?

I dunno, I don’t wanna jinx it but I prayed for this, literally. I dreamt about this. I never thought this feeling could be real, maybe I’m still dreaming.

Anyway that aside, we have the time skip here as you can see, so things are about to get real, the birth of the ‘chosen one’. As far as my reading, I finally got around to reading that Parker book they made into a shitty Jason Statham movie and it wasn’t that much better, I mean it was better but not by much. It was both more action packed and cool and also more boring and anti-climactic. The ending was a total wash, I expected a tense tactical fight and it just fizzled out, it was sort of pathetic, totally lost me. But I see why they made a movie out of it, probably the only Parker book where there was a character J-lo could play haha. I mean this is the most lines a woman has ever had in a Parker book, probably why it was so boring and shitty haha.

It was ok, it just wasn’t that special, I didn’t feel a real tension or mystery at all despite Parker being in a weakened state should’ve heightened things and it just didn’t. I dunno, it just wasn’t very gripping, not as engaging as the other books.

But I finished it and I’m back to reading Elric which is always pretty good. I mean it’s better than the witcher haha. Watching paint dry is better than the witcher haha.

It’ll never be as cool or as gripping as the first Conan story, that was bad ass, I wish the witcher books and Elric and even the rest of Conan was as cool as that haha.

Anyway.

See you…

–

Six months later.

“Mother, mother?” A small pale boy called in vain alone on the dingy streets of the once shining city of Murias.

“You are alone child, no one wants you, your own mother died at the sight of you” A fowl hissing voice said.

“Filthy halfbreed”

“Look at his skin, how it shines.”

“Like a fish!”

“Disgusting”

“Fomorian dog!”

“We should cook him up!”

“Your mother was a whore who laid with a fish!” A voice laughed.

“No mother, mother, where are you?” The boy called, his voice ringing through the empty streets of the shining city, the one of four that flew above the heavens in the lap of Dannuu herself.

“She is dead child, you are alone now… and forever”

Suddenly a stirring in the darkness as one falling off a log stirs in terror, the only sound the flicking and cracking of the dim dying fire. A figure stiffly shifting in the darkness groaned. The man rose from his seated position of waking and walked slowly over to a grand fireplace taking up a poker. The lithe man stabbed and prodded at the fire hatefully as if it had wounded him in some way. The pit spitting back at him sparks and flashes of vicious bubbling light. Illuminating the potmarked scarred face of Bres the once beautiful, king of the tuatha. His face at once was talked about throughout Inish Veil. Now cursed by the bard Coirpre, the treacherous half-blood king hides in darkness for fear of losing everything. For only a perfect king can rule the people of Danu.

He stood solemnly over the fire, the light glinting and lighting up his face in a hanging mirror over the pit. He sighed and touched his disfigured face and cursed under his breath. “Coirpre, how I wish I’d seen you die, I wish I had been there when the Fomor stripped the flesh from your bones. For the fomor care not for poetry.” Bres hissed to himself in the dark. The mirror shone strangely for a moment and a ghostly figure appeared there for a passing second.

“My son”

Bres turned in fright but there was nothing in the dark waiting for him.

“Who goes there? Babd? I told you not to disturb me witch!” Bres cursed.

“It is me my boy, my beautiful boy” The soothing ghostly voice said.

“Mother?” Bres gasped “How can this be?”

“I call to you from beyond death to deliver a warning and give new hope”

“A warning?”

“One comes that would take all this that I bequeathed you.”

“Who? Who would dare?”

“Nuada Airgetlám”

“Impossible!”

“It is true, he returns to take your rightful throne. But do not fear, you must away to your father’s kingdom, he will aid you.”

“My-my father?”

“High king of the Fomor, Elatha.” The specter held out it’s hand “Take this ring, so he may know you and go quickly.”

Bres reached out his to the specter and it’s ghostly hand slipped the ring onto his finger and it fit perfectly. But the moment the ring was on his finger there was a loud ruckus from outside of the keep of Dun Bresse. The sound of something akin to a battle but then just silence and then shouting, jubilant shouting.

Bres rushed to his tower so he could see what was going on outside by the stars and fire light of the many sconces and braziers lighting the keep.

Amassed was a great gaggle of peasants. A veritable army carrying farming tools and torches as weapons and shouting foul slogans. Some Bres was sure were reciting the poem of Coirpre himself, loudly and more vulgar than was intended by the dead poet.

Bres tightened his jaw as he watched this procession “Guards!” He shouted from the tower, almost immediately a group of armed guards rushed to meet the horde with spear in hand. But something stopped them. A name and a white horse and the man on that horse slowly trotting into the brazier’s fire light. The torches of the peasants parted to allow this grand figure to pass to the front of their grim procession.

A shining tall slim figure in white and gold riding. In his hand he raised the flaming sword of Nuada. The Claíomh Solais, shining brighter than a star, the light from it so bright Bres swore he could feel it’s glow on his marked face.

“Nuada!” Bres whispered to himself. And as he himself acknowledged who it was before the keep at Dun Bresse. So too did the guards, all in turn dropping to their knees at the sight of the once and dead king in his divine perfection.

–

Read the rest of the chapter on inkitt https://www.inkitt.com/stories/action/300249/chapters/12

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Three ring samurai part 3 Chapter 3 ‘The part you throw away’

Long time no listen to my drivel.
It’s nothing dramatic, just lots of boring day jobbing sucking up my time and soul. Still trying to find a new job, not holding much hope for that honestly but I keep soldiering on nonetheless.
Personal and work life aside, my consumption of product in terms of media is pretty great recently. My ascension to escapist sci-fi incel is complete haha. I’ve been watching farscape recently to give the expanse a rest because the seasons are short and I was running out of them now I can’t say which I like more because farscape is sort of more silly but I feel more connected to the characters and their chemistry. 
But I love the expanse for the realism and story but I love farscape for the characters and the puppets and all the physical effects which are literally Jim Henson puppets. So this is like sesame street in space except not aimed at children even remotely haha.
I would kill to see an escape of sesame street with Rygel haha.
Wait is Jim henson sesame street or muppets? Are they the same thing???
So I’m hooked on that and there are four seasons of like a billion episodes so I’m set for stuff to watch while I lift heavy things and grunt. My product consumption is set and I’m excited for next product.
On the book front I didn’t notice I did this but I actually stopped reading the Parker the books when Richard Stark stopped writing them for like twenty fucking years for some reason haha.
Just totally an accident. But I started reading his nineties books now and they’re pretty solid. They haven’t dipped in quality at all, the first one was not my favourite style of his books. I notice that he has like two styles of Parker books and considering the subject matter it doesn’t surprise me that it has these limitations. You either get a situation where Parker is just finishing a job and it went right or it went wrong then someone betrays him or it goes wrong and the rest of the book is him trying to deal with the new development and get away with the money.
Or my personal favourite where it starts with Parker getting the job and then spends forever autistically setting up the job only for it then to go wrong from some unforeseen circumstance which he then has to deal with and get away with the money. I like these ones purely for the great build up and excitement. I tend to think the first style is just laziness, where he can’t be bothered to come up with a clever heist so he just skips it and gets into the meat of the story which he’s great at and the action is always really great. But it’s just a way of getting the heist out of the way, I see why he does it because normal people are bored by ages of tedious planning and setup. But I think we’ve established I’m far from normal.
The first book is actually the peak of the first trope, a heist goes really badly wrong, his wife betrays him and shit gets fucked up haha. Watch the movie Payback if you can’t be bothered to read the far superior book. The book wasn’t about heisting, even thought here was a heist in it. It was about Parker being this unrelenting force that was going to get what was his nomatter what. It was setting up this character that would step on the devils dick to get what he wanted.
But the second book is what gave shape to the mythos in my opinion because it’s all about that anal setup, like half the book is about him getting this truck which he is used for like a few seconds to block off the view from the road in this armored car heist. But it was just this fantastic build off to an amazing pay off that really set the tone for the rest of the books as well establishing new characters and worldbuilding.
The nineties era books (I’m not sure what era they’re actually set in because Parker and his pals haven’t aged it seems) the first is the epitomy of the first kind, the book starts where they’re in the middle of the job which goes right. But then they’re betrayed and shit happens, looking back it was ok, not amazing. The next book I’m on now is like a mix of both kinds which is weird.
It starts with the action at the end of a heist that goes sort of wrong because Parker is climbing out of a wrecked car but he has the money and he gets away leaving one guy there stuck in the car. 
The real story comes in where this guy had another job set up which now falls on Parker when this guy dies. So we have all this good set up which pleases my autism all while shit from the previous job is encroaching on the latest job. So he’s really mixing it up with this one. That and he brings back a few fan favourite characters from the roster, not my favourite characters, I really want to see Grofield and Handy Mckay come back and I’m saving the Grofield books for when I finish the Parker series. I really wanna see Grofield because he wasn’t in good shape in the last book, as far as I remember he’s missing a few of his fingers. But it’s not like Stark really gives a shit about continuity I mean he brought back Ed Mackey from being literally dead without even an explanation. I guess he just forgot.
I mean I was planning to read all the Parker books again in graphic novel format but I can’t find a good place to pira- I mean buy them at an affordable and price from a reputable source.
Come on! Richard Stark is dead he doesn’t care if his books make money. I mean fuck, pirating these books about a master thief is some ultimate irony surely. The closest I come to being Parker is downloading comics for free and possibly lots of movies and games if I was a pc master racist.
So yeah content, finally some content and it doesn’t totally suck, yeah well ok it kinda does but it’s fun to write and until my unusual form of writers block passes it’s really all I can muster. My inspiration is in short supply right now and I can only church out ironic crap. But I think I’m gonna just throw all my other books either up for free or onto muddy boots so it at least gets out there and maybe makes some money. 
I hope is that my ultimate punishment is that the worst book I’ve written, the zombie book I wrote as a joke gets put up as a humiliating netflix show.
One can only hope.
See you…
–
A little boy with a blank expression stares off into the distance as his head is lathered and shaved in preparation for his training.
A crude clownface is painted over his dull lifeless face.
Sitting before the elder clown master. The elder’s legs crossed, his eyes closed solemnly puffing on a pipe, a few bubbles coming out of the end of it as he thinks to himself.
“My young one, you are now a clown in appearance but not one in spirit, a clown does not have to smile on the outside, but in his heart there must be laughter.” The old man put his pipe to one side and leaned forward. “Once you can take this nose from my face your training will be complet-“
Before he could finish the child ripped the nose from the old man’s face, the sound it made was a ridiculous honking as he squeezed it in his little hands.
“You didn’t let me finish” The old man spat “What I meant to say was ‘your training will be complete when you can take the red nose- without it honking.” He said as he took the nose and popped it back on his nose with a loud honk.
“Now the first part of your training will be to enter that tent over there-“. The old man raised a wrinkled tattooed arm pointing towards a large tent covered in strange graffiti clown markings. Lots of ‘Ha-ha’s and ‘why so serious?’s and other edgy stuff like that.
The boy quickly began to rise without changing his expression “Hey- let me finish will ya?” The old man scowled “On your hands” He smirked.
The child looked sceptical at the old man for only a moment, not sceptical but surprised and then accepting. As if he was about to listen to a ridiculous story but been told it was ‘based on real events’.
“Only those who can walk on their hands can truly say they know how to walk on their feet.” The old man smiled. “No man in that tent walks on his feet, to do so would shame the holy ground”.
–
The orange dust settled on a road side flea market bizarre selling all manner of goods and trinkets. The merchants wore long ragged clothing and hunched to display there wares on rickety stands made from refuse metal and wood. Their hands clasped as they sharply eyed customers over their long hawkish noses.
Pookie had agreed to accompany Riki on a quick supply run for the tent commune thing.
“Thanks for coming with me” Riki said over his shoulder.
“I had nothing better to do” Pookie said as he picked up a weird nick nack of a clown with green hair and yellow skin.
He pulled the string and the doll said in a strange mechanical voice “I’m crusty the clown hahaha”.
Pookie sneered at the little doll before putting it down and saying “Never heard of you.”
Riki continued looking forward and talking as if to no one. “You must be wondering about Jersey, what’s she’s doing with a bunch of guys like us.”
“Not really.” Pookie said prodding a stuffed dinosaur toy with one of it’s legs missing.
“It doesn’t strike you as odd a young woman like that would be in the company of all these men?”
“Take a look at me guy, ya think anything strikes me as odd?”
Riki turned to look Pookie up and down and said “Hmm, I guess not.” He smirked. “But you have been thinking about her?”
Pookie was flustered for a second before he said “What, no!”
“She came to us much like you did.”
“I didn’t come to you, we’re just passing through.”
“Passing through huh? I like that.” Riki laughed. “She had nowhere else to go, the wastes churn out so many like her, no families, no friends, no hope. We’re all like that in some way, but it’s good to find others, ya know what I mean?”
“Not really” Pookie said.
“Sure” Riki laughed as he turned back around and dipped his head to smiled with his arms behind his back.
Pookie let him walk on a little further while he messed with some beanie babies he had no intention of buying. With the no money he had before he heard an off putting whimpering sound.
“Look kid, I’ve already told you, I’m not a teacher and I don’t have time for this crap ok.” Riki yelled.
“Please master, I beg of you accept me as a student, I wont take no as an answer. I’ll wait night and day out in the acid rain and the radiation, I’ll do anything.”
“Try going away.”
“Good evening sir? Maam?”
“Who are you? Some other nutjob that wants me to train them?”
Pookie sighed exasperated and decided to go over and see what was happening.
The scene was an unusual one. That weird fumer kid from before was on his knees begging Riki to train him, on the verge of tears. But more pressing was the tall gaunt man standing just behind Riki in his blind spot.
He was slim and ghostly looking wearing a weird multicolored wrapping around his head with an unusual gem in the centre. His face seemed dark and brooding despite the bright time of day. Atop his lip was a neatly trimmed pencil thin moustache and soul patch below. The look in his eye was piercing but also seemed like a chameleon looking everywhere at once.
“I have heard you are very skilled, I would like to put those skills to the test in a duel.” The man said, his voice rising eloquently, a slight tinge of accent running through his words.
“And who are you?” Riki asked defiantly.
“I am but a humble warrior mystic who wishes to put his skills to the test. I have travelled all over this world and learned very many interesting techniques, I’d like to see how they stack up to someone such as yourself.”
“Is that a challenge?” Riki smiled.
“You can call it that” The man laughed.
All the while the young fumer Brandon was looked back and forth between them in some form of incomparable awe at the two figures and the aura they gave off.
It seemed as if the air pressure changed as these two unusual men studied eachother.
–
Read the rest of the chapter on inkitt.
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LCYE Chapter 12 ‘Silent Circus’

Bonjour, you know the drill now ladies and gentlefolk. I rambled on for a bit and then dish out another chapter of one of my many and diverse brainfarts.

Honestly not much has happened between the last time I did this except oh yeah I have a child now. Surprise. I have a child with a woman that doesn’t like me, on the otherside of the globe that I’ll most likely never see and she’ll grow up resenting me and calling someone else daddy.

Enough of that drama.

The wheels are still turning, I kicked the people who need kicks in the asses and it should be working it’s way up now. The cover sketches are on the way and I’ve sent the lcye manuscript off for editing, we’re just working out payment now.

So here it is as promised, soon to be edited and available for free when you join my mailing list. As usual this is just a snippet, the full chapter and the rest of the book can be found on inkitt with the hyperlink below.

LCYE Chapter 12

Silent Circus
~
Con drove this time.

“Right over there” Harri said.

“I see it”.

Con pulled the Lincoln into the Riverside County Sheriff’s department parking lot.

The department had its own street sectioned off with the court house on one side and the Robert Presley detention centre on the other.

They parked in the small east side parking lot in between a couple of shiny pickup trucks.

The building itself was located in downtown riverside. A built up area that made a change from the open spaces they’d become accustomed to out here.

The courthouse, the detention centre and the sheriff’s department building were all concrete buildings. Elegant but with a hint of noble authoritarianism.

The building they’d parked in the shadow of was a tall rectangular concrete edifice. The windows of which were narrow strips high across the top, well above the average person’s height. Around eight or nine feet off the ground hooded by concrete awnings. Evidently it was some sort of holding facility not connected to the actual detention centre.

Despite the serious tone the buildings evoked, this was still California and of course there were palm trees everywhere. But even they were regulated in a strict spacing along the sidewalks. More serious plants stood guard in grey concrete planters along the edge of the rectangular holding facility. Some sort of fern or bush that had been trimmed into a phallic point.

On the other side of the parking lot was what looked like a multi-storey car park. They’d come the opposite way so hadn’t passed it. In between that and the temporary holding cells was a small red building with a comms tower poking out of the top. That must have been some kind of small office building for admin personnel.

Con hopped out of the car and quick stepped around the front not quite sure what to expect. Harri bundled herself out of her side almost visibly shaking. The thought of standing seemed to throw her. She sat for a moment turned out in her seat leaning on the open door taking in as much air as she could before could stand without feeling sick.

Con stood like a child watching his mother recover from a car crash. He was a good foot away standing with his hands out of his pocket not sure whether he should try and help her.

His mind was made up when she steadied herself against central column of the Lincoln and her Glock fell out of hip holster. He quickly stepped in and stooped to pick up the small plastic gun, which now looked like a cap gun on the parking lot floor.

He lifted it up like a glass slipper and presented it to her on one knee. She scowled at him and made a chupse sound. “Thanks” She put the Glock back in the holster and steadied herself.

His eyes searched her for a moment and she chupsed again “It’s nothing sordid ok?”

“I didn’t say anything”

“I know but I can feel your smirk.” She closed her eyes and lowered the pitch of her voice “It’s not a big deal, I don’t want you to go building it up in your mind”

“I wouldn’t dream of it” A little smirk leaked out, his fears of her unknown past seemed to melt away just a little.

She sighed and chewed on her lip a little almost for show.

“You know I used to be a cop”

“No, I didn’t know that.”

“Really, I thought everybody knew. Well regardless, I used to be a cop back in St Louis and when I was such a thing I worked in narcotics.” She paused to watch his cogs spin a little. “I know what you’re thinking and it’s not that. I didn’t steal drugs from the taskforce, you think someone with a history like that could make it into the FBI?”

Con shrugged.

~

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GREEN SUNDAY Chapter 13 ‘Sunday Mourning’ (Edited) Sunday returns, finally.

Ok ok finally getting around to going over these edited chapters of GS fresh out of the girl and cat publishing bakery of fine editing. Thanks as always to Nat and her time and effort and really great comments.

I’ve fallen behind on these and now seeing a gap in writing I thought it was best to strike now and get them out of the way so I can move onto editing for my newer stuff and get onto a new project.
I’m taking a little break, which isn’t really a break and will last til january. I’m just not starting any new projects at the minute and focusing on editing and cleaning older stuff up as well as plotting new stories mainly a sloppy as shit Dexter fanfic. I’ve got big dreams people, I’ve got Jeff Linday on facebook and we’ve exchanged like five words haha. I’m sure he’s just chomping at the bit to have me take the reigns of his mythos haha.

Honestly, I don’t know why I’m doing it, I should be plotting out my fantasy story or laying the solid ground work for a new Green Sunday but I just felt like doing some Dexter stuff for fun. It just bubbled to the surface of my mind and I felt like hammering it out a little for when I eventually start reading the books again and getting straight in my head.

In January, I’ll be jumping into another novella probably, just to break the pace up a little, do something a tad different, a little fantasy/surreal horror. Which now thinking back sounds pretty much what Ladies Close Your Eyes turned into but I didn’t intend it to haha.

It’ll be another adapted comic strip and I have a rough idea which one I have in mind but I’m a fickle cunt so whichever sticks best in my head on the day will be what goes down, new year new head, new flesh.

So here we are back again, I’ve got all the chapters done now, just gonna doll them out to you on here and of course you can read them all, because I’m just putting them all up as they’re done on my inkitt page which I will leave a link to below.

I’m probably going to launch the full book on amazon some time next year when I get the cover back from an artist friend of mine and do some marketing giving away LCYE as a free ebook, which I’ll do on here and facebook and twitter and probably minds.

Here it is chapter 13 ‘Sunday Mourning’, let me know what you think and don’t forget to check on out on twitter and minds.

https://www.minds.com/CallMeRyk

As always the full chapter can be found on my inkitt page.

Sunday Mourning

See you…

–

A drone camera buzzed over the scene behind TJ’s house, out of sight, too high up to be heard. Its ambivalent gaze documenting everything. Its lens flitted about like that of an insect’s eye. The monitor feed from Evergreen’s deployment truck glared as he grinned back, the feed reflected in his goggles.

“She got too close to the perimeter of the game zone. Looks like she was taken out by beta team,” The nerd at the console said as he looked over the footage again. “Very clean; she won’t have felt a thing.” Murray straightened his glasses with a morbid sense of appreciation. “They really are the best, sir”.

“Uh huh.” Evergreen’s grin shrunk a few sizes, listening to the tech gush. “It’s time.”.

“Yes, sir, beginning stage three,” the tech said as he turned back to his console.

~

Helicopter blades cut through a violent wind, casting rain in wide dispersal patterns as the heavy behemoths rocked back and forth.

These were military transport helicopters, for carrying battlements or vehicles to the field: four in all, carrying heavy metal containers. They looked like smooth industrial shipping containers, but both the containers and the choppers were completely unmarked.

“Roger that. We’re estimated four hours out of the drop zone. Good morning. If this rain lets up, it’s gonna be a beautiful day,” the chopper pilot said over his radio.

~

“You kept me waiting,” Carpenter whispered as he twisted the barbed point of the arrow under Dave’s chin. Dave grimaced, dropping his torch and kukri.

“Killing me will do you no good. I’m not a part of the game; I’m just his assistant!”

Carpenter took Dave by his shoulders and threw him down on the dirty linoleum floor. Dave offered little resistance and fell at the side of the dead woman drinking the milkshake. His fall caused her to shift in her seat, sliding down the bench until her face rested right next to Dave’s as he attempted to dust himself off. By the dim light of his torch he could see he was in kissing range of the gaping exit wound in her face.

“Oh, shit!” He gaped.

“‘Oh, shit’ indeed,” Carpenter chuckled as he picked up both Dave’s torch and his kukri knife.

“What do you want?”

Carpenter put the torch under his chin and smiled like a ghoul in an old monster movie. “A way out.”

“Why would I know the way?”

“Do you like scary movies?” Carpenter said, smiling. He poked each yellow tooth with his tongue in turn. “You don’t think there was someone like you and your butt buddy up there the last time?” Carpenter let out a bitter little breathy laugh. He shook the beam of the torch around, feigning hysterics. “It’s a sick world we live in.”

He marched up to Dave and stomped on the leg closest to him; Dave let out an anguished cry like an injured animal.

Carpenter crouched down next to Dave, shining the torch in his face and Dave cowered under the beam, guarding his eyes with his hand. Carpenter saw it immediately and snickered to himself, thinking of something poetic to say at this karmic justice he’d send on its way. “Feeling all right? Fever? Dry mouth? Itching under the skin? E-rectile dysfunction?”

Dave looked up at him and swallowed a dry gob of spit.

“There’s a helicopter. North side of town, by the abandoned railyard, but it’s guarded; you’ll never make it alone.”

Carpenter gave him that wide devil grin and turned to walk away, tossing the torch and the kukri away as he left Dave scrabbling in the dark.

“I’m not alone; not anymore.”

~

TJ couldn’t move. His body was rooted to the ground by chains of empty regret. His limbs felt hollow and heavy at the same time.

“TJ, it’s Sunday, I know we just met, but you have to trust me. I used you; I’m not a good person. But I can make it up to you, if you live,” Sunday whispered in TJ’s ear where he lay on the cold, damp grass of his backyard. A light drizzle was approaching, accompanied by muffled threats of dull, aching thunder.

TJ remained perfectly still. Sunday swallowed and turned him over. His eyes were open, vacant and grey. His mouth hung open a fraction and fluttered as if he was trying to say something but didn’t have enough energy. “TJ, can you hear me? We need to move. You’re gonna come with me, OK?” She hooked her dainty little hands under his sweaty pits, lifting him with some effort. “Urf, fuck, you’re heavy!”

She turned him around and dragged him in the direction of his house. “Ergh! This would be a lot easier if you just – hrrff, hrrff – stood up and, you know, walked.”

She got him back into the kitchen, which felt a lot colder now. Closing the door, she looked out the window. His mother’s body, lying there, looked almost beautiful. Sunday breathed in and out, feeling her icy breath swirling around in her chest. “It could have been worse,” she sighed as the rain rolled in.

~

 

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Blood Ties By Katie Matthias – A review

Bloody good.

Hands down this is probably the most professional story I’ve read on inkitt. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was an actual novel someone had copy pasted here haha.
It’s very professionally written, the prologue is nice, but after reading the first chapter it seems a little bit surperfluous to have her locked up. I think the first chapter has enough of a hook the prologue draws it out a little too much and considering the first chapter is already very long, it seems a little excessive and overindulgent.
The style is perfect, first person narratives are hard to get right, but you nailed it. It’s just right, not too cocky or self-depricating, it hits a sweet spot right in the middle and I like the character of Ana. Female characters are tough, if you make them too nice they come off as Bella Swan wilting violets, too tough and they just sound bitchy. Ana is not too hot and not too cold, she’s just right. Not too nice as to be boring and not too mean to call a bitch.
The first chapter is everything I’d want from a first chapter, it sets up the story, the characters, and leaves a nice thread for the overarching plot, culminating in a very nice hook. It’s a little long but it really makes use of all that length, there’s never a point that seems unnecessarily drawn out or boring, it’s all vital and interesting and gripping.
Now to set this aside, the level of research is great, the medical knowledge on display, is very believable, and it really helps pull me into the story. This to me and any else reading it says, this took time and effort, somebody loved this book and put their time into.
The only real criticism I have are few and far between and almost too middling to mention. Ok well the paragraphs are really much too long, you just have these big long walls of text that need mountaneering equipment to scale.
That’s gripe one, gripe two, the title, it’s incredibly generic. Just type ‘blood ties’ into google and you get a laundry list of book and shows and movies and what have you. It’s much too mundane a title for such a skillful book.
My third and final gripe; Vampires? Really? haha.

All in all I think this is probably the most accomplished thing I’ve read on inkitt, I could easily see this in print, easily. Even a film adaptation. Bravo.

If you want to read the story in full and reserve a free copy, it would really help out a fantastic fledgling writer.

Blood Ties

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