Bad Girl Blogfest – Mary

Bad Girl Blogfest – Mary

BIO – Wild Mary

• Novel: Wild Mary’s Way
• Role: Main Character, Hero
• Created: 1998
• Setting: Future post-apocalyptic wasteland.
• Aliases or Nicknames: Wild Mary, Mary of Archa
• Nationality: Citizen of Archa, Kingdom of Calph
• Position: Warrior
• Age: ~18
• Synopsis: Wild Mary was brought up in a military academy by her father, and far surpassed his abilities by a young age. She holds her sword in her left hand, and refuses to fight with her right. A deep-seated anger runs through her veins, and woe be to anyone who crosses her path. But sometimes, in the heat of battle, a Weakness overcomes her, leaving her feeble and sick.

Excerpt

Post-apocalyptic future, former San Fernando Valley. Mary has just escaped the Archa Military Academy and now faces her first day of freedom.

The sun shone grand, warming Mary’s naked limbs with morning heat. She squatted at the side of the road, resting after her ten mile jog that started at first light. Her limbs had complained at first, not used to the weight of her pack, but they warmed to the task. She swallowed water from her skin, then chew some lamb jerky. Ahead lay Calph, the seat of the Kingdom. Behind her Archa, and the Academy that had been her only home. In the distance, farmers tended their fields, while closer, cows lowed in their pastures.

Sated, Mary stripped off her chest harness and tied it to her pack. Her only garments consisted of her waist harness and a fur to keep the pack from chafing. The fur didn’t quite cover her chest, but she thought little of it. Why should she dress differently from any male warrior? She strapped on the pack and hit the path at a practiced gait she could maintain for hours.

A few miles later, the road passed through rolling hills capped with small wooded glades. In one of these glades, Mary sensed something amiss. Years of training had prepared her to spot the bent grasses along the road’s edge, the biting scent of men and horses, and small scratchings of feet on leaves. The pack flew off her back and her sword flew from its scabbard, sinking into the chest of a man who had launched himself from a rock that hung above the road.

A half-score of ragged men, dressed in torn leather and linen, jumped from the forest. As quick as thought, the sword drank from their lives, slipping in and out of their bodies in a surgically precise attack. Six men lay dead before their fellows paused. Mary waited, blood dripping from her sword, her right hand held high to ward off the sun.

Rustling filled the forest as additional men crept into the battle, armed with rusty old swords or dull knives. Mary would be trapped against the rock. She needed open space. She feinted in one direction, then charged in another, nicked a man’s carotid, and sprinted down the road. The other men pursued.

The road descended into a river. Where was the bridge? Mary stopped at the edge of the river, facing the onrushing attackers. Yes, she could doubtless outrun or outswim them, but she needed her pack. The open riverbank was as good as any to make her stand.

“Come on, girl,” said one man, panting. “You put that little stick down and we’ll be real nice to you.”

Mary squinted. I am the attacker. Their taunts shall not alter my strategy. Twelve men faced her. She recited a litany of forms used when faced with overwhelming odds. Press the attack. Don’t wait for them. Her hand trembled, begging for action. Who is the strongest? Who poses the least danger? She chose her victims. With a scream, she launched herself at the men, her weapon forming a maze of metal as it flashed among their ranks. Their swords found her, but she deflected the bulk of their efforts. Her metal did not fail. Blood filled the air, splattered into her hair and eyes, and dripped down her breasts. This was war. This was fighting. At last.

The last two men, the weak ones, armed with puny knifes and skinny frames faced her. Not worth the effort of killing, she slaughtered them nonetheless, their heads rolling onto the ground, life pouring from their severed necked. She raised her sword and screamed to the sky. She kissed her sword and then ran it against her tongue, tasting the blood of the men she had dispatched. A dizziness seized her, and she dropped to her knees in the midst of the carnage.

Here it comes. “The Weakness,” she called it. Women wailed and keened as they stumbled down the road towards their lifeless husbands. Mary’s stomach clenched and she vomited. She hated the Weakness. The sight of blood and severed limbs—a true warrior should not be affected, but a part of her rebelled, the cursed female part. She turned from the corpses, covered her face, and breathed, spitting the bile from her tongue. The women pawed through the bodies, shuddering and clinging to one another. “Get away from me,” growled Mary, not wishing to injure further. The women stayed.

Mary jumped up and sprinted down the road until she recovered her pack. She hoisted it upon her shoulders, and then returned to the scene. She stripped naked and bathed her wounds in the river as flies spread among the corpses. She swam to the far side to continue her journey. One woman called to her.

“Who are you that you dare murder our men in cold blood,” she screamed.

Mary considered. “I am Wild Mary, Warrior of Archa, and woe to those who cross my path!” She turned and ran.

There you have it. Wild Mary in a nutshell. Her struggle is coming to grips with her two sides to become a whole person. I literally dreamed the entire novel and wrote it in a couple days (it’s only 35K words).

Bad Girl Blogfest – Elena

Bad Girl Blogfest – Elena

BIO – Elena

• Name: Elena Galistina
• Novel: 30 Days: The Infinity Event, The Singularity Matrix
• Role: Ally, Love Interest
• Created: 2007
• Setting: Modern Day San Francisco
• Aliases or Nicknames: Agent Ellie
• Nationality: Dual Russian/Chinese Citizenship
• Position: General in People’s Secret Army of China
• Age: ~26
• Synopsis: Elena (“Agent Ellie”) started her assassination career in a young age as a Russian immigrant to China. She turned upon her masters, and rose high in the ranks of the People’s Army secret service. Tiring of that life, she moved to San Francisco to take up simple corporate espionage where nothing is as simple as it appears.

Excerpt

Thanksgiving Day, 2007, at a cabin outside of Lake Tahoe. Alex Ross and Ellie have just fought off mercenaries with the help of Chinese agents. Ellie is now interrogating them. This was posted to by Alex to his blog a couple days afterwards.

Ellie surveys her prisoners in front of the cabin. An army of trucks and Chinese men winds its way up the smoking path. The first tackle the small fires in the forest and then they round up the corpses. Twenty-three dead and six captured. Ellie’s men dump her gory kills in front of the prisoners. The cabin looks like something out of “The Guantlet,” riddled with hundreds of bullet holes.

“I want you to tell me everything.” She paces before them, her visage caked with drying blood. The men stand with bowed heads, their hands bound with plastic cable ties behind their backs. “Take a good, hard look as these fools. A similar fate awaits you. We are not American citizens, and we are not subject to the rules of this country. You dared attack a foreign agent, and now you will pay the price. We can make you disappear, so that your friends and families will never hear from you again. I want to know who’s behind this and I want to know now.”

The men shuffle and glance amongst themselves. “We didn’t want any of this,” says one dressed in desert fatigues. “This was supposed to be clean, get in, get out, you know?”

Ellie stops and smiles. “You’re one of the leaders, I take it? Good. What are you, a Guardsman or something? Do you have any real experience?”

“Recon over in Iraq.”

“You people are pathetic.” Ellie stomps at them. “If you are the product of the American military, then I don’t think my country has much to fear.” She strips wires and a headset off the man. “Is this how you contact your commander? What’s your call sign?”

The man hesitates. Ellie’s men push guns against his neck but she waves them off. “Please,” she says.

“Foxtrot Delta. My contact is Charlie Papa.”

Ellie dons the headset. “Come in, Charlie. I know you’re listening. Elena Galistina here. I really appreciate you sending your friends to the Ross’s Thanksgiving dinner. I’m so sorry that so many of them chose to be unruly and act inappropriately. I’m afraid that I’ve had to excuse them from the table. Are you still listening, Charlie?”

She winks at me. What is Ellie up to?

“Well, Charlie,” she continues, “I’m sorry you won’t respond. No matter. Your friends have decided to stay. They’re telling me all about you. Foxtrot Delta has been extremely helpful. You’ve just made yourself a terrible enemy. I’m not the kind of person to acknowledge niceties, or the rules of war, or even laws of common decency. Hmm. I think a demonstration is in order.”

She places the wires back on Foxtrot’s head and leans in. “Tell them everything that’s about to happen. I want Charlie to hear every detail. Now choose one. Choose one of your men.”

“No.”

She lays a hand on his shoulder. “Foxtrot. It’s either you or one of them. You remember what I did in the house, don’t you? The teeth? Do you really want to die that way, choking on your own blood?”

He points to one of his men. The dude screams. I’m worried that Ellie has snapped.

“Good. Bring him over there.” Her men drag the struggling merc back behind a Hummer over on the edge of the yard. She walks past me, holding her knife up to the sun.

I shiver. “Don’t.”

She winks at me and grins, then hands me the knife. “I won’t need this.” She disappears behind the vehicle. Her victim screams.

Foxtrot talks into the headset. “She’s behind the truck. He’s screaming, can you hear that? Blood is flying everywhere. Oh my god, she’s a monster. Please, send us some help! Wait—she’s coming back, covered with blood. I’m going to be sick. God help us all.”

I wander over and glance behind the truck. The man is unconscious, but unharmed. Blood lies everywhere, but also a can and a baster. The same baster we were using for the turkey. Where did the blood come from?

I walk back over, holding my stomach, acting the part. “God, Ellie, not again. Please, no more. I can’t stand it.”

Ellie snatches the headset. “Now Charlie, I’d hate to do that to the rest of your men, but once I start, it’s hard to stop. I’ll give you a piece of advice. Get the hell out of town. I will track you down, and I will kill you in the most brutal fashion that our culture has ever produced. I will create a river of blood so thick that you’ll drown in it. If I even feel a breath of yours, I will stifle it so quickly that you’ll be watching you body fall away while I hold your severed head. Now I need to go and finish off these men. Have a nice day.”

She pulled off the rest of the unit and stomped on it, smashing it to bits.

“Let’s go for a walk,” she says nicely to Foxtrot. “Nice and slow. We’ll eventually wind up behind the truck. You don’t want to go behind the truck. You see, I kill with my bare hands. I can make it fast or slow, it’s really up to you.”

They walk towards the truck. Ellie says not a word. Halfway there, Foxtrot hesitates. “What? What do you want to know? Say something. Say something!” She keeps walking, her blood-stained face expectant. “Stop staring at me! What the hell is wrong with you?!” They reach the truck, she cocks her head, eyebrows raised. She motions for him to move.

“Okay! Stop! We received our instructions online. The entire transaction, plans, names, maps, everything. Except for today, no one even ever talked to them. And their voice was scrambled, sounding like a frog or something.”

Ellie just stands there, staring at him.

“What? I’ve told you everything. Say something!”

Ellie points around to the back of the truck. The man’s face is all shades of red.

“No! What do you want? Will you fucking say something!? Shit! Listen, we just get paid. We’re nobodies. I can show you anything. Our website, our IP logs, our servers, the logs for the headsets, everything you need to track them down. Just don’t make me go back there, please.”

Ellie nods at me. I hope for his sake the man is telling the truth.

So I wrote 2 blogvels about Elena. You can find the links on my blog main page (look for 30 Days). Her journey is really only begun, because her parents are still held hostage. Some day I hope to resurrect her character, because she’s a lot of fun.

Bad Girl Blogfest – Carrie

Bad Girl Blogfest – Carrie

BIO – Carrie

• Name: Carrie Park
• Novels: 30 Days: The Infinity Event, The Singularity Matrix
• Role: Villain
• Created: 2007
• Setting: Modern Day San Francisco
• Aliases or Nicknames: Shelly White
• Nationality: American
• Position: Director of Software Development, Infinitae Corporation
• Age: ~25
• Synopsis: After spending years in hospitals reconstructing her body after a devastating car crash, Carrie has changed her face, changed her name, and now plots revenge against the perpetrators of the wreck. Her stranglehold on the world’s financial system nearly brought down the economy and contributed heavily to the recent financial crisis.

Excerpt

November 29, 2007. Alex Ross has been framed by Carrie Park for blowing up Infinitae’s Building Four. He now seeks revenge and to clear his name.

Now to find Carrie. She’s going to pay for destroying Building Four.

I drive around San Francisco. Carrie’s smart. She’s probably somewhere monitoring everything. She’ll want to know the second that suspicions are cast in her direction. She’ll want to have direct access to Infinitae’s data gathering prowess.

She had mentioned “south.” Where? There’s Stanford. She might have access to some servers there.

What about the datacenter warehouse in Santa Clara? Infinitae has blocked it, but that wouldn’t pose much of a challenge to the woman who wrote the blocking code. I head there.

I stop near the warehouse. The streets lay quiet and dark. I have no idea how to get in. I’m not a spy. How would Ellie do it? She’d probably bust a door down. The back door. I drive around and check it out. There’s no handle, only a lock. I get out, put my ear against the door, and I’m rewarded with the roar of still-active servers. Something’s up.

I get back in, line the car up with the door, and slam the gas. It impacts with a crunch. I pull the car away. The door’s frame is loose, and with some wiggling I’m able to pull it completely off, frame and all, probably triggering an alarm.

I draw my gun and remove the safety. I have no intention of killing Carrie, unless she fires first. I head towards the front, searching for the office. I spot it, but it’s empty. A dozen large monitors in the office display newscasts, surveillance footage, and various readouts. One monitor displays my damaged car. The cold business end of a gun presses against my neck.

“Drop it or I’ll drop you.”

Carrie. I toss my gun away. My mouth goes dry.

“Put your hands on your head.” She pats me down and swipes my emergency cell phone, pocketing it. She laughs. I cringe.

“Wow, Alex, you never give up. Where’s you friend Elena? Too hurt to make the trip? What a shame. Move it.”

She shoves me into the small office at gunpoint and sits opposite me. “What are you doing here, Alex? Come to kill me?”

“If I have to. You’ve done some bad things.”

Carrie shakes her head. “Hey, I didn’t make anyone suffer for years. Every person I killed died with very little pain.”

You tell yourself that. ”So now what, Carrie? Are you going to kill me?”

She picks up my phone and studies it. “Maybe I should call the news stations. I could be a hero. I’ve already tied you and Ellie to this datacenter. It wouldn’t be a stretch to get them to believe this is your hideout. Hero today, goat tomorrow. And I come out smelling great.”

That would be the day. ”Then what? What’s your big plan? You can’t go back to Infinitae. You can’t escape suspicion forever.”

Carrie points around with her gun. “See all this? Do you know how many emails and IM’s and chats and voice communications I’ve collected? I’ve captured trillions of conversations waiting to be mined. Even as we speak, I’m transcribing all kinds of voice conversations. The NSA would kill for a system like this.”

She’s insane. “Why? What’s it all for?”

She leans forward and rubs the butt of the gun on her forehead. “God, Alex, you idiot, do I really need to spell it all out for you? Think of all the corporate insider information I’d have. I’d know about every earnings miss. I’d know how senators are about to vote. I’d know what the Fed is planning. Within a few years, I’d be the richest person on the planet. I could run for office, buy a few campaigns, and who knows? I could be President. Imagine that, President Park.”

“You mean President White, don’t you?” Bitch.

She glares and aims her gun in my general direction. “Shelly White is dead. That loser no longer exists. You made sure of that. Maybe I should thank you. You know, we’re really not that different, you and me. Maybe that’s why I liked you so much back then. I was a loser, and you were a loser, too. But guess what? I’ve grown up, and you’re still a fucking loser.”

I snort. “We’re nothing alike. You’re a murderous, psychopathic bitch with delusions of grandeur. You’ll never get away with any of it. They’ll trace everything back to you.”

Carrie shakes her head. “Forget it Alex, I’ve covered my tracks too well. They’ve got nothing on me. Look at this screen. I’m monitoring the entire world for any mention of my name. The moment it pops up, I can be prepared to defend myself.” She waves at the consoles.

I shrug and look around. My leg shakes. Carrie studies my face. “Alex. Are you expecting someone? Oh my gosh.” She looks at my phone, then rips it open. “Alex, I’m surprised at you! This phone has been transmitting this entire conversation, hasn’t it? But it looks like it’s off. Let me see. Ahh, here it is, the battery is it’s own transmitter. I can take it out and it’s still going. Genius!” She smashes the whole thing with the butt of her gun, then points the gun at me.

I can’t help but smile at her. I won. “They’ll be here in a minute. It’s over, Shelly. You’ve confessed to everything. It’s all been transmitted and—oh yeah you’ll like this—posted on the internet!”

Her face grows dark. “Get up. Get up or I’ll drill you.”

Alarms chime all though the building. On the monitors black cars pull up from every street. The entire building is surrounded.

“Come on, move it.” She pushes me ahead of her. I look back as she grabs a device off her desk and pulls out an antenna. Shit.

“What is that, a detonator?”

“Move your ass, Ross, or I’ll set it off right now.”

She pushes me through the datacenter to a metal railing that leads up to a ceiling panel. “Remove the panel, and don’t try anything funny.” The railing leads up past the panel to the roof about thirty feet up. “Climb!”

At the top I push through a hatch. Up on the roof, hidden from the street, stands a small gyrocopter. “Stand back,” cries Carrie. Lights flash in every direction. She jumps into the single passenger aircraft. She pushes some buttons, and the blades spin. I notice that the roof of the building has been cleared out like a runway.

“Hey Alex,” she shouts at me through the growing din of the gyro’s motor, “the moment you stepped inside, I detected your transmission. You think I can’t dampen a cell signal? You’ve lost, Alex, and I’ll make sure you get blamed for this explosion too. Goodbye.”

She revs up the motor and taxies down the roof of the building. I run after her and grab one piece of the rear wing. I hold on for dear life as I’m dragged along the roof.  I can’t hold on and I roll right to the edge of the roof. I have about two seconds to jump off before the whole building explodes in a huge burst of flame. I hit the ground and roll under a car as a deluge of servers and wires and cinder blocks rain down all around me. Once the debris stops, I run, blood oozing from a dozen painful wounds. I spot a car where some people had stopped to look at the fire, leaving it running. I hop into it and speed away.

Well, I’m back at Ellie’s hideout now. There are videos on the web connecting me to the scene. None of my secret transmissions got through. I can’t beat Carrie. She’s just too smart. Her gyrocopter disappeared to who knows where, and I have no way to clear my name. Wherever you are Carrie, know that you can’t escape, and I’ll be chasing you.

Carrie is the most certifiable anti-social megalomaniac I’ve ever created. She’s brilliant, resourceful, and highly manipulative. She’s a classic mad scientist, surrounded by incompetent boobs. And she always gets away in the end.

Bad Girl Blogfest – Amelia

Bad Girl Blogfest – Amelia

BIO – Amelia

• Name: Amelia (surname unknown)
• Novel: The Immortals
• Role: Supporting Character
• Created: 2009
• Setting: America 2400 to the year ~5300
• Aliases or Nicknames: The Sky Goddess, Amy, Ames, Sky
• Nationality: Originally American
• Position: Sky Goddess, one of the Twelve Immortals created by Death Angel
• Age: yes (she doesn’t age…hence the “Immortal” tag)
• Synopsis: REDACTED

Excerpt

CONTENT REDACTED

Sorry folks, this is a current WIP and I didn’t want to leave it up. Thanks for your interest!

Bad Girl Blogfest – Viola

Bad Girl Blogfest – Viola

BIO – Viola

• Name: Viola Willimante
• Novel: Steam Palace
• Role: Ally, Mentor, Sidekick
• Created: 2009
• Setting: Alternate History New England, 1901
• Name, Aliases or Nicknames: Vi
• Nationality: New Britannian
• Position: Dome Girl on the Steam Palace
• Age: 23
• Synopsis: Viola carries a secret that links her to a woman whom she has never before met. She plots that woman’s ultimate destruction: to bring her into the horrid sorrow of Viola’s life, a quagmire of humiliation, self destruction and abuse, and soul-crushing wickedness.

Excerpt:

September 28, 1901, aboard a mechohorse-drawn wagon on the River Trail.

Viola eyed the poor woman hiding under the bench. Such an innocent flower, Sophia wouldn’t last half an hour aboard the Steam Palace. She had an attraction about her, an irresistible cuteness that sickened her. Curly red locks, a button nose, freckles, and a wide smile would make her a quick favorite among the men—until one of them used and broke her like every Palace Girl, and she became as black as Viola.

Viola smiled and rubbed the woman’s knee. Men of wealth and women of high repute populated the wagon as it rumbled along the river trail. She was perhaps the only woman of lesser repute aboard, although she dare not openly show it. She winked at a man who caught her eye, and he blushed. His golden chains and silver buckles intrigued her. What might such a man might offer her for a night of pleasure? More than that, she shivered at the thrill of seeing poor Sophia’s reaction if he were to advance. The girl crawled back up on the bench, her face tinged green. Viola slid next to Sophia and threw an arm around her, all the while staring at the man. She rubbed her lips, then licked a finger. He approached as she expected, his hat in his hand.

“I—I don’t exactly know how to do this,” he said, “I’m not familiar with the proper—intercourse—for this type of arrangement.”

Ahh, another Steam Palace newcomer. The women next to her stared at the man without comprehension. Viola declined to explain, enjoying the man’s incoherent turpitude.

He sat down on the other side of Sophia and leaned in. “Pardon me. You see, this is my first visit, and my friend over there,” he nodded to another man dressed in a similar manner, “claims that you are Palace Girls.”

“What is he talking about,” mumbled Sophia, trapped in the middle, holding her stomach and sipping water.

“We are no common Palace Girls. We are Dome Girls, the finest women upon the Steam Palace,” said Viola, ignoring Sophia’s query. Let her squirm. “Both of us for you? Or to share? Do you have a preference? Ten Royals buys your every dream come true.”

Sophia’s face turned a satisfying shade of black and she clutched Viola’s ruffles. “Tell me you did not just sell my services to this man—”

Viola turned to her. “You owe me, and you will repay it exactly as I say.” The woman didn’t respond, she only bent further at the waist. “Sorry, sir, she’s new.”

“Well I don’t have ten royals,” said the man, his gaze glued to Viola’s bosom. “What can I get for a fifty-crown?”

Fifty measly crown? For a Dome Girl? Viola beamed at him. “It’s what we call the ‘backseat special.’ Follow me to the rear of the wagon.” She rose and took the man by the hand.

Sophia tugged at Viola’s dress. “Please don’t do this. Don’t leave me here alone. I’m feeling most dreadful.”

“Be quiet!” Viola snatched the coin from the man, placed it inside her corset, and led the man to the back, to a small platform behind the luggage compartment, out of sight of the passengers. She reached up and held onto a bar. “Now pull your pants down, just down to your ankles. Good. Now close your eyes.” Once ready, Viola lifted herself up by the bar, swung her feet to the man’s chest, and kicked the man right over the rail. He landed heavily in the mud of the trail and rolled to a stop. Viola screamed every epithet in her vocabulary at him. “You vile dog! Don’t you ever touch a Dome Girl!” The nerve of some people. He jumped to his feet, pulled his pants up, and gave chase to the wagon, but the mechohorse outdistanced him. He fell to his knees screaming and waving his fist. A fifty-crown? Really?

She watched the landscape slip by, slowed her breathing, and then returned to the front. The man’s friend peered behind her. “Where’s Frederick,” he asked. “I thought I heard something.”

“Oh, he’s recovering,” she replied, sweet as molasses. “Why, is it your turn?”

The man pushed Viola aside and headed to the rear.

“Get ready,” Viola told Sophia who now lay on her side. “Cause I kicked little old Frederick from this land train.”

Sophia swallowed. “What? I thought you were—”

Viola pulled Sophia back to a sitting position and approached so close their noses almost touched. “Who exactly do you think I am, Stratton? I’m a Dome Girl, not some cheap gutter wench. That man insulted me, and he paid the price.”

Her companion rolled herself up in a ball, holding her knees. “Whatever.”

The man returned, his face red and spittle-ejecting. “What have you done with Frederick?”

Viola smiled and shrugged. “I guess he got off at the wrong stop.”

“Why you—” the man charged, his hands reaching for Viola’s throat.

Viola whipped out a thin knife and waved it in the man’s eyes. “Come one step closer and I’ll gut you.”

The wagon jerked to a halt. A shotgun-wielding man catapulted from the cockpit of the mechohorse and ran back to them. “Drop that weapon and get the hell off my wagon! Now! Both of you harlots!”

This is from a scene that is slated to be deleted because it is very similar to another scene. But it will live on here forever. Viola has a strange sense of pride about being a Dome Girl and loves embarrassing Sophia whenever she can.

Primal Scream Blogfest – Dawn’s Rise

Primal Scream Blogfest – Dawn’s Rise

Thanks to Raquel Burns for hosting the Primal Scream Blogfest. Follow the link to check out all the other entries!

Also, one last, final reminder that the Bad Girl Blogfest is Friday! Yay!

This excerpt comes from Dawn’s Rise, set in 2101, when a series of unprecedented disasters threaten Earth and life itself. Dawn has been captured by the evil Chairman, the leader of the world, and she has insisted that Dawn, a budding psychic, provide her a reading. The reading reveals a great deal, but suddenly Dawn sees something much more prescient.

Dawn staggered around the room, her visions furious. “No, no! Please, something terrible is here. Now! We need to get out of here. Death! Death is coming! Oh God, oh God, we’re all going to die—” Her throat screamed. Her eyesight flashed.

“Guards! Get her out of my sight,” the Chairman raged. “Put her back in the Hole. I’ll deal with her later. Do not let her talk to anyone!”

Guards threw on a hood and cuffed her wrists. Dawn fought against their rough hands. They herded her into the elevator and then tossed her into a waiting vehicle. An engine purred to life and they eased into the busy Charlotte streets while Dawn strained against her bonds.

The vehicle flipped. Dawn’s head smacked something hard. Stars shot into her vision and pain wrapped her head. The vehicle hopped and vibrated on its side. Bitter concrete dust and coppery tasting blood filled her mouth. A rumble thundered all around. She pulled off the hood. Dust filled the van and invaded her lungs. Black clouds darkened the sky, blotting out the sun. A guard lay at her feet in a dead heap. Escape. Dawn keyed his pad and unlocked her bolts, coughing and whimpering.

The van shook like jelly. Dawn kicked open the back. Dust boiled in every direction. The street overflowed with piles of debris and wrecked vehicles. Small particles rained. Dawn grasped the van for balance. Grit seared her eyes. Beams and blocks protruded from the dust clouds, the rubble from countless collapsed buildings. High above her tall buildings swayed and shimmied, their façades peeling off. Run! She bounded away, dodging cascades of falling rubble as she ran through the pulsing streets. She climbed up a small hill into an old cemetery. The dust cleared to provide a small vision of Charlotte. Gaps appeared where magnificent one-hundred-story-plus buildings used to stand.

“Okay, time to wake up,” she wheezed on the dust that clogged her airways. “I’ve have enough of this vision. C’mon, wake up.” She activated her Eyespy which reported, “Emergency Standby Mode. Instructions forthcoming.”

A motion caught her eye. “No—no—what is that?” In the distance, a wave of destruction flew across the landscape, a boiling tsunami of devastation. The violent upheaval of earth raced towards her, flinging rivers into the air, tossing cars like toys, and detonating the ground like a vast field of dynamite. This was no vision, no crazy delusion. Her bones rattled, her knees shook, and stomach clenched. Death approached. The wave swept down the streets, lifted the buildings, and before she could take another breath, flung her and the contents of cemetery high into the air. She sailed through the boiling soil, tensing in anticipation of the final impact that spelled her doom.

She slammed into a pile of loose dirt. Her breath escaped her pain-wracked body. Dirt and debris poured down. Her eyes refused to focus, her limbs refused to respond, and raining dirt prepared to bury her with the other corpses. Dawn clawed at the soil, gasping, suffocating. Survive. Just survive. She grasped a large tombstone that had nearly crushed her head. With her free hand she pulled the dirt from her eyes and froze. The grand HQ building, a kilometer high and the pinnacle of modern architecture, imploded and collapsed into the streets in a massive cloud. Thousands of people, crushed in an instant. But behind that—the Edenville Sky Towers. All 325 stories tilted and slid into the earth, thundering and generating towering clouds. “Rose!” Not Rose. Please, not Rose! This vision has to stop. This can’t be happening. I want it to stop. Now! Her stomach convulsed and purged itself. She rolled away, choking on dust and vomit.

The earth shivered and trembled. Dawn crawled from mound to mound, avoiding the churning soil. A smaller wave slammed through the dying city and flipped Dawn like a rag doll. The earth churned and bucked while Dawn clung to a toppled tree, wracked with coughs. Nothing in her visions had prepared her for this terrifying onslaught. Day became night.

The ground opened beneath her, a maw of a giant earthen whale with teeth of broken pipe and rebar. Dawn tumbled down, the bars ripping her clothes and cutting her flesh. A casket gaped, its contents spilling out as the dead rolled from their graves. She grabbed a pipe suspended above the chasm. As the earthen jaws closed in, she fought, climbing up the pipes and bars and out onto the heaving ground. She panted and gagged in the choking dust. Soil slid back towards the hole, but she pulled herself away before the chasm could swallow her again.

Steam Palace Cover Art

Steam Palace Cover Art

Wasn’t planning to post anything today but I needed to come up with a cover for Steam Palace for a web site I may use to get critiques and feedback. Click through to see full-size (8”x12”) versions.


Here’s Version One with both Viola and Sophia:

And here’s Version Two with just Sophia:


I had to go with the second version on the site because when it’s reduced to a small size, the first one looks bad.
I don’t love the font either. But definitely look at the full-size version because the background is pretty kewl. I also think I need an airship in there somewhere. But if you look carefully you’ll see lots of gears!
Next post will be my Primal Scream entry, I promise!
BTW if anyone’s interested, I got the images off of http://www.fairygothmother.co.uk which looks like it has really wild goth/steampunk/victorian outfits, so you can actually buy what they are wearing!