The Ramble

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In want of a title (that might end up being Broken Things)

More of that little “brain why are you like this” project I posted the other day. There’s been over 10,000 words on that out of me in a week. That’s generally a very interesting sign.

Sirens woke me.

The air was thick, heavy—misting rain and humidity and heat and smoke.  Flames crackled too close to be safe but my movements were sluggish, head ringing.  The sirens sounded so far away and yet very, very close.

Help was coming but it didn’t feel fast enough somehow.

It couldn’t have been that long since I’d hit the ground—I wasn’t wet enough for it.  I lurched to my feet and staggered toward where the pilot lay a few yards from me.  One leg was at an odd angle and his flight suit smoldered, as if he’d taken the brunt of the blast somehow, and his helmet was gone.  I didn’t see it anywhere nearby and I wasn’t sure what that meant or if it mattered.

A mumbled curse escaped me as I dropped to my knees next to him, patting out the last of the flames with the sleeves of my sweatshirt and reaching to check his pulse.  Steady, mostly, not stringy and weak like I’d feared given the amount of blood on his face that mixed and ran with the rain.  He was breathing, though each one hitched, as if he couldn’t draw one deep enough.

It was bad.  I knew it was bad, beyond knowing it had to be—he’d crashed a godsdamned plane and it was in pieces behind me.  It was a miracle he was still alive.  In an ER, with more than my bare hands, I’d have maybe been able to do something.  Out here?

Out here all I could do was hope that he made it as far as a hospital.

My mind stumbled through possibilities as I started to be aware of voices, of police telling bystanders to stay back, of the sound of ambulance doors.  It was like time had somehow compressed, or those sirens had been a lot closer than I’d thought.

I focused on his breathing, on his pulse.  I could hear the paramedics coming but they seemed so, so far away.

“Aden.”

Everything seemed to stop.  His voice was a bare whisper, almost lost in the sound of the increasing rain and the crack and roar of the flames that seemed near enough to scorch my spine.  How was he even conscious?  But he was and he was staring at me, eyes dull as he squinted through the falling rain.

“John will be coming,” he whispered.  “Listen to him.  Please.”

The bottom dropped out of my stomach.  There was something about the voice, rough and quiet as it was, that made me feel hollow, like I’d forgotten something important.  For a few seconds, he held my gaze.  There was something familiar about the stormy color of his eyes and the tarnished silver ring around the edge, tugging on something anchored in my soul.  But I didn’t know any pilots or anyone who worked for Eden.

Right?

A breath shuddered out of him and his eyes fluttered shut.

No.

A quiet thud shook me from my shock and I twisted to look up at the paramedic who took a knee beside me, his partner quickly moving around to the other side of the now unconscious pilot.  “Did you find him like this?” the paramedic asked.

I shook my head.  “No.  He was still in the cockpit.  Barely got him out before something exploded.  He was—”  I stopped, swallowing hard.  What if I’d imagined it?  “He was conscious a second ago.”

“That seems like a miracle,” the other paramedic muttered.

“Pulse was steady,” I said, starting to rock to my feet.  “Don’t know how much trauma is there.  I blacked out when the—I don’t know what it was exploded.  His helmet was still on when I got to him.  He was still strapped into the cockpit.”

“Okay,” the first paramedic said, squeezing my arm for a second.  “We got it from here, doc.  Should be someone else coming with the fire department that can check you, okay?  Don’t go far.”

I blinked at him, then shook my head, wincing as I realized that I had a lump on the back of my head the size of an orange.  “Oh.”

The paramedic flashed me a quick smile that faded quickly as he turned back to the pilot in front of him.  I didn’t remember their names, but they seemed to know me.

Of course they knew me.

I don’t want to go to the hospital.  I backed away slowly, watching the paramedics with the pilot.  I probably needed to, though—I was almost certainly concussed, given the lump on my head and the few minutes of lost time, to say nothing of my potential hallucination.

There was no way that was real.  He couldn’t have been awake.  There’s just—there’s too much.

There’s too much.  He couldn’t have been awake.

Staring at the pilot, I knew that I had to be telling myself the truth.  I must have imagined it—that was the only explanation.  That was why he’d seemed familiar somehow, why I’d somehow known the voice, his eyes.

How he’d known my name.

I convinced myself that it was true and that was the only reason I let them load me into the front seat of the ambulance ten minutes later.  Better to be safe than sorry.

The pilot, still somehow alive, was in the back.

Behind us, in Barrow Park in the middle of the suburbs, the plane burned.

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And now for something completely different

If you glanced at the stream video post I made, you might have noticed that I mentioned a new project. This one can be filed under “brain why are you like this?” in some ways, though in others I definitely did it to myself.

The past couple weeks, I’ve been thumbing through old work–like, really, really old work, some of it dating back to high school. High school was a really, really long time ago at this point. All of it is objectively terrible and sometimes it’s nice to realize how much progression there’s been over the years, but conceptually some of them are really interesting. Lately I’ve been reflecting on how some ideas from those days that I started and discarded as beyond belief seem a lot less so now. That’s a little bit of a digression, but it does in part lead into what comes next.

I started writing something this past Tuesday, just to flex some muscles and see what happened. This is a lightly tweaked/edited of that first page and a half or so. I don’t fully have my arms around what this is going t o be, but after polling some roleplay buddies, I think I have an interesting direction to go in. We’ll see what happens. It could be something or it could be nothing. Either way, enjoy this little untitled slice of something inspired by old work that could become something very interesting (and probably pretty dark if I’m being honest).

I remember the rain and a strange sound before it happened, but for the life of me, I couldn’t tell you what it was.  It was just a sound and a strange light I caught from the corner of my eye.

Then entire world around me shuddered when that plane hit the ground.

I remember what came next mostly in fragments.  Flashes.  Broken pieces.

A lot of broken pieces.

The sound of my keys hitting the ground next to my foot.  I don’t even remember if I’d locked the door or not.  I just remember turning and seeing the fading and then growing glow and the smoke.

I didn’t think.  I just ran.

Ran toward that glow and smoke like some instinct in me was screaming that I should.

The field where the plane had gone down was two blocks from the old house.  I sprinted the entire way like the hounds of hell were after me.

The closer I got, the stronger the smell got—fuel, smoke, the smell of burning things set my common sense howling not to get closer, that this was dangerous, that this was deadly, that no one could have survived anything that smelled like this.

But something in me wouldn’t let me stop moving toward danger instead of away from it.

The plane’s wing had taken out part of the fence around the field, curling it like the lid of a can.  I could still make out the lettering along the metal, pitted and ragged at one end where the wing had been wrenched from the plane’s fuselage.

Eden.  It was an Eden Technology Group plane.  A test plane.

It wouldn’t occur to me until later that it didn’t make sense that a test pilot would’ve been flying in the rain.

I remember the heat of the fire as I threw myself toward what was left of the plane, as if I was going to be able to do anything for whatever pilot had been flying the thing.  It was barely recognizable for what it was and for weeks after—months, even—no one could quite believe that anyone had survived it.

I couldn’t even believe sometimes that anyone had survived it, and I was there.

The cockpit had separated from the main fuselage and it was laying on its side, the canopy torn away, or perhaps jettisoned at the last second before impact—it was hard to tell at a glance and I don’t remember the details.  I just remember the taste of smoke and the sting in my eyes and at the back of my throat as I got close enough to see that was still someone in there, still strapped into the pilot’s seat.

Just one.

I remember the red helmet with the blue streak and the scrapes across it from I don’t even know what.  I remember the shattered visor and a bloody face.

I remember one breath, two—and thinking that those breaths had stopped by the time I got to the cockpit, my hands scrabbling against a tattered flightsuit and buckles that burned my fingers as I tried to free the pilot.  The fire was spreading, was getting close.  I remember him taking one big gulp of air as I yanked the restraints free, but not any breaths in between.

I don’t even know if he was conscious as I hauled him out of the cockpit with strength I shouldn’t have had.  Maybe he helped me.  I don’t know.

We were three steps away when the fuel tanks exploded and sent us flying.

For a few minutes, everything went black.

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New stream layout

Not what I intended to be working on this evening, but it’s what ended up happening.

A little video of me testing out a new stream overlay and some stream deck settings (if you have never used a stream deck as a productivity hack, let me tell you, having it plugged into my desktop for pulling up files alone is amazing), preview of a tweaked layout, and a little teaser of something.

The something is a consequence of my looking over some really old work and starting to reconsider it. I guess we’ll see what shakes loose here.

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Submerged Rock (troll)

One of my favorite places in the whole damn world is Museum Campus on Chicago’s lakeshore, specifically the area around the Field Museum and the Shedd Aquarium.  On occasion, usually when the weather is good or I have time to kill or just feel the need, I’ll walk down along the walking and biking paths in the area, the ones that wrap down around the back of the aquarium, whose edges drop straight down into Lake Michigan.  Sometimes they’re closed off because of ice or because the waves on the lake are too high, making them dangerous to walk.  Sometimes even when they’re open, you’ll get sprayed by water from a freshwater sea that isn’t as the waves crash against the edge of these pathways.

It’s one of those places that I sometimes wonder if visitors ever think to wander along, or if it tends to be the provenance of locals, who bike along it in their lane, take their morning runs along the slanting walkways and the quiet that can come in those spaces, especially before the day really begins.  The view is really spectacular, even on misty days when the fog hangs heavy over the water and you can’t even see the park a few hundred yards away.  Of course, maybe I’m biased.  It is, after all, one of my favorite places, and I know that if I lived in the city I’d be there as often as I could be, convenience be damned.

Another point in favor of my eventually moving there, I guess.

Along one of those pathways are old warmings painted onto the pavement, telling passersby—and anyone who might consider jumping into the water—that there are submerged rocks in the area along the shore.  On the one hand, it seems silly that the warning would be needed.  It’s not a beach, not a swimming area, but there are certainly folks who fish along that pathway amongst the runners and the cyclists and wanderers.  The warning would be as much for them, who could lose a line in those rocks, or anyone who falls in or would-be rescuers.

Five years ago while walking the pathway, I snapped a picture of one of those warnings.  Someone with a sense of humor and a touch of whimsy decided to add a bit of extra flavor to one of those warnings.  I haven’t been back in the last year or so to see if it’s still there or if it’s been repainted, but it was still there a few years ago, the last time I was able to come down while the weather was good enough to wander down toward the water.

Spotted in the wild out on Museum Campus, behind the Shedd Aquarium

I’ve wondered since the first time I saw it—it’s been there for a lot longer than five years—about whoever painted the word “troll” onto that warning.  A college kid on a dare, a nerdy one out with friends?  High schoolers out for a laugh?  A creative with a penchant for a little bit of graffiti?

There’s a story behind it, one I know that I will never know.  Somehow, though, that makes it that much more interesting, that much more magical.  A touch of whimsy to the mundane, something that exists if you’re willing to find it.  That’s a little something we all need, now more than ever.  A little touch of magic to a gray, hard world.

So here’s to the magic makers and those who seek it—the ones that make joy and those who find pleasure in what’s been made.

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Histories of Starfall – Fall of Illycriam – Chapter 1 (original draft)

For years, I’ve toyed with the idea of writing a book based on Lawman’s Brut, an extensive prose history written during the medieval period.  I initially read sections of it while working on my master’s degree in history and actually own a copy.  The Histories of Starfall is a science fiction version of the Brut in some ways, though it’s sadly unfinished but is a project I’d like to get back to at some point.

This is the first chapter of the Histories.

  

One

“It’s worse than we feared,” he said as he strode into the king’s command center. “The fleet is at least a thousand ships with full fighter and bomber compliments. I shudder to think of how many marines they might have brought with them for ship to ship and ground assaults.”

Old King Servaas looked up from the screen that illuminated his weathered face. He had seen more than sixty years, fathered ten children, and now he was brought low by the folly of his youngest son.

Worse yet, his people would pay the price for that folly and there was nothing he could do about it. The men and women of Illycriam would pay the price for the crime of one man, the crime of Eder Alantir, son of Servaas, King of Illycriam, last of his line.

“Give us some ray of hope, Jacob,” the king said quietly. “Can some of our people be saved? Have we time enough for any evacuation?”

Jacob Kelley took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. He exchanged a look with Hector, the king’s eldest son and heir. Hector’s jaw tightened and he shook his head almost imperceptibly.

“Whatever must be done must be done, brother. Anything to save even a fraction of the Illyrcians will be worth the cost.”

Jacob turned back to the king, his voice steady but heavy with remorse. “If the bulk of our naval forces head out face them, sire, there might be a chance of evacuating some of the population through the Postern Gate.”

Hector shuddered. “No one has flown through that gate in recorded history. It could go to nowhere. It may not even activate when you reach it.”

“I know that and so does the enemy. The other gates and waypoints are blockaded but the Postern Gate’s clear.”  Jacob said. “We have no choice, it’s the Postern Gate or nothing. It’s our only hope. You said yourself—anything to save even a fraction of Illycriam’s people.”

Servaas stared at the pair for a long moment, his son by blood and his son in spirit, before he turned away, pacing across his command center to study the holographic maps of the known galaxy. “Jacob, find some volunteers to accompany you through the Postern Gate with refugees. Take ten destroyers and a carrier. Hector, gather a force and refugees and make for the Evangeline Gate. Take twenty destroyers and two carriers. Perhaps you’ll be able to thin the forces enough to open the way. I will have Edwin Millardo prepare a group to follow whichever of you is successful. Armena Caradine will lead the rest of our fleet against the main body of the armada. Hopefully, that will give each of you enough time to escape.”

They don’t stand a chance going through the Evangeline Gate. Jacob held his tongue and pounded his right fist against his left breast in salute. “By your leave, then, my king?”

Servaas turned back toward him again, smiling sadly. “We will miss your counsel in these final hours of Illycriam, Jacob. Take the Ascanius and take my grandson to safety. May the gods smile on you all the rest of your days.”

“I pray that they see all of Illycriam’s people through this, my king,” Jacob said softly. “Gods save you.” Because I know I cannot.

The old king nodded and turned away again. Jacob stared at his father-in-law’s back for one last, long and aching moment before he strode out of the command center for the last time.

By morning, it and the whole of the capital Illyrium would be nothing but ash.

•••

“Father!”

Jacob turned toward the sound of his son’s voice and felt his heart give a painful squeeze. Julian had the look of his late mother, gone these past two years since Eder’s perfidy. Amanda had been the king’s chosen envoy, sent to the Syprian Expanse to broker peace.

They’d sent her body home in a cyrotube, her throat cut and her eyes gouged out, a message for her father and her people. It made him sick to think of it.

Julian had the same troubled look in his gray eyes that his mother had the day she’d told them she was going to the Expanse. Jacob’s stomach dropped even further toward his boots as he took the boy by the shoulders and gave him a gentle shake.

“What’s wrong, Jules?”

“It’s Aunt Cass,” Julian said, his young voice breaking there in the corridor of Ecclesiastes Station. He was barely thirteen, far too young to know as much as he did of war and hardship. But he was the only grandson of King Servaas, and should the old king die and his sons pass from the world of the living without issue of their own, Julian Kelley would be the king of Illycriam.

Or would have been, if their world and way of life wasn’t about to be wiped from galactic memory.

Jacob’s heart fluttered into his throat. Cassiopeia was the very youngest of Servaas’s children and Julian’s favorite relative. “What about her?”

“They brought her in on the Tellurian. She—Father, she—” Julian swallowed hard, looking frustrated as he glanced away, then back to his father’s dark eyes. “The Syprians shot her down and captured her, Father, then they sent her back to us. They sent her with a message to us. Father they—they blinded her.”

He had to swallow bile before he could speak, thoughts flashing back to the ruin of his dead wife’s face in that cryotube. Cassiopeia was a fighter, a pilot of no small skill, much to the chagrin of her beloved father and king.

She was also reckless and perhaps not entirely sane. There were stories and rumors that she had a touch of second sight, a gift that had been lost to the Illycrian people long ago. Jacob hadn’t believed it until the day Cass had clutched his sleeve and told him that he’d never see Amanda alive again, the day they stood on the tarmac of Rydian Base and watched her transport lift into a starlit sky.

The only person Amanda had loved as much as her husband and son had been her baby sister.

All thoughts of getting his son to the Ascanius and evacuating evaporated. They couldn’t go without Cass—it was an impossibility. Jacob jerked his chin toward the corridor behind Julian. “Take me to her.”

Julian swallowed and nodded, then turned and dashed down the hallway, his father at his heels. The gunmetal gray corridors gave way to sterile white as they headed deeper, toward the heart of the station where the medical center was safely nestled.

“How long ago was it?” Jacob asked. It couldn’t have been that long ago. I was only here a few hours ago and I’m thinking they would have told me about something like this before I went down to the surface.

“Maybe fifteen minutes after you left the station.” Julian swallowed hard. “I—Father, I didn’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do. She—I—Father, it’s—”

Jacob squeezed his shoulder. “We’ll sort it out,” he said softly. It was little comfort, he knew, but it was all he had to give.

Julian met his gaze and nodded slowly. “Right,” he said. “Sure. They—they took her this way.”

The teenager led him down a side corridor and a moment later, both of them could hear the sound of a woman shouting—Cassiopeia shouting, cursing the enemy, cursing the medics, cursing anyone and everyone in earshot.

At least she’s alive to curse them. Jacob slipped past his son. “Go find Tacitus and tell him to start the evacuations. You get to the Ascanius with our gear and tell Carlos that we’re leaving as soon as I’m aboard.”

“Leaving?” Julian stared at him, brows knitting. “Where are we going?”

“The Postern Gate and whatever lies beyond it.” Jacob pushed him gently. “Now go. I’ll collect your aunt and we’ll both be there shortly.”

Julian cast one last look at his father before he nodded and dashed off in the direction they’d come from.  Jacob took a deep breath and turned and continued on toward the sound of the curses that slowly turned to screams. His heart began to pound harder as he forged onward, heading toward the sound.

I never should have let Riley send her out there.

He shouldered open the door into a scene of chaos. Three medics struggled to hold Cassiopeia down as a third tried to inject her with something. Still dressed in the tattered remnants of her flightsuit, it was easy to imagine what had happened to her while the Syprians had her. Contrary to his fears, her eyes were still there, not gouged from their sockets like her sister’s had been. They were still there, huge and blue, the pupils shrunk to nothing and the irises filmed over with gray-white, angry red-purple marks radiating out toward her temples. Her mouth was open in a full-throated scream of rage and fear and she was fighting the medics with all her strength.

“Let go of her,” Jacob ordered, slamming the door. “And get the hell out of here.”

“General Kelley—”

“Go!” he roared, storming toward the bed. Cassiopeia had suddenly gone silent and still, her sightless eyes wide, chest heaving as she sucked in ragged breaths. One of the medics glanced at her strangely before all four skittered toward the door and out, not daring to look at Jacob as they passed. Cassiopeia sat up fully, swallowing and choking back a sob.

“Jacob?”

“I’m here, Cass.” He took one of her hands in both of his, wincing at the restraint marks on her wrist, her flesh raw and purple-red with angry bruises and welts. “I’m right here.”

“I tried to warn him, Jacob,” she said, clutching at his sleeve with her free hand. “I tried to warn him, but he wouldn’t listen. I tried to warn all of them. No one listened. Why wouldn’t they listen?”

“I don’t know,” Jacob whispered, fingers tightening around her hand. “I don’t know why they didn’t listen. Can you walk?”

“Walk? Walk to where?”

“The Ascanius. We’re getting out of here. Can you walk?”

“I—”

He took her hesitation for a no and swept her up into his arms. She gave a little yelp and threw an arm around his neck to steady herself. “The king has ordered evacuations,” he said as he strode toward the door. “Hector and I are taking the first two groups. Admiral Caradine will lead the defense—she’ll buy us time to evacuate as many as we can and get away. Hector’s taking a group through the Evangeline Gate.”

“He’ll never make it,” Cassiopeia whispered, her head against his shoulder, her face half buried in his chest. “Doesn’t Father realize that?”

“Who am I to gainsay my king?” Jacob asked softly. “He’s given me leave to take a group through the Postern Gate. That’s where we’re going with the Ascanius.”

“No one’s flown through that jumpgate in recorded history.”

“You said it would work.”

Her tears wet the shoulder of his uniform jacket. “You’re the only one who believed me. You’re the only one who’s ever believed me.”

“You haven’t been wrong yet, Cass.” As much as I wished you were that day on the tarmac, I’ve never known you to be wrong when the sight’s touched you. He held her a little more tightly. “Now be quiet and still. Doc Andrews will have a look once we’re aboard the Ascanius. Does it hurt much?”

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answers to.” She rested her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes, exhaling a shuddering breath. “I don’t want to sleep because I know that there will be nightmares.”

“He’ll give you something so you won’t dream,” Jacob promised, ignoring the strange looks he received as he forged onward down the corridor, toward the docking rings where the Ascanius waited for its commander. “All things heal with time.”

“Illycriam won’t.”

“No,” he agreed softly. “It won’t. But whatever handful of her people that can be saved—they will. I promise, Cass, they will.”

Her face pressed against his shoulder, the king’s youngest daughter nodded, her eyes squeezed shut. “I believe you,” she whispered. “Gods help us all, Jacob.  I believe you.”

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UNSETIC Files snippet: Becca Reid says good-bye

Rebecca Ariel Reid spends a lot of time in the UNSETIC Files universe missing.  She is the close friend and business partner of Cassidy Beckett, who runs their New Age bookstore and supernatural supply shop in Hell’s Kitchen after Becca vanishes in Alberta, Canada, without a trace (this is an incident referenced in Truth Will Set You Free).  She reappears much later, alone, without the Central Park pack that she’d traveled with years before and a mystery to solve that will tie her to UNSETIC tighter than she and Beckett ever could have imagined.

The scene that follows is the good-bye shared between Becca Reid and her mate, Ioan Griffin, the pack’s alpha.

  

The tribe was singing a mourning song, beautiful and haunting. It sent shivers down Rebecca Reid’s spine, though not because of its beauty.

“Who died?” She whispered. No one had been out hunting today, she’d thought.

Ioan Griffin’s arms tightened around her waist, breath warm against her ear. She could feel his heartbeat as she leaned against his chest, heard him take a deep, almost ragged breath before he spoke softly. “No one yet,” he said. “But they’re playing it for us. For the pack.”

She stiffened, staring up at him. Ioan was staring back at the fire, at the circle of singers clustered in its flickering light. His jaw was set, but it quivered a little, betraying him. It was weakness he’d never show to anyone else.

But they belonged to each other, and she’d have seen it where no one else would have.

“Ioan, why would they do that?”

“I have to ask you something,” he whispered, ignoring the question. “To do something, but you’re not going to say no. Not this time.”

Her brows knit as she stared at him. “What is it?”

He hesitated, closing his eyes for a moment before he looked at her square. “You need to stay behind this time.”

“What?” Why would he– “I’m the best shot the pack has, Ioan, and you’ve said yourself that without my cover fire, half of what you’ve accomplished wouldn’t have been possible. I’m not letting you guys go into that place without me.”

“I’m not risking you,” he growled, letting go of her waist. He took her face in his hands instead, scarred, calloused thumbs stroking her jaw. “You’re staying behind. So I have a reason to make that music into a lie.” He nodded toward the fire, to the singers and their mourning song. “They don’t expect us to live through this. It’s a suicide mission.”

“And you volunteered for it anyway,” she said softly, eyes widening. “Ioan, why?”

His expression softened and he rested his forehead against hers. “Because someone taught me that there are things that need doing, no matter how dangerous, for the good of the whole.”

She slumped. “My father.”

He shook his head slightly. “No. You.”

Her chest convulsed as she swallowed a sob, wouldn’t let it tear its way free of her throat. She gripped his face, brought his lips to hers. The salt of their shared tears mixed against their lips in that hungry kiss.

He stroked her cheeks as they both came up for air, their foreheads pressed together. “We’ve been betrayed, Becca,” he whispered. “We’ve been betrayed and we don’t know who did it. The clan leaves as soon as the song is done. They’re going to evacuate the town. There are defenses set up to protect this place, defenses that Moonshadow’s grandfather set up fifty years ago.” Ioan swallowed, looking away for a moment, then continued in a thick whisper. “I’m not going to ask you to leave with them, but I will ask you to leave.

“Three days, Becca. If we’re not back in three days, go home. Go back to New York. I will find you. I promise.”

“Ioan—”

“No,” he whispered fiercely, traces of silver starting to overshadow the blue of his eyes. “No, listen to me. You are the light of my heart and I can’t stand to see you hurt, but you’re not staying just because I want you to be safe. You’re smarter than the rest of us by half and more. If we don’t make it back in three days, you have to figure out who betrayed us, who betrayed the pack, the clan, maybe everyone—maybe every single one of the nahuali left in the world, maybe every living thing left on this planet. I don’t think anyone else can. Do that for me.” He swallowed. “Promise you’ll do that for me.”

She kissed him again, a long, gentle kiss, then squeezed her eyes shut, nodding as she stepped back from the pack’s alpha, from her mate.

“I promise.”

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UNSETIC Files Drabble – Tim and AJ

This is a scene I wrote on a whim, one that has taken on a little more meaning in the months since I wrote it.  It’s a scene with Tim and AJ McConaway, both of UNSETIC, and takes place a few months before Ghosts and the Future.  This little piece is from Tim’s point of view.  Enjoy!

  

She found me perching on a concrete wall overlooking the lake, a glass of something amber cradled between my hands but long since watered down by the ice that had melted in the time between I’d started drinking it and the time she’d found me. My hand didn’t even twitch toward the sidearm I wasn’t wearing—tonight was khakis and a dress shirt, not even a sport coat.

Tonight had been for my sister and I’d tried to be good. I really, really had.

Something about something in that exhibit had really unsettled me, though, enough that I couldn’t stay, I had to go—had to walk away. The damnable part of it was that I couldn’t figure out—couldn’t remember—why it had upset me so much.

“They’re all wondering where you went,” AJ said softly as she sat down next to me. I thought she looked beautiful, smartly attired in her dress and heels. “That departure was a little sudden.”

I closed my eyes. “Go back inside,” I said quietly. “This is your party. It’s not every day that…that you get an exhibit at the Field, AJ. Go back there and enjoy it.”

“I can’t enjoy it without my brother with me,” she said. Her palm skated across my shoulders and spine. I shivered, biting down hard on my lip and squeezing my eyes even more tightly shut. “Talk to me, Tim. Just…talk to me. What set you off?”

“Don’t you think I’d tell you if I knew?” I rasped, then tossed back half of what was left in my glass. The whiskey was so far gone it didn’t even burn on the way down. “I don’t remember. I just…I had to get out of there, AJ. I couldn’t stay.”

Her arm slid around me. “I get that. I’m just—I’m more worried about the why. If there’s something in there that can set you off like this, Tim—”

“I probably overreacted,” I said quickly. “It’s probably nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

“Too late.”

A sigh I couldn’t stop escaped me and her arm tightened.

“You’ve got more important things to worry about,” I murmured.

“There’s nothing more important than family,” she whispered. “We both know that, Tim—at least we should. You’re my brother and I love you—and I spent too much time without you to be willing to let something like this go. I know that some kind of ghost of your past swam up from the shadows back there. I want to figure out what it was so we can slay that bloody demon.”

“AJ—” I stopped, sighing again. This fight wasn’t one I was going to win.

Just let her help.

I felt like I let her help too much, but in reality, the opposite was true and there was a part of me that hated myself for both things.

“I don’t know which artifact it was,” I said, swallowing hard against the bile that started to creep upwards in my throat. “Must have been one, though. It just—whatever it was, it triggered a major flight response. I had to get out of there. Blank spot in my memory, though. Don’t know what it was, or quite where it was either.”

“Damn,” she breathed. “Damn and damn.”

I just shook my head, staring out at the water, at the slowly fading light against the horizon. “It happens like that,” I said.

“I know.”

“You never—I never told you.” My stomach sank. She hadn’t seen it happen before, had she? I couldn’t remember her ever being around for an episode and I sure as hell hadn’t told her.

Kate? B?

“You didn’t have you. You’ve got a partner that looks out for you when I can’t.”

Brigid. Brigid told her. It shouldn’t have surprised me at all. The woman was my fucking guardian angel.

I was grateful to her as often as I was angry at her—probably far too often on the latter count.

It was just as well.

“She’s got a big mouth,” I mumbled.

“She cares about you,” she said. “It’s a good thing.”