Gail Daley's Blog

As I promised, I am doing a newsletter for the month of October. Since this is my birthday month, (and no, I am not going to tell you how long I’ve been on this earth) I’m offering you guys a gift—free books. I’m not the only author celebrating the spooky month this way—several other authors are a well,

This has been a hard year for my family. I am just now scratching and biting my way back to normal, I did get the blurb finished for my new release The Inheritance Genome (coming out around Christmas). I know some authors wait until the book is finished to write the blurb, but I feel having it written ahead of time helps me to focus on where the book is actually going,

It’s a little long winded but I’m giving you a sneak preview now.

Betrayal, power struggles, and a dangerous attraction – Lady Patrice O’Teague and Detective Craig Lansing are caught in the middle of a three-way fight for leadership in the Port Recovery Thieves Guild. As they navigate the treacherous world of thieves and clans, they can’t ignore the sparks flying between them. But when Lansing’s boss warns him against getting too close to anyone from Clan O’Teague, it becomes clear that there’s more at stake than just their hearts.

Set in the gritty streets of Vensoog, where the local Thieves Guild is plagued by power struggles and ruthless competition, this thrilling tale follows Patrice and Craig as they fight to survive in a world where trust is a dangerous luxury. As the local Thieves Guild struggles to fill its leadership position, VanDoyle and Grouter compete against Tovaris and Sirrah for the coveted spot. Grouter, determined to take out his rival, devises a sinister plan that involves sacrificing innocent children – including some of his own ‘special’ creations.

VanDoyle has his own plans to make Vensoog a stronghold for the Thieves Guild and overthrow the Clans in power. But his tactics involve stirring up rebellion among the unaffiliated groups on Vensoog, putting even more lives at risk.

Lady Ispone, Lady Katherine, and three of Katherine and Zack’s  daughters, Juliette, Lucinda and Azalure, uncover Grouter’s twisted scheme and must fight to rescue their young daughters from his clutches. But with VanDoyle’s plan to overthrow the Clans and solidify the Thieves Guild’s hold on Vensoog, the stakes are higher than ever before.”

Fans of action-packed suspense and sizzling chemistry won’t be able to put down this page-turner.

I have two more books in the works, Soturi! And the Betrayal Syndrome, both set in the Confederated Worlds universe. But they won’t be out until after Jan 1, 2026.

Below is an AI created image of the heroine of the Betrayal Syndrome, the missing book in the Space Colony Journals series,

Click here to learn more: https://gaildaley.com/Become-an-ARC-reader-on-Gail’s-Team.php

Suspicion

THE SUN WAS just peeking over the horizon as Jayla ran with her usual long easy strides along the deserted beach. Jayla liked to jog along the shore next to the spaceport because despite the noise the shuttles made taking off and landing, the shore was usually deserted except for a few solitary runners like herself. She and Ghost, the creamy white Quirka clinging to her shoulder, enjoyed the fresh breeze and the freedom from demands on her time.

     She brushed her short gold hair back out of her face. It seemed she had been running half her life. Jayla smiled to herself as she remembered how hard it had been when she began to run every morning.

     Jayla wasn’t native to Vensoog. Her Uncle Gideon had married Genevieve, the Laird of clan O’Teague and emigrated to Vensoog after Moodon, their home planet was burnt off in the last war with the Karamine Coalition. Jayla had just lost her parents and had resented being uprooted to a new world with strange customs where she knew no one. A headstrong, resentful teenager can find plenty of trouble to get into by herself and even more if she connects with unscrupulous adults who intend to take advantage of her rebellious feelings. She had made loads of mistakes that first year. She bitterly regretted having gotten involved with Gregor Ivanov, the much older man who had romanced her and planned to sell her for the child sex trade. While it had not been her fault when she and other girls from the clans were kidnapped by the Thieves Guild, she hated remembering how helpless she felt as a captive. She was rescued from both situations, but she vowed to learn to defend herself so nothing like that could happen again.

     Two weeks after the clans had rescued the girls from the Jack ship, Wolf Larsen from her Uncle Zack’s old Recon unit, showed up on Glass Isle to give her lessons in self-defense. She later learned Wolf had been specially requested as her teacher by Lord Jake Reynolds, her Cousin Luc’s best friend.

     “Stamina,” Wolf’s deep voice echoed in her mind, “is the essence of fighting. You can’t fight if you are exhausted or out of breath.” He had knocked on her door at dawn that first day to drag her out to run a mile. Wheezing, and with her legs feeling like jelly, Jayla had kept at it because she was tired of being pushed around. Seeing her determination, Wolf agreed to show up every day for the next two years to train her in self defense.

     After Wolf had returned to his other clan duties, she had kept up the training. The morning runs were not an indulgence even though they took time away from her shop. She ran, worked out in the Clan gym at Glass Manor, and practiced her marksmanship faithfully because she intended to never again be at the mercy of someone else.

     Thanks to her parent’s foresight in moving their accounts to Fenris as soon as the war with the Karamine Coalition started, Jayla had inherited a sizable nest egg when she came of age. Enough to buy the gift shop she had always wanted. When she had bought the shop with the apartment over it earlier in the year, Jake had promised to come by and see how she was getting along.

     Her faithful companion Ghost was a Quirka. Quirka were native animals adopted as pets by the early Vensoog settlers because they were small, cute and avid hunters of the insects and other vermin infesting human dwellings. The Quirka adopted humans because they provided a mutually satisfying emotional bond and a ready source of food and hunting grounds.

     Like all Quirka joined with a person, Ghost went everywhere with her chosen human and even seemed to enjoy the morning runs. Her pristine white coat sparkled in the morning sun, and her plume of a tail waved with the motion of Jayla’s steps. The sturdy leather straps affixed to the shoulders of Jayla’s running clothes allowed Ghost to cling to Jayla with her tiny, hand-like paws and feet. White Quirka like Ghost were rare. Ghost had never developed the ability to adapt her fur color to match her environment the way other Quirka did. The hollow rows of retractable venom quills along her backbone, which were Ghost’s chief defense against predators, glistened as the sun hit them. If she felt threatened, her quills stood upright and filled with an acidy venom. Being stung by a Quirka was quite unpleasant, and in case of smaller predators, sometimes fatal. Ghost’s bright blue eyes, also unusual for Quirka, matched Jayla’s in color. She chirped in Jayla’s ear now, her small upright ears pricked forward as she recognized the large rock where Jayla usually turned to make the return trip.

     There appeared to be a bundle of rags and sticks lying next to the boulder. Jayla slowed as she approached, hoping it wasn’t something nasty a picnicker had left there. If it were, she decided, she would report it instead of hauling it all the way back to the Spaceport buildings the way she ordinarily did.

     Ghost hissed as they approached and her quills lifted, her sharply pointed nose wrinkled in distaste. The smell hit Jayla whose olfactory senses were less well developed than a Quirka, and she stopped several feet away. She had once come upon a goat on Glass Isle that had been dead for several days. It had smelled like this.

     It took her a moment to realize what she was looking at. What she had taken for a bundle of sticks was wearing shoes. Swallowing nausea, she made herself walk closer to see if what was lying in the sand was human or humanoid. It was difficult to tell what species it was, because the body was in an advanced state of decomposition, but it had been some type of humanoid.

     Glad she hadn’t eaten before starting her run, she backed away and sat down on a driftwood log, trying not to throw up. Ghost, in the way of all Quirka, was more concerned with Jayla than with the unknown body. She stroked her mistress’s face and crooned soothingly to her projecting comfort. Jayla dropped a kiss in gratitude between the small pricked ears and took a deep breath before she tapped on her wrist com.

     The com automatically dialed Clan security on the O’Teague compound instead of the emergency Port Recovery Security Patrol. Even though she was now living above her shop in Port Recovery, she had forgotten to re-program it. Her com was immediately answered by the Clan communication center.

     “Jayla, I haven’t heard from you in ages—what’s wrong, honey?” Mira, who had often been assigned as her trainer, had sounded cheerful until she saw the girls face.

     Jayla turned her wrist so Mira could see the body through the com. “I need Port Recovery Security to come out here. It looks like Ghost and I found a dead body this morning. We’re out at the end of the island behind the spaceport.”

     “Are you safe?” Mira demanded, instinct kicking in. Her regular job was O’Teague Clan Security but she was pulling desk duty because she was pregnant.

     “Yes, we’re safe,” Jayla reassured her. “I think it’s been here a while.”

     In the background, Jayla could hear her calling for Larry to grab a sled and get his ass out to the end of Port Recovery Island. “Jayla’s found a body. I’m calling the Port Recovery Security but she’s alone out there—”

     “Jayla,” Mira’s voice was calm. “You stay where you are. I’m sending Larry out to you, and I’ll call the Port Recovery Security. I want you to keep this com open, okay?”

     “You don’t have to tell me twice,” Jayla assured her.

     The trip from Glass Manor on O’Teague Isle to Port Recovery Isle took thirty minutes by boat, but a fast airsled could make it across the channel in ten. When the tall, dark skinned man dismounted from the sled, he smiled reassuringly at Jayla whom he still saw as the little girl she had been when he first met her. Larry Jorgensen, the O’Teague Clan Security Chief, was a former member of her Uncle Gideon’s unit who had married into the clan

     “You okay, kid?” his deep voice rumbled.

     She nodded, giving him a watery smile. “Yes, I’m fine Larry. It was a nasty surprise, but we’re okay.”

     Jorgensen nodded at her and went to inspect the body, being careful not to touch it. He was examining something on the ground in front of the corpse when they heard the approaching whine of the Port Authority Security sleds. He came over to her side to wait with her.

     Within a few short minutes the deserted shore was swarming with Patrol. The first to arrive were the uniformed officers who came to check out her story, then the medics, and finally, the detectives in charge, a man and a woman in civilian clothing.

     Since she and Larry and been told to wait for the detectives, she leaned back against a boulder on shore, and sipped at the bottled water Larry provided for her and Ghost. Ghost, no longer perched protectively on her shoulder, was busy investigating a pile of seaweed a few feet from where Jayla sat. They had both missed breakfast, and presumably the Quirka was hoping to find a few insects to munch on until they could return home. Larry had offered Jayla an energy bar earlier, but her stomach had rebelled at thought of eating anything.

     When the two detectives finally approached her, Larry moved in protectively.

     “Lady Jayla?” the male detective asked. “I’m Jim Gorsling, and this is my partner, June Sipowitz. We have a few questions for you.” Gorsling was short, with a square, bulldog face and dark hair in contrast to his partner, a tall, hazel-eyed woman with bronzed skin.

     “You found the body?” Gorsling asked.

     “Yes,” she said.

     “Why did you contact Clan O’Teague Security before you called us?” Sipowitz asked.

     “Like all the Laird’s immediate family, Lady Jayla’s emergency signal is set for Glass Manor on O’Teague,” Jorgensen interjected, obliquely reminding the two detectives they were dealing with a high-ranking clan member and to be careful how they treated her.

     “Perhaps you could join me over here, sir,” Gorsling suggested. “We have a few questions for you.”

     “I was dispatched here when Lady Jayla notified O’Teague clan she had found a body,” Jorgensen said, not moving. “It’s been requested I stay with her until she can leave. I’m to give her a ride back to her shop.”

     “Are you her legal representative?” Gorsling inquired. “Because unless you have some legal standing—”

     Ghost, sensing discord, left off hunting for bugs and scrambled back to Jayla where she hopped up to her shoulder. She turned her bright blue eyes to the two detectives and hissed defensively, her quills lifting.

     The detectives eyed the Quirka warily. Neither one wanted to chance getting stung by the Quirka’s acid tipped barbs.

     Sipowitz tried a different tactic. “Your Quirka is unusual. I don’t think I’ve seen a white one before.”

     Jayla stroked Ghost’s back and the quills lowered marginally. “Yes, she is different. Ghost was a gift.”

     “From me,” announced a voice from behind them. “Why is it,” Jake remarked as he dismounted his airsled, “that whenever I find you, you’re either in trouble or causing it?”

     “Jake!” Jayla cried, jumping up. “Where did you come from?”

     Jake pulled off his helmet and hung it on the handlebars of the sled, revealing a shock of dark hair. The male detective gave Jake a sharp look of recognition. He saw, as she did, a slim man in his early twenties with an easy smile, and an air of assurance showing he was accustomed to being obeyed.

     Ghost bounced in delight, and when he was close enough, leaped to his arms chirping happily. “Yes, I’m glad to see you too,” he told her, petting her before moving her to his shoulder.

     Sipowitz frowned. “And who might you be?”

     Her partner answered her. “Cara, this is Lord Jake Reynolds, the Duc d’Orleans’ nephew, L’Roux Clan. What brings you here Lord Reynolds?”

     Jake gave them a little bow. “I’ve been requested by Clan O’Teague to assist Lady Jayla in her present difficulty. Ah—I do have legal standing.”

     Jorgensen relaxed his protective stance. “Good to see you kid. If you’ve got this, I’ll head back to the manor. I was just coming off shift when I was notified about it.”

     “Sure,” Jake said, “take off.”

     Jorgensen stepped away and spoke with Gorsling for a few minutes before mounting his sled and zipping off.

     When Gorsling returned, he said, “Lord Reynolds, you said you had legal standing but—”

     Smiling, Jake pulled a small crystal out of his pocket and handed it to the detective. “Here is my authority to act for Lady Jayla.”

     Frowning, Gorsling stuck the crystal into his porta-tab and showed it to his partner who rolled her eyes. All they needed was interference in their investigation by a high clan lord.

     Jake looked over at Jayla. “So, you found a body, did you?”

     She nodded. “Yes.”

     “This is a kind of deserted area to run in.”

     “I like to run out here,” she said a little defensively. “Nobody bothers me.”

     He grunted. “Where’s your weapon?”

     She patted the pocket of her running shirt. “It’s here. Mira got me a small one to fit in this pocket and I always carry it when I run.”

     Sipowitz looked up and held out her hand. “May I see, it Lady Jayla?”

     Jayla slid her hand into her pocked and pulled out a pulsar gun about the size of her palm, which she held out butt first to the detective. Sipowitz took it and examined it. “Hasn’t been fired,” she said, handing it back.

     “That’s right,” Jayla said.

     Sipowitz studied her. “Had you ever seen the deceased before this?”

     “I don’t think so,” Jayla replied. “I’m afraid the smell got to me so I didn’t go any closer than I needed to make sure it was a person.”

     “Okay. Just as a matter of form, can you tell us where you’ve been over the last several days?”

     “I’ve just moved into my new apartment in Port Recovery. I’ve been out on Glass Isle collecting the rest of my stuff.”

     “All right,” the detective said. “That’s all for now. We may have more questions later though so don’t leave town.”

     “I believe it’s time we let these officers get on with their investigation Jayla. If you have any further questions, Detectives, you can get in touch with Lady Jayla through Clan O’Teague,” Jake said. He took Jayla by the arm and led her over to his sled.

     “There’s no place for Ghost,” she objected.

     “That’s where you’re wrong,” Jake replied, opening a cache in the side. He took out a spare helmet for her and handed it to her. Then he brought out what looked like an upside-down helmet with a clear visor. He snapped it into place on the front control panel. “C’mon Ghost,” he said patting it. Ghost hopped into the cavity and settled happily into the made-for-Quirka seat.

     “I want one,” Jayla declared. “Where did you get it?”

     “It’s a prototype. Friend of mine is marketing them. I’ll tell him he’s got a sale.” He mounted the sled and waited for her to throw a leg over the seat behind him before they took off in a whirl of sand.

     Gosling left the Coroner and returned to his partner as Jayla and Jake took off. “Coroner thinks it’s a body dump,” he told Sipowitz. “She figures the woman has been dead about two days.”

     “That means if Lady Jayla was out on Glass Isle she couldn’t have done it.”

     “I suppose so, but she sure drew a lot of defensive firepower for someone who is innocent,” Gorsling said.

     “What do you mean?”

     “Well, I told you Lord Reynolds is the Duc d’Orleans’s blood nephew. He’s the clan troubleshooter. The Duc sends him out to solve problems. And the guy we found here with her? That is O’Teague’s Head of Security here in the Port.”

     “Well even if her bracelet is marked as a member of the Laird’s immediate family, I’m surprised to find the clan sent two people out to back her up though, unless—”

     “Unless what?”

     “I’ll tell you after you run her Match List history and that of Lord Reynolds,” she said.

     “I’ll do it on the way back to headquarters. What do you want it for?”

     “Well, the Planting Festival is coming up and it occurred to me that Lord Reynolds coming to ‘rescue’ her from us might have nothing to do with this murder. Either the Laird or the Duc could be doing a little matchmaking. If that’s the case, then O’Teague’s local Security Head showing up might only mean Lady Jayla has an overprotective family.”

     “The O’Teagues do have that reputation,” he admitted. “We’ve got an intern from that clan working down in the morgue this year, and from what I heard Lady Katherine practically microscanned the place for germs before she let the kid work there.”

     Unaware of the speculation they left behind them on the beach, Jake stopped the sled in the rear of Jayla’s shop. Her apartment was on the second level. Although she had access from the store, the private entrance was upstairs in the back. She dismounted and pried a reluctant Ghost loose from her perch in the Quirka basket. “Thanks for coming to the rescue again,” she told Jake.

     “I was coming to see you anyway. Drusilla wanted me to invite you to have dinner with the three of us tonight here in the city,” he said.

     “I’d love to, but I’ve been invited to attend the Merchant Guild mixer tonight. It’s my first one and I don’t want to miss it.”

     Jake shrugged. “So, I’ll escort you there, and then we’ll meet Luc and Drusilla for dinner afterwards.”

     He waited while she and Ghost mounted the stairs to the owner’s quarters. When the door had closed on Jayla and Ghost, he restarted the sled as he commed his uncle. L’Roux was head of security in Port Recovery this year and his uncle liked to be informed of anything touching the clan families.

     Once inside her apartment, Jayla stripped and then she and Ghost got in the shower. She lifted Ghost to the specially made Quirka shelf, and turned on the water letting the hot spray wash away the morning. Ghost enjoyed playing in the water, turning and twisting to rinse her short, plush fur of the sand and salt that had accumulated on it during their stay at the beach.

     Once they were both clean, Jayla wrapped a towel around herself while she patted Ghost dry. She set the Quirka down on the mat in front of the Quirka sized blower on her dresser, laughing as Ghost danced and whirled in the stream of warm air.

     “May I assist you in dressing?” Jayla jumped as her house-bot spoke behind her.

     Jayla gave a small shriek of surprise and scowled at it. The bot had been christened Daryl by the previous owner. It was one of the expensive bots that could fool the unwary into thinking he was human. When she first moved in, Jayla thought it was a plus that her apartment came furnished with a house-bot to cook and clean. However, Daryl had yet to cook or       clean anything, and judging by his behavior, his previous owner had installed some unconventional programming, which Jayla had tried in vain to modify.

     “No, you may not,” she snapped. “Remove yourself from this room while I am dressing. Go in the kitchen and make a grocery shopping list.”

     “But Mistress,” the Daryl protested. “I am versed in all forms of physical pleasure and I can assure you—”

     “Out!” she shouted. Thank Goddess the maintence people were due to come today to adjust his programming, she thought half hysterically. If she had to listen one more time to that bloody list of sexual acts he was programed to perform, she would scream.

     She was furious all over again when she listened to the messages on the house net and discovered that the Robo-Maintence crew was not coming out today. They were sorry to hear she had canceled and wanted to reschedule the appointment.

     Furious, Jayla got on the com with them and demanded to know who had canceled the prior arrangement.

     “Your house-bot left us a message you were canceling the appointment,” she was told.

     “Well, I didn’t,” she snapped. “I expect to see you out here today at our scheduled time.”

     “I’m sorry, but that won’t be possible,” the receptionist said. “We’ve filled your time. We have an open slot two weeks from now if you want that.”

     Jayla made a growling noise. “Fine! please have it noted in the records that until he has been re-programed, you are not to accept messages from my house-bot! Is that clear?”

     “As crystal,” she was told snippily.

     Jayla turned her glare on the house-bot. “You may no longer contact anyone without my express order.”

     “That is a waste of my talents,” Daryl informed her. “I am well versed in communication protocols needed to efficiently run this house for you and—”

     “Shut up!” she yelled.

     Daryl hadn’t stocked the robo-chef either so Jayla took Ghost down the street to a local eatery that served breakfast where she ordered Ghost the Quirka Special (diced raw meat, nuts and vegetables) and a large spicy omelet made from Ostamu eggs for herself. Ostamu were huge flightless birds bred by the settlers for their meat and eggs. Their multi-colored feathers were highly prized for clothing and decorations as well.

     Since Jayla was a fellow business woman, Carol, the café owner, brought her order to her and sat down for a friendly chat.

     “What’s the matter, hon?” Carol asked, pouring them both a large Cafka. Carol was in her late forties with the comfortable shape of those who work in the food industry.

     “Can they charge you for killing a droid?” Jayla demanded. “I just found out that clump of slag I inherited as a house-bot canceled the appointment I made to get him reprogrammed!”

     Carol’s eyes danced over the rim of her cup as she gave a gasp of laughter. “Oh, dear,” she said inadequately. “Is he still offering you sexual favors?”

     Jayla nodded over a bite of omelet. “This morning when we got out of the shower. I don’t dare invite anyone over—I hate to think what might happen if he does it to a guest. Suppose my friends think I programed him for that stuff?”

     Carol sputtered into her Cafka. “You never know—it might lead to some interesting encounters.” She eyed her friend shrewdly. “That’s not all that’s bothering you, though is it?”

     Jayla sighed. “No. I found a body on my morning run today. It was nasty.”

     “Oh, you poor thing. Who was it?”

     “Well, to tell the truth the smell was so bad I didn’t get close enough to find out. Just that it was human or humanoid.”

     “Icky,” Carol sympathized. “I wonder who it could be? I don’t know of anyone local who is missing—”

     “I’d rather talk about something else if you don’t mind though. Anything else.”

     “Sure,” Carol said obligingly. “It’s going to make the rounds though. You’re likely to have customers asking about it all day. There’s nothing like curiosity to drum up business.”

     Jayla made a face. “You’re probably right. I’m not officially open, but I can’t afford to turn away customers.”

     “The other shop owners will be dropping by too, you can bet,” Carol told her.

     The rest of the day was productive, even with the constant interruptions from her fellow shop owners and local customers who had heard about the body and wanted the latest gossip about it. When she went upstairs from the shop to dress for the evening events, she was conscious of a pleasant feeling of achievement.

     The original shop owner, Sara Lipski had sold high-end imports, but Jayla intended to widen the sales base by featuring locally made arts and craft products. She already had several local artists and craftspeople bringing in new products, and hoped to pick up more at the Planting Festival.

     She and Ghost were still dressing when she heard Daryl let Jake in. The apartment’s walls were soundproofed so she couldn’t hear the actual conversation, just the murmur of voices.

     She looked at herself and Ghost in her mirror and nodded in satisfaction. She wanted to look professional, but classy tonight, so she had decided on loose black pants and a dark gray vest over a blue, dragon-nest silk blouse. The blue in the blouse, with its three-quarter inch sleeves and scooped neck matched her eyes, and the gray vest snugged under her breast and drew attention to her slim waist. Ghost wore a bracelet of glittering black and blue stones around her neck, and Jayla had fluffed her white coat until the hollow ends of her fur sparkled.

     When she joined him in the sitting room, Jake was standing with his arms crossed frowning at Daryl, but he gave her a wide smile and a wolf whistle.

     “You look great. Very classy,” he said.

     “Thanks. I want to look like a businesswoman at the mixer.”

     “You pulled it off,” he said. “At least you will have if no one at the mixer ever meets Daryl here.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the house-bot as they shut the door and started down the stairs. “Seriously Jayla, you need to get that sucker re-programmed. Do you know what he asked me?”

     She signed, “I can guess. The programmers were supposed to be out today, but Daryl called them and canceled. I was furious. He’s driving me crazy. It seems Sara Lipski had some very irregular enhancements programmed into him. The house maintence company told me it would be another two weeks before they could reschedule me. I’ve told them not to accept any more orders unless it comes from me in person, but I don’t know if I can stand keeping him around for that long.”

     “You could turn him off.”

     She snorted. “I tried that. He’s got a failsafe that resets itself if he’s been off for over eight hours.”

     “Want me to check around for another House Maintence company?”

     “Thanks, but I’ll do it. I just didn’t want to deal with stuff like that today. I hid in the shop doing inventory.”

     She was pleased to see that Jake had brought a closed two-seater airsled for tonight. She had enjoyed the ride from the beach but tonight she didn’t want to arrive at the mixer looking windblown.

     The Merchant Guild Mixer was held at a meeting room in City Hall, one of the large domes lived in by the first settlers that the City had converted to civic use. Tonight, the Merchant Guild had scattered tables around the large room for seating, but a lot of the local shop owners were standing around in groups talking. When Jake and Jayla entered, they were met by Miles Standish, the current Elector of the Guild.

     “So glad you came tonight, Jayla,” Miles said, enthusiastically pumping her hand while his eyes ran over her admiringly. When he saw Jake, he frowned, but quickly smoothed out his expression. “And you brought a plus one, too. Nice to meet you. Are you a close friend of Jayla’s Lord Reynolds?” he asked Jake, smiling owlishly. 

     Miles and Jake were of similar heights, but Miles mild blue eyes, snub nose and round face gave him the air of a friendly puppy.

     Next to Miles, Jake appeared dark and dangerous and it was plain Miles wasn’t exactly happy to see him despite his pleasant welcome. Jake did nothing Jayla could object to; in fact, he was perfectly pleasant to the Elector, but Ghost muttered fretfully in her ear and Jayla could almost feel Jake going on alert as the men talked.

     “That’s right,” Jake agreed. “Jayla and I go way back. He cousin Lucas introduced us.”

     “I see. I hope you will excuse us for a few minutes while I introduce Jayla to some of the other merchants. Ah, Carol,” Miles said snagging Jaylas friend from the café, “Perhaps you can find Lord Jake here a drink and entertain him while Jayla and I make the rounds.”

     “Sure,” Carol agreed, smiling. “I’m always up for a drink with a good-looking man.”

     She signaled a waiter-bot who brought over a tray of drinks. “What’s your poison, Jake?”

     “Cafka,” he told the server. “No alcohol for me thanks; Jayla and I are meeting friends for dinner after this, and I don’t like depending on the auto pilot on my two-seater. It’s been a little wonky lately.”

     “Miles always likes to give special attention to the new women merchants,” she told him.

     Jake gave her a considering look. “Especially if they are young and beautiful?”

     Carol grinned at him. “Somehow I don’t think he was expecting competition like you.” She slipped her arm through his. “C’mon, I’ll introduce you to some people I think you’ll enjoy talking to.”

     Jayla enjoyed meeting the other store owners, some of whom she could see becoming friends. After several minutes though, she became aware that a few of them seemed ill at ease. Everyone was friendly and polite, but she caught some odd expressions whenever Miles put a hand on her shoulder or her back, which he did a little too frequently. Whenever Miles touched her, Ghost stiffened on her shoulder and muttered unhappily. Jayla wondered what the Quirka sensed that she didn’t.

     When she was introduced to a young couple named Fred and Elsie Boyington, who owned a food supply store, she surprised a flicker of relief mixed with pity in Elsie’s expression. It was even more puzzling to get almost the same response from a pair of sisters named Jan and Lin Sorency who ran a local clothing shop.

     “Perhaps we can get together later this week for lunch, Jan suggested, directing a challenging look at Standish. “Miles always encourages us old timers to make you newbies welcome, don’t you Miles?”

     He hesitated briefly, and then said, “Of course. An excellent idea. Just don’t frighten her away.”

     Jan bit her lip, but nodded. “Sure. No reason to scare a newcomer away.”

     “That sounds as if there is something to be afraid of. Don’t worry—I don’t scare easily,” Jayla said lightly.

     About halfway around the room, Miles stopped. He seemed to hesitate for a minute then he asked, “Do you mind a personal question?”

     “I suppose it depends on the question,” Jayla responded, looking at him curiously.

     “That guy who came with you—is he boyfriend or guard?”

     Jayla stiffened. “Jake is a good friend of mine and of Clan O’Teague,” she said somewhat haughtily. The ‘it’s none of your business’ remained unspoken.

     Miles looked self-conscious. “I’m sorry, it’s just—well I got a copy of my Match List today and you’re on it, and I find you very attractive, so I was wondering—”

     Jayla’s anger softened. “I’m sure you didn’t mean to be offensive,” she said. “Look Miles, I like you, and you seem like a nice man, but I will be too busy getting my shop up and running to think about Match Lists.”

     Deciding it was time to put an end to this type of overture, she caught Jakes eye and he moved casually toward her.

     As soon as he was within speaking distance, Jake asked, “Everything Okay here, Jayla?” Jayla turned to him with relief.

     “I’m fine, Jake,” she said. “I guess this morning took a little more out of me than I thought. I’m sorry Miles, Carol, but I think we need to get going to meet our friends for dinner. Thank you for inviting me. I had a lovely time and I do want to meet more of my compatriots later.”

     “Of course,” Miles said. “I’ll drop by with the application for joining the Guild sometime this week.”

     “Thank you and good night,” Jayla told him

     Jake was silent as he put her into the airsled. He gave the order to proceed to the restaurant, a new one overlooking the water, and turned to face her.

     “Okay, what did I interrupt?” he asked.

     Jayla made a frustrated noise. “Did anyone ever tell you what a nosy boots you are?”

     Yes,” he said calmly. “You, many times. Give.”

     “You’re worse than Ghost at a vermin hole,” she complained. “He wanted to tell me I was on his Match List. There, are you satisfied?”

     He studied her face. “You didn’t look overjoyed at the news. Is he on yours?”

     She looked at him blankly. “I don’t know. I didn’t download mine when it came in this morning. I was too busy dealing with the house programmer fiasco and then I went down to work in the shop.”

     “So look now,” he said. “I’ve got mine.”

     When she hesitated, he said, “I’ll make you a deal. You download yours, and I’ll call mine up and we’ll swap. That way neither of us will have any surprises.”

     She looked at him suspiciously. “Why would you be willing to do that? You always guarded your list like it was pirate gold before.”

     He grinned at her. “And you always found out who was on it anyway. What are you afraid of?”

     Jayla tapped her com unit and scrolled down through the list until she found the message from the Makers, conscious of Jake doing the same. When she called it up her Match List, she stared at it in shock. Miles Standish was on it all right, but so was Jake. Before she could wipe it clear, Jake had started the data swap. She looked at his list. She was on his list.

     “You knew I was on your list this time,” she accused him. “That’s why you wanted to swap.”

     “Well, I was curious,” he admitted. “Now we both know and we don’t have to worry who else is on it. All we have to do is decide what we’re going to do.” He patted her hand. “You think about it.”

     Truthfully, she didn’t know what to think or feel. Her first girlish hero worship of Jake, began when he had defended her from Gregor at the trial and intensified when he rescued her from the Jack ship, had never quite gone away. However, over the years she had accustomed herself to thinking he regarded her like a little sister, and that he was just a friend. Now he was hinting at something different and she wasn’t sure how she felt about it.

     The two-seater stopped at the door of the restaurant and the valet came to open the doors. Jayla exited the car with mixed emotions.

READ MORE

HUNTING VARMITS
A WHUFFLING snort in his ear woke Zach Tylor from a sound sleep. He turned his head to find a pig-like snout about an inch from his nose. The snout belonged to Lucy, his semi-guard pet. The scientific name for Lucy’s species was Lupinus Leo. Colonists referred to them as Banded Koodoo. Zach just called her Lucy. Lucy’s DNA said she had both feline and canine characteristics; she had the retractable claws and night vision of a cat and the devotion and loyalty of a dog. She stood eighteen inches high at the shoulders and weighed about sixty pounds, with coarse, oily, red fur, broken by horizontal yellow stripes along her back and tail. She had short, pricked ears and large dark eyes. Spines made of the same substance as her claws ran up and down her spine as a predator defense. Her tail, wide at the base, narrowed to a barbed ball at the end.
She was regarding him with the alert attention that told him she wanted a human to fix what was wrong. The ambient light in the room told Zach it was about an hour before dawn. It was too early for his brood of Sun Risers, the large fluffy birds he kept for their meat, eggs, and feathers, to be awake unless something was bothering them. Since he didn’t hear the restless clucking signaling they were alarmed, he decided whatever had prompted Lucy to wake him wasn’t bothering the Sun Risers.
He slid out of bed, wincing when his bare feet hit the icy floor. The stone left by the aliens who had built his house was smooth, but it was also cold. He pulled on his leather pants and shoved his feet into his high-topped boots. The shirt was from the night before, but he had only worn it two days, so he considered it clean enough to hunt varmints.
Grabbing his night-vision enabled helmet and his pulse rifle, he stepped outside into the inner Bailey. An area adjacent to his living quarters, but inside the high walls made of iridescent stone left by the Aliens. His grandparents had selected it as a prime spot for the kitchen garden. The area had no roof, but the walls were tall enough to keep out most of Lemuria’s larger predators and wandering herbivore herds. Usually, the walls kept his vegetable garden and the bird coop safe from predators. He had built a fence with access to his Elfs and Raffe corrals and sheds on one end of the Bailey. The exterior corrals also had high walls, but the end open to the valley was edged with a more modern contrivance—a shock fence.
Elfs were draft animals, as large as earthly elephants, with long wooly coats that could be sheared and woven into cloth. Both bulls and cows possessed sharp tusks which usually provided all the protection a herd needed. Like the elephants they had been nicknamed after, they also had a long prehensile trunk with long fingery appendages on the end. It served as a nose and occasionally a hand. Their wide ears hung from the tops of their heads and helped protect their eyes and faces.
The Raffe’s were riding animals; tall, spindly legged critters with triangle shaped heads set on their long necks, a smooth, straight back that would hold a saddle if it was fastened on with chest and rump straps in addition to the cinch.
Both herds were quiet, although the Raffes were restless, but they always were. He glanced at Lucy. She was staring at the garden.
Zach stopped and stood still about thirty yards from his garden. Even with the night-vision visor, it required concentration to distinguish shapes. Lucy whined and his hand dropped to her head, a signal to be quiet.
It was more of those bloody Coney Rats. The Coney Rats were the scourge of Lemuria’s farmers. They ran in large family groups and could clear a crop field in a few hours. Smaller than Lucy, the Coney Rats were no match for her individually, but in a horde, they could beat her senseless. They weren’t actually rats, being genetically closer to earthly rabbits. The Coneys had excellent tasting meat, and a strong, thick skin, covered in long fluffy hair which could be scraped and woven into light cloth suitable for summer clothing.
He took aim with his rifle and downed six of the invaders before they realized he was shooting at them. He got six more as the horde leaped for the fence to escape. Their powerful back legs easily allowing them to jump to the top. He got several more as the horde went over the high wall in a wave. The rising sun hitting the top of the wall silhouetted the rodents, making them easy targets.
By the time Zach had collected his bounty, ensured any survivors passed into the ether, and hung the carcasses in his butcher shed under stasis to keep until he had time to deal with processing the meat, the Sun Risers were griping to be let out and fed.
He opened the coop, and a dozen or so balls of fiery colored fluff bounced out. The sheer mass of the Ball of bright feathers on each bird not only made excellent decorative items, but their feathers also made it hard for predators to tell where their plumages ended, and the bird’s body began. Unwary predators often came up with a mouthful of fluff instead of a piece of bird anatomy.
Zach scattered some cracked corn for them and went to turn off the shock fence so the Raffes and Elfs could graze in the area just outside the compound.
He was looking forward to eating breakfast when the com link chimed. Hastily running his fingers through his tangled mane of dark hair, he answered it.
The woman on the other end was Terella van Horn. Among other things, the van Horn’s handled the insertion of new-commers into Lemurian society and had been instrumental in stopping the revolt that nearly captured the portal last year. The van Horns, like Zach’s family the Tylor’s, were one of Lemuria’s Founding Families. Although Lemuria was the first world the town of Laughing Mountain discovered able to support human life, it had been a hard sell until the Alien Ruins had been found. On earth there existed a group of people who believed Aliens had visited earth in the distant past, but they hadn’t found much actual evidence to prove it. Laughing Mountain was willing to sell access to Lemuria if the proposed colonists were willing to never attempt to publish their findings on earth. If Earth’s Portal Authority had discovered the existence of a gate leading to an unauthorized world, it would have destroyed the colony and the town which ran the illegal Portal, so the terms of the sale had included a non-disclosure clause.
Although not as well financed as the planned colonies of Barsoom, Arcadia, and Shangri-La, the Founding Families who made up the first two hundred Lemurian colonists were an organized group of historians and scientists who pooled their money to purchase farming, mining, and communication equipment to send through the Portal. They also invested in seeds for crops and weapons for defense against the large animals already inhabiting the planet.
To survive Lemuria’s predatory plants and animals, the Founding Families realized they needed to learn to work together fusing their interests to become a community. Since the first arrivals, other colonists had trickled through the Portal, and the original society had become somewhat fractured, but the laws and government created by those first families had held up well.
Terella was a few years younger than Zach. She always presented the fresh, button-downed picture of a sophisticated academic. Her white-blond hair was drawn back in a neat twist, showing off her fine-boned face with its generous, wide lipped mouth and dark grey eyes. Today she wore a pale pink blouse, demurely buttoned up to her slim neck and a pair of dark grey trousers. For some reason that prim air attracted Zach; he always had the urge to grab her and physically mess it up.
He wished fervently he had had time to shower and shave before she called. Ruefully, he put the wish aside and got down to business; Terella wouldn’t have called him unless she had a job for him.
“What can I do for you, Miss van Horn?” he asked.
“Are you up for a guide job?” she asked.
‘I might be,” he said cautiously, swiftly calculating the amount of money he had locked up in his hidden safe. If the job paid enough, the extra money might mean he could enclose the lower end of the valley to plant several fields. “Who is it for and how much does it pay?”
Terella smiled at him. He was entirely unaware of the masculine impact he made on women, even needing a shave and grubby from lack of sleep and collecting Coney Rat corpses. His blood-spattered tee shirt clung tightly to his brawny shoulders and chest. Corded muscles in his powerful biceps and forearms stuck out of the sleeves.
“It’s a family of newcomers,” she said. “A Professor and Mrs. Lamont. They have two kids, a boy about thirteen and a girl about sixteen. They want to go out to the Halivaara Wheel by the Scarlet Lagoon.”
Before colonists had arrived on Lemuria, a mapping drone had explored the planet. Topographical printouts of its findings were stored in the Government House Library. There were no recognized trails through the Duranga Savana, the prairie between the town, the Faraway Mountains to the north and the Shimmering Ocean to the south. The Halivaara Wheel had shown up next to the Scarlet Lagoon as several large circles of the Alien’s iridescent material with spokes leading from the center and connecting the outlying circles. Unlike the smaller ruins left by the aliens, an estimate of its size was nearly seventeen kilometers, nearly three times as large as any other settlement found.
If they made it to the Wheel, Lamont’s expedition would be the first to reach it. Despite the yearning to find and explore anything left by the Alien Forerunners, the planet itself had made concentrating on anything but survival difficult. An earlier attempt to reach the Halivaara Wheel in a dirigible aircraft, had come to grief when the vessel was attacked by a pair of Harlequin Dragons. Harlequin Dragons were about half the size of the dirigible, but their attack damaged it, creating a large hole allowing the gas keeping it in the air to escape. It was forced to land before it crashed. Unfortunately, the explorers who had risked everything had no more money to build a second dirigible or repair the damaged craft, so they limped back into Shellgate several months later.
Harlequin Dragons bore some resemblance to the descriptions of those found in earthly myths, hence the name, but they were Avians, with contrasting tiny feathers in patterns of red, black, and turquoise on their heads, necks, wings, and chests.
“How new are they?” Zach asked suspiciously. Bear Leading newcomers through the hostile area to the site could be difficult.
“Pretty new,” Terella admitted. “He’s willing to pay.” She named a price high enough to enable Zach to enclose the field and still have a little left over.
“What’s the catch?” Zach asked. “For that price the guides in town will be falling over themselves to take it on. Why me?”
“Some of them might abandon the Lamont’s in the middle of the journey. He’s—arrogant. I know if you take the job, you’ll stick to it.”
Zach translated this: the man was a jerk who didn’t take orders.
“Uh—huh.” He named a price half again over what she had quoted. They dickered for a few minutes, finally settling on a price that included feed for himself and his animals and paying for a crew to help with the travel and outfit the expedition, as well as a bonus for aggravation.
“I’ll see you in a few hours,” he told her. “I have some arrangements to make here first. If he and I can’t come to an agreement, I get a deposit for coming in to meet him,” he warned her.
“Of course,” she said.
Ten minutes later with his unruly hair tied back and wearing a cleaner shirt, he headed out the door. On the way out he grabbed a couple of smoked meat strips for himself and Lucy to eat on the way.
When he fired up his two-seater airsled, Lucy, her mouth full of meat, jumped aboard.
As an afterthought, he also grabbed the new hooded cape he had recently finished weaving. He was especially proud of the workmanship; he had dyed strands of Coney thread in brilliant shades of blue and green and woven them into a shimmery blanket of color which rippled with movement. He was sure Mrs. Smithers would want it for her daughter Dulcia, whom she was anxious to marry off. He intended to offer it to her in exchange for young Jimmy’s services in taking care of his garden and animals while he was gone.
The Smither’s family were long time neighbors. Her first husband had been Zach’s cousin James. James had been killed by a pack of Crested wolves. Zach considered himself an uncle to the two children Dulcia and Jimmy.
Mrs. Smithers, a slatternly woman with fading red hair, had once been pretty but the years had been hard, and her looks had faded. Now she concentrated her ambitions on finding a husband for her sixteen-year-old daughter. Because she considered Zach an ideal catch despite the kinship issue, he always dealt cautiously with her—wary of falling into one of her matrimonial honey traps.
Today the trap was relatively easy to dodge; when she mentioned Dulcia joining him on the expedition as a cook, he simply said, “I’m sorry, but I only negotiated payment for myself. You’ll have to speak to Terella van Horn about that.” Not true but he knew if he admitted he had already negotiated for a cook’s wages, Joann Smithers would keep the entire amount of Dulcia’s wages for herself.
He dropped young Jimmy off at his farm, grabbed a spare bedroll and more smoked meat and headed back out with Lucy again riding shotgun.
Airsleds on Lemuria were powered by an esoteric energy crystal found only on the planet. A machine blueprint etched on the wall of one of the mysterious quartz buildings had been built by an enterprising engineer named Mikhailovich Gregor. He went looking for the crystals shown on the design and found them purely by chance (he tripped and fell into a cave). The cave showed evidence that it had been mined at one time. He dug a few out and tried them in his new engine. No one was more surprised than himself when the engine produced power. He named the Crystals Lechatelierites but everyone else called them Gregor’s Crystals.
The motor built by the engineer was too large to be portable. However, a Portal Runner who also frequented Barsoom, another of the outlaw colonies saw the design. Upon hearing it worked, he hunted up Gregor and proposed letting the scientists on Barsoom, who specialized in miniaturized robotics, have a go at developing a smaller version.
Barsoom’s scientists were successful, Gregor and the Runner got rich, and versions of the X-T motor were now used to run most of the machines used on Lemuria. The crystal and the Mikhailovich Engine had garnered interest on Arcadia as well, and the enterprising Arcadians were attempting to develop a Portal going directly from their colony to Lemuria to facilitate mining the crystal. There wasn’t enough storage space in the Portal town of Laughing Mountain for the quantity of Crystals the Arcadians want, so a direct gateway from Lemuria to Arcadia made sense.
The sled made the fifty-mile trip to Shellgate, the colony capital, in less than two hours. Shellgate City was the only large settlement on Lemuria. It boasted a population of about five thousand people including residents and transients.

As Zach topped the rise leading into the valley towards the city, he could see the cluster of government buildings and the stone arch in the center square. The colonists had unconsciously copied the Architectural style of the Forerunners. Streets led away from the arch and government buildings like the spokes of a wagon wheel. Shellgate itself was a unique assortment of styles, a mixed bag of prefabricated buildings and native stone or wood. Raffes and Elfs mixed freely on the streets with bicycles, tricycles, and air sleds.Zach stopped at the Red Cat Tavern on his way to the government center. His friend Marley Redfern owned it and would usually keep one of the upstairs rooms free for him if he knew Zach was in town.He was in luck; Marley had a free room. "Jace is cooking up roasted Ibex and we're serving it with a mess of fried tubers and red beans," Marley said. "Try to be here for dinner—you don't want to miss it."Terella had commed Zach on his way into town. “Is there something going on with you and Dulcia Smithers?” she asked,“Good God No!” he exclaimed. “The kid is what—sixteen?”“Her mother seems to think so,” she said, watching him with her head cocked to one side.“Dulcia and her brother are my cousin James' kids. I'm the only family left on his side, so I feel sort of responsible for them. Her mother,” he said with emphasis, “has been trying to marry that poor kid off since she was thirteen!” “Oh, dear,” Terella said. “She wants me to hire Dulcia as a cook. Do you want me to turn her down?”He sighed. “Dulcia is a good cook. She wants to earn enough to escape from her mom. She won’t be a problem. I explained the situation to her the last time her mother tried to get her to crawl into my bed. She was embarrassed, but she did understand I don’t have sex with children.”“She was lucky it was someone like you, not some jerk who would have taken advantage of her.” Terella said.“You’ll have to give Joann Smithers a portion of Dulcia’s wages but set some of them aside for the kid.”“I can do that.”She closed the com as Zach pulled up in front of the Government house. Leaving Lucy to guard the sled, he entered the two-story building. Outside the building had been slapped together with prefab material and it showed. Inside someone had tried to improve the look with paint. Art from local artists was scattered around the large foyer.Zach nodded at the receptionist and went down the hall to Terella’s office.She was perched in her chair behind the heavy wooden desk, obviously attempting to soothe the family of newcomers sitting on a leather covered couch. The man was tall and spare, with a neat goatee and a pair of black framed glasses perched on his beak of a nose. His wife was of similar height and build, with her hair drawn back in a tight bun. She was dressed in a neat suit dress. The two children both wore earth issue clothing. The boy Herve' a lad of about thirteen, was dressed in cargo pants and a tee-shirt in virulent colors. He was a little overweight, with sandy hair and a pale complexion, denoting a sedentary lifestyle. The daughter, Josette, looked about sixteen. She wore a low-cut tank top and skintight leggings. She also wore a pair of flip flop shoes.The newcomers eyed Zach as warily as he did them. They saw a man in his middle twenties, dressed in standard clothing for the colony: a short-sleeved homespun shirt under a waist length leather vest, lined with cloth made from woven Coney hair. The shirt was tucked into tough leather pants, tanned a medium brown, which in turned were tucked into calf length boots. A ten-inch blade in a tightly woven sheath hung from one hip, and a large pulse pistol in a tied down holster hung on the other. He had left the pulse rifle in the sled under Lucy’s watchful eyes. Theft wasn’t that uncommon on Lemuria, but it would be a rare thief who would dare Lucy’s considerable wrath to try and grab anything out of Zach’s sled.“Ah—you made it,” Terella smiled brightly at Zach. “Zach, this is Professor and Mrs. Lamont, and their children, Herve' and Josette. Professor, this is Zachery Tylor, one of our best guides.”“I still don’t see why we need a guide,” Lamont griped. “I’ve seen a map of the area. It’s due north from here. With a good compass, there is no way we can get lost.”“Getting lost isn’t the danger,” Zach said. “Yes, there are hazards on the way to the site you aren’t familiar with,” Terella said.“Can I see the supply list?” Zach asked.When Terella handed it over, he went through it carefully, marking through a few lines and writing more at the bottom. He handed it back to her and she passed it to the Professor, who scanned it with an ever-increasing frown.Zach looked them over while the Professor read his corrections. Many newcomers were under the impression the rules here were the same as those on earth. Most of them also discounted the non-disclosure/non-publish Law about their findings on Lemuria; it was illegal to reveal anything concerning Lemuria or the other colonies back on earth. On Lemuria, the penalty for attempting to violate this law was a long term in a labor camp for a first offense. A second offense rated the death penalty.Even if colonists proved the existence of X-T visitors, it wouldn’t change that law. Lemuria, the Laughing Mountain Portal, and the other Outlaw colonies needed earth to remain in ignorance of their existence. Second and third generation colonists were aware of the penalties for breaking the Non-Disclosure Law, but most of the colonists were so desperately poor they were willing to assist newcomers in their research anyway as it put much needed coin in their pockets.The Professor waived his corrected sheet of supplies at Zach. "These items are necessary," he said. "We need them to operate efficiently.""Those items aren't available on Lemuria," Zach said patiently."Young man, you don't understand. I insist this expedition be equipped with top-of-the-line instruments.""I'm sorry," Zach said. "But unless you brought them with you, it isn't possible to obtain them here." "So, order them from earth. I don't see the problem. I assure you our sponsors will ship them promptly."Zach and Terella regarded the two newcomers with pity. "Did you read the Non-Disclosure Clause in your immigration contract?" Zach asked."Yes, of course, but surely that is only a formality—"He stopped when Zach shook his head no, "I'm afraid it isn't a formality. It's a very real fact." He turned to Terella, "Perhaps you could refresh their memories?"Terella nodded and withdrew two pamphlets out of her desk drawer, handing one to the Lamonts. She opened hers to read the contract aloud. Zach, who could probably have recited the entire short volume from memory, leaned against the wall with his arms crossed and listened in silence.'I, the undersigned, agree to have no further contact with earth or its population in any form whatsoever for any reason.I understand this is a one-way passage and I will not attempt to return to earth or contact anyone there.Moneys received from any earth source will be funneled through channels that do not reveal the presence of the Lemuria colony or Laughing Mountain’s involvement with the colony.Any of my findings gained from exploring Lemuria can only be published in the Colony of Lemuria.'"I have the colony copy of the contract with your signatures on file. I can furnish you with another if you've lost yours."Professor Lamont sat down limply in a chair. His wife had tears running down her face."Richard what are we going to do?" she whispered.Terella went to the file cabinet and took their actual contract out of the 'to be filed' box."According to this, you will continue to receive a yearly salary from earth, so you won't starve. A sufficient sum of money has been deposited into an account in your name to enable you to live comfortably for a year and to equip an expedition to study the alien ruins. If the payments continue as scheduled, they will support you long enough for you to establish yourselves."Lamont looked up sharply. "What do you mean 'if they continue'? Why wouldn't they continue?"Terella hesitated before she said, "Judging from experience, after a few years, Earth organizations who sent researchers here usually stop funding an expedition from which they gain nothing.""That doesn't make sense," Alice Lamont protested. "Why send us here at all if they know we can't report what we find?""There could be any number of reasons for that Mrs. Lamont," Terella said kindly. "It's better to concentrate on getting you settled so you can make some decisions about your future, than to waste time speculating on the reasons you were sent here.""What about the expedition? Is it still on?" Zach asked."That will depend on Professor and Mrs. Lamont. However, the deposit is non-refundable; you and the others will be paid for your time and trouble.""What?" Lamont exclaimed. "Why should they get paid for an expedition that doesn't take place?""Our laws in respect to these matters may be different than those on earth," Terella said. "Once the offer has been posted, those who signed up for employment under its offer are considered hired. If the expedition is cancelled, they are entitled to severance pay to cover time and wages lost."She looked up as her younger brother Terrence poked his head in the door. "I have rooms arranged for the Lamonts at Mrs. Riker's boarding house," he said. "Excellent. Why don't you go and settle into your rooms, have a meal and we'll discuss this further tomorrow." Gently but inexorably, she guided them to the door, shutting it behind them."Are you staying at Marley's?" she asked.Zach nodded. "He said he has a spare bed. Why don't you join me for dinner? He sets a good table.""Maybe I will if I get done in time. About seven?""Sure." He watched the engrossing sway of her hips in the tight jeans as she walked away from him.

SUSPICIONS
RUBBING THE crease between his eyes, Jeremiah van Horn put down the letter he had been reading. It had come through the Portal from earth in today’s mail pouch. He was a short, rotund man with thinning grey hair and a wispy beard. His horn-rimmed glasses perched on a round button of a nose. He looked like what he was, a kindly man who had responsibility thrust upon him.
“What’s the matter Dad?” his daughter, Terella, stood in the doorway. It was a constant source of amazement to him he and his wife Louise had produced a daughter as lovely as Terella. Despite the way she underplayed her looks, her father thought her ash blond hair, grey-green eyes with their dark lashes and generous mouth added up to beauty. When those things were combined with a slim hourglass figure, it amazed him she didn’t have suitors beating down her door.
He held out the missive. “You’d better read this. It’s about that new family who recently came through the portal.”
Dear Mr. Horn, the letter read. I have learned of a new danger to our colonies I feel you should be informed about. A man named Richard Lamont and his family will come through the Portal. His dossier says he is an archaeologist, and the Hidden Treasure Foundation sponsored him to an ‘unknown destination’. While he has a minor degree in archeology, he also holds a PhD in Portal Technology. I don’t know how well you know a Portal Runner named Leslie Jorgenson, but the man has the reputation of dipping his fingers in shady waters. Because of that, colonists who want to get around the rules which keep us all safe from the Portal Authorities sometimes approach him about illegal imports. However, it seems he has some standards. He tells me Lamont and another man approached him about smuggling in the tech it would take to build another Portal. One that would not be under local government control. Jorgensen claimed he refused, but I discovered Lamont is taking his family across to Lemuria this week. While I don’t know for sure if Lamont will bring in stuff to build a second Portal, I urge you to keep an eye on him.
On another note, I will be arriving with the next scheduled shipment to program the connections to Arcadia and Barsoom. Hopefully we can test it during my visit. Arcadia wants to arrange a shipment of the Gregor Crystals at that time.
Sincerely Yours, Devon Morton.
Terella laid the letter back on her father’s desk. “This doesn’t sound good,” she said.
“You met with them in your office,” Jeremiah said. “What was that about?”
“He wants to explore that forerunner site out by the Scarlet Lagoon. I set him up with Zach Tylor as a guide.”
“The Halivaara Wheel? It will take at least a month to get there. That’s far enough away to make it hard to keep an eye him,” he said. “I assume Tylor will stay around for a few weeks after they arrive?”
“He usually does, if only to prevent any troubles arising,” she replied.
“I want you to go out with them,” he said.
“Zach will know I rarely do that,” she protested. “What do I tell him?”
“Do you trust him?”
“Yes,” she replied.
“Then tell him everything,” he said.
She frowned. “If Lamont is part of a conspiracy, they are probably watching us. They might guess we know something.”
“Didn’t I hear Tylor invite you out for drinks later?”
“Yes,” she admitted.
“So put on a pretty outfit, let your hair down, and go have a drink with the man. You spend too much time in the office. A pretty girl like you should get out more.”
“I go out,” she protested.
“With girlfriends,” he retorted. “I mean on an actual date.”
“It’s customary to wait to be asked,” she said dryly.
“Well, he asked you, didn’t he? You could do a lot worse,” her fond father told her.
Her eyebrows rose. “I thought you didn’t approve of ‘hardscrabble farmers’ as a suitor for me?”
“He’s different; he’s ambitious and he works hard. He’s going to go far unless I miss my guess. Besides he’s a far cry from that yahoo you had your eye on back in high school.”

So, she went home and changed into a tank top and a pair of tight black jeans. A wide belt with an ornate buckle and a necklace of native jade completed the ensemble. She took a cab pulled by a pair of Raffes to the Red Cat Tavern.
A wooden sign depicting a large red cat hung from a pole over the door. The outside wall was made of river rocks on the ground floor and timber planks on the upper. Marley Redfern, the owner, was tending bar. He gave Terella a friendly nod when she entered and stood looking around. The tavern was packed. Several groups of people gathered around the big round tables, enjoying both cards and dice games. Marley had set a dart board up against the back wall, and a group of players were taking pleasure in competing against each other. Several people playing checkers, chess or parchisi occupied a few of the smaller tables. A few couples were eating some of Marley’s excellent food. Even most of the stools at the bar were occupied. She spotted Zach at a small table in the rear, with Lucy lying at his feet.
Surprised and pleased she had accepted his invitation he rose to his feet when he saw her waiting in the door.
“Wow, you look great,” he said when she arrived at the table after winding her way through the other patrons and fending off several invitations to join one of the groups.
“Thanks,” she said. Lucy nudged her with her snout, and Terella squatted to greet her. “Hello, Lucy,” she said, stroking the animal’s coarse fur. “I didn’t think you brought her with you. Was she waiting outside when you met the Lamonts?”
“She was guarding the sled,” he replied. “Besides—well, they are newcomers; I didn’t want to scare them off.”
He pulled a chair out for Terella, and she sat across from him. “They’ll have to get over that in a hurry. Wait until you put them up in an Elf Howdah,” she said. “Besides, Lucy isn’t scary, are you, girl?”
When Betsy, Marley’s overworked waitress, appeared at the table, Zach ordered a glass of wine for Terella and a beer for himself.
“What about Lucy?” Betsy asked.
“A plate of appetizers for her—and bring one for us, too,” Zach said.
Betsy brought out the two plates, loaded with fried vegetables and stuffed mushroom caps. Terella moved Lucy’s over to the edge of the table, pulled out a chair, and patted the seat. Nothing loath, the Banded Koodoo hopped up on the chair and daintily scarfed down the appetizers.
“Glad you came?” he asked Terella.
“Yes,” she said. “Dad tells me I spend too much time working and not enough socializing. Thanks for the invite.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Did you think anything was off about Lamont?” she asked.
Zach sighed. “I might have known you didn’t come here for the pleasure of my company. What’s bothering you about the Lamonts?” he asked.
“That’s not true; I enjoy your company. You don’t get into town often enough for me to indulge in it.”
“Come, that’s encouraging,” he said with a smile.
“I didn’t think you wanted any,” she retorted. “As for the Lamonts, Dad got a letter from earth in the mail pouch from Devon Morton, do you remember him?”
“Isn’t he the man who came to check out the Portal machine after the coup failed?”
“Yes, that’s him. He warned Dad that Lamont and another man had tried to hire a Runner to bring in some tech to set up another Portal.”
He frowned. “I thought Lamont was an archaeologist?”
She took a sip of the excellent wine. “He has a degree in it, but according to Morton, he majored in Portal Technology.”
“Oh, Hell,” he said. “I don’t suppose you want to come along on the trip to help me keep an eye on him?”
“You must be psychic. That’s what Dad wants me to do. Do you mind an extra?”
He grinned at her. “Not a bit—I’ll simply put you to work.”

AMAZON

CLONED AMBITION

DEATH SENTENCE

TWELVE YEARS LATER, Scarlet was told she was going to be given a chance to exercise her nascent acting skills. A studio was re-making Spartacus, and she was to play the role of Varinia, the love interest for Spartacus.

  “Does the director know I’m a clone?” she asked hesitantly.

  “Yes,” Miss Simpson said. “All the actors will be clones. I understand Spartacus and the others will be played by a group of cage fighting clones. The director wants the fight scenes to be authentic.”

  Scarlet was delighted to realize the leader of the cage fighters was a childhood friend. “Dagmar?” she asked when she was introduced to them, “Do you recognize me?”

  He stared at her. His appearance had certainly changed, she supposed hers had as well. He was now over six foot tall, with heavily muscled shoulders, arms, and legs. Glittering tattoos ran up his arms and over onto his back and chest. He had shaved his hair.

  “Six?” he asked cautiously. 

  “It’s Scarlet now,” she told him. “I go by Scarlet Jones. My owner insisted I get accustomed to a human sounding name.”

  “Well, you look different,” he said, his eyes going over her superb figure, revealed by the toga costume she wore as a slave girl, her beautiful face, and long, honey-blond hair.

  He eyed her. “Have you read the script?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I understand we are to be lovers in the vid.”

  “Yes,” he said. “Have you done something like this before?”

  Scarlet shook her head. “This is my first time. I’m a little nervous.”

  He grinned at her. “Maybe we can get together and practice before we have to perform it on camera.”

  “Maybe,” she agreed.

  Between scenes Scarlet spent most of her free time with Dagmar’s group. The other clones were a little suspicious of her, but soon became friendly. Two of the women, Nara Kildevil and Eyja Deatheye were also veteran cage fighters. Both women were as tall as Scarlet, with smooth muscles. Like the three men, they had been tattooed with glittering patterns of mythical animals. Both women’s faces were tattooed around the eyes to give the illusion of a mask. Two of the other men, Killian Wolfcrest and Hogun Silverthorn, were large, like Dagmar and also carried tattoos. The five of them had often competed as a team in the televised games. Like Dagmar, both men had shaved their scalps, but Hogun was blond, and Killian was very dark-skinned; his tattoos barely showed unless he was under the studio lights.

  Pursuant to their plan of rehearsing the sex scenes they would be required to perform on camera. Scarlet and Dagmar arranged to meet at her secret place, an abandoned shell of a house just off the edge of the Dandridge estate. Scarlet had discovered it the first year she had spent in the Dandridge home. The house had a basement which was mostly intact. Over the years, Scarlet had managed to furnish it with an old mattress, pillows, and blankets as well as an old chair she had repaired. The place also had what she considered her secret hidey-hole: a loose panel near the fireplace, she had hollowed out to keep things she didn’t want anyone to know she possessed.

  The night she and Dagmar arranged to meet to ‘rehearse’ their sex scene, she had filched a bottle of wine and some leftover finger foods from the larder. 

  It was wonderful, but afterwards, Scarlet turned over and cried.

  “What’s wrong?” Dagmar asked, blaming her distress on his sexual performance. Like most men he had a very personal view of anything sexual. “What did I do wrong?”

  Scarlet sat up, wiping her eyes. “Nothing. You did it perfectly.”

  “Then why are you crying?”

  “Because I don’t want to lose this. I’m going to die soon. I hope I will take this memory with me.”

  “What?”

  “I wasn’t supposed to know, but in three weeks, the old hag is going to have her brain transplanted into my body.”

  “What? I didn’t think that was possible.”

  Scarlet wept harder. “It might fail. But it doesn’t matter. Don’t you see, I’ll be just as dead.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Scarlet pulled a Kleenex out of the box on the bed and wiped her eyes. Her nose was running so she blew it. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “What happens to your brain afterwards?”

  “What usually happens when a Normal uses one of us for spare parts! I think it’s called medical waste.”

  “I didn’t want to tell you yet, but the team and I have a plan. We’re going to escape. Come with us.”

  She shook her head. “We’ll just be caught.”

  “We’re good. We know how to blend in. We’ll teach you.”

  “You fool, all of us have a tracking device implanted when we’re decanted. They can use it to find us.”

  He frowned at her. “Where did you hear that? Maybe it’s a lie.”

  “It’s not.” She pulled her hair off her neck turning her back to him. “It’s located under the skin, here.” She took his hand and brought his fingers to her hairline. “Feel that? it’s the implant. You have one too.”

  “If it was implanted, it can be taken out,” he said stubbornly.

  “How?”

  “We’ll cut it out,” he said.

  She stared at him. “Can you do that?”

  “We won’t have to do it ourselves,” he said. “I think we can force the team doctor to take them out. He’s a little afraid of us anyway.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Umm—won’t he tell your owner?”

  He shrugged. “It won’t matter. By then we will be gone.”

  “You’ll need money,” she said thoughtfully. “I think I know where we can get some.”

  “Where?”

  “The old woman hoards money because she doesn’t trust the banks. She has a stash hidden in the attic—When I was a child I hid there for some reason. While I was hiding, I saw her get some cash out of it.”

  “That would mean going back to her house,” he protested. “I had thought you would simply disappear with us.” 

  “They won’t do the operation until the twenty-fifth of this month. It’s some kind of special date for her. I’ll have time to get the money.”

  “What makes you so sure she will wait until then?”

  “She’s very superstitious. Before she—ordered—me created, she had an astrological reading done. It said she would be reborn on the twenty-fifth. I’m confident she will wait until then.”

  Because he didn’t want to deal with the regulations concerning transporting clones, their owner, Jackson Robards, had rented several three-bedroom trailers in a motor home park about a mile from the studio. He told the owner of the park they were extras in the movie. Because he wanted his clone teams to pass as human, Robards provided relatively loose supervision of them, relying on the team doctor who was also staying in the trailer park, to keep an eye on them. 

  Robards had been willing to lease his fighters to make the vid because the producer offered him a lot of credits.

  “Your fighters will add a note of reality to the fight scenes in the vid,” the producer explained to Jackson. “It’s the main reason I am willing to pay your exorbitant rental fees.”

  Subsequently, the director cast Dagmar as Spartacus and another clone, Scarlet Jones as Varinia, Spartacus’s love interest in the vid. Hogan had been cast as Antonius and Killian as Gracchus. The two women were cast as extras who alternately played slaves or gladiators.

  Unfortunately for the director and the producer, the premise of the movie (Spartacus) had unintended consequences: it’s theme of rebellion against slavery resonated so strongly with Dagmar in particular, he became determined to escape their captivity and swayed the others to his viewpoint. They all knew that while their present situation was comfortable, it would become less so as they grew older. Clones typically didn’t have a long lifespan. When they reached middle age and their usefulness declined, they would be ‘retired’ or destroyed.

  The trailer park where Jackson had located Dagmar and the others was only about four miles from the Dandridge estate.

  After he left Scarlet, Dagmar made the run back to the park at an easy jog. When he arrived back at the three-bedroom trailer he and five other fighters were living in, he found everyone asleep but Hogun Silverthorne, who was lying on the couch reading a book acquired from a local free library. The third man on their team, Killian Wolfcrest was asleep in one of the rooms. Hogun and Killian shared unofficial second in command duties. Like Dagmar, Hogan was big, about six foot four with tattoos of mythical animals on his chest, back and forearms. They hadn’t been consulted about the tattoos; Robards thought it made them look more intimidating so after he purchased the men at auction, he ordered it done. The three men had been bred specifically to fight in the televised gladiator games. Their owner, Jackson Robards, had invested heavily in the televised version of the games and wanted his own teams of fighters. Over the next few years, Robards had purchased several women fighters as well: Eyja Deatheye and Nara Kildevil had immediately paired with two of Dagmar’s inner circle, Hogun Silverthorne and Killian Wolfcrest. Robards was indifferent to the relationship which developed between Eyja and Hogun and Nara and Killian, other than to ensure the women were supplied with birth control patches.

  Hogun looked up from his book. “Well? Did you speak to her about coming with us?”

  “I did,” Dagmar said grimly. “She’s on board, but she pointed out an obstacle we didn’t know about.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Feel up under your hairline at the base of your neck. Is there a small lump there?”

  Hogun set the book aside and did as instructed. “Yes, I feel it. What is it?”

  “It’s a tracking implant. We’ll have to get them taken out before we escape, or Robards will be able to haul us right back.”

  “We all have these?”

  “Yes. According to Scarlet, they were implanted just before we were decanted.”

  “Well, that sucks. Can we take them out ourselves?”

  “I thought we would just make Dr. Leoni do it.”

  Hogun nodded. “He would do it, but he’ll talk afterwards. You know that.”

  “Not if he’s dead.”

  “Who’s dead?” Eyja Deatheye, who usually shared Hogun’s bed, stood in the doorway, frowning at them. She was tall for a woman, almost six feet, with heavily muscled arms and legs. She wore her white-blond hair in a short bob.

  “How long have you been standing there?” Dagmar asked.

  “Not long. Your jabber woke me up. What’s going on?”

  “Sit down, Eyja,” Hogun sat up and patted the couch beside him.

  Yawning, she came over and snuggled up beside him, tucking her bare feet up under her.

  “We were discussing our escape plans. We need to remove our tracking implants before we leave so we can’t be traced.”

  She rubbed her eyes. “What implants?”

  Hogun took her hand and guided it to the lump on the back of her neck, rubbing the implant. “Feel that? It’s the implant.”

  “How do we get rid of it?”

  “That’s what we were just discussing.”

  “We’ll need money too,” Eyja said practically. “How do you plan to get some?”

  “Scarlet says the old woman has a secret cache of coins and bills.”

  “Is she going with us?”

  “Yes,” Dagmar said. “I want to do it soon. They will finish up the crucifixion scenes day after tomorrow. I overheard the director say he intended to spend several weeks editing the vid. I want to be gone as soon as we’re done filming.” 

AFTER DAGMAR left, Scarlet returned to her room and waited until she was sure everyone was asleep before slipping out to go to the attic. The attic was a hoarder’s paradise. Dorothea stored a lot of things up here: old costumes from movies she had starred in, keepsakes from lovers, clothes that had gone out of fashion, and miscellaneous items no one had thrown away because the staff never knew when Dorothea might go up there to rummage through it. 

  Scarlet unlocked the door and shut it before she turned on the light. Under a pile of ratty old furs near the back wall was a canvas tote with faded flowers printed on it. Dorothea had brought the tote home from a tour of Europe before the Pandemics made travel there prohibitive. Deciding it would be the least likely item to be missed, Scarlet carried it over to the other wall, being careful not to leave footprints in the dusty floor.

  Stuck in a warped bookcase were several fake volumes which had been designed to look like regular books, but each one held a locked box. Scarlet took the keys she had made copies of earlier in the year and unlocked each one, transferring the credit chips, paper money, coins, and jewels into the tote. She left a few things in each box so it would look as if Dorothea herself had emptied it. Ironically, a DNA scan would say the same thing; Dorothea herself had opened the boxes. Scarlet had been created using Dorothea’s genes so the DNA would say it was Dorothea. Luckily for Scarlet, the PGA clone farm had obeyed Dorothea’s instructions and not imprinted Scarlet’s DNA cells with their brand. Since Dorothea intended to be the one in Scarlet’s body, she had taken no chances of being mistaken for a clone after the brain transplant. 

  Scarlet took her escape fund and crept downstairs and out to the garden. DNA wasn’t the only thing she had gotten from Dorothea; Scarlet also had her creator’s secretive nature. Outside the estate was the remains of an older building destroyed by a long-ago fire. Scarlet had discovered it as a teenager and created her own special place to hide things. She descended the basement stairs (the only part of the burned-out shell left intact) and lit the Coleman lantern she had left there. By its light, she opened a false wallboard and put the tote inside it. When Dagmar came to get her, she would retrieve it then.

  The next morning, Scarlet was eating breakfast in the dining room before being driven to the studio when she heard the news. Janice Leroy, the nurse who attended Dorothea came out of the old woman’s bedroom, white faced, and told Jenkins, the butler to call the doctor. 

  “What happened?” gasped Miss Simpson.

  “She’s dead,” Nurse Leroy said flatly.

  “How?”

  “That’s for the doctor to say. There will have to be an autopsy; it’s an unattended death,” the nurse said repressively.

  “I’m due at the studio,” Scarlet said. “Should I go?”

  “Yes, she would want you to finish what you started,” Miss Simpson said.

  Scarlet finished breakfast and went out to the car. Michael, the chauffer let her out in front of the studio door, which had a sign “Filming in progress. No admittance” posted. 

  “I’ll be in the canteen, Miss Scarlet,” her driver said.

  Scarlet nodded and waited until he had driven away to walk around the studio towards the RV’s brought in for the actors and stagehands comfort.

  Eyja was sitting outside under the shaded awning. She looked up as Scarlet arrived.

  “So, you’re coming with us,” she said.

  “Yes, I hope so, Scarlet said. “Is Dagmar inside?”

  “Yes. We weren’t sure you would be here today. We heard the old woman is dead.”

  Scarlet nodded. “Yes. Did Dagmar tell you about her plans for me?”

  “Not exactly. He said it was something bad though.”

  “She was planning to transplant her brain into my body,” Scarlet told her. “I think my brain would have been tossed as medical waste.”

  “Yuck,” Eyja said. “So, what happens now?”

  “Well, technically, I suppose I’m part of her estate. I don’t think she had any contingency plans for dying before she could be transplanted.”

  Dagmar came outside. “Scarlet! You came. What happens now?”

  “Until I’m told otherwise, I finish the movie,” she said. “Can we go inside for a moment?”

  “Sure.”

  “You too, Eyja,” Scarlet said,

  Once inside the RV, she sat down at the tiny table. “I was able to retrieve the cash and jewelry last night. I hid it in that abandoned house where we had the picnic.”

  “I hope you didn’t leave it out in the open,” Killian Wolfcrest said. Like Dagmar and Hogun he had been bred to fight in the televised gladiator games. On his dark skin the tattoos didn’t show up as well as they did on the lighter skinned Dagmar and Hogun.

  “I didn’t, of course,” Scarlet said. “I hid it behind a loose panel near the fireplace. Dagmar knows where it is.”

  One of the set techs rapped on the door. “Miss Jones they’re setting up for your scene with Crassus.”

  “I’m coming,” she called.

  Scarlet went inside the studio. The tech crew was still setting up for the scene. A man dressed as a slave was offering a fruit plate to a portly man reclining on a divan. He was another Clone, one who was used extensively by the studio in movies requiring an older man. His real name was Sherlock Lamer. Sherlock was one of the lucky clones; he was still usable by the vid studios, so he hadn’t yet been ‘retired’.

  “Please get into costume, Miss Jones,” the director, Hans Christian said. He maintained the fiction that all the actors were human, addressing them by the names which would appear on the vid credits. This wasn’t done out of any altruistic feelings, but to make it difficult for the authorities to close down the vid for using ‘clone’ actors. Everyone knew this was done, even the so-called authorities, but they had been paid a hefty sum by the studio to ignore this fact. Christian did his part by addressing his actors as if they were normal humans.

  When Scarlet finished the scene, she found Michael waiting for her. She knew something was wrong because he wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I’m to drive you back to the estate, Miss,” he said.

  “Alright. I just need to—”

  “No, Miss, I’m sorry, but my orders say you aren’t to speak to anyone here. We’re just to go.”

  “The Director—”

  “I’ve already given him a letter from Miss Dandridge’s lawyer. He understands. Please Miss.”

  “I have to change out of this costume,” Scarlet protested.

  “Your regular clothes are in the car, Miss. Please come with me.”

  Scarlet walked as slowly as she dared back to the lot where Michael had parked. She saw Nara watching them and waved to her. Nara started over to them, and Michael shoved Scarlet into the car, shutting the door firmly.

  “Where are you taking her?” Nara asked him.

  “That’s none of your business,” he replied, getting in, and shutting the driver’s door. He started the engine and backed out, nearly clipping Nara when he did so. She jumped back out of the way and stood watching him as he drove away.

  “What happened? Wasn’t that Scarlet’s car and driver?” Eyja asked.

  “Yes. He wouldn’t let me speak to her. I don’t know where they took her.”

  “Maybe the Director knows.”

  The director simply looked at them in silence before he spoke. “I’m sorry, Miss Dandridge’s lawyer requested Miss Jones be returned to her estate. I don’t know anything else.”

Learn More about Scarlett’s fate: https://buy.bookfunnel.com/o0rkubnrl4

Sister, Sister

IT WAS MIDNIGHT and Lucinda nursed a cup of Cafka as she waited for the time to report in for her first shift on Port Recovery’s Security forces. Agra, her Dactyl, snuggled with her littermate Saura in the fur-lined nest made especially for them. Dactyls were six-limbed flying mammals native to Vensoog. They came in all sizes, from creatures large enough to hunt the Water Dragons living in the rivers and along the channels between the Equator Islands, to miniatures like Agra and Saura who were tiny enough to hold in your hand. Although tiny, they possessed all the characteristics of their species: limitless curiosity about the world around them, wings covered with long lint-like hair, a fluffy, down-coated body, talons on the rear feet, and arms with hand-like paws. Humans fell in love with them because of their soft coats, large ears, big dark eyes and pointed noses.

      In the wild, Dactyls depended on their lightning fast flight speed to escape from predators. Like the Quirka, another native pet adopted by the settlers, Dactyls were empathic, bonding in love with their chosen humans.

      Domesticated dactyls were rare; they were shy and seldom tamed unless taken as kits. Several years ago, Lucinda and her foster brother Rupert had been on a plant foraging expedition and found four orphaned, hungry Dactyl kits and adopted them into the family. The two males had bonded with the girl’s foster brothers, Roderick and Rupert.

      Because she intended to keep Agra with her while on duty, Lucinda and the dactyl had undergone specialized training as to how the dactyl should behave during the times when she accompanied Lucinda to work.

      Lucinda was not yet a full-fledged officer in the planetary police force; all cadets had to do a three-month stint under a trainer before transitioning to a qualified officer. Cadets like Lucinda, and Agra in this case, remained on probation until their trainer was satisfied with their on-the-job performance.

      Lucinda was excited to begin, although she let none of her anticipation show in her face, not even to her sister Juliette, sitting across from her in a night robe. The sisters looked nothing alike. Juliette was tiny, with a thin body, green eyes and a long, curly mane of red hair, while Lucinda was tall and full-bodied. Her white-blond hair, cut to chin length, fluffed around a heart-shaped face with red, cupid bow lips, a short nose and light grey eyes.

      When Juliette and Lucinda were twelve and their younger sister Violet was ten, Lady Katherine and Lord Zack had come to the center looking for Lord Zack’s orphaned nephews Rupert and Roderick.

      Discovering the illegal nature of Grouter’s operation, the couple had made sure Grouter was arrested for his part in the child sex trade. They adopted Lucinda, Juliette, and Violet as well as Zack’s nephews. Although the three girls considered themselves sisters, they were ‘designer children’ who had been ordered to specifications. They had been born in a laboratory on one of the moons of Fenris and later lived on Fenris in a child placement center run by Hans Grouter. Grouter hid his identity as a lieutenant in the local Thieves Guild by posing as a dedicated government official, existing in an uneasy alliance with Jerry Van Doyle, who ran the Guilds prostitution business. Over Grouter’s protests, Van Doyle recruited much of his “new meat” for the child prostitution arm from the Fenris Child Placement center.

      Grouter had plans of his own for the girls, so he protected them from being used by Van Doyle. However, their life was by no means an easy one. From the first day they arrived, they had been subjected to harsh training methods to enable them to utilize their programed genetics for the Guild’s criminal purposes. By the time Lady Katherine and her husband had rescued them, the girls were already an accomplished team of thieves who raided the rich of Fenris at Grouter’s request.

      Five years after coming to Vensoog, Juliette and Lucinda were just a few months away from receiving their Match Lists. Under Vensoog law, receiving your first List made you a full adult. The Match Lists had been created to help preserve the biological diversity of the human population. Traditionally they were issued by the Makers and given to all young people who came of age during Festivals in the spring and fall of each year. Varying opinions as the usefulness of the lists abounded among natives to Vensoog. Some like Laird Genevieve thought them simply useless, others believed you always found your true love on your List. But that was for the future; right now Lucinda was more concerned with her present situation.

      For the next three months she would be on her own in the apartment because Juliette was leaving later that morning on an expedition to the largely unexplored northern continent of Kitzingen.

      As Lady Katherine’s First Daughter and direct heir, Juliette was learning her trade by shadowing her mother when Parliament was in session. Juliette was destined to be heavily involved in politics; Lady Katherine wasn’t only the next in line to rule Veiled Isle, she was Clan O’Teague’s Parliamentary Representative. However, Parliament only met three times per year, and Juliette was taking advantage of the free time to go out with one of the exploring expeditions to Kitingzen, the closest of the four largely unexplored continents.   

      “There is just one tiny favor I need you to do while I’m gone,” Juliette said.

      Lucinda eyed her suspiciously. Juliette’s designed genetics made her naturally manipulative, and while Lucinda’s had given her genius level intelligence, as a child she had more than once been tricked by her sister into doing something she hadn’t intended to do.

      “What kind of favor?” she asked.

      “I got tapped for helping with the plans for the Harvest Festival and I need you to stand in for me.” Seeing the refusal in her sister’s face, she rushed on, “it’s not a big deal; I’m not in charge of anything. It’s mostly showing up at a few meetings to vote on what the committee decides and going to the reception for the Free Traders when their delegation arrives. Please?”

      Lucinda scowled at her. “I might be on duty when they have their meetings. Police work isn’t like a regular job; there’s a lot of unscheduled overtime.”

      Juliette smiled winningly at her. “It’s okay if you have to miss a couple of meetings because of work. I cleared that with Duchesse St. Vyre, the head of the committee. She won’t mind, as long as you let her know.”

      “What about this reception? Is it formal?”

      “Well, yes, but you have that lovely new dress you got for Jayla’s wedding. It’s a shame to let it sit in the closet.”

      Trapped, Lucinda gave in. “Oh, alright, just let me know when these meetings take place. You owe me though.”

      Her sister jumped up and gave her a big hug. “I already uploaded everything to your calendar. You are the absolute, best sister. Anything you want, I promise.”

      “I’m the best patsy, you mean,” Lucinda snorted.

      The house alarm chimed, signaling her it was time to leave for her shift. She hugged Juliette again and stood up to put on her jacket. “C’mon, Agra, it’s time to go,” she told the Dactyl, who reluctantly left the warm nest and fluttered over to her shoulder, yawning.

      Knowing Juliette would have left for Kitingzen when she came back from work, Lucinda stopped and looked at her. “You be careful out there, okay?”

      “I promise,” her sister said. “Besides, thanks to Dad, I’ve got Bridge and Terrence Mann along as minders, remember?”

      Lucinda laughed, hugged her again, and left. She opened the garage section attached to their apartment and rolled out her air sled. Agra obediently settled into a made-to-order Quirka Seat attached to the dash. With so many Vensoogers having Quirka, the Quirka Seats, which resembled an upside-down helmet with a glass faceplate, had become popular.

      Agra, being about the same size as a Quirka, fit into the seat just fine, her wings taking up the same space as a Quirka’s plumy tail. Mini Dactyls such as Agra and Saura came in all colors. Agra’s fur was a mixture of pale green, red and yellow, the skin on her face, feet and hands was a pale tan, shading to a darker shade outlining her eyes and on her nose. Dactyls were magpies and loved glittering jewelry, which Agra usually wore in the form of a bracelet around her neck. Tonight, Agra’s neck adornment was a braided tan and brown leather collar to match Lucinda’s Security uniform. Although plain, Lucinda had added several shiny flat metal bars etched with her badge number.

      Settlers had adopted the Dactyls and Quirkas because both animals were small, affectionate and avid hunters of household vermin, which crept into human dwellings despite the best efforts of modern technology. The Quirka’s and Dactyls had returned the favor because humans provided a mutually satisfactory love bond, and a ready source of edible goodies.

      Lucinda threw a leg over the seat, strapped on her own helmet and fired up the sled. There was still some traffic out because Port Recovery, the capital of Vensoog, never really slept, but this section of the city was quiet as most residents who lived in the girl’s neighborhood were in bed.

      The apartment was located over a shop near their cousin Jayla’s in a high-end merchant section of town. The two-story domed buildings, a necessity because of Vensoog’s seasonal hurricane winds, were mostly dark because of the late hour but as she neared the center of town more lights showed in the windows. As she moved toward the core of the island where the city government offices were located, she could see the tips of shuttle noses at the spaceport peeking over the tops of the large government buildings.

      When the Clans first landed on Vensoog, the huge city domes had been used as shelters. As the Clans moved to their permanent territories, the domes had been converted to government and commercial uses.

      Lucinda parked her sled in the security employees parking lot, showing her brand-new ID to the gate guard, who nodded, grinning at her, and she and Agra went inside for roll call.

      There was a mixed assortment of officers waiting in the roll call room: young, old, male and female. Lucinda took a seat by her trainer, Sgt. Mira Forest. She knew she had been lucky to draw Mira, a twenty-year veteran of the streets with a reputation as the best trainer in Port Recovery. One look at Mira and people immediately knew she was a cop from her short pepper and salt hair, tough, blocky build and most of all, the look in her eyes. She was a dead shot with both a pulsar rifle and pistol. Mira had been offered promotions to detective grade numerous times and refused. She preferred to stay on the streets and train young recruits.

      Although she was the only one with a Dactyl, Lucinda was relieved to see that about a third of her fellow officers had a Quirka perched on a shoulder. About the size of a human fist, Quirka’s faces resembled an Old Earth hedgehog. Quirkas had a squirrel-like body, hand-like paws and feet, a pointed nose and small upstanding ears. Their primary defense against predators in the wild, venom tipped quills, ran along their spine from their shoulders to their plumy tails. Like the small Dactyls, they were omnivores.

      Lucinda had been a little worried Agra’s presence might cause issues. Officers who were accompanied by Quirka or Dactyls were required to take special courses with them in how the animals should behave while on duty. She had been relieved when Agra easily passed the course. If she had failed, she wouldn’t have been able to join Lucinda on duty until she passed.

      Lucinda glanced at her mini-porta-tab to ensure she had received the list of the latest B.O.L.O. (Be On The Lookout) updates. A rash of break-ins along the waterfront shops had been happening, some vandalism by persons unknown in a couple of commercial sled parks, there was a list of stolen air sleds, and a peeper had been reported in a couple of neighborhoods.

      When she joined Mira in the locker-room, she found the older woman frowning at her own porta-tab.

      “Is something wrong?”

      Mira tossed her a crystal DNA key for her official sled. “That is for your sled. If you’ve got one of those fancy Quirka seats for—Agra, is it? You can snap it into place. I’m afraid you’ll have to use your personal one. Command hasn’t gotten around to issuing them for the rank and file yet.”

      Lucinda caught the key easily and pulled the Quirka seat out of her locker. Tucking it under her arm, she followed her trainer out to the sled park.

      “Why were you frowning just now?”

      Mira shrugged. “Nothing really, I heard a few rumors there is some smuggling near the docks.”

      “Isn’t that our area?”

      “Uh-huh. This is your first night, so stick close. Don’t go chasing off when you see something without telling me first. I’ll do the same for you.”

      Lucinda activated the key and pushed it into the waiting slot on the dash of her sled. The DNA encoding meant that from now on, she would be the only one who could start it. When she gripped the handlebars the sled purred into life. She followed Mira out the gate of the secure lot and the pair of them rode side by side toward the docks and warehouses. There were few homes in this area, just manufacturing, small shops serving the offices and the warehouses who needed access to the ships bringing in meats, fish, harvested crops, and other raw materials from the outer islands.

      Lucinda and Mira stopped their sleds at the edge of the district and dismounted, parking the sleds in the designated area saved for official vehicles.

      “A map of our patrol area should have been downloaded to your sled controls. Set the monitor to meet us at the warehouses in an hour,” Mira instructed.

      Several storefronts selling paper, tools and a few all-night eateries serving simple, fast food and Cafka lined both sides of the street leading down to the docks.

      “We do a foot patrol from here,” Mira told her. “Keep your eyes open for anything unusual.”

      “That one looks as if there are workers inside,” Lucinda said, gesturing to a lighted warehouse with its own attached dock.

      Mira consulted her tab. “That belongs to Medford textile. They are supposed to be getting in a shipment of dragon silk to ship off world. We’ll swing by there on our beat. We start here; we each take one side of the street. Check the windows and test the shop doors. If you find one open, tag me.”

Domestic Disturbance

The street was quiet. At first, Lucinda had been a little nervous, but her nerves soon smoothed out. At least until she found the open door on a shop specializing in small hand tools.

      She tapped her shoulder com. “Mira, I’ve got an unlocked door here.”

      “Okay, wait for me before you go in,” Mira instructed, calling it in as she crossed the street.

      Once there, she shone her light on the lock. “Doesn’t seem to have been forced,” she said. “Okay rookie, this is how it goes down. Draw your weapon. We enter and check each side of the store for someone who shouldn’t be there. I’m going in high, you go in low. Try not to shoot any shop owners who just forgot to lock up.”

      They were moving cautiously through aisles of small tools when they heard the hullabaloo start at the back of the store.

      “You cheating bastard! I come down to bring you dinner because you’re working late, and I find you boinking this slut!” A woman’s voice shouted, and there was a splat as if something messy hit a solid object.

      Lucinda turned the corner of an aisle in time to see a man with his trousers partially undone wiping the remains of a messy take-out box dripping sauce and noodles off his face. Just as she arrived, the woman who had obviously thrown it jumped on another woman sitting half-dressed on the low counter. The two went over backwards, pulling hair, kicking and biting.

      ‘Hey, no!” the man cried, and jumped in to separate them.

      “PRS! Freeze!” Lucinda shouted. Seeing this had no effect, she holstered her gun and grabbed the nearest combatant, who happened to be the man, and pulled him out of the fight.

      In the meantime, Mira had arrived and dived into the roiling mass of flying fists and kicks behind the counter. She separated the half-dressed woman from the pile, dragging her around the display case where there was more room to handcuff her. Climbing over the countertop the wife leaped to attack again, landing on Mira to reach her prisoner. The three careened around the area between the sales counter and a tool display, slipping in the spilled sauce and noodles, as they knocked over stands of products.

      Mira ended up on her butt underneath the fighting women. The wife had the advantage now because of the younger woman’s cuffed hands, and she used it mercilessly, landing several fist blows and kicks on the other woman’s face and breast. She also managed to raise a lump over Mira’s eye when she missed her target and got Mira instead.

      Shoving the husband down in a seated position against a wall, Lucinda told him sternly, “Stay there,” and rushed to help her trainer.

      She grabbed the wife by the back of her hair and heaved her off Mira and her captive. She forced the woman down on her belly and pulled her hands behind her to apply restraints.

      Disobeying Lucinda’s order to stay where he was, the husband got up to help his girlfriend. Agra flew at his face, talons on her hind feet extended. He ducked Agra’s charge, but he needed to get by Lucinda to reach Mira and her captive. Her hands busy restraining his cursing wife, Lucinda used her boot to shove him away. He slipped in the spilled dinner again, and ended up on his rump covered in sauce and noodles.

      “I told you to stay where I put you! Go sit down!” Lucinda yelled.

      Agra flew in his face again, this time hissing a threat.

      Eying the Dactyl warily, the man dropped back down.

      “You okay?” Lucinda asked Mira, who had staggered to her feet, dragging her captive with her.

      “Just dandy,” Mira said, swiping a smear of sauce off her chin and then wiping her hand on her captive’s still undone blouse. “Welcome to patrol work, rookie.” She looked down at the sauce and noodles spattered on her uniform and scowled. “I ought to charge the three of you for my cleaning bill.”

      “What do we do with them?” Lucinda asked.

      Mira studied the three combatants. “Depends if they want to press charges or not.”

      “I do!” the half-naked one said. “She assaulted me!”

      Mira sighed. “Okay, that’s one. Anybody else?”

      “Yes! I want to exercise Code Duello!” the wife snapped. “She’s attempting to break up my home.”

      “Code Duello is a civil matter,” Mira told her firmly. “You’ll have to file that with your Clan Liaison.” She looked over at Lucinda. “Call it in rookie.”

      Lucinda swallowed, and tapped her com, trying frantically to remember the codes for a domestic disturbance and assault.

      The rest of the night was uneventful; sort of. They arrested three half-lit tourists serenading what one of them mistakenly thought was the home of a pretty girl he had met in a bar. They couldn’t carry a tune between them and the din roused the neighbors as well as the homeowner and his wife. The justifiably annoyed homeowners had called in the disturbance and the irate husband had dumped a bucket of water on them. The neighbors had come out to watch.

      “Call the wagon,” Mira told her as they rode up, “and then shut them up.” She indicated the trio of drunken singers. “I’ve got the homeowners.”

      “He didn’t need to call you guys; we didn’t know she was married,” the first singer protested, when Lucinda identified herself to them.

      “I don’t think that’s her,” one of his friends whispered loudly.

      “Yeah,” the third drunk opined. “Where did she change her clothes?” He pointed at Lucinda. “That looks like a uniform.”

      “You’re lucky you didn’t get shot,” Lucinda told them in disgust while Mira calmed the irate husband. “This neighborhood has reported a peeper these last few nights. Sit on the curb and we’ll arrange a ride for you.”

      “Just go back to bed, sir,” Mira told the husband. “We’ll handle it from here.”

      “I hope they lock you up and throw away the key,” he yelled, before he slammed his window shut.

      Apparently losing interest in the couple, the first  singer complained, “I’m hungry. How come you smell like Chinese noodles?”

      “We broke up a fight. One of the weapons was a box of take-out,” Mira said dryly.

      “Hey, I’m hungry too. Can we stop on the way and pick some up?” asked one of his buddies.

      “No,” Mira replied.

      “Hey, where are we going anyway?” the third one asked. “What kind of party are you girls taking us to?”

      “Oh, you’ll like it,” Mira said. “There’s lots of people in your condition there.”

      “You guys are keeping us busy tonight,” Kneckie the Patrol sled driver, told Lucinda as they pulled up in front of the dome.

      When he opened the door to the sled, the aroma of noodles and sauce wafted out, along with the miasma of vomit and sour booze.

      “Don’t you ever wash this thing out?” Mira demanded, as she helped Lucinda herd the three drunks inside.

      “Why? We don’t have to smell it. It’s sealed off,” the driver retorted. “What have you got for us Sarge?”

      “Drunk and disorderly, disturbing the peace. The homeowner and his wife will be in tomorrow morning to sign a complaint. In the meantime, throw ’em in the drunk tank.”

      “Sure thing. There you go, upsy-daisy,” he told the last man, as he boosted him up into the sled. When the drunks sat down, the sled’s bench cuffs snapped into place. “See you back at headquarters, Sarge.”

      Mira rolled her neck. “Sure thing Kneckie. C’mon rookie, we’ve got reports to write.”

      Returning home, Lucinda parked her sled in the unused storage space on the ground floor. She glanced at the empty storefront, wondering who Jake Reynolds, their new landlord and cousin Jayla’s husband, intended to rent it to. Because the girls were upstairs, he was being very picky about the tenants.

      Opening the upstairs door to the apartment, she was struck by a sense of loss, as she realized she was going to be spending her first ever night alone. At Grouters, and later in Lady Katherine and Lord Zack’s home one of her sisters had always been near.

      Agra chirped comfortingly in her ear, and rubbed her cheek against Lucinda’s, emitting reassurance and love.

      Lucinda reached up and stroked the Dactyl, who purred at her. “Just us tonight sweetie. Let me get out of this smelly uniform and you and I’ll take a shower and get something to eat.”

      Stripping off her uniform, which gave off a faint odor of soy sauce, she examined it for stains. Programing the clothes fresher for stain and odor removal as well as cleaning and pressing, she tossed in her uniform.

      She had no fear of the stains not coming out; as a housewarming present, Jayla had sent Martha, her house-bot over to set up the house comp, which included programming the clothes fresher. Looking at the menu in the Robo-Chef, Lucinda realized the ever-efficient Martha had not only stocked it, but loaded it up with her recipes, which were far superior to the standard ones it came with.

      Afterwards, Lucinda did a quick clean-up of the kitchen. The apartment came with a weekly cleaning service, but she hated the smell of dirty dishes. She and Agra tumbled into bed and slept dreamlessly.

      It was late afternoon when she woke to the sound of her com chiming. Looking at the display, she saw calls from both her sisters. Setting up for a multi-vid call, she slipped on a robe and wandered out to the kitchen to program a pot of Cafka for herself.

      “How was your first day?” Violet asked. That far south, the sun was just coming up over the horizon. She and Jelli, her sand dragon, were on the cliffs above the Dragon nests on Talker’s Isle. Lucinda heard the ocean waves crashing on the rocks in the background.

      “You look like we woke you up,” Juliette commented. She was sitting outside her pop-up dome on Kitingzen, with Saura sleeping on her lap.

      “You did,” Lucinda laughed. “It was different. We broke up a fight over a man, got slopped with Chinese noodles and arrested three drunken tourists. How was your trip?”

      “A bit crowded, and Jorge isn’t happy to have me here. I think Dad must have threatened him if something happened to me.”

      Violet nodded. “He did that at Jayla’s wedding. He was in full protective papa mode that night. I saw him talking with Tom Draycott too, and I know he laid down the law to poor Silas Crawford. It was kind of sweet really.”

      Juliette snorted. “He thinks Jorge is a risk taker. That’s why Bridge and Terrence are getting a vacation on Kitingzen.”

      “Is Jorge reckless?” Lucinda asked, frowning.

      Juliette shrugged. “I don’t have a way to judge. We haven’t really gotten started yet.”

      “I thought you would be mapping the area outside the new village,” Violet remarked.

      “Originally, we were going to do that, but apparently, Jorge saw something resembling buildings further along that mountain range on the vids the first-in scout made. He thinks it’s an old city, and the council gave permission to go and look, so that is where we are heading.”

      “Did Mom and Dad know about this?” Lucinda asked.

      “I don’t know. I just heard about it in the shuttle on the way over to our first base camp. Today we unloaded our stuff out of the shuttles and set up for the night. Tomorrow most of us will spend the day going through our equipment to make sure we have everything we are supposed to have is here and organizing it for the trail. Jorge will be taking our mapmaker and the geologist up into the hills to try to scout out the easiest path to that old road he thinks he saw. When he returns we head up the trail into unexplored territory. We will be out of com touch a lot of the time, and we could encounter anything.”

      “Well, you be careful,” Lucinda said.

      “I could set it up through the link for all of us to know if one of us is in trouble,” Violet offered.

      “Judging by last night, mine could show trouble a lot though,” Lucinda protested. “Violet, I can’t have you two panicking whenever I have to chase someone or break up a fight.”

      “It can be fixed so we can talk to each other through the link,” Violet promised.

      “Okay, I guess,” Lucinda agreed. “If Juliette is going to be out of com reach we need it.”

      “What are you going to be doing the rest of the day?” Violet asked Juliette.

      Juliette made a face. “I’ve been told we will have a camp meeting after supper to arrange camp chores and go over the route and safety rules.”

      “That doesn’t sound as if Jorge is taking unnecessary chances,” Violet remarked.

      “I doubt if he is as careful as Mom on the trail though,” Juliette replied, and all three girls laughed. Lady Katherine had justly earned her reputation as an over-protective mother; she had once been tried for killing a woman who had threatened one of her children. The subsequent Clan trial had declared it a justifiable homicide, of course. Any attempt to harm children was taken very seriously on Vensoog.

      “We do have a real greenhorn with us this time,” Juliette admitted. “Our map-maker, Isaac Jordan has never even been camping. I had to help him with his pop-up dome, and those things practically set themselves up.”

      Picking up something in Juliette’s voice, Lucinda asked her, “Is he cute?”

      “How old is he?” Violet seconded.

      Juliette’s fair skin flushed a little. “He is about our age. A year older than Luce and me.”

      “You didn’t say if he’s cute or not,” Lucinda pressed.

      “Oh, there’s the dinner gong,” Juliette said hastily. “I’ve got to go. Later guys.” She dropped out of the link.

      “She didn’t answer you,” Violet said.

      “I noticed that,” Lucinda agreed. “She likes him though.”

      “Attracted,” Violet corrected. “Couldn’t you feel it through the link?”

      “I felt something,” Lucinda admitted. “Did you manage to do that while we were talking? You are getting really good with this link stuff.”

      Violet nodded. “Drusilla is a good teacher. I’ve learned so much since I’ve been studying with her.”

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DEATH SENTENCE

TWELVE YEARS LATER, Scarlet was told she was going to be given a chance to exercise her nascent acting skills. A studio was re-making Spartacus, and she was to play the role of Varinia, the love interest for Spartacus.

“Does the director know I’m a clone?” she asked hesitantly.

“Yes,” Miss Simpson said. “All the actors will be clones. I understand Spartacus and the others will be played by a group of cage fighting clones. The director wants the fight scenes to be authentic.”

Scarlet was delighted to realize the leader of the cage fighters was a childhood friend. “Dagmar?” she asked when she was introduced to them, “Do you recognize me?”

He stared at her. His appearance had certainly changed, she supposed hers had as well. He was now over six foot tall, with heavily muscled shoulders, arms, and legs. Glittering tattoos ran up his arms and over onto his back and chest. He had shaved his hair.

“Six?” he asked cautiously. 

“It’s Scarlet now,” she told him. “I go by Scarlet Jones. My owner insisted I get accustomed to a human sounding name.”

“Well, you look different,” he said, his eyes going over her superb figure, revealed by the toga costume she wore as a slave girl, her beautiful face, and long, honey-blond hair.

He eyed her. “Have you read the script?”

“Yes,” she said. “I understand we are to be lovers in the vid.”

“Yes,” he said. “Have you done something like this before?”

Scarlet shook her head. “This is my first time. I’m a little nervous.”

He grinned at her. “Maybe we can get together and practice before we have to perform it on camera.”

“Maybe,” she agreed.

Between scenes Scarlet spent most of her free time with Dagmar’s group. The other clones were a little suspicious of her, but soon became friendly. Two of the women, Nara Kildevil and Eyja Deatheye were also veteran cage fighters. Both women were as tall as Scarlet, with smooth muscles. Like the three men, they had been tattooed with glittering patterns of mythical animals. Both women’s faces were tattooed around the eyes to give the illusion of a mask. Two of the other men, Killian Wolfcrest and Hogun Silverthorn, were large, like Dagmar and also carried tattoos. The five of them had often competed as a team in the televised games. Like Dagmar, both men had shaved their scalps, but Hogun was blond, and Killian was very dark-skinned; his tattoos barely showed unless he was under the studio lights.

Pursuant to their plan of rehearsing the sex scenes they would be required to perform on camera. Scarlet and Dagmar arranged to meet at her secret place, an abandoned shell of a house just off the edge of the Dandridge estate. Scarlet had discovered it the first year she had spent in the Dandridge home. The house had a basement which was mostly intact. Over the years, Scarlet had managed to furnish it with an old mattress, pillows, and blankets as well as an old chair she had repaired. The place also had what she considered her secret hidey-hole: a loose panel near the fireplace, she had hollowed out to keep things she didn’t want anyone to know she possessed.

The night she and Dagmar arranged to meet to ‘rehearse’ their sex scene, she had filched a bottle of wine and some leftover finger foods from the larder. 

It was wonderful, but afterwards, Scarlet turned over and cried.

“What’s wrong?” Dagmar asked, blaming her distress on his sexual performance. Like most men he had a very personal view of anything sexual. “What did I do wrong?”

Scarlet sat up, wiping her eyes. “Nothing. You did it perfectly.”

“Then why are you crying?”

“Because I don’t want to lose this. I’m going to die soon. I hope I will take this memory with me.”

“What?”

“I wasn’t supposed to know, but in three weeks, the old hag is going to have her brain transplanted into my body.”

“What? I didn’t think that was possible.”

Scarlet wept harder. “It might fail. But it doesn’t matter. Don’t you see, I’ll be just as dead.”

“Are you sure?”

Scarlet pulled a Kleenex out of the box on the bed and wiped her eyes. Her nose was running so she blew it. “Yes, I’m sure.”

“What happens to your brain afterwards?”

“What usually happens when a Normal uses one of us for spare parts! I think it’s called medical waste.”

“I didn’t want to tell you yet, but the team and I have a plan. We’re going to escape. Come with us.”

She shook her head. “We’ll just be caught.”

“We’re good. We know how to blend in. We’ll teach you.”

“You fool, all of us have a tracking device implanted when we’re decanted. They can use it to find us.”

He frowned at her. “Where did you hear that? Maybe it’s a lie.”

“It’s not.” She pulled her hair off her neck turning her back to him. “It’s located under the skin, here.” She took his hand and brought his fingers to her hairline. “Feel that? it’s the implant. You have one too.”

“If it was implanted, it can be taken out,” he said stubbornly.

“How?”

“We’ll cut it out,” he said.

She stared at him. “Can you do that?”

“We won’t have to do it ourselves,” he said. “I think we can force the team doctor to take them out. He’s a little afraid of us anyway.”

“Oh,” she said. “Umm—won’t he tell your owner?”

He shrugged. “It won’t matter. By then we will be gone.”

“You’ll need money,” she said thoughtfully. “I think I know where we can get some.”

“Where?”

“The old woman hoards money because she doesn’t trust the banks. She has a stash hidden in the attic—When I was a child I hid there for some reason. While I was hiding, I saw her get some cash out of it.”

“That would mean going back to her house,” he protested. “I had thought you would simply disappear with us.” 

“They won’t do the operation until the twenty-fifth of this month. It’s some kind of special date for her. I’ll have time to get the money.”

“What makes you so sure she will wait until then?”

“She’s very superstitious. Before she—ordered—me created, she had an astrological reading done. It said she would be reborn on the twenty-fifth. I’m confident she will wait until then.”

Because he didn’t want to deal with the regulations concerning transporting clones, their owner, Jackson Robards, had rented several three-bedroom trailers in a motor home park about a mile from the studio. He told the owner of the park they were extras in the movie. Because he wanted his clone teams to pass as human, Robards provided relatively loose supervision of them, relying on the team doctor who was also staying in the trailer park, to keep an eye on them. 

Robards had been willing to lease his fighters to make the vid because the producer offered him a lot of credits.

“Your fighters will add a note of reality to the fight scenes in the vid,” the producer explained to Jackson. “It’s the main reason I am willing to pay your exorbitant rental fees.”

Subsequently, the director cast Dagmar as Spartacus and another clone, Scarlet Jones as Varinia, Spartacus’s love interest in the vid. Hogan had been cast as Antonius and Killian as Gracchus. The two women were cast as extras who alternately played slaves or gladiators.

Unfortunately for the director and the producer, the premise of the movie (Spartacus) had unintended consequences: it’s theme of rebellion against slavery resonated so strongly with Dagmar in particular, he became determined to escape their captivity and swayed the others to his viewpoint. They all knew that while their present situation was comfortable, it would become less so as they grew older. Clones typically didn’t have a long lifespan. When they reached middle age and their usefulness declined, they would be ‘retired’ or destroyed.

The trailer park where Jackson had located Dagmar and the others was only about four miles from the Dandridge estate.

After he left Scarlet, Dagmar made the run back to the park at an easy jog. When he arrived back at the three-bedroom trailer he and five other fighters were living in, he found everyone asleep but Hogun Silverthorne, who was lying on the couch reading a book acquired from a local free library. The third man on their team, Killian Wolfcrest was asleep in one of the rooms. Hogun and Killian shared unofficial second in command duties. Like Dagmar, Hogan was big, about six foot four with tattoos of mythical animals on his chest, back and forearms. They hadn’t been consulted about the tattoos; Robards thought it made them look more intimidating so after he purchased the men at auction, he ordered it done. The three men had been bred specifically to fight in the televised gladiator games. Their owner, Jackson Robards, had invested heavily in the televised version of the games and wanted his own teams of fighters. Over the next few years, Robards had purchased several women fighters as well: Eyja Deatheye and Nara Kildevil had immediately paired with two of Dagmar’s inner circle, Hogun Silverthorne and Killian Wolfcrest. Robards was indifferent to the relationship which developed between Eyja and Hogun and Nara and Killian, other than to ensure the women were supplied with birth control patches.

Hogun looked up from his book. “Well? Did you speak to her about coming with us?”

“I did,” Dagmar said grimly. “She’s on board, but she pointed out an obstacle we didn’t know about.”

“What’s that?”

“Feel up under your hairline at the base of your neck. Is there a small lump there?”

Hogun set the book aside and did as instructed. “Yes, I feel it. What is it?”

     “It’s a tracking implant. We’ll have to get them taken out before we escape, or Robards will be able to haul us right back.”

“We all have these?”

“Yes. According to Scarlet, they were implanted just before we were decanted.”

“Well, that sucks. Can we take them out ourselves?”

“I thought we would just make Dr. Leoni do it.”

Hogun nodded. “He would do it, but he’ll talk afterwards. You know that.”

“Not if he’s dead.”

“Who’s dead?” Eyja Deatheye, who usually shared Hogun’s bed, stood in the doorway, frowning at them. She was tall for a woman, almost six feet, with heavily muscled arms and legs. She wore her white-blond hair in a short bob.

“How long have you been standing there?” Dagmar asked.

“Not long. Your jabber woke me up. What’s going on?”

“Sit down, Eyja,” Hogun sat up and patted the couch beside him.

Yawning, she came over and snuggled up beside him, tucking her bare feet up under her.

“We were discussing our escape plans. We need to remove our tracking implants before we leave so we can’t be traced.”

She rubbed her eyes. “What implants?”

Hogun took her hand and guided it to the lump on the back of her neck, rubbing the implant. “Feel that? It’s the implant.”

“How do we get rid of it?”

“That’s what we were just discussing.”

“We’ll need money too,” Eyja said practically. “How do you plan to get some?”

“Scarlet says the old woman has a secret cache of coins and bills.”

“Is she going with us?”

“Yes,” Dagmar said. “I want to do it soon. They will finish up the crucifixion scenes day after tomorrow. I overheard the director say he intended to spend several weeks editing the vid. I want to be gone as soon as we’re done filming.” 

AFTER DAGMAR left, Scarlet returned to her room and waited until she was sure everyone was asleep before slipping out to go to the attic. The attic was a hoarder’s paradise. Dorothea stored a lot of things up here: old costumes from movies she had starred in, keepsakes from lovers, clothes that had gone out of fashion, and miscellaneous items no one had thrown away because the staff never knew when Dorothea might go up there to rummage through it. 

Scarlet unlocked the door and shut it before she turned on the light. Under a pile of ratty old furs near the back wall was a canvas tote with faded flowers printed on it. Dorothea had brought the tote home from a tour of Europe before the Pandemics made travel there prohibitive. Deciding it would be the least likely item to be missed, Scarlet carried it over to the other wall, being careful not to leave footprints in the dusty floor.

Stuck in a warped bookcase were several fake volumes which had been designed to look like regular books, but each one held a locked box. Scarlet took the keys she had made copies of earlier in the year and unlocked each one, transferring the credit chips, paper money, coins, and jewels into the tote. She left a few things in each box so it would look as if Dorothea herself had emptied it. Ironically, a DNA scan would say the same thing; Dorothea herself had opened the boxes. Scarlet had been created using Dorothea’s genes so the DNA would say it was Dorothea. Luckily for Scarlet, the PGA clone farm had obeyed Dorothea’s instructions and not imprinted Scarlet’s DNA cells with their brand. Since Dorothea intended to be the one in Scarlet’s body, she had taken no chances of being mistaken for a clone after the brain transplant. 

Scarlet took her escape fund and crept downstairs and out to the garden. DNA wasn’t the only thing she had gotten from Dorothea; Scarlet also had her creator’s secretive nature. Outside the estate was the remains of an older building destroyed by a long-ago fire. Scarlet had discovered it as a teenager and created her own special place to hide things. She descended the basement stairs (the only part of the burned-out shell left intact) and lit the Coleman lantern she had left there. By its light, she opened a false wallboard and put the tote inside it. When Dagmar came to get her, she would retrieve it then.

The next morning, Scarlet was eating breakfast in the dining room before being driven to the studio when she heard the news. Janice Leroy, the nurse who attended Dorothea came out of the old woman’s bedroom, white faced, and told Jenkins, the butler to call the doctor. 

“What happened?” gasped Miss Simpson.

“She’s dead,” Nurse Leroy said flatly.

“How?”

“That’s for the doctor to say. There will have to be an autopsy; it’s an unattended death,” the nurse said repressively.

“I’m due at the studio,” Scarlet said. “Should I go?”

“Yes, she would want you to finish what you started,” Miss Simpson said.

Scarlet finished breakfast and went out to the car. Michael, the chauffer let her out in front of the studio door, which had a sign “Filming in progress. No admittance” posted. 

“I’ll be in the canteen, Miss Scarlet,” her driver said.

Scarlet nodded and waited until he had driven away to walk around the studio towards the RV’s brought in for the actors and stagehands comfort.

Eyja was sitting outside under the shaded awning. She looked up as Scarlet arrived.

“So, you’re coming with us,” she said.

“Yes, I hope so, Scarlet said. “Is Dagmar inside?”

“Yes. We weren’t sure you would be here today. We heard the old woman is dead.”

Scarlet nodded. “Yes. Did Dagmar tell you about her plans for me?”

“Not exactly. He said it was something bad though.”

“She was planning to transplant her brain into my body,” Scarlet told her. “I think my brain would have been tossed as medical waste.”

“Yuck,” Eyja said. “So, what happens now?”

“Well, technically, I suppose I’m part of her estate. I don’t think she had any contingency plans for dying before she could be transplanted.”

Dagmar came outside. “Scarlet! You came. What happens now?”

“Until I’m told otherwise, I finish the movie,” she said. “Can we go inside for a moment?”

“Sure.”

“You too, Eyja,” Scarlet said,

Once inside the RV, she sat down at the tiny table. “I was able to retrieve the cash and jewelry last night. I hid it in that abandoned house where we had the picnic.”

“I hope you didn’t leave it out in the open,” Killian Wolfcrest said. Like Dagmar and Hogun he had been bred to fight in the televised gladiator games. On his dark skin the tattoos didn’t show up as well as they did on the lighter skinned Dagmar and Hogun.

“I didn’t, of course,” Scarlet said. “I hid it behind a loose panel near the fireplace. Dagmar knows where it is.”

One of the set techs rapped on the door. “Miss Jones they’re setting up for your scene with Crassus.”

“I’m coming,” she called.

Scarlet went inside the studio. The tech crew was still setting up for the scene. A man dressed as a slave was offering a fruit plate to a portly man reclining on a divan. He was another Clone, one who was used extensively by the studio in movies requiring an older man. His real name was Sherlock Lamer. Sherlock was one of the lucky clones; he was still usable by the vid studios, so he hadn’t yet been ‘retired’.

“Please get into costume, Miss Jones,” the director, Hans Christian said. He maintained the fiction that all the actors were human, addressing them by the names which would appear on the vid credits. This wasn’t done out of any altruistic feelings, but to make it difficult for the authorities to close down the vid for using ‘clone’ actors. Everyone knew this was done, even the so-called authorities, but they had been paid a hefty sum by the studio to ignore this fact. Christian did his part by addressing his actors as if they were normal humans.

When Scarlet finished the scene, she found Michael waiting for her. She knew something was wrong because he wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I’m to drive you back to the estate, Miss,” he said.

“Alright. I just need to—”

“No, Miss, I’m sorry, but my orders say you aren’t to speak to anyone here. We’re just to go.”

“The Director—”

“I’ve already given him a letter from Miss Dandridge’s lawyer. He understands. Please Miss.”

“I have to change out of this costume,” Scarlet protested.

“Your regular clothes are in the car, Miss. Please come with me.”

Scarlet walked as slowly as she dared back to the lot where Michael had parked. She saw Nara watching them and waved to her. Nara started over to them, and Michael shoved Scarlet into the car, shutting the door firmly.

“Where are you taking her?” Nara asked him.

“That’s none of your business,” he replied, getting in, and shutting the driver’s door. He started the engine and backed out, nearly clipping Nara when he did so. She jumped back out of the way and stood watching him as he drove away.

“What happened? Wasn’t that Scarlet’s car and driver?” Eyja asked.

“Yes. He wouldn’t let me speak to her. I don’t know where they took her.”

“Maybe the Director knows.”

The director simply looked at them in silence before he spoke. “I’m sorry, Miss Dandridge’s lawyer requested Miss Jones be returned to her estate. I don’t know anything else.”

Learn More about Scarlett’s fate: https://buy.bookfunnel.com/o0rkubnrl4

The 2nd book set on Barsoom Colony

FEEL THE RYTHEM

AVA GARNEYS checked the display on her tablet against the survey marker she had just inserted into the ground to ensure it was securely placed. This was the last marker she needed to set today. Satisfied, she swung an armored-clad leg over the seat of her personal airsled and headed back to base camp. Ava was a mapmaker and explorer attached to the Outlawed Colony of Barsoom. She was the last one to return to base today.

   “There you are girl. I was beginning to think we needed to send out search parties,” Mathilde Dale, a petit blond and one of her fellow mapmakers chided as Ava slid her airsled into its customary place outside the Pop-up dome they shared with the other female member of the team, Thomasine Willys, who was busily preparing tonight’s meal. Thomasine was about medium height with a chunky body and light brown hair which she wore in a short bob for easier care and maintence out in the field. 

   “Not likely,” Ava retorted before disappearing into their dome to shed the armor she wore during the day, re-emerging in the leggings and sweatshirt she customarily wore when off duty. Ava had inherited her height and lanky build from her father as well as his ginger hair.

   “I leave for town tomorrow, remember?” she said.

   “Yeah, a month off to laze around and try on clothes,” Constantine Bryan, one of the two male members of the team and the only one who looked the part of the intrepid explorer, said.

   “I see you’ve never been at ground zero during the weeks before a wedding,” hooted Jacques Brunelle, a tall, skinny nerd. “I remember when my sister got married! Ordinarily she’s okay for a sister—but talk about turning into Bridzilla! Ava’ll probably want to come back here to relax!”

   “Now that Ava’s back, we can turn on the security field,” Constantine announced, staring pointedly at Jacques.

   “I did it last night. It’s your turn,” Jacques told him.

   “We need to redo next month’s chore rotation, anyway,” Mathilde who was senior stated. “We’ll do that after dinner, so don’t anyone run off immediately.”

   “Yeah, the deserter here will be gone for a month,” Constantine said.

   Ava sank into her customary camp chair, stretching her long legs out toward the Crystal heater. “You’re breaking my heart, Bud,” she snorted.

   Compared to down near Savona, the colony’s capital city, which nestled in the hot and humid tropic zone, it was chilly up here in the mountains, especially at night. She would be glad of her insulated sleeping bag later.

   When she left the next morning, dawn was just breaking. The twin moons could still be seen in the sky and the rising sun had turned the horizon a splendid orange, fading into lavender, and then into the dark blue of night.

   Jacques had been right, damn him—she wasn’t looking forward to the weeks before her baby sister’s wedding. Judith was marrying Randal Langton, the son of one of her dad’s business partners, who she had been affianced to since they were children. The marriage was an arrangement between their parents, as was the custom in the colony which adhered as closely as possible with the way things had been done in the Renaissance.

   They would have done the same for Ava; indeed, they tried—but she had been singularly uncooperative. She had managed to torpedo all the arrangements her parents tried to make for her. Gossip and innuendo had done the rest. No one wanted to try and marry their son to her. Ava was glad for Judith, but she knew she was going to have to endure the humiliation of her parents looking for a husband for her among the wedding guests and any single young men of the right age. The trouble was her taste and that of her parents simply didn’t fit well together.

   Her unpleasant thoughts were interrupted by a fracas going on below her. Swooping lower on her sled, she saw several Kevlar had cornered what looked like a furry catamount. Why didn’t the silly creature simply climb the tree behind her to get away? She wondered. Then she spotted the litter of pups half-hidden under the bush next to the tree. 

   Kevlars were a Medium to large carnivore, with shaggy, green mottled fur, pointed ears and Predator eyes. After an incident earlier in the year when someone had attempted to kidnap Judith, her new brother-in-law to be had insisted on installing some weapons on their personal sleds. He had done Ava’s first since she intended to leave as soon as her father had been cleared, but for some reason had put off adding weapons to Judith’s personal sled. Ava suspected this was because Randal didn’t want his fiancée to go looking for trouble.

   Ava squeezed the handlebars, and a plasma bolt shot out, clipping the rear of the Kevlar pack. With a squeal of rage and fright, they ran away. They would be back, she knew. Kevlar’s were hunters; they might have been frightened away, but the pack would soon overcome their fear and return.

   The Catamounts found around Savona were nearly hairless an evolutionary adaption to the heat, but this one had a short, dense coat of golden fur fading to white around the paws and face. Intending to document the creature, she stopped her sled close to the tree, dissolved the wind-blocking force bubble over the sled and pulled out her vid-cam to take pictures. Up close the resemblance to a Catamount was even more pronounced. The skin under the dense fur was still wrinkled. Either this was a previously unknown variant or an entirely new species. The colonists had only been in residence on Barsoom for about 150 years; there was a lot they didn’t know about their new planet.

   The mother was thin to the point of emancipation, and she was weakening rapidly. Ava dismounted her sled and crouched in front of the dying animal. Cautiously she reached out to touch the kits. The first three she touched were dead, cold and stiff, but one of them was moving, attempting to nurse, even though it was plain her mother had no milk to feed her. When Ava touched the kit, the mother hissed feebly and then simply closed her eyes and died. Ava gently slid a hand under the live kit and lifted it. It was cold but still alive. She tucked it inside her shirt, next to her skin and re-mounted her sled. She could see the Kevlar pack peeking out at her from across the clearing, and hastily hit the lift button on the sled. It wasn’t unknown for a Kevlar pack to attack a lone human on the ground or even one on a one-man sled like hers if it was flying low enough. She re-instated the force bubble and gunned the engine. Behind her she could hear the Kevlar fighting among themselves for the corpses of the dead creatures.

   In town, her first stop was the veterinarian used by her sister for Licorice, her pet Catamount.

   Like Ava, Dr. Helewis Peele was tall, with short-cropped dark hair and a fit body. She looked up as Ava gently removed the animal from inside her shirt and laid her on the examining table. “A Hairy Catamount!” she exclaimed. “Wherever did you find it?”

   “A pack of Kevlars were fighting her mom as I passed over on the way home. I scared them away with a plasma bolt across their tails and they ran. The mom died in front of me. This was the only kit still alive. I couldn’t leave her there to die or be eaten, so I brought her with me.”

   “Was she still nursing?”

   “Well, she was trying to, but I doubt if the mom had any milk. She was awfully skinny.”

   Dr. Peele nodded. She ran a scanning wand over the small animal. “Female, about three weeks old. We’ll put her on a formula we use for Catamounts. I take it you’re planning to adopt her?”

   “I guess so,” Ava said, feeling a tug on her heartstrings. She’s a fighter.”

   “What are you going to name her?”

   Ava looked down at the small body with its dense golden fur, fading into white around her face and paws. “Sunrise, for the time I found her.”

   “I’ll send a vet-bot with nursing supplies and a few other things I think you will need over to your house. In the meantime, just keep her warm and her tummy full.” She handed Ava a half full glass bottle with a nipple and showed her how to get the kit to drink. Sunrise latched on fiercely, swallowing nearly the entire bottle, after which she burped and went to sleep.

   Ava looked up with a smile. “I guess she was hungry.”

   On the way home from the vets, she stopped off at a local pet store and purchased a pet bed, some food dishes and litter box supplies which she had sent to her parents’ home.

   The house her father had built for their mother was just the same as she remembered; a 3-story edifice nestled on the water, with the bottom floors open to the air, with tall trees, whose enormous broad leaves shaded the house from the sun and heat, rising around it. She parked her sled on the deck where two robot servers waited for her.

   “Welcome home, Miss Ava,” the one in the butler’s livery said. “How was your trip home?”

   “A little exciting Marston,” she told the senior robot. Even though the servers were only robots, Tamara Garneys demanded her family address them as if they were real people. “Dr. Peele will be sending over a vet bot and a few essential items for my new Catamount. My clothes and stuff are in the saddle bags and side storage.”

   She extracted Sunrise from inside her shirt. The small animal blinked still blurry eyes at him.

   “He has fur,” Marston said, his robot voice showing surprise. Most robots on Barsoom had been programmed to interact with humans as their programing dictated another human would.

   “Yes, she is a different variety than Licorice,” Ava replied referring to her sister Judith’s pet, whose fine, transparent hair revealed his nearly blue-black skin.

   She had no chance to say more; Judith and Tamara became impatient for her to come inside and rushed out. Judith showed her inheritance from her parents as clearly as Ava did, she resembled their mother, except for her flame-tinged hair. Ava had always felt her sister looked like one of the fairies in the stories Tamara liked to read to them as children. She was tiny, like their mother, with the same Rubenesque figure. Tamara’s once voluptuous figure had softened into matronly lines, and her hair, once a platinum blond, was now simply white.

   “Ava!” Judith cried, throwing her arms around her sister to hug her.

   “Careful! You’ll squash Sunrise,” Ava exclaimed in her turn.

   Judith drew back. “Oh, what is it?”

   “She’s a catamount, like Licorice, but a different variety. Dr. Peele called her a Hairy Catamount.”

   “What an ugly name for such a sweet-looking creature,” Tamara had given her daughter a much gentler hug. Now she stroked a finger over the kit’s tiny head.

   “Come inside and let’s get you and Sunrise settled in your room. We’re having some friends over for tea later. I’ve laid out some fresh clothes for you. All you need to do is take a shower and freshen up.”

   Ava sighed. The wedding circus was starting already. “Who’s coming?”

   “Oh, the usual crowd.” Judith answered.

LONG ARM OF THE LAW

BARSOOM WAS a planned colony. Part of the planning had included creating a court system. Although the Colonists deeply admired the Renaissance lifestyle, they hadn’t hesitated to alter customs where they considered changes necessary. Although it paid a small stipend, the job of Chief prosecutor and his subordinates was voluntary. After the volunteers had put in their names for consideration they were reviewed and selected by a judicial council every three years. This was how Carlos Santana had come to serve as a prosecutor. He had been selected over the other candidates because although he was now a solid family man, he had a history of being a tough opponent who didn’t scare easily. In his younger days he had been a famous duelist, an excellent shot with a pistol, and a master of bladed weapons. The Black Templars and the judicial committee were aware that he had also been a bounty hunter before he took up the law as a profession.

   Carlos Santana was tall and slender with finely cut features and melting chocolate eyes behind absurdly long eyelashes. His dark hair had just enough grey in it to give his handsome looks a distinguished air.

   Just now he was prosecuting a case against Christopher Moyet who was believed to be an enforcer for the Red Conclave, a local criminal organization, for extortion. It was a solid case, and Carlos was confident of a guilty verdict. A series of alternate threats and bribes offered hadn’t stopped him from forging ahead. That morning before court had convened, he found his clerk, Denis Norward, a rotund little man with limp brown hair, attempting to dispose of an envelope without giving it to his boss.

    “You needn’t be afraid to show it to me Denis,” Carlos held out his hand for the envelope. “What part of my anatomy am I going to lose this time?”

   Denis turned stricken eyes to his boss. “It isn’t about you sir,” he said, watching Carlos open the envelope. Several vid-stills of his daughter at school slid out. Carlos’s face darkened as he stared at the pictures.

   “I checked with the school, sir,” Denis said hastily. “Your daughter is fine. I also requested them to add additional security.”

   Carlos wadded the vid stills of his daughter Francisca playing soccer and walking across campus, into a crumpled ball and threw them in the trash.

   “Thank you, Denis,” he said. “We’d better head for court now, or we’ll be late.” 

   As Carlos had expected, the jury brought in a verdict of guilty in less than 15 minutes. He invited his clerk and office staff out to celebrate with him at lunch.

   Across town the verdict was received much less happily.

   “You are certain we can’t overturn it on appeal?” Jerome Redglove, one of the titular heads of the Red Conclave asked the man who brought the news. Redglove was a thin man with brown, sleekly groomed hair. No one looking at him would suspect him of being anything but the well-groomed, up-and-coming politician he was.

   The woman he was sharing lunch with was striking. Adeline Prowd had long, silver hair, which she allowed to cascade down her back in a mermaid style coiffure. The tattoo of an eagle placed discreetly over her right eye was the only thing to mark her as the Conclave’s top enforcer.

   “Santana is becoming a problem,” Redglove told her. “I thought you were going to take care of him.”

   “Since you won’t let me get rid of him, I’ve been working under a handicap. I’ve been looking for a whip to tame him with, and I think I’ve found it. We’re going to introduce his daughter to a young, ambitious captain in the Conclave. Up till now, we’ve only used him for a few collection and intimidation jobs, but he’s anxious to move up and he’s pretty enough to appeal to a fourteen-year-old.”

   “What’s his name?”

   “Jean Coudet.”

   Coudet had once thought becoming a member of the Red Conclave would be glamorous. After being outed about the date rape ring, he had been shunned by most of the good citizens of the colony. He received his assignment with mixed feelings. He wasn’t attracted to little girls, but he told Antoni Guissipe, the Enforcer who brought him the assignment, he would do it.

   “How?” Guissipe asked curiously.

   Coudet had been flipping through the pages in the information Guissipe had handed him. “There is a teen hangout called the Black Dog Café she frequents. It shouldn’t be hard. Girls her age are always looking for a bad boy underdog. I’ll get her to come to me.” 

Learn More: https://buy.bookfunnel.com/pzrwb1opa4

A MAN AND a woman stood looking down at the young girl about fourteen who lay on the gurney. The child was of slight build, with long dark hair, and a honey toned complexion. Her dark green eyes were closed in sleep.

   The woman was Dr. Jolene Marston. She was tall and angular, her graying hair pulled back in a messy bun. She felt a brief moment of regret that she wouldn’t be the one to teach this child to use her abilities. Long ago, before she had been embittered by the death of her son, she had been like this child; just teetering on the edge of her burgeoning mental abilities. It was better this way, she told herself. On the psychic colony, this girl might never learn how powerful she was—but no one would be crafting her into a weapon either.

   “You’re sure she won’t remember?” the man asked. Simon Torrent was ex-military. His badly scarred visage and hands gave evidence he had once been a powerful warrior.

   Marston lifted her shoulders and let them fall. “Well, nothing is absolute, of course,” she replied, “but unless she is brought back into contact with something from here to trigger a memory, it’s unlikely.”

   He frowned. “What about the others?”

   “They’re only three. They were in Franklin’s compound when it was attacked by that group of wild clones. Our sources learned all the toddlers were 

 adopted by Mathias and Ivette Bedingfeld, a pair of students from Laughing Mountain.”

   He nodded, satisfied. “They will be out of reach of the Others there, No one will be able to weaponize their abilities. What about the infants who were scheduled to be decanted?”

   “They’ve apparently been adopted by a Man named Liam Brendan and his wife Tally Higgens. Higgens is also from Laughing Mountain. Not a lot is known about Brendan: he and his sisters disappeared for about thirteen years. He returned alone to Laughing Mountain after his uncle, Robert Masters died. Masters was rumored to have links to the mob. Shortly after Brendan and his wife claimed the infants, they disappeared from Laughing Mountain too.”

   Just then, the door opened, and an aide said, “The runner from Shangri-La is here, sir. What do I tell her?”

   “Tell her we’ll be right along.” 

   “Shangri-La? That colony of Psychics?”

   “Yes. Her abilities should pass without too much notice there.”

   “How are you going to pay her emigration fee?”

   “I’m not.”

   “But then she’ll go in as an indentured servant,” the woman protested. Shangri-La’s Indentured Servant program was a controversial platform in some circles. It was based on an old system popular in Colonial America. An already established colonist would pay the emigration fee, and provide housing, food, and clothing for a period of five years while the new emigrant worked off what they owed the sponsor, At the end of the period, the new emigrant would be free to seek another position.

   “I’m, sorry, but it can’t be helped. We can’t take the chance the money could be traced back to us. Besides, she’s still a minor. They don’t assign hard labor to children.” 

   The woman frowned. It was true, but while Shangri-La laws precluded the girl from being assigned rigorous duties and ensured time for her to attend school, she knew that while this sounded okay in theory, a lot depended on the contractor’s policies, since the fuzzy minded idealists who formed Shangri-La’s charter hadn’t created any penalties to encourage a bad contractor to mend his ways.

   He stooped and lifted the sleeping child in his arms. The aide held the door for him.

   He carried her out to the truck and the Runner helped him fasten her seat belt. He stood back and handed the runner the locket with the name ‘Tracy Lucent’ engraved on it. “Be sure she is wearing this when she goes across,” he instructed.

   “How long will she sleep?” the runner asked.

   “The drug should wear off by the time you exit the Portal on the other side.”

AWAKENING

THE FIRST THING Tracy remembered was also her first sight of the city of Fortuna and the planet Shangri-La. Both were beautiful. Shangri-La was a pastoral paradise capable of sustaining human life. It had no sentient species. The planet was Approximately 67% water with seven continents and three islands large enough to be called semi-continents equidistant from each other. It had one large moon orbiting it. The planet took 465 days to orbit a yellow sun. The axel tilt was enough to provide seasonal change. The capital city and the Portal were in a temperate zone of one of the northern continents near the ocean.

    “Miss, can you hear me?” the woman who shook her shoulder was in her forties, with dishwater blond hair cut in a short bob. Her rotund figure was clad in leggings and a loose, long-sleeved shirt dyed with many colors.

   Tracy sat up slowly, looking around. She had been lying on an ornately carved stone bench. Behind her she could hear the crash of waves hitting the white sand beach and overhead the scream of sea birds. The sun made a sparkling aureole in the east, and the crisp air held the tang of sea salt.

   “Where am I?” she asked.

   The woman stood back and looked her over. “You’re on Shangri-La. What’s your name?”

   “I—my name?”

   “Well, you’ve got a name, don’t you?”

   “I suppose I must, but I don’t know it,” Tracy said numbly. She glanced down, seeing the locket dangling between her little girl breasts for the first time. She lifted the locket to look more closely at it. It had a name carved into the silver finish. She showed it to the woman. “This has a name. Tracy Lucent. Is that me?”

   “It’ll do for now. How old are you?”

   Tracy’s brow wrinkled. “I’m not sure—fourteen?”

   “Do you remember coming through the Portal?”

   Tracy shook her head. “I’m sorry. Is that how I got here?”

   “You must have come through it. You aren’t a native. Come with me. We need to get you checked out by a doctor.”

   Following her, Tracy stumbled, so busy looking around, she forgot to look where she put her feet.

   The city dazzled her. Fortuna, the capital of Shangri-La was set on a narrow peninsula of rocky land, jutting out into the Crystal Sea. The Founders had spent a lot of money on aesthetics. The buildings lining the wide paved streets were graceful and ornate with stained wood rooftops and white stone walls. Water fountains and statues of Greek and Roman figures graced the fronts of buildings and street corners.

   Delivery wagons pulled by large, sturdy Llandaffs filled the lanes as they distributed todays fresh produce, grains and meat to the houses and businesses lining the streets. Somewhere far back in their evolution, Shangri-La’s Llandaffs and Kookabura, used by the colonists for transportation, were genetically related to camelids, and resembled earthly Llamas and Alpacas although much larger (the Llandaffs were about the size of a Clydesdale horse). 

   Like all of the Outlawed Colonies, Shangri-La didn’t possess an industrial base, so they had needed an alternative form of transportation. Occasionally, an air sled was imported, but they were rare.

   The settlers had domesticated three native breeds of camelids to use as draft animals, riding animals and for other things horses had once been used for on earth. Llandaffs have long necks, slender limbs, and rounded muzzles. They have protruding lower incisors (front teeth), and their upper lip is split. Partly because they have been domesticated for their wool, it can be found in a wide variety of colors. The Llandaffs under-coat wool was famous for its softness, whereas the upper-coat wool (known as “guard hairs”) is a little coarser and serves to protect Llandaffs from debris and rain. Both coats are used for weaving into fibers. Kookaburas were smaller and lighter boned than Llandaffs. As they walked toward the trolley stand Tracy saw a few of them being ridden down the street. There were also a few of the Vicuburas, the smallest of the three breeds, hitched to small, lightly laden carts.

   “Who are you?” Tracy asked,

   “My name is Ramona Frost. I’m in charge of unattended minors who come through the Portal.”

   Ramona ushered Tracy into a seat on the trolley, pulled by a team of six Llandaffs.

   “Get aboard girl and take a seat.”

   “Long night?” Caley, the trolley driver clucked to her team and the trolly meandered down the street toward the town civic center.

   Ramona leaned her head back against the seat. “Yeah. As soon as I can get this one sorted out, I’m heading for bed.”

   “Excuse me,” Tracy said, “but what are those called?” She pointed at the Llandaffs. 

   “Those are Llandaffs. We use them as draft animals,” Caley answered her.

   It was a new word. Tracy savored it on her tongue. She wanted to know more, but a more pressing worry diverted her. “What’s going to happen to me?” She asked.

   “First, you get checked out by one of our docs to determine how old you are, and if you are healthy, then we try to find your parents or guardians.”

   “What if you can’t find anyone?”

   Ramona smiled reassuringly at her. “Then you go into the system. Don’t worry, we take good care of our children here on Shangri-La.”

   Tracy said nothing although she sensed Ramona’s unease, instinctively, she didn’t feel comfortable revealing her own ability to pick up on other’s emotions. Plainly the woman didn’t choose to discuss whatever was bothering her.

   The pediatrician was a slim young woman with short-cropped black hair and a café-a-late complexion.

   “Well, Ramona, what have we here?”

   Tracy unconsciously sent out a feeler to get a reading on the woman’s intentions, then relaxed. She felt no animosity or ill will from the doctor. I didn’t know I could do that, she thought. I wonder what else I can do.

   “She doesn’t remember her name or coming through the Portal,” Ramona said, “but she’s wearing a locket with a name engraved on it. Tracy Lucent, so we’ve been calling her Tracy.”

   “Humm, no parents or guardian looking for her?”

   “Unfortunately, no,” Ramona replied. “The gate keepers noticed her asleep on one of the benches near the unloading area. She woke up when I spoke to her.”

   The doctor pulled a handheld scanner out of her pocket and ran it over Tracy.

   “Any idea how old you are?” she asked.

   Tracy searched the blank slate of her memory and came up empty. “I’m sorry. I think about fourteen, but I don’t know.”

   The scanner transferred its readings to the large holo screen mounted on one wall. The screen beeped a complaint.

   “Humn,” the doctor said again.

   “Is something wrong?” Tracy asked fearfully.

   “No, you appear quite healthy, and you’ve had all the regulation inoculations. But I do notice there seems to be some smudging showing up on the brain scan here,” she pointed to an area on the chart.

   “Smudging?” Ramona asked. “What does that mean? Is it dangerous?”

   The doctor looked at her in surprise. “Dangerous? Oh, no, this in the area where we find personal memory. It’s just a guess at this point, but in my opinion, this young lady has been subjected to an extensive memory wipe.”

   “Are the memories recoverable?”

   The doctor shook her head. “I doubt it. The wipe was too widespread.”

   “So, no recoverable memories, then?”

   “’Fraid not.”

   “How old is she?”

   “Around thirteen or fourteen; I’d say just entering puberty.”

   “Let’s get you set up in the dorms, Tracy, and then we’ll get you some breakfast.”

   “We will need to run some tests to check where to place her in the school system,” the doctor reminded Ramona, who nodded.

   “We need to find her a sponsor too,” Ramona said, frowning. Tracy would probably end up as an indentured servant, a policy she disapproved of on principle.

A GLITTERING EYE

SHANGRI-LA, FOUR YEARS LATER:

Sheriff Geoffrey Talent glared at his favorite granddaughter. He was a large man, with a powerful body now turning soft. “Sit down Officer Talent,” he said.

Jeanne stared at her grandfather. The tone wasn’t one she was used to hearing from him.  She was a tall, slim, blond woman, beautiful, with a usual air of entitlement, which was currently suffering a setback.

    “I had visitors today. A group of business owners. They wanted to discuss abuse of power under the guise of authority by one of my officers. Care to guess which officer?”

    She swallowed, unable to meet his eyes.

    “Imagine my surprise to discover the officer is a member of my own family! Something like this could lose me the election. Do you understand that girl?”

    “Surely not,” she said. “You always win. You’ll be sheriff until Dad can take over—“

    Her grandfather made a sound like a balloon deflating. “Are you really that stupid?”

    Deciding she needed a quick diversion, she said, “She did it, Grandpa, I know she did! No one believes me!”

    Geoffrey glared at her. “If she killed him the proof is out there. Get off your lazy ass and find it!”

    Jeanne stood up. “Yes sir. As she left her grandfather’s house, Jeanne Talent thought about where she could start looking for more evidence. She had heard that Clemintine LaSalle had bought out her mother’s contract and that of the girl Tracy Lucent. Where had the money come from? It was a good place to start.

Trapp’s servants had to wait for his will to be probated before the new owner could accept any offers to buy out his Indentured contracts. “Have you met the new owner yet?” Tracy asked Grace. 

    All of Trapp’s servants were understandably nervous. A good contractor often ended up with a loyal employee. A bad one could make his servants’ life Hell. Baxter Trapp hadn’t been one of the good ones.

    Four years ago, when Grace LaSalle had discovered Trapp hadn’t made any provision for Tracy’s care beyond buying the contract, she had made room for the child in the two-bedroom suite allotted to herself and her husband Greg. 

    When she and her husband had emigrated, Grace had paid their daughter Clemintine’s emigration fee so she would come in as a paid-up emigrant, while she and her husband came in as Indentured Servants. 

It meant her daughter couldn’t live with them, and she missed her desperately, but at least she wasn’t someone’s servant, and she was free to see her parents whenever their duties allowed. Clementine had been assigned to a foster family run by Josephine Valentina, but she visited her parents when she could.

Grace’s mothering heart had gone out to the child who had arrived without a sponsor and apparently had no one to look after her interests. Grace had stepped in as a surrogate mother when Tracy’s indenture contract had been picked up by Baxter Trapp. 

    Tracy lived with the LaSalles until Greg, who had gambling issues, got in trouble for embezzling from Trapp’s clients to pay off his gambling debt (he and Grace were both accountants). He was supposedly killed by a runaway robot trash collector. Trapp had lost no time in ordering Grace to move in with him. When she refused, he had forced her to comply.

Grace had once been a beautiful blond. Several years as Trapp’s mistress had taken their toll. She was now thin to the point of emancipation, and she looked several decades older than her real age,

    When Tracy had turned sixteen, Trapp decided it was time to change concubines. He had sent for Tracy. Tracy had cautiously explored her abilities since she had arrived. She had discovered that one of her talents was empathy. She knew why he wanted her, and it frightened her. 

    “What can I do?” she asked Grace.

    “I’m sorry,” Grace had told her. “I don’t know. I wish I could protect you, child, but I can’t—I couldn’t even protect myself.” Tears leaked from Grace’s once pretty blue eyes.

    That was how Tracy ended up in Trapp’s study confronting her foster sister Clemintine across Trapp’s dead body. Clementine was wearing a specially made skin suit that made it hard to focus on her.

    “Did you kill him?” She asked.

    “No! I just got here! Did you kill him?”

    “No,” Clemintine said. She frowned for a few minutes, studying Trapps body which showed no signs of violence. When she looked up, she asked, “Where is his safe?”

    “Behind that painting, I think. Why do you want to know?”

    Clemintine strode over to the painting and swung it away from the wall. She tossed a spray can at Tracy. “Don’t touch anything until you spray your hands,” she ordered over her shoulder as she went to work on the safe combination.”

    “You are touching the safe. Why do you want it open?”

    “I sealed up before I came in.”

    She swung the safe door open, and thrust all the papers, credit chips, and loose change into the pouch she wore cross body.

    “Are you robbing the safe?” Tracy asked, scandalized.

    Clementine gave her an impatient glance. “He’s dead,” she said. “We need a reason for his death that doesn’t include either you or me killing him. I’m going out through the patio. As soon as I leave, you start screaming. Remember, we both got here at the same time, and the safe had already been emptied and he was dead. Got it?”

    “I’ve got it,” Tracy said. She watched Clementine start to climb up the patio wall, and remembered she was supposed to start screaming. It was surprisingly easy.

    Although Officer Talent had managed to put Clemintine on trial for Murder, the judge had thrown the case out of court for lack of evidence.

    Now Tracy and Grace were waiting nervously in Grace’s old apartment (Grace had moved back in as soon as they heard Trapp was dead) expecting to be told to report to the new owner to learn their fate.

    Instead, Clemintine arrived. Tracy admired Grace’s biological daughter, and Clementine had always been kind to her. Clemintine was tiny, like Tracy, with honey blond hair cut very short, and hazel eyes. She was a little underweight, but she had a good figure. Her special talent was psychometry. She had recently gotten engaged to Mason Archer a local private investigator.

    She greeted them with a huge smile. “Pack your stuff,” she said, laying a sheaf of papers down on the table.

    “Are we leaving?” Grace asked cautiously.

    “Yep. I came to show you to your new home.”

    “What about the new owner?” Tracy asked.

    Clemintine grinned and tapped the papers. “He’s out of the picture. Your contracts are paid off. You are free women ladies.”

    She held out a pair of shears to cut off the bracelets which marked them as Indentures.” Do you want to do the honors Mom?”

    Grace eyed her suspiciously. “Where did you get the money to buy out our contracts?”

    Clemintine glared at Grace. “I told you that once already. I worked my tail off for it. Here, you do it,” she thrust the shears at Tracy who awkwardly cut off her own bracelet before she removed Grace’s.

    “Where are we moving to?” 

    “I rented a house for the two of you close to Aunt Jo’s. Get your stuff and let’s get out of here.”

The rest of the story: https://buy.bookfunnel.com/s74n12bait

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“Devon Morten and Tash Higgins, returning to the colony for their friends’ wedding, never expected to be caught up in a race against time. Along with their friends Randal and Judith, Judith’s older sister Ava and the girl’s father Carlos, they must navigate the treacherous underbelly of the colony to find the missing girl before it’s too late.”

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Well, I’m letting deception cook for a little bit. I did find a few errors reading through it, but I’ll correct those before the 31st when it’s when it’s supposed to go out (hopefully ) . This time when downloading the PDF copy of the book for print on D2D it went smoothly. It took it this time it’s not an issue, the cover fit so I’ve got my finger crossed. I’m just hoping I haven’t found very many mistakes so hopefully downloading corrected. Copy of the PDF won’t be an issue.

If it isn’t one thing–its another!

I’m a little fed up with Microsoft. Every time I save something to the cloud it makes me sign in again, which is annoying. You get one thing working right and something else goes wrong. Right: I found a way to put photos and book trailers on my iPad without having to go to email them, which is a plus because some of the book trailers exceed the 2-megabyte capacity for email. That seems to work just fine. I downloaded them to Facebook so and they went across without a problem so that should work. I still need try and load them up on Amazon, which is another issue because last time I did it, they kicked two of them back to me saying it violated their community standards for God knows what reason. I really wish these companies like Facebook and Amazon and Twitter who have these so-called “companies standards” would be specific when they tell you can’t do this, I mean, how difficult is that? They must read it anyway why can’t they highlight it and kick it back to you and say you can’t do this?

Vertical Books Trailers 4 Instagram/Pinterest

I also need load book trailers up on my website, which is another thing as the website badly needs reworked. I’m hoping I’ll learn more about creating book trailers because I really would like to be able to shift some of the features around. For instance, being able to put in a text box between the videos would help now I’m still learning to do that. I did put in a request with Book Brush asking them about it, but I haven’t heard anything back yet. Oh well. The video book trailers I make on Book Brush are all horizontal, which means they don’t fit well on Instagram and Pinterest. So, I’m gonna need figure out how to make vertical book trailers. I’d like also to learn to do presentations which could be turned into videos. Adobe says you can do that, but so far, I haven’t figured out how the hell it works on their site, I would like to know how to do that. Create a nice little slideshow thing.

Learning Curves Stink!

Here I am nearly 70 and I’m having to re-re-educate myself on how to use tech. I wish this stuff had been available back when. It would’ve been nice to have it, but then when I first really started getting back into writing and painting, reel to reel computer tapes were in (late 1970s). And they were considered brand new tech. I know I lost a book; I was writing it on my lunch hour at work when I worked for the purchasing department. I had an hour. I didn’t have a car, and I didn’t drive so I wrote. I went back to files area and used a computer there and I use my own floppy discs and all that kind of stuff. but You know the 8-inch floppy that we use back then which were such high-tech items, nobody even has systems that could’ve downloaded them anymore, so I lost the book that I had on it.

Books to Write–If I can find the original Manuscripts!Stormbringer

It was sci-fi: a little bit sword and sorcery a little bit sci-fi. At the time I was working on something a little like John Carter of Mars. The other book that I worked on in high school and almost finished I never got out of the handwritten stage. It was a sci-fi western which should go over real good right now if I could dig it out.

Spaceship Down

I had a spaceship crash in the 1900 timeline. I kind of picked Arizona because I knew more about Arizona. The spaceship carried a race of amphibious humanoids, but they did have passengers. One of those passengers was a professor type. He looked a little like a monkey and had wings and he would get drunk on milk. Which is quite funny. I had three sets of couples on it. One of them was a was from the amphibious race which had a caste system. The girl that one was a high clan lady and the guy who was in love with her was a warrior type which–well let’s just say he was a lower caste, so she would’ve been marrying down if she chose him. The other two couples were humans. There was a cowboy type, whose dad owned the ranch where the crash occurred, his best friend who was really a dude and knew absolutely nothing about the West. Then there are the two women who were parts of the couples. One of them was a schoolteacher, and the other one was a professor’s daughter who was trying to make a name for herself as a professor too so she could be regarding the way or father was and make him proud of her.

Anyway, they find several lifeboats and later the ship they were traveling in. It was different. It was fun. I have no idea where the original manuscript is. I think that one’s buried in my cedar chest, but it is all in a hand-written Copy as well.

Maybe when I run out of things to write about my Saint Antoni and my 3 other series, I’ll go back and work a little bit on them.