LeighB_NA

Chapter Fifteen is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Happy Christmas readers and enjoy the murders.

Chapter Fourteen is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

After a bit of a hiatus chapters nine through to thirteen are now available.

Share and enjoy.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Chapter Eight is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Chapter Seven is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Chapter Six is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Chapter Five is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Finally I’ve gotten over the hump that was chapter four (I should have written the fight scene better the first time around), so here it is.

Sorry about the delay. Expect a chapter every few days from now on.

Link to the main site.

For those of you who are interested. I have now done a little web badge for my novel which not only looks cool, but also updates to show which chapter is available.

The badge can be found at my main site [linky] (the thing that looks like the novel cover).

Another chapter should be published a bit later.

Chapter Three is now available.

Individual chapters and the story so far can be found here: The Wandering Year

Chapter Two

The sound of something breaking brought Karri slowly back to consciousness. One of her arms was numb. She must have been lying on it while she slept. Opening her eyes fully she stared blankly at the wall and carpet in front of her for a moment. Then she remembered the man in the car and the darkness that had enveloped her. She attempted to get up from where she lay.

Her hands were tied she realised after a moment or two of twisting, as were her feet. Struggling to her knees she looked around. Now she was upright she recognised where she was – her bedroom. The cords that bound her had been attached to the foot of her bed making it impossible to stand up.

She was trying to decide if she should call out or attempt to break free before anyone knew she was awake, when the door opened. The man who walked in wore a creased black leather jacket and torn jeans. His hair was stuck up in a series of spikes about a fist high, the tip of each was painted green. In one hand he held a partly eaten apple, the other was rooting around in one of his jacket pockets.

As he approached Karri she tried to get as upright as possible.

“What do you want?” she asked as he came to stand in front of her. The man’s expression remained impassive. “Look, I don’t have that much money, but you’re welcome to it.”

She was trying to link this guy in with the one who had been in the car. They were obviously not the same person. Maybe the other man had just been put up to it. The one now in her bedroom looked like a member of the Hellions gang, but he lacked the demon mask they often worn to hide their faces.

“Is it something else you want?” she tried again. “I’d normally charge for a bit of fun, but for you I don’t mind making it free.”

The thug continued to ignore her. As he pulled a key out of his pocket a second man walked into the room. He was dressed just as roughly, but did not look like he was part of the same gang. He wore clothes more suited to the black and white attire the Skulls tended to go for.

Following just behind him has a third person. He was clearly no street urchin or gang member. He had on a white robe embodied with gold stitching. Long straight black hair framed a face hidden behind a white mask which ended just above his mouth. Beneath this the dark tanned skin of a strong chin jutted out. There were slots for his eyes and Karri could see a dark red glow emanating from them. He nodded to the man holding the key who then bent down next to Karri and reached behind her.

“Hey,” she said, trying to twist away from him, “what are you doing?”

The man in white mask tilted his head down so he could look at Karri.

“It is no use struggling,” he said to her. “You have been chosen to aid me in my accent to power.”

Karri heard the clang of metal against the iron bed frame and guessed she had been released. She staggered up from her knees and managed to stand to face the three men.

Directing her gaze at the masked one she said, “You’re that guy who picked me up aren’t you? Well if it’s help you want I don’t mind working with you. I know a lot of the people out there on the streets.”

There was a short burst of laughter from behind the mask. “Good, I’m glad you will do this willingly. I had hoped you wouldn’t give me too much trouble.” He nodded to the two thugs. “Bring her through.”

Karri let the two men take hold of her arms, which were still tied behind her back, and push her out of the bedroom following after the dark haired man. Rather than turning left and going into the lounge, however, he turned down the hall towards the bathroom and the front door. The sound of running water reached Karri.

“Hey! What are you going to do with me? I don’t need a bath.”

All three ignored her and she was forced forward to follow the leader into the bathroom. The scene that greeted her made her gasp out loud – the walls had been painted a deep purple. There was a smell of drying paint, which mingled with some other scent she could not identify.

Struggling slightly in the grasp of the two men she tried to face the leader who was stood to one side of the bath.

“What the hell have you done to my bathroom?” she demanded. “Why did you go and paint it all like this?”

He ignored Karri, instead nodding again to the two men who were holding her. In an instant Karri found herself being lifted by one of them as the other moved to grab her legs. She instinctively tried to struggle but their hold on her was too tight.

“It should please you to know that you will be the first to help me in my rise to power,” the leader said as he stepped aside to let the two carrying her approach the side of the bath. “You will not be the last though,” he finished as Karri was lifted higher.

She was about to offer some further plea, when she was plunged into the bath, the cold water enveloping her. The shock made her open her mouth and it was instantly filled by the water, a salty taste accompanying it. She tried desperately to fight against the hands which were holding her under, but her head never broken the surface. Within moments she could feel the burning in her lungs growing and finally she gave in and tried to take a breath.

The water in her mouth flooded into her lungs and she began to choke, the natural reflexes of her body doing all they could to expel the liquid. There was no air to replace the water though and within moments her lungs were swamped. She continued to struggle for a few seconds more before losing consciousness. Her body going limp in the water and the long coat she still wore washing around her like a gossamer shroud.

Chapter One

Karri Lopez pulled her coat tighter about her body. The thin fabric offered little protection against the chill wind that had sprung up that evening – weather more suited to April than early May. Paragon City, situated as it was on the east coast of America did not tend to suffer from any sudden shifts in the seasons, but Karri, along with a lot of the girls who worked the evening streets of the city, had noticed the changes in the last few years. It was just like the papers said, global warming really was happening.

Strands of Karri’s long black hair flicked across her face and she released a hand from holding the coat together to brush them back behind her ear. Turning the corner on to Cherry Street she could see three other girls standing on the pavement. Monday nights were never that busy. As she came closer to the small group a car pulled up beside them and one of the girls leant down to talk through the open passenger window. After a brief discussion the door opened and the girl got in. The car pulled away.

“Hey,” Karri called to the two who remained.

“Karri!” a male voice said from one of the figures. “How you doing?”

She laughed out loud. “Karl, I didn’t recognise you. What the hell are you wearing tonight?”


“He’s gone all trani’ on us, K,” the other girl responded. “Thinks he can cut into our game a bit.”

Karl threw back the flowing locks of the oversized blonde wig he was wearing making an overstated show of dignity. “Now Missy, don’t you go putting that down on me. I’ve just as much right to the men around here as you girls do. If they happen to find my new look that bit more alluring, who can blame them?” For emphasis Karl turned slightly and stuck out his butt, pushing against the skin-tight jeans.

Karri looked him up and down and gave a disapproving tut. “You know what, hon, I like that hair on you. I can see the style you’re going for,” she turned to Missy and gave her a quick grin, “and with the circus back on Talos Island, I’m sure they’ll hire you right away.”

Both the girls fell about laughing and Karl made an effort to look crestfallen.

“No appreciation,” he sighed. “I could do with space from your twos lack of class.” He turned his back on them, flicking his hair again. “I’ll take my tight little butt back down to the corner where you aren’t castin’ it in shadow,” he called over his shoulder as he walked away.

Still laughing, Karri called out to him, “Make sure you don’t trip over in those high high heels you got on. Don’t want you breaking one of those so nicely painted nails.”

He flicked one finger back at her as he continued to walk towards the corner.

“That guy!” Missy said, stifling more laughter. “Love him, but he sure is crazy. You just know he’ll be back to his fifteen year old boy look by tomorrow.”

Karri smiled and nodded agreement then started fishing in her handbag. “You gotta light? I can’t find mine.”

“Sure,” Missy pulled a lighter from one of her pockets. She was about to say something more when a car stopped by the side of them. The passenger window rolled down, but the street light failed to penetrate far enough into the vehicle to allow either of the girls to see anything.

Missy made sure Karri’s cigarette was lit and then walked over to the edge of the curb. The slight wind stopped Karri from hearing what was said, but after a moment Missy turned back to her.

“I’ll catch you later. Look after yourself,” she said as she opened the car door and got in.

“Yeah, you too,” Karri replied.

The car pulled away and the street was silent for a moment, the lights seeming to add to the areas look of a rundown industrial section that had seen better days.

Glancing down to the end of the street, Karri could not see any sign of Karl. He had probably been picked up by one of those repressed little bankers. That blonde wig and nine inch heels were the sort of thing they went for. A motorbike roared across the junction. Two kids having some evening fun. The one on the back threw a beer bottle at the stop sign. It shattered, spilling its contents across the pavement.

“[censored] gang members,” she said to herself. “It’s about time the police increased their patrols around here and clamped down on them.”

As she turned back she caught sight of something in the corner of her eye and it startled her. A car had pulled up on the other side of the road. She had not heard it come down the street, but she could see fumes rolling out of the exhaust. It was an old, slightly beat-up, brown sedan. Halfway back along the rear door she could make out a large scratch in the paintwork.

The driver’s window wound down and although the interior was cast in shadow Karri could just make out a pale hand resting on the door. Glancing up and down the quiet street she walked across, flicking away her cigarette as she went.

As she drew closer the face of the man behind the wheel came into view. He looked to be in his early forties, light brown hair slightly receding but left uncut. Strands of it curled down to touch the top of his glasses. Karri bent down slightly so she could see him properly.

“You,” he paused, his tongue flicking out to moisten his lips, “you, free?”

“Yeah, hon,” Karri replied. “What you after?”

The man looked surprised by her question. “Err. The normal stuff?”

Karri almost felt sorry for him. She had worked the streets here and in Detroit enough to know when she was presented with a loner. This guy had probably never had a serious girlfriend. He probably still lived with his mum, and now he had finally got up the courage to come looking for a woman.

“Okay,” she said, standing up again, “you got me.”

She walked around the back of the car and pulled open the passenger door, scooping up the tails of her coat as she sat down and closed the door behind her.

“Where do you wanna go?” Karri asked as she reached over her shoulder for the belt. “I know this quiet spot round the back of some old warehouses if you wanna stay in the car.”

There was a faint whirring as the man wound up the window and Karri glanced on to the back seat to check it was clean.

“Here’s fine,” the man said, his voice muffled slightly by the gentle thud of the window fitting into its seal.

Karri turned her attention back to him. “No, hon, here’s not gonna work. The cops do patrols and I ain’t getting caught again.”

The man turned to look out of the windscreen at the junction some fifty yards away. Light glinted off the rim of his glasses. “What about we go back to yours then?”

Karri shook her head. “We can go to yours, but we ain’t going to mine.” It was one of the few rules she stuck to.

The air in the car seemed to grow darker and cooler. Karri had no idea where it came from but she felt a fear begin to rise within her. All of a sudden she did not want to be in the car with this man. She opened her mouth to make an excuse, but nothing happened. Her hands refused to respond to the urge to open the door again and she continued to stare at the driver.

As she watched he turned to look at her. Darkness appeared to seep out of him, spreading across the windshield and hiding the pale glow of the streetlights, filling the front of the car with black tendrils. All that Karri could focus on was the man’s face as his stare leered back at her.

“I think we’ll be going back to yours,” he told her, his voice taking on new strength and power. “I think you’ll be doing exactly what I want you to.”

Her mind clawed at the inside of her skull in an attempt to break free. Each try growing more feeble than the last until darkness finally closed in on her.

The Wandering Year

Lucy Flanagan is down on her luck. An officer in the Paragon City Police Department, the promotion that should have been hers has gone to someone younger. She has never had the big break others seem to get, that is until now.

Michael Hermes Aspen is a local radio DJ who is bored with his job. What he is more interested in is the crime fighting he does as the superhero Pentangle.

A series of ritualised murders and the rumours of a new gang on the rise in Kings Row sets them both against an ancient power which could threaten the fragile stability of the city.

The story is written (there or thereabouts) and I’m just getting on with the editing so I thought I’d better start a thread for myself.

All the chapters, along with the cover art and notes, will be published here (a bit of my web site), but I will put a link to each chapter on this thread as they become available. I’ll only show a couple of the early chapters here as no one wants a thread with 60,000 plus words in it.

Please feel free to comment in this thread or on my web site. And, er, enjoy.

[ QUOTE ]

Wowzers! If that's what turning Brit does for you then I'm going to have to run out to my local Anglo bakery, the British Pantry, and pick up a couple of pasties for inspiration!

[/ QUOTE ]

I honestly thought I was doing well until I started looking are various friends writing buddies.

There’s one girl in Travis County (TX) who’s already managed the 50,000 target and another in Louisiana who’s written 68,000 words.

I’ve been trying to work out if there are enough hours in the day to write anything of sense at that speed. Still they both have twenty six days to do the editing.

<grin>

Life really got in the way at the weekend and I only managed to write about 2,500 words across the two days. Monday was a lot better and by the end of today I’m hoping to be close to the 15,000 mark.

As for everything else - I’m enjoying this so much that it’s all been thrown out. No reading, no TV, food is becoming optional and the study door will probably have a lock on it by the end of tomorrow. I even turned down a free ticket from a friend to go to a concert on Friday night. Bloomin’ crazy I tell you.

I’ve never looked for other ways to show thought, I always just use commas and speech style punctuation without the speech marks. The comma seems to give adequate pause for the reader.

(i.e. I really should be starting my NaNo story, Leigh thought.)

As Mr Grey mentions, I’ve also seen italics used and, as with speech, there are some really experimental ways of doing thought as well. IMO do what you feel most suits that story (or even character) as long as it doesn’t confuse the reader.

If you want to stick with speech style thought, just use apostrophes instead. There'll be someone out there who will dislike you doing it, but some heathens don’t play CoX so clearly not everyone can be perfect.

And so it begins. Well, after all the home stuff, going out, sorting out a present for a friend, dinner, attending a party, some more sleep.

Ah, well, maybe tomorrow.

Thanks for the kind comments guys. I can still never understand how the outcome isn’t easy to guess, I thought I did a poor job.

Funniest thing was when one of my friends read it the other week (she has never even heard of CoX or MMOGs for that matter). Talking to me later she said, “I wasn’t sure it was a cat until the end.” After I’d stopped laughing and picked myself up from the face plant I tried to explain it to her. I think she understood. XD

Oh, and just before I get accused of attaching myself to any other countries, I’m in the UK now but originally from ‘down under’ (although have spent some time, and got friends, in the US).

The slip with ‘lift’ was just poor on my part. I’m normally good with getting regionalisation correct. I think I now have an America beta so that won’t happen again. (Probably. )

Lost and Found

I remember the day I found Max. It was a Wednesday morning in June. The weather was good, and I had left the apartment early to get a paper. This was certainly not a day I would have expected something odd to happen, but then I’ve lived in this city long enough that so few things appear strange these days.

My usual route to the store was via the little bridge on to Lexington and then right on to Ribbersdale. I’ve always avoided the alleys between the apartment blocks as there are still too many of those aliens teleporting out of goodness knows where and a woman of my advancing years, as my nephew would say, doesn’t want to get in to a fight, or even have to run for her life. That Wednesday as I looked over the water to Lexington I could see a group of Circle standing around and if there’s one thing we have all learnt to avoid more than the aliens it’s the Circle. So, instead of crossing over I continued on past the bridge and decided to cut through the alley where our building sat alongside the next one.

Even in somewhere as clean and well kept as Founders’ there is often some litter lying around. Ivy and a few of the others blame it on the street sweepers always being chased by Circle cultists, but I think it’s just young people these days who cannot be bothered to do a proper job. Simon, my nephew who comes to visit every now and then, claims I’m just getting like all the other old people and forgetting what it was like when I was young. He’s probably right, but I’ll keep denying it while I can.

As I came close to the end of the alley, where it opens up on to the canal, I had to step around a small pile of papers and a cardboard box. I glanced briefly down at the rubbish and just as I looked away I thought I caught a glimpse of something. It was one of those moments where your body carries on doing what it had been while your brain works things out, and I was a few steps closer to the end of the alley before I stopped and turned back to the refuse. I can’t tell you now what caught my eye and I don’t think I could have told you then. Something I had seen looked slightly out of the ordinary and nothing to do with cardboard or rubbish. Something with more life in it than a piece of paper.

Moving around I looked down at the pile and tried to find the same angle from which I had caught the sight of whatever it was. It was difficult to see exactly what was hiding in there as the alley, like all of those in Founders’, was in shade due to the tall buildings, and it took me a few moments to find what I was looking for – a small sliver of a leg.

I just stood there looking through the little window of rubbish and found myself torn between wanting to move things aside to find out what was there and a fear that it was something dangerous. Suspicion is something we have all come to live with in the modern world. I’m sure it’s another one of those getting old things that makes Simon smile and look like he is going to pat me on the head, but for me there is always something to be wary of when I don’t have the confidence of the young.

My uncertainty made me glance back the way I had come, and I also turned and looked towards the other end of the alley where the sunlight was catching the tops of the small waves on the canal. Then I made up my mind, I suppose you could say I got a hold of myself or plucked up some courage, and I bent down towards the small pile.

Even with this new found nerve I was still slightly cautious of what was hidden under the box and I hesitated briefly, just like when we used to dare each other to touch the electric fence as children on the farm. Then I pushed aside some of the surrounding bits of paper and with a small flick turned aside the box covering the thing. At the same time I took an involuntary step backwards.

I’m not sure what I had expected to see. I think part of me thought it would be nothing, a fluffy toy or a clump of old clothes that had looked like something alive when in shadow. The sight of the poor little thing lying there on its side was certainly not what I was expecting, and when it turned its head and looked up at me with those large eyes I was snapped back in to action.

“You poor thing,” I heard myself say, and without putting any more thought in to it I bent down and scooped it up using the cardboard it had been lying on. There was a kind of twitching and a shudder from it and as I brought it closer I could see that its breathing was laboured. There wasn’t any blood where it had been lying so I presumed it might just be suffering from being out for a few nights.

“Let’s get you home and fed,” I told it. “It looks like you haven’t eaten for days.”

I traced my path back to the apartment building, watching the group of Circle from the corner of my eye. They hadn’t moved, and were still stood around talking and waving their arms at each other. As would usually happen there would be a hero along sometime soon who would send them off to prison. I always wondered why they never learnt that standing around in plain view attracted the attention of heroes, but they never seemed to.

There weren’t any other residents in the lobby and I hurriedly pressed the button for a lift. I spent the time as I headed up towards my floor looking at my little find and making reassuring noises. Once back home I busied myself trying to make him comfortable. My life spent as a secretary had given me no particular skills with animals. I’d been without Bob for seven years since he passed away with cancer and retirement had started to become lonely, so maybe it was my misplaced need to have a man back in the house that made me think of him as male.

I found a plastic basket I’d been using to put out the recycling and lined it with some old sheets, and then I took him in to the kitchen while I made up some food. Having hunted through all the cupboards and the fridge a couple of times I settled on making a small puree from some fruit, and gave it to him on a small plate. He seemed to enjoy it so I made up some more for latter. I also found a bowl and filled that with water and then I moved us both in to the lounge and settled down on the settee to watch some TV while I kept an eye on him.

Later that afternoon my thoughts started to turn to what to call him. I think I’d already decided at that point to keep him. If I’d had a house away from the city I would have got a dog, but living in an apartment this was out of the question for me. A couple of my friends had birds, parrots I think, but they never appealed to me. You couldn’t cuddle a parrot or curl up with it on a winter’s night. I settled on the name Max in the end. I’m not sure where it came from, but it seemed appropriate and he seemed to like it when I told him.

Over the next couple of days I spent my time sorting things out for Max. I bought him a proper bowl for water and one for food both from the local pet shop. I also tried a number of different types of cat food before settling on one he seemed to like. BY the next morning my concern regarding his health had dwindled as he was already starting to look a lot brighter, and within a few days he had perked up no end. I even caught him sitting on the lounge windowsill watching the birds go by.

Once Max had settled in I called one of my close friends, Martha, to tell her about my new pet. She was amazed I’d picked up a stray in the street and admonished me about the risk of fleas and other ailments I could have brought back in to the apartment. She asked me if I’d taken him to the vet and had I tried to track down the previous owner, but I found myself making excuses for not doing either. Max was looking well and he was getting stronger so what was the need for a visit to the vet. It would only upset him. It was also clear from where I’d found him that he hadn’t been loved by his previous owner, so there was no point looking for anyone to give him back to. Left alone to die, I thought, was the more than likely explanation as to why he was wandering around the streets and sleeping in cardboard boxes in alleys. Besides all that, I had really started to like having him around and I didn’t want to chance him being taken away from me.

I’ve now had Max for just over a week and he’s already become part of the household. He’s certainly a cleaver little thing. Most people say that a dog is the best companion to keep around, and I would have agreed until I got Max. The difference is that Max can look after himself when I go out and is quite happy to sleep on the chair all day. A dog would be far too demanding for what I want. I’m happy with Max and he seems happy with me. I already know I’d feel lonely without him. It’s strange, but I had considered myself an independent woman since Bob passed away - I never thought I’d be saying I needed a pet in the apartment.

Martha is coming around for coffee this afternoon and while I can’t wait for her to meet Max, I’m not sure how she’s going to react to me having a Rikti Monkey as a pet. I’ll just have to talk her round to the idea.

Strangely I’ve played this game for years and yet I still don’t write stories about heroes, never mind the main characters in the cannon. I said I'd try to post something else before I’m swamped with NaNo and as it’s the last few hours before it starts here’s a small story.

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Lost and Found

An elderly woman finds a stray in an alley in Founders’ Fall. She decides to take it in and care for it.

For those who are interested:

PDF Version
Background and Author Notes

Any comments and feedback always appreciated. Enjoy.

I’ve really been enjoying the characters you’ve got in this story (and have read some of your other stuff when I was lurking ) and I like your style of storytelling.

The only bit that always throws me slightly is putting thought in speech marks. I appreciate it’s a stylistic choice, but for me I always have to do a double take to make sure the character hasn’t actually said it out loud.

Good story and I like the interaction between them at the end. Are you going to be doing some more?

Good story and I like the interaction between them at the end. Are you going to be doing some more?

Thanks for the kind comments guys. Much appreciated. I’ll try to post something else next week before I’m swamped by NaNo.

Please feel free to say anything critical that springs to mind about this (or anything else I post). I’m always after feedback, even it’s just, “Meh!”.

SlickRiptide: Yes, currently British, although not by origin.