Great Hites # 50

This week's show is guest hosted by Norval Joe, and we have stories by:
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Norval Joe,
Ashley Redden
Guy David
and
Jeff Hite



This week is sponsored by RMSComputerSystems.com where I go when I need computer help.

Need copy editing? Try contacting Shawna Noble.

New Place
By: Jeff Hite

One

Matt heard the scream on every level, but as he stared into the blackness he was not sure if it had been in his head or if it was what had woken him. His heart pounded and he felt a bead of sweat trickle down to the small of his back. He had been exhausted when he lay down and that was dangerous. He did not remember where he was.
Had the scream been from the hallway out side of his room? Or had it been in his head. He tried to remember but his minds clutch would not engage. He tried to move slowly, not making any noise, but he knew that if someone was watching him that they would have the advantage. He could not see, but they undoubtedly could see him. He thought about trying to wait until his eyes adjusted to the lack of light, but he knew that the longer he waited, the less time he would have to do anything.
His hand had finally made it under the edge of his pillow, and he felt the familiar form of his weapon. Then he had a new thought. If he was being watched and the scream had been his head, if he pulled his weapon out, he would blow his cover. What was his cover? Was he undercover, or was he between jobs. He could not remember. What was worse, he could not remember where he was. Nothing in this rooms seemed familiar, but then he had spent so little time in his own apartment that his bedroom was just as unfamiliar as any hotel room. Then again he could be at home, and his cover could have been blown and the scream could have been the night security guard.
A second bead of sweat started to form at the base of his neck. He had to make a decision. Finally he opted to lay back down. If it had been a dream, nothing would happen. If someone was waiting for him to move, the would assume they were safe to make their move, and he would have hear them. If he was being observed from outside the room, they would think he went back to sleep, and his cover, for the time being, would be safe.

Two

The alarm sounded, and he sat up in bed. This time his hand remained on his weapon. The room was bright enough that he he could tell his was alone in the room. It did not however, help him to remember where he was. The gray shadows were all hard angles and gutting shapes, that only told him that he was in a bedroom. If he was alone, he could be pretty well assured that he could get out of bed, and start the day like any other. As soon as he put his feet on the floor, he realized a new problem, was his cover a shower person?

Three

It had been three days and no contact had been made. he did not know if he should have been watching from someone, or just pretending to be someone. He could not blow whatever cover he had to make contact. Even if he did he was not sure who to contact. It was getting worse. He could not remember where he was supposed to be if anywhere. They had not contacted him, he had not contacted them. Were they looking for him? Was he supposed to be looking for them? For that matter who were they? Either the good guys or the bad guys. Were their any of either. He had become increasingly unsure about any of it. What he did know was that he was sure about less and less, even the city he was in did not look familiar to him any more.

Four

It was four in the morning and the dream was back. The scream had come, and in his head, and by knew that is where it had come from. It had come ever night for the last week. He woke with the scream still bouncing around in his head. Every night the scream woke him, he went back to sleep and woke in the morning and no one was there. Suddenly as if had not been able to open his eyes for the last few days it hit him. There was no one there. He had walked around an empty city, he had seen no one in the hotel lobby, no one in any of the shops.
He picked up the phone next to his bed.
"Front desk?"
"Hello, where are you?"
"This is the front desk."
"Where are you."
"Sir, I am at my front desk."
"Thank you." He put the phone back down and started to lay back down. Then he he had a better idea. He would walk down to the to the lobby and find the front desk person.

Five

Three days ago he had realized there was no one anywhere. The phones seemed to be on some kind of automated system, that would answer him, but there wasn't really at the other end. The radios all played with no DJ's. The T.V. news kept playing but even when he when to the local studio there was no one there. The lack of people was a mystery that he could not answer, in the same way that the nightly dream was. There was always food, the stores never seemed to be out, nor did the food rot of the shelves without people to take care of it. It was as if everything was take care of while he slept.

Six
thirty two days in, there was a change. The city that he had started to call home seemed to be getting smaller. He had take his rental car, the one whose keys he had found in his pocket, and drove to the edge of town on the second day that he could remember. when he got there he was greeted by a desert so expansive he could not see the edge in any direction. Today, he drove to a shop that he had found at the edge of town. They carried the freshest pasties that he had ever tasted. When he got to where it should have been, there was nothing but desert. Matt drove all the way around town and confirmed that the desert was encroaching in all directions. For the first time since the first week he began to panic. He drove back to his hotel room and got his weapon. Then he drove around town until he found what he was looking for.
When he found the large 4x4 in the parking lot of a local restaurant, he left his rental car, and took the big truck. There was a chance that in the morning it would not be outside his hotel room as the other things he had stolen where not, but at least he knew where to find it now.

Seven
It now became his morning ritual to walk to the parking lot where the 4x4 was and take it to the edge of town, which was becoming a shorter and shorter trip. It was no the fortieth day that he decided to find out what was out there.
He took three extra gas cans and drove the truck into the desert, but had found nothing. No life, nothing, only more sands and identical more dunes. He woke in the middle of the night as he always did, with the scream in his hotel room sweating and along.

Eight

The sands now lapped at the base of the hotel. The only place left to eat was the hotel restaurant, but he had stopped leaving the hotel over a week ago. He had decided that when this day came he would stop eating anyway and just let the desert consume him, as it had everything else.

Nine
The night was not punctuated by a scream, instead the slow stead hiss of the sand, first at the out side of the building and then slowly building up in walls of the hotel. Near dawn he could hear it's scree against the door of his room. They he could hear it building up in his room. He did not open his eyes afraid that he would loose his nerve to stay and bed and let it take him. Finally he could feel it brushing against his face, cold and so fine it felt like a cool breeze across his face. It came at him faster now, so that the friction was beginning to warm his skin.
Finally he could no longer take it. He reached under his pillow and grabbed his weapon. Better to end it quickly then panic and fight it. He let the weapon rest at his side before he tired to move it. When he did he found that his arm was restrained by a human hand. The warmth of it's touch started him so that he opened his eyes.

Ten

Staring back at him was a woman. Her hair was cropped in a military style, but she was definitely a woman. She smiled at him.
"Captain, I am sorry that we had to wake you."
"Aaaaaaaaaaaa."
"Don't try to speak yet, the meds are still doing their job warming your body. We have had an emergency and will be coming out of hyperspace soon. The ship needs her captain.

Wall Flower
By: Guy David

Jerry folded his napkin neatly, then he got up. His wife didn't even look up. He was a given to her, something that was there, not to be bothered with. Jerry showered, then put on his clothes and his tapper hat. He didn't tell his wife about the layouts. Her world was a perfect one. He knew if he told her he lost his job, it would just go past her without hitting home, so he just left and walked into the street. He kept on walking for a long time, then he came into a bus station. A bus came. Jerry got on it, not bothering to ask where it was going. The bus drove for hours and arrived an unfamiliar city. Jerry got off and started walking, not knowing where he was or what he was doing there.

A few hours passed. It was getting dark, so Jerry found a hotel and checked in, paying in advanced as he always did. He paid for a week in advanced. Night was settling in. He knew the money would last him three more months. He knew what his monthly expense was. He was calculated, taking the hotel as well as his wife's very predictable shopping pattern into his calculations. He spent the week having long walks and trying to think what he was going to do next. Nothing came. He usually got up, went to work, did his daily chores. His schedule was the same for the last twenty years. He had the comfort of knowing exactly where he was in his life, where he was going. He had no idea how to handle unemployment. It was a situation no one prepared him for.

As he walked, no particular thought came over to him. His mind was more or less a blank, then it wandered off to his home, his wife and the two separated beds. He wondered how he ended up in this situation. His job was always a constant, something that didn't change. It has become his whole life. It was all he knew. He turned a corner and bumped into someone. He stopped and stared at an undetermined point in space. After some time he shook himself as if awakening from a dream and went back to the hotel, where he found out that his wallet was missing. This didn't bother him though. It was the fake wallet that was missing, the one he kept there for the pickpockets and thieves. His real wallet stayed hidden in his secret place and was only pulled out when needed, which was rarely.

The week ended quickly. Jerry reached no conclusion, made no decisions. He took the bus back home. His wife, apparently, didn't even notice he was gone. He continued with his regular routine, only, instead of going to work he just took long and pointless walks. His calculations where accurate and his money was gone after three months. That's when his wife left him. The day after she left he got up, brushed his teeth and set down to eat. The dining table was empty. No one prepared his food for him. He just set there and waited, expecting his routine to return to normal. That's how they found him when they broke into his house a few weeks later, sitting and waiting.

Waiting for Help
By: Ashley Redden

He sat upright, knees pulled up against his chest, arms wrapped tightly around his legs in a trough of two foot deep snow. He found himself listening to a strange repetitive tapping sound. The sound didn’t seem too far off, but maybe not too close either. He listened for what seemed like a long time. Finally, he decided the sound must be coming from his teeth chattering, but it could just as easily have been something else. His whole body was one big convulsion, one endless shiver that went on and on. The pain was beyond reason, but still he fought on.
He tried to decide what to do next. Trying to think was hard. His mind seemed to only be half working and that was just half of the time. Thinking had become like swimming in quicksand, tremendously hard work for little or no results. Despite the impediment, he considered his situation. As he concentrated, his name slowly came back to him. “Carl, yeah, Carl something or other, that’s who I am. I was with friends before I got here,” Carl thought still shaking uncontrollably.
He cut his eyes left then right, jerkily, and saw a deep furrow in the snow just in front of his knees. Beyond that was the beginning of a large opening in the tree line. Just beyond the edge of the trees, he could just make out a spot where the snow had been broken, no not snow, ice. Carl could see something shimmer within the ragged hole. He remembered then, not everything, but some of it.
He had been separated from his friends, he couldn’t remember how anymore. He had been struggling to find them, trying to get back but becoming more and more lost. Carl had walked far and was very, very cold, colder than he had ever been in his life. He remembered that vividly, being so very cold, that’s when he had fallen through the ice. Carl had fought mightily to get out of the ice and drag himself up and away from the brutal shock of the lake. Carl had been thinking that things couldn’t get much worse just before falling through the ice, but that turned out to be just a prelude to the main event. Carl now knew the true meaning of the word cold. His whole body felt as though it was on fire, nerve after enraged nerve screaming together to produce a cacophony of agony. Still Carl shivered, on and on and on.
He wanted to cry out so his friends would know where to look. Surely they were still looking. All he had to do was hang on just a while longer, just keep fighting. He could do that. So Carl sat and shivered and hurt and waited.
He came to realize that the tapping sound had gone away; the quiet now became almost absolute. The shivering also seemed to lessen and then slowly stop altogether. Carl noticed with some relief that the mountain of pain that had been his constant companion since falling through the lake ice had evaporated, gone but not easily forgotten. He actually found himself feeling warm. Maybe he wasn’t in such a bad place after all. His friends would find him, he could wait. Things seemed to be looking up. Carl thought of home and the feeling of warmth increased. Though he still couldn’t remember, he knew deep in his heart what a wonderful place it must be. Inwardly Carl smiled, relaxed and waited to be found, rescued and brought home.
The hole in the ice began to refreeze slowly, fractionally, layer upon layer. A light snow started, faltered then continued falling as the wind picked up just slightly, enough to make the leafless tree branches sway gently, caressing the frigid air. Voices could be heard floating, wraithlike, on the wind. The persistent voices were calling, searching and looking for a lost friend who had wandered from the path. Seeking a companion that had become hopelessly lost somewhere out in the harsh wilderness.

No Body but you
By: Norval Joe
　
He woke up to find that he was having a bad day. He could tell that it was, because his body was missing, again. Though it was usually difficult to think clearly when he was separate from his body, it didn't take much mental processing to see that his body was, in fact, gone.
"It must be Wednesday", he thought, "this kind of thing always seems to happen on Wednesdays." He was pretty sure that it was mid-week though he couldn't be sure or the exact day, separated from his body as he was.
He walked across the bedroom floor and ducked his head as he walked under the bed. He didn't need to worry about hitting his head on the bed frame, since his his head was with his body, but of course, it wouldn't occur to him in his current state. He ducked his head out of habit; this is the nice thing about habits, they don't require thought, you just do them. He walked around under the bed, looking in an empty shoe box and behind neglected stuffed animals.
　
It was a pleasant spring morning in New Orleans; it was warm enough for short sleeves, but not at all like the sticky humid heat that would come with the summer. The young family was strolling casually down Bourbon Street. Traffic was light, being the middle of the week, early in the day, and not during The Mardi Gras. Still the young couple was vigilant in keeping their daughter close to them at all times.
As they crossed a small side street, she broke from her mothers hand and dashed up the alley shouting, "Dolly, Mommy, dolly!" The parents caught up to her as she reached a grimy shop window, and peered into the darkness, her nose pressed hard against the glass. The faded gold leaf name on the window identified the shop only as 'Jezareel'.
Through the window they could see in the dimly lit shop, the homeliest excuse for a doll either of the parents had ever seen. Its bald ceramic head was expressionless with its black beans for eyes and a small flat horizontal cleft for a mouth. The body appeared to be made of random pieces of thread, yarn, twine and cloth, wrapped tightly around old popsicle sticks and twigs. Its only clothing was a simple cotton serape, held in place by a piece of yarn around its waist.
The father felt a chill run down his spine as he looked at the ugly doll, discomfort growing with each passing moment. The girl kept her face pressed against the window, trying to get the best view. Finally, he said to the girl, "No, honey, you have enough dolls at home, you don't need any more. Come on, let's go."
Her tantrum was so sudden and violent that both parents stood, shocked, mouths open, staring at what they could not believe was their child. Eventually, they broke from their stasis. They knelt to console the girl and try to convince her to come along back to the hotel. They coaxed, bribed and threatened, but nothing would calm her.
When she stopped her screaming, it was as sudden and shocking as when it had started. With a great sob and sigh, it abruptly ceased. Relieved that the ordeal was over, her parents looked around to see who else had witnessed the embarrassing event.
A woman stood in the open doorway of the small shop. She was as old and dark and dusty as the store itself. So wrinkled and small it was impossible to determine her ethnicity. Was she French, Spanish, or African? They couldn't tell.
"Madam Jezareel sees the dolls little girl," she slurred mysteriously in a rich southern accent. "Come," she commanded them, "The doll must be held."
They followed Madam Jezareel into a shop so small that here was barely room enough for all to sit around a small table without bumping the walls or one another. On the table and on a bookshelf there were bits and pieces; scraps of cloth, snips of thread, beans and soft, grey, clay; to make more dolls, but there were no other dolls near completion.
The old woman placed the doll in the little girls lap, who immediately hugged it around the middle of its lumpy body. Jezareel closed her eyes and began repeating arcane words while moving her hands in circles in the air between herself and the doll. At times she would raise her voice in volume while raising her hands higher into the air. At other times she barely whispered the incomprehensible words. At one point, when she was getting fairly worked up, her hands making great circles, her voice a shrieking wail, she inhaled a bit of saliva, that caused her to pause her incantation. She sat, looking ahead, for a few, long seconds, and made a small cough; then another. At first, it appeared that her coughing was under control, but soon she was hacking and choking, spraying the family with spittle with each wheezing gasp. Eventually, she stood, beating herself on the chest, coughing and gasping for air. Just as the girls parents stood to see if they could help the old woman, the hacking subsided.
She sighed and sat back down, as if this was nothing out of the ordinary. With her chin raised and her eyes closed, she took several deep calming breaths.
She took up her chanting where she had left off, and while it was not as frenzied, she spoke much more rapidly. The now recognizable arcane words and phrases came to a sudden stop. Jezareel sat with her hands flat on the table, eyes closed and breathing steadily and deeply.
She opened her eyes and looked at the doll, still clutched tightly in the little girls arms. The surprise was evident on the old woman's face. She stood again and reached for the doll. The girl was reluctant, but allowed the doll to be taken from her. The old woman held the doll close to her wrinkled face and squinted into its black bean eyes. She supported it by placing her hands under the dolls arms and shook it lightly. "Dear me," she said, "dear, dear, dear, dear, me." Then placing it face down, its stomach on one of her hands, she patted it on the back with her other hand, like she was burping a very small baby. She turned it onto its back, its lifeless stick and twine arms flailing behind it. "My, my, my, my, my", she said, shaking her head.
"Well," she said, an unmistakable note of finality in her voice as she handed the doll back to the little girl who quickly took it and clutched it again to her chest. "Well," she said again, firmly and with a nod. The family understood that they were being dismissed. They left the shop in a daze and wandered back to their hotel as if the unusual evens of the morning had been a dream. All the while, the little girl held the mysterious gift tightly, but lovingly in her arms; evidence that the experience had been real.
　
He crept out from underneath the bed, careful, again, not to bump his head on the bed frame. He scanned the floor, the corners of the room, the furniture and bookshelves. There was no sign of his body.
He went to the door and looked up and down the hallway. To his horror; if he could have felt horror without his body; perhaps his body, where ever it was, was feeling the very horror, that his brain was having difficulty perceiving at that moment; in the hallway outside the bedroom door, was a piece of himself.
He bent to pick it up, but couldn't, naturally, not having a body to pick it up with. But it felt good to be near it, and he did know that if felt good. He followed the bits of himself down the hall and around a corner until he found himself in an entirely foreign and wholly unfamiliar place. He knew the bedroom, the kitchen and dining rooms, the tv room, all places his girl had carried him. He had never been in this tiny room. There were two large white machines, boxes of soap powder on shelves, and brooms and mops hanging from hooks on the wall. Next to the white machines was a large plastic pan with sand in it, and an awful odor exuding from with in. He could smell the odors, hear the sounds, and began to understand what was happening.
With a rush, comprehension and realization he woke him to his dilemma. There, before him, between its litter box and its bowl of water, he found himself in the razor sharp claws of the family cat. With its wicked teeth it tore at his body of string, and yarn and pieces of cloth. Suddenly back in his body he could feel the burning pain of the cats teeth and claws as it chewed on his head, neck and chest.

Great Hites # 48

Krista won this week's voting by a landslide with 7 total votes.

This week Hear Great Stories by:
Krista Heiser
Norval Joe
Scott Roche
Ashley Redden

Hear a Promo for:
The Jesus Geeks podcast
Weather Child
Short Cummings Audio

And the new Intro By Kevin Cummings





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The Volunteer Bride
By Krista Heiser

She stood in the back of the room and, for what seemed the millionth time that night, prayed to a God she had once mocked as ineffectual and inattentive. Remembered phrases learned in a back pew of the small town church, the same church she had eventually denounced as being lost in antiquity, found their way into the babbling litany inside her skull. Heavenly Father, Most High, Almighty. She would have knelt if she thought the supplication would have brought a miracle, but she had no faith in miracles, not even small ones. No, moving would only draw their unwanted attention, so she prayed silently with her eyes wide open and her head held high.
As she glanced about the well-lit room, one of dozens inside the interstellar spacecraft, she saw her fear and revulsion mirrored in the eyes of the other women. Their expressions, the way they stiffened whenever one of the males approached, told her they hadn’t understood, either. There had been no hint or warning that their prospective grooms would be anything but human.
She should have asked. Should have known something wasn’t quite right. After all, she had found the brochure in the shelter’s soup line. Blue-green waters, white sands, palm trees and an array of exotic flowers decorated the cover. Layered over the picture were the simple words, “Become a bride. Pick your honeymoon location now.”
She hadn’t thought to question why anyone would leave such inappropriate literature in a soup kitchen – no one in the weakly lit room could afford such luxuries, not when watered-down soup and near-moldy bread were welcome treats – instead, she had picked up a copy because fantasies were free and one of the few things left to her. Captivated by the pictures, she had nearly finished her soup before the words on the page made any sense.
Without any friends or family to notify, she had set out for the Intergalactic Public Relations satellite office. Every established city had one. The one in this city – the name of which she had forgotten or never learned – stood next to a military recruitment office. Behind the two towering structures she had glimpsed the Space Platform and the shuttles that would carry her and her new husband off-world.
Eager to escape the poverty and illness plaguing the multitude on Earth, she had entered the cold, polished interior of the Public Relations building. Showing the brochure to the smiling receptionist, who she thought now may have been smiling just a little too much and for a little too long, she had been escorted to a small conference room.
Gripping the brochure like her next hot meal, she had sat through a brief presentation of the various locations she could pick. Beautiful alien worlds had flashed before her eyes to the sway and tempo of light-hearted, jazzy music.
She had picked one of the planets. She couldn’t remember now why she had picked that one, what had drawn her to that particular landscape or location. But she had picked one and that had set everything into motion. It had put her name on the contract and her signature on the consent form. With the paperwork out of the way, she had been fed, clothed, bathed. She had peed in a cup, given blood, and let them mess with her teeth. It had taken her a few days to realize the toothache she had suffered for the last few months, the one that had caused so much swelling and discoloration, was gone. For the first time in months, she had felt healthy and hopeful. Not even the nausea from the injections had diminished her sense of good fortune.
Until now.
One of the indigo-skinned males bumped her as he moved past. His weight threw her off-balance, forcing her to move when she had wished only to blend into the dull whitewashed walls. As she threw out her hands to steady herself, his three-digit hand closed about her wrist, preventing her from falling or knocking into the next couple. Silvery eyes with no hint of black pupil focused on her with shark-like precision. “Pardon me.”
She didn’t speak his language, yet she understood him, immediately and without fear of misunderstanding. One of the injections, one of the more painful ones, had inserted a translation device into her bloodstream. As she had been warned, the microscopic chip had traveled through her circulatory system until it had found its home in the parietal lobe and inserted itself into the left hemisphere of her brain. Or was it the right hemisphere. The details were a bit fuzzy still.
As they stared at each other, she wondered what other differences set their races apart. Manners, taught to her in an age she had nearly forgotten, an age that had preceded the diseases and plagues, the wars and the skirmishes, reasserted themselves. “That’s quite alright.”
She even managed to smile. Somehow.
She realized then that he had not let her go, that he still held her wrist. Instinct told her to pull away, to put distance between them, but then his voice was in her head. “As you chose my planet, I Choose you.”


Hot Dogs in the Park
By Norval Joe

It was a pleasant day in the city park, and though it was the lunch hour, they were the only two there.
He smiled a toothy grin at her, winked his eye, and licked his lips. She looked his way and sniffed the air; It wasn't as if she needed to, she could smell him without even trying. He didn't smell bad, just not very interesting.
He walked over and sat down next to her, as she lay, sunning herself. "Your big head is casting a shadow on me," she said and looked away. Now that he was close enough for her to really see him, she realized that he wasn't bad looking at all.
He stood and walked around to her other side and sat again. She found herself looking directly at his chest; full, nicely shaped and muscular.
She snorted; an awkward, accidental, sound, and she was aghast. She turned to look away from him, again, trying to hide her embarrassment.
He leaned over, his mouth close to her ear. "What do I have to do to keep your attention", he whined, then he laughed.
'Oh, you have it!', she thought. She was getting used to his smell and there was something attractive about it.
"I don't know," she said eventually, "Tell me something interesting."
He thought for a moment. "I'm pure," he said, hopefully.
She rolled her eyes. "That's what they all say. And that's not very interesting, anyway."
"OK," he said, "You have the most alluring, deepest brown eyes that I have ever seen. They draw me and suck me into them, and hold me there; they tell me that I am your pet, that I must be obedient to your every command."
She grinned, and said, "That's close. And very flattering, I might add. But I want to hear something that says, 'This guy is something special!' I want to hear something that Wows me."
He thought for a moment more, and with a gleam in his eye, he said, "I'm a super hero. I can fly."
She couldn't help it; she laughed out loud. "That's one I haven't heard before," she said and laughed again. Her laugh was a magical song that lifted him to his feet. She stood as well and he leaned his chest into her and her scent was an intoxicating perfume.
She playfully pushed her shoulder into his chest, and said, "You are kind of cute, maybe we could meet for dinner some time."
He was overcome by her nearness and nuzzled his nose behind her ear. He licked her neck. The sensation that rippled from her head to her toes was thrilling, but it was sudden and unexpected. She turned her head to look directly in his eyes and said, "Hold on, Turbo. You're moving a bit fast. I mean, shall we choose where to have the honeymoon, first, or just start naming the children." Her comment more biting than she intended.
He was slow; he was a guy after all; but he clearly read the sarcasm in her tone, and was abashed. She could see the shock on his face and the hurt in his eyes, as he looked down. She felt guilty and small. "Hold on," she said, "I just mean, we only met. Let's take our time."
Just then, a woman approached. "Oh," she breathed, "I have to go. I'll see you around, sometime, ok?" She turned and left.
He sat down, dejectedly, to watch her leave, her stubby legs beating a rapid cadence as she hurried after the woman.
Shocked with realization, he jumped to his feet and barked after her, "I'm Fritz! My name is Fritz!" Floating on the wind, he heard her laugh; that magical laugh; and she said, "I'm Schnitzel."
He sniffed the air as her laughter faded away. The laughter would fade, but her scent wouldn't, he could follow her scent forever. He closed his eyes and followed her in his mind; past the post office, the grocery store, the pizza place. As she approached a row of apartment buildings, his senses picked up another smell; he smelled danger.
Without hesitation, he raced to a park bench. Leaping onto it he vaulted himself into the air. Short forelegs extending in front of him, his long ears flowing across the sleek fur of his neck and back, he flew out, over the city, his ultra-canine powers of hearing and scent, alert; he searched for crime.

Magic Quadrant
By: Scott Roche

A slight pinch on his arm woke the captain. His eyes fluttered open to gaze into the nearly golden eyes of his ship’s physician. Dr. Masudi was striking, so having her face to be the first he was to look into wasn't the worst thing that could happen. She was frowning though and that was rarely a good thing. Her smile was nearly ubiquitous. “Will you marry me?”

The frown turned to a smile. "And where shall we have our honeymoon?" The call and response greeting went back to their first meeting when he woke up in sick bay after his graduation party. It was their little secret. Since then they had become great friends, though they were never romantically involved. When he got the Kongo as his ship, he moved heaven and earth to get her as his doctor.

He tried to stand, but she restrained him.

“Easy Captain.” Her voice was deep and mellow. “You’ve taken a bad fall and I want to scan you before I let you move.” She detached the handheld scanner from the bottom of her tricorder and ran it over his temples. Satisfied with the result, she moved her hand and let him rise.

He stood with a little effort. The table he had been walking towards was now behind him. There was ketchup all over his tunic, at least he thought it was. He ran a finger over a stain and tasted it. Sure enough, not blood.

Masudi made a slightly disgusted sound.

Sean looked up at her, the dark skinned woman was easily three decimeters taller than he was, and smiled. “Sorry doc, it’s crude, but the best test I know of. So what happened?”

She replaced the scanner in its charging unit at the tricorder’s base. “It looks like you hit your head on the edge of that table. There is no skull fracture, or table fracture, evident so you apparently just clipped it. I gave you something to bring you around and to take care of the pain. I don’t detect a concussion either.”

“So what happened?” Sean removed his tunic and tossed it at the bed, moving towards a locker to retrieve a fresh shirt. He was annoyed at having the injury, not that there was any way he could have prepared for the unexpected course correction.

“For that you’ll have to ask Lisor. He is still trying to sort it out.” She slung the scanning device over her shoulder and straightened her pants and blue tunic. She opted to wear trousers instead of the more common short dresses, simply noting that they were more utilitarian. In reality she was a little self conscious of the fact that her legs were almost a meter long. “The thing you should know, well we’re not sure where we are.”

“What?” His voice was a little muffled through the gold material. His head popped out of the hole. “How is that possible?” He started to ask if they had checked the astrogation charts, but that would be a stupid question and would only display the fact that he still wasn’t quite with it. “Belay that.” He waved a hand at her, knowing she’d probably take the questions he did ask as rhetorical. He saw that the light on his data station was flashing and sat down to check it.

“If there isn’t anything else Captain?”

Sean looked up. “Oh, sorry. Any other casualties from the incident?”

Masudi shook her head sharply. “Just our fearless leader. Oh a few bumps and bruises, but you’re the only one who got knocked out.” Her smile broadened.

“Dismissed.” He snapped at her. He wasn’t really angry. One of the reasons he kept her around was that she was nearly immune to his temper and loved to keep his ego deflated. The latter quality wasn’t to the point of disrespect, especially not around the rest of the crew, but it was always ready. He found the combination vital in the person that was not only physician, but counselor. The data came alive on the screen and he struggled to make sense of it. As he read, the communication unit whistled at him. “Thornton.”

“Captain, I trust you are well?” Lisor’s voice betrayed no concern.

“I am. Just knocked around a bit. I’m reading your report. Give me the executive summary.” He continued scanning the stream.

Lisor chuckled. “What you have is the summary, sir.” His voice turned serious. “The only thing I have to add is that Mr. Travis believes that we are nowhere in the Alpha Quadrant.”

Sean whistled. That would put them outside of Federation space and a long way from home, no matter which quadrant they were in. “Well keep on him until he figures out where we are at. I’m gonna pour over this data until I make sense of it. Let me know if anything changes. Thornton out.” He cracked his mental knuckles and started reading in earnest. If they couldn’t figure out what happened then their grandchildren might not see home


The state of Marital Bliss
By: Ashley Redden

Margery practically floated as she sashayed down the residence hall in route to room 142 her long embroidered skirt dancing in front of her moving feet. She was more than excited, Margery was giddy. But this was nothing new. Though the lonely nights were spent at her apartment two blocks away, she returned each and every morning to spend quality time with him. Every morning she underwent the same ritual. But habitual as her mornings were, they never grew old. She swung her hand bag daintily, like a schoolgirl as she walked. “Just a few more steps,” she thought, “just a few more steps to marital bliss, marital bliss and the man of my dreams.”
Finally she arrived. Margery stood for a moment listening, savoring the anticipation of the moment. She knocked twice and, wearing a smile big as tomorrow, entered the room.
“Jacob, my love, it’s me your Margie,” she sang. Jacob lay upon his mattress, slightly raised so that he could better see the wall-mounted television. As she entered his eyelids fluttered. Margery clapped her hands with glee. Jacob was an invalid, comatose as far as the medical community was concerned, but what did they know. For all their fancy smancy education her opinion was that they collectively didn’t know squat. But not her, she was not concerned by their goings on. Margery knew her man.
Over the past seven years she had learned all his mannerisms, no matter how slight. A shift of the finger for an affirmation, a flick of the foot to answer her questions, a flutter of the eyelids, lips or nose to display excitement or concern or any of the other myriad complex emotions that the poor dear must feel while locked into his shell and unable to express himself otherwise.
A little over seven years ago, Jacob had swept her off her feet in a brief but tumultuous two week romance. Margery had never been so happy. They had eloped, been married by the justice of the peace and honeymooned in the Bahamas. Margery still felt her eyes moisten when she thought of the lush beauty of the island Eden that she had explored with Jacob.
Not long after the honeymoon was over, Jacob had fallen ill, becoming comatose almost overnight, though not vegetative but remaining quiescently alert. She had placed him here at a cozy retirement villa and settled down to take care of him for as long as he would need her. She had found the transition from fiery romance to quiet domestic marriage more than fulfilling. The knowledge and security that she was needed by the man she adored seemed, in some compelling way, to complete her. Margery felt that she had blossomed to full womanhood after assuming her role as the doting domestic wife.
Jacob was always there to show his support, a twitch of the nose here, flutter of the eyelids there, quite the chatterbox. On queue, Jacob twitched his nose then both ears as a raspberry fluttered from his closed lips.
“My,” said Margery, “that’s a new one. Jacob, you’re in quite the state today. It’s okay; I have exactly what you need.” Margery put her bag down onto the floral settee; a woman’s touch that, and withdrew a slender bottle of elixir. As she lifted the bottle, Margery thoughts drifted to her father as they always did when she lovingly held this particular bottle.
Her father had been quite a brilliant man, a scientist no less. His formal education had been in pharmaceutical botany, his specialty in herbal medicinals. Margery never understood the complex symbols or many of the huge words, but she listened intently and was always the very best student. Her father’s most prominent research was botanically derived elixirs that affected the body human the results of which ran the gambit from mild sedation to death. Her father was also quite knowledgeable in the traceability of these chemical agents. Luckily, by the time he met his untimely death after an unexpected mysterious exposure to a particularly deadly botanical elixir, Margery had become an adept on the subject.
She swept a single tear from her eye with her index finger; she had dearly loved that man.
She brought the elixir bottle to Jacob’s mouth, slightly prying his lips apart. She unstoppered the bottle and gently touched the contents to his now visible tongue. Jacob’s eyes fluttered once, twice then were still.
“There, there love,” whispered Margery. “Calm down now, everything’s going to be just fine, right as rain,” she said patting his chest lovingly. Margery smiled anew and settling down onto the settee began to remove sewing utensils from her hand bag. “No matter what my love, we’ll always have the wonderful time we spent together on our honeymoon.”
“You just rest now and your Margie will hum us a nice tune,” said Margery as she fastened her linen fabric into the hoop. She began to hum a happy tune as she relaxed with her cross stitching and settled down into peaceful wedded bliss. Jacob lay still as a stone upon his slightly raised bed, eyes fixed upon the unplugged television. Time went on.

Great Hites # 47

This Week we have Stories by

This weeks winner was Norval Joe!

Scott Roche
Norval Joe
And
Jeff Hite

Hear Feed back and learn about submitting your own prompt.





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Magic Quadrant Part 3
By
Scott Roche

The mysterious figure hunched over and crawled into the Jefferies tube, pulling the access door shut, behind him. He was certain that he hadn’t been followed. This deck level was largely empty during even a normal duty cycle. In addition, thanks to the Red Alert status which relegated everyone not on duty to their quarters, it was even less likely that he would be discovered. Still if someone in security did catch him there would be hard questions.



Once he was securely in place, he slid the small device out from its hiding place and slapped it on a conduit. Unless you knew exactly where to look there was no way anyone would spot it. Satisfied with that he spoke into the micro-recorder he had in his bag of tricks. “Log number forty-seven, Agent Alpha Three dash Zero Zero Seven recording. We have arrived at the agreed upon coordinates. I have necessary access to all of the ship’s subsystems as required by my mission. If I run into any problems I will avail myself of whatever options I can find, though I want to state for the record that I find none of the potential answers is very savory."



Stating it for the record would do little good if the recorder never made it back into his overseer’s hands, but it made him feel better. “I will initiate self destruct or make the necessary adjustments to the power structure to assume command only if I am forced to do so. Otherwise I shall let things proceed as planned.”



Working for Section 31 often meant that he had to do things that most people would find not only unsavory but perhaps even outright treasonous. If it meant keeping the Federation safe though, no agent worth his salt counted the personal cost. The only problem was, this particular agent had let his guard down and started to get to know this crew. He was friends with some of them.



That didn’t mean he would shirk his sacred duty. Friendship meant little if they were thrust into a disaster, the proportions of which made their involvement necessary. It still made the whole matter stickier than he liked. “The science officer has yet to detect the modifications that were made to the sensor package. I await the transmission from our operatives on the other side. Agent Alpha Three dash Zero Zero Seven out.” He replaced the micro-recorder into the slit pocket in his red tunic’s sleeve. Only the most advanced sensors would detect it and even then it would have to be turned on.



He turned in the cramped space and opened the hatch. Satisfied that the coast was clear, he crawled out and dogged the hatch behind him again. He had three minutes to return to his quarters before he was missed. That was plenty of time.

Family Matters
By: Norval Joe


The king stood in the passage just outside the open door to his daughters ante chamber, and watched the ladies-in-waiting hover and fuss like a swarm of helpful bees attending to a single flower. "She is beautiful', he thought as the ladies primped and preened her in preparation for the betrothal feast, just a few hours away.
A son-in-law that would be the most beneficial alliance for the kingdom was not the foremost factor in the kings mind as he negotiated with the eligible men of the surrounding kingdoms, but it was high on the list. He wanted his only daughter to be happy, that was foremost. Ten kingdoms touched the boundaries of his own, or were within a days ride of it. All had varying degrees of hostility or cooperation with his land. Should he choose the son of his most trusted alliance and cement a relationship that was already strong, or pursue the son of his most heated rival and build a bridge to cooperation that had been difficult to achieve in the past? Would allying with this rival, then, offend his trusted friend, and thus shake a fundamental and valued relationship? Should he choose the dim witted, but handsome, youth of one king over the intelligent, but middle aged brother of another? None of the choices had been simple; all had potential repercussions that might prove to be undesirable.
He had made his decision and forged an alliance with one of the more distant kingdoms that produced much of the grain that his kingdom used; It had seaports and was strong in trade with distant, exotic countries. In addition to fields of grain and sailing ships, the kingdom had a prince, the heir to the thrown, a few years older than his daughter. The princess had accompanied the king and her older brother each autumn, since she was eight years old, as the king traveled to the foreign land to secure treaties and trade agreements. It would seem that the princess had been concealing an interest in the young prince for many years; when he presented the idea to the princess of marriage to this young man, she reacted with indifference, and replied, "My desire is to serve the kingdom. If this is what is expected of me, I can do nothing but comply with your wish."
'She will be a beautiful queen,' the king thought, proudly, as he heard her reply, her shining eyes putting the lie to her affected indifference.
The king turned from the door and walked toward the banquet room, where his trusted advisors and ministers were preparing to receive the prince and his envoy, in preparation for the official betrothal.
A scribe, red faced and perspiring sped down the passage and threw himself at the kings feet. "My Lord, I bring the gravest of news. The princes envoy was attacked as it passed through the eastern forests, and the prince was taken hostage. The rest of the entire party were killed, save a single squire. He reached our gates only this very hour. He said that there is a large contingent moving this way. He brought this emblem from a dead solder of the attacking party."
Mechanically, the king took the emblem form the messengers outstretched hand. He recognized it immediately and wanted to cast it down in disgust. The kings face paled then reddened in turns, as the implications of the attack clarified in his mind. "Rise, good servant." The king said gruffly. "Send word that all are to gather in the banquet hall within the hour. I must, now, speak to my daughter."
His son stood and all discussion ceased in the hall when the king entered. He was composed, but it was evident from his demeanor that the news was not easily received by his daughter. Emotionally drained and feeling all of his five and a half decades, he dropped into the large cushioned seat in the middle of the long banquet table; with a wave of his hand, he indicated that all who stood in attendance, should sit. "Father, will she be alright", the prince leaned in and whispered? He nodded an abbreviated half-nod to reassure his son.
All the choices were before the king, and he knew that a decision would need to be made quickly.
He looked, first, down the table to his left. There sat his minister of finance, the deep sense of unease clearly readable in her eyes. She saw his contemplative stare and quickly glanced down to the sheets of parchment on the table before her. She shuffled them about and acted as if she was reading them, hoping that this would divert the Kings attention elsewhere. Her lead accountant sat to her right, careful not to look up from his own notes. To her left sat her chief economist, blissfully unaware of the tension.
He then looked down the table to his right. His minister of trade sat between two of his long time friends, the guild masters of the bakeries and the blacksmiths.
Between these two groups were arrayed the various other ministers and advisors.
The king signalled to his steward who rang the dinner chime and the room was suddenly filled with servants rushing about to get the various platters and tureens onto the long banquet table within three of the kings deep, steadied breaths; they knew that he was counting, and were too familiar with the results, if the count was too long. The food on the table, the servants disappeared as quickly as they had come.
"Eat", the king declared when the last of the servants had left the banquet hall, "This was to be a celebration banquet, after all." He looked at the steaming entrées, a look of dismay growing on his face; sweet and sour soups, candied yams, and chocolate fondues. He looked at his ever expanding waist and at the dinner service again. 'All sweets', he thought, ' not a savory choice on the table. No wonder I'm getting so fat!'
He looked up from his evaluation of the table to see his dinner guests; The entire entourage sat, motionless, waiting for the king to be the first to eat; someone's stomach groaned loud enough for half the table to hear.
The noise startled the king from his contemplative stasis. With a heat he hadn't expected, he growled at his advisors, "Make your selections and eat. With an invading army approaching our lands, we've many decisions to make this evening, and none of them are savory." He slammed the table for emphasis and picked up a honey coated date ball to throw, sullenly, into his mouth. The dates were crunchy and sweet, yet difficult to swallow.
They all began to eat cautiously pondering the steps that must be taken to prepare for war.


Merideth Introduction
By Jeff Hite


The Sound of his phone Ringing was like a nail being driven into his skull. The headache was back, and the high trill of his phone was almost more than he could handle this morning. He thought about ignoring it but, both ignoring it and answering it had consequences that he didn't really want to face that this point. It rang one more time before he made his decision and picked it up.
"Rob, this is Mary." Rob did the best not to roll his eyes. Mary was the best receptionists the company had, but her voice had a quality that could strip paint of walls in any direction she choose to point it.
"Yes, Mary."
"Rob, you have a guest up here, and your conference call with marketing is in five minutes." It was completely odd for a guest to be visiting him. Mary was very good about not letting any sales people in, and he didn't have any planned guests from the other departments.
"Who is it Mary?"
"I don't know Rob, he would not give me his name, and when I tried to get rid of him, he said he was an old friend and that you would make time for him."
"An old friend huh?" If this job had one cost it was his social life. He had not been home before nine thirty in over a month, and had mostly spend his weekends just trying to recover from the weeks. That was of course the weekends that he didn't end up working. "Alright Mary, I will be but shortly. When the conference call comes in, can you stall them for a few minutes?"
"Alright Rob, but they won't buy it for long."
"Thanks Mary." He hung up the phone and took a quick look at the train wreck that was his schedule today, then he made his way to the front lobby. There was a man sitting in the chair facing away from him, and a woman in the chair opposite him that he could not take his eyes off of. When she meet his eyes he felt like the room had just lit up.
"Rob, look at you," the voice was unmistakable, and it was probably the one thing that forced him to take his eyes off the woman, now standing up in front of him.
"Larry, what? but where have you."
"Larry?" Mary's voice removed the last spot of stubble he'd missed this morning.
"Surprised to see me again?"
"That is an under statement." Rob said when he finally was able to speak again.
"Yea well things happen in funny ways."
"The last time I saw you was on the top."
"Lets not talk about that now," he said holding up his hands. "Rob, I would you like you to meet my friend Meredith." The woman at Larry's side held out her, hand and for the first time in his life, Rob felt like maybe he should kiss it and not shake it.
"It is nice to meet you Meredith. Did you meet Larry in Greece?"
"You could say that," She said with a smile and voice that made him feel warm. "It is very nice to meet you, Larry has spoken a lot about you."
"Rob, your meeting is waiting."
"Thanks Mary. Listen Larry," Rob started.
"It is alright Rob, I understand I just wanted to let you know that we were back in town. Can you meet us for a late dinner. We can celebrate your promotion. Mary told me you got Dave's job."
"Alright, but."
"No buts tonight at the steakhouse on the west side of Broadway at nine-ish alright?" Rob nodded dumbly. "Great, we will see you there. Get to that marketing call."
Rob watched the two of them go and could almost feel the room getting colder as they stepped from the lobby to the streets beyond. Larry had been one of his only friends for years. Mostly because they both worked for Unitide, but Larry had been gone for years since they had lost sight of each other while looking for what Larry thought was the was entrance into the home of the gods. And what about the woman with him. Larry had never, as far as Rob knew, been very good with women, and Meredith was certainly the most beautiful woman that Rob had ever seen him with. He didn't have time to think about this now. He needed to have his thoughts together for this call, or the marketing team would walk all over his department again.

Great Hites # 46

This week hear stories by:
Anima Zabaleta
Ashley Redden
Norval Joe
and
Scott Roche





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THE RAINMAKER
By:
Anima Zabaleta

I store my feelings and memories in the clouds. There, my ideas are free to float around in the atmosphere, allowing me to deal with more mundane tasks. Like what to fix for dinner. For most of my life, this system has worked fine. My happy thoughts were cumulus clouds, tall and billowing, filled with light and air, frolicking like sheep in cerulean pastures. Daydreams drifted high in the atmosphere, settling in as cirrus clouds, wispy and far away.

And morning… morning was my favorite time. My thoughts swirled like ground fog, obscuring the hard edges of day, until I slowly got organized over a cup of tea and the early news.

Then things took a turn for the worse. I lost my job, and dark nimbostratus loomed overhead for weeks. I started to drink and distance myself from my family. I drank more, and the summer I spent in Florida was unusually cold and overcast. That was noted in all the papers. It occurred to me that I might be influencing the weather patterns, so I started checking channel 13. They were blaming El Nino, but I knew the truth. Hurricane Katrina? Hmm, I was in New Orleans when I heard my parents died in the car accident.

It’s been hard, trying to shake the depression. I shouldn’t feel so lonely, being orphaned at age 36. I’m afraid of whom else I might hurt, with my dark weather disposition.

I am testing the theory that cloud memory storage works both ways… If I go to a place where there are no clouds, I should be happy, right? And be able to dissipate this ominous thunderhead that has lingered since 2005. So I am headed to the Atacama in Chile, where the annual rainfall averages a millimeter a year. If that doesn’t work, it can still be a win/win situation, I think. If my mood doesn’t lift, I will market my talents as a rainmaker. Got to look for that silver lining somewhere…



Magic and the Sword Do Not Mix
By: Ashley Redden


Gianni stumbled again, but managed to catch a bush before she fell. How many times she had stumbled and fallen, she no longer knew. She stood silent for a moment and closed her eyes. A wave of fatigue mixed with anguish washed over her. Gianni was very tired, but the emotional ache was almost too much to bear. She wasn’t sure which was worse.
After a moments rest, she opened her eyes and stole a glance down the glade, back the way she’d just come. He was still coming. A slight gasp escaped at the thought. She could not see nor hear him, but knew that he was still coming none the less. Nor was it necessary for her to elicit a finding spell. She simply knew. That flight or fight response that was so deeply embedded to be beyond conscious understanding, but there nonetheless, told her every nerve that something harmful was steadily approaching.
After a deep breath, Gianni turned and resumed her retreat up the pass. She had been moving in and out of sparse clearings in various stages of growth for the better part of the morning. There were few mature trees scattered here and there, but saplings and brush were aplenty. Gianni knew that the upper passes of the mountains, really misnamed huge hillocks that bordered her home lands, were prone to huge and destructive lightning storms. The resulting fires were ignited enough to keep the land here burned shaping the local flora.
As she continued her retreat through bramble and bush, she couldn’t help but wonder how things had come to this. Oh, her parents would cluck their tongues and say for the thousandth time that magic and the sword do not mix. But she was determined to prove them wrong. After all, Laven had been so different in the beginning. But things had changed after he and Gianni were officially joined. He had steadily become more and more violent and less interested in her as a person, but more as an object, lately it seemed more often than not, an object of scorn. Gianni had some small talent at magical healing, so she was always able to heal herself and hide the evidence from prying eyes.
The last fight had been the worst yet. Laven had worked himself to such a rage, all the while smashing their house and cursing Gianni that she had retreated to the corner and hid her face in fear. All the while Laven had blamed everything he could think of on magic folk. It seemed to go on and on.
Finally the screaming and destruction stopped and Laven seemed to regain his composure. He had turned on her then and calmly drawn his short sword. She knew that he most preferred this sword for close personal battle. Gianni shuddered. Her husband hissed between clenched teeth, “You and your kind are an evil pox upon the world. The disease must be removed. I shall begin with you”
He had smiled a killer’s smile then and crouching into a loose fighting stance advanced upon his cowering wife. He wore an almost euphoric look upon his face, but determination and death danced in his eyes. Gianni had thrown up her hands and clapping them together speaking by wrote a defensive version of the elder spell. A blinding white light had flowed from her clapped hands and engulfed the advancing Laven. She then fled as his curses followed her out of the house and beyond.
The worst part of the fight was that Gianni was still unsure as to what she had done wrong.
Magic and the sword do not mix.
Gianni remembered those fateful words as she bypassed a particularly thick swath of bramble. After she had introduced Laven to her family, her father had pulled her aside and spoken sternly, “swordsmen don’t have to think. They don’t need a brain to hack each other up, so it’s been my experience that they generally act as if they don’t have one. A lifetime of behavior as such can leave a person mentally deficient.”
He had sighed and looked at her stricken with worry, taken a deep breath and continued, “Mages, on the other hand, have to use their brains at all times. I tell you Gianni this will not work.”
She had snatched her hand away and stormed out of her parent’s home, her father’s words chasing her out the door, “magic and the sword do not mix.” Later, she was mortified that she could act like such a petulant child. Apparently love could do that to a person. Love. Who would invent such a despicable thing?
But she had been in love. She still was. That’s what made the hurt so intense, the wounds go so deep. All hurts sting, but let the one you love inflict the pain and it goes straight to the bone.
Gianni came to an open area and skirting the edge made her way to the small immature wood beyond. Though really not wood at all, but overambitious shrubs, the thicket would be sufficient for the coming conflict.
Scanning the sky, Gianni found the thunderhead almost directly above. She had become aware that she was tracking the cloud without thinking. Apparently her subconscious had gone to a place that she hadn’t allowed her thinking self to go, self preservation catalyzing a subconscious plan for survival. She knew that such clouds could build up and store tremendous electric energy under the right conditions.
Gianni fell to her knees; both hands in front upon the ground palm-up. She sighed. She just wanted to sit here and weep. Though wracked with anguish, she found that she could not cry. Gianni wanted to live.
Again she closed her eyes and wished upon any distant star that things would not be so. But after a moment, she opened them again only to see that nothing had changed.
A rugged sigh filled the thicket as Gianni concentrated and began chanting aeromancy.
As she had been taught from her earliest memory, she compartmentalized the emotions and thoughts foreign to her current task. She focused on the words, thinking of nothing but the chant. Soon, the rhythmic words were her world. Her conscious thought and will became one with the great cloud.
Within the great Gianni/thunderhead, winds began to rush downward from above and upward from below hastening the creation of the desired conditions. The air within also began to cool condensing water vapor to ice. Soon, the great Gianni/thunderhead began to bristle with restless static energy. She carefully caressed the energy, feeling and shaping the charge, harnessing and controlling the maelstrom.
With the thunderhead in check, Gianni allowed her consciousness to settle back into her corporeal body. She sat waiting patiently, eyes fixed on the far side of the small clearing. She did not have long to wait. Emerging from the brush quietly like a wraith, Laven stepped out. He stooped looking left and right casting for her spoor. Laven had always been a superior woodsman.
“Laven,” she called out. His head snapped up and their eyes locked. Both stares carried fierce determination.
“I shall run no more. Come my husband. Here, in this open place, let our haranguing be forever silenced,” spoke Gianni clearly from across the clearing not moving except for a slight quiver of her lower lip.
Laven cast a lecherous grin and answered, “Oh yes wife let us again embrace. I too would wish an end to our troubles.” Laven gazed out at the clearing as if looking upon a field of play.
“Here in this place, let us make things again right.” And saying this he swung his sword in a powerful figure eight before him and laughed aloud.
Gianni belatedly realized that he had probably not resheathed the sword, but had carried it in anticipation all the morning during his dogged pursuit. Unsolicited, a single tear left the corner of her eye and began its lonely journey down her cheek. As with most tears, this one would soon be followed by many.
Laven took a step. Time seemed to slow; Gianni reached out and touched the ambient energy within the ground and plants surrounding the clearing.
Laven took another step, then another his eyes fixed on his target. Gianni began to sort and coalesce the ambient energy with an opposite charge of that surging within the thunderhead.
Laven took another step. He was now in the center of the clearing. Gianni pushed the ambient energy she had been gathering into the advancing man with a desperate cry of force.
Laven paused and cocked his head slightly, a quizzical look upon his face. He stood stock still for just a moment, his long mane of hair rising like a wisp from his shoulders and head. Laven was battered down as a great white bolt of lightning slammed into and through his body.
Gianni screamed, “No, no, no, no, noooooo.” Still on her knees, one hand open and beckoning outstretched as the other sank into the cold dirt. She screamed and screamed as she watched her husband be beaten down by one pulsing lightning strike after the other. The assault went on for what seemed like an eternity.
Eventually the lightning barrage stopped. Amid great shuddering sobs, Gianni wept herself to sleep. The thunderhead, now depleted of magic and energy quietly drifted away.
Later, she awoke and made her way around the clearing to where she first entered. The center of the clearing now had a sizable crater that the lightning had blasted there. Gianni looked one more time upon the killing field where her doomed marriage had ended. No more tears came.
She reached a hand out and said, “goodbye my love.”
A great tired sigh escaped her as she turned and began her journey home. She idly wondered if she would ever love again. Probably she thought mechanically placing one foot in front of the other.
But one thing was for certain she vowed to herself. Forever more would she heed the words of her father.
Magic and the sword do not mix. This was a mistake she would not make again.


The Shaman
By: Norval Joe

The old man was as grey and immobile as the granite on which he sat. His eyes were a shocking blue that matched the sky on clear winter days; clear and piercing like the icy crystal pools in high mountain streams. His skin hung loosely on him, as a robe many sizes too large.
Ancient. The oldest man's grandfather spoke of him as old. So old now, that he could not speak. Too old to raise his own hand to feed himself. Young men and women were sent from the villages to feed and care for him, and to hold his arms for him.
Every day, from spring equinox to that in the autumn, two young men came for the villages to place the staff in his weak and gnarled hands, and raise the old mans hands above his head, and hold them there.
Proud parents raised their boys to be strong and patient and prepared to raise the old mans hands. Boys and young men of all ages could be found as they walked from place to place, with their hands above their heads, holding a staff, increasing in strength and endurance, hoping to one day be selected to raise the old man's hands.
He sat on the granite ridge one thousand feet above the villages of the fertile plain. As he sat, hands folded neatly in his lap, he scanned the summer sky. As always, it remained clear and blue and still.
Young women, pure and chaste, fed him each morning, he didn't require much to sit and watch the sky. They brought him water and washed and trimmed his hair. They brought blankets for him when it was cold, and shaded him from the heat of the summer.
And each day, two young men; young, though physically mature; knelt at each side. Supporting elbow and wrist, they raised the old mans hands and staff over his head.
And held them there. Sometimes, they needed only hold them mans arms for a short period, but more often the task reached an hour or more.
As the arms were raised, the wind would rise in concert. The young men would lean into the wind to maintain their hold on the old man and his staff. With the wind, as it crossed the broad plain below, came clouds, boiling up to block out the sun and cast the earth into darkness; and rain.
The deluge was sudden and complete, creeks and rivers swelling and overflowing their banks. The old man with his attendants holding fast, chilled by the sudden downpour, searched the distant horizon, for the sign. Finding a break in the clouds, the afternoon sun peaked though, and the old man sighed; the cue to his young assistants that the days task was complete and they may relax.
Lowering arms and staff, the young men got to their feet, the clouds thinning suddenly and blowing away, leaving in its wake as sodden stillness, pristine and new. The young women came out to assist the young men. They worked together to dry the old man and help him into a clean robe.


Magic Quadrant Part II
By: Scott Roche

Lisor gripped the arms of the captain’s chair tightly. While not as strong as Vulcans, his people did possess more strength and agility than humans. He was able to keep his seat in spite of the pitching and yawing. His emotions ran high, but he reined them in.

“Status report Mr. Singh.” He had put the ship on red alert as soon as the odd readings were picked up by the sensor package, so their shields were up and all weapons were online. Unfortunately almost as soon as he did so, they temporarily lost helm control.

The helmsman regained her seat quickly and rain one fine boned hand through her blue-black hair. “Control has been restored. All systems are within normal parameters. What was that sir?”

The small readout on the arm of the chair wasn’t as good as the viewfinder at his station, but until he felt sure that there would be no more unusual movement he elected to stay put. He consulted it closely. “That’s not clear yet. Mr. Travis what do you have to tell me?”

Travis checked the navigation console. “Readings are... odd sir.” There was a slight twang in his voice, accentuated by tension. “The star field doesn’t conform to our last known position. Trying to get a fix on where we are.” His fingers flew over the buttons.

There had been no word from the captain since the incident. Lisor triggered a button near his hand. It brought up a status report echoing what Singh had to say. The hull was intact. Medical reported no current injuries, though they were still waiting on certain non-critical areas to report in. All duty stations were manned and functional. Life support was online. Satisfied that nothing was going to blow up in the next minute, he got up and walked over to the science station. “Lieutenant Banks, contact the captain. Pipe all reports to the readout in his quarters.”

The communications officer nodded. “Yes sir.”

Bluish-white light from his viewfinder played over Lisor’s skin. Data streams confirmed that they weren’t in the same sector that they had been in only moments before. There was still no clear information on where they were exactly. He played back the sensor readings from just before the incident. All of the input from hundreds of sensitive instruments flowed into the holographic memory banks at the core of the ship. Far superior to the “cloud storage” used hundreds of years ago, these databanks could take that and feed it back to him massaged to his liking in what might as well have been real time. The computing power at his command dwarfed that of what was available to some star systems. Still nothing in front of him could tell him what happened. There was so much they didn't know.

He banged his fist on the console in frustration. With a huff, he stood and looked over at Banks. “Any word from the captain?”

The big human shook his head, short blond dreadlocks dancing. “No sir. I’ve sent a security team to check on him. Sir?”

Lisor ran his hand over his smooth scalp, relishing the sensation and using that pleasure to calm himself. “Yes lieutenant?”

“I’ve been trying to reach the nearest subspace relay to help Mr. Travis in getting a fix on our location and I’m not getting anything back.” Concern etched his features. “We’re lost, aren’t we sir?”

The science officer couldn’t help but feel the eyes of the entire bridge crew on him. Most of these men and women hadn’t been in service more than a standard year. They were understandably nervous. He stood and exuded warmth and confidence. “I won’t lie to you. We are lost, but I have confidence that we will find out where we are. This is a good crew and we have a great captain. Now let’s get to work making that happen.” His words and the affect that his race had on most sentient species worked together and in moments everyone returned to their work with renewed vigor.

Great Hites # 45

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This week we have stories from:
Scott Roche
Guy David
Norval Joe
and
Jeff Hite

Magic Quadrant
By Scott Roche

The first officer spoke in hushed tones "We are now in the Magic Quadrant, Captain."

Captain Sean Thornton nodded sharply to his Deltan science officer. “Thanks Lisor.” The knowledge both amused and terrified the young captain. It was amusing because this area in space was neither magic, nor a quadrant. It was frightening because much like the Bermuda Triangle back on Earth, it was a place where many a ship disappeared without a trace. Of course much like the Triangle a good number of those disappearances where overstated, misattributed, or otherwise explainable. Still, he had been fed horror stories since his first day in the Academy.

He stood and tugged at his uniform tunic, noting not for the first time that it was amazing, given how far technology had come since humans first breached the troposphere, that military clothing still never seemed to fit quite right. He walked up to the con and stood behind his helmsmen. “Mr. Singh, be sure to let me know the second your readouts show any anomalies.”

“Aye, Captain.” The young lady nodded.

“Take us ahead one quarter impulse.” He imagined that he experienced the sensation of the NCC-1710 Kongo slowing down. The Constitution class starship was in tip top shape though, having just left space dock after an extensive overhaul and the addition of some unusual sensor packages. So there was no way that the inertial dampers would be out of whack enough for that to be the case. They were to be the first ship in Starfleet to really give this area a good going over.

Thornton suspected that someone in the upper ranks wanted them to fail. Why else send such a green crew out into this god-forsaken piece of space with bleeding edge technology and so close to the Neutral Zone? Well he wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction.

He made a fist, without realizing it and turned to face the strikingly handsome bald man at the science station. “Anything to report Lisor?”

Lisor smiled, but not too much. “No, Captain. Everything is within normal parameters. Mr. Trangh reported some fluctuation in the warp core, but it too is not unusual.” He bent to his viewfinder again.

Thornton was tempted to be annoyed at the Engineer for not reporting to him, but then he realized he was micro-managing. That was a sign that he needed to talk a walk, maybe get some grub. “Lisor, you have the con. I’ll be in my quarters for a bit.”

“Aye, Captain.” He nodded and slaved his read outs to the captain’s chair. It would alert him of anything needing his attention.

The elevator doors whooshed open at his approach. He grabbed the handrail and called for the deck that held officer’s country, such as it was. Once the door was closed, he ran one hand shakily through tightly curled auburn hair. Off the bridge he acknowledged that he wasn’t only hungry, but indeed famished. He hadn’t eaten since, what had he even taken breakfast? A strong cup of tea with a splash of milk had been it, or as near as the fabricators could come.

The doors opened and he stalked to his cabin, the temper turned on himself for not attending to his bodily needs. Too little food or sleep, even with the intense training and discipline that Starship captains underwent, could lead to disaster. For want of a nail and all that. Once in the cool dark of his room, he was able to fully relax and sprawl on his bed. His rangy form nearly took up the whole thing. It was good that he didn’t have occasion to entertain female visitors as some did, since there simply wouldn’t be room for anyone else.

“Computer, fix me a roast beef sandwich and a side of home fries.” A series of beeps sounded from the console and a small door opened. The odor of the synthesized food was tremendous, even knowing it hadn’t come near a real cow in light years. With great difficulty he moved off of the bed and towards his lunch.

The tray was in his hand and he was walking to the table when the deck dipped forty-five degrees, sending food, captain, and anything not nailed down into the deck plates. Red alerts flashed and sirens screamed all over the ship.



When the Mages Came
By Guy David

Someone once said that when technology is advanced enough, it might seem like magic to those who don't have it yet. The Mages knew this, as they have been studying us for centuries, so when we got to their quadrant, they appeared as magical beings to us. They had the ability to shape-shift. We also had this ability to a limited degree, but they where obviously more technologically advanced. They had space-time travel when we only had space travel. We could learn from them, but they didn't trust us. They have seen the possible future. They had no idea they created it.

They told us the future can be shaped. The universe is magical and modular in a way. You can travel to alternate universes and you can even create them. The key is time travel. You travel to the past, then you change something and suddenly the universe itself is changed, split into two separate universes. The Mages have learned how to harness this ability, to choose their universal destination and to travel through all of alternity.

They told us that throughout the universe, there where only three species capable of doing that. We where one of them, and the scientist that invented our own version of time travel existed on our time. They where there to destroy him, but they only succeeded in splitting the universe again. In one alternate universe, the scientist was destroyed, while in another he was successful in inventing time travel. Now, alternity is shared. That was why they came and told us. They hope they can prevent a possible future, where we have achieved mastery of the universe. They didn't tell us that. We just knew. We are wondering what the third species is. We think we can use them to help us rule over the universe. We will find out. We have time on our side.

The Subway.
By Norval Joe

This was their station. Anyone that wanted to do business here; hookers, drug dealers, pickpockets; would first need to check in with the street gang's representative. There was at least one around the platform, anytime of day or night, and usually there were more. You probably didn't know that they were there, unless you needed to know it. They kept a close eye on all the action, and were quick to rally enough of a presence if some unknown player tried to leave the platform without paying the 'tax'. You could do business here, but running a business always had expenses.
The weekly meeting was about to begin as the 12:05 was pulling away. An unusual number of 'inconspicuous' men had gotten off the subway car just as it pulled away. One of them shouted, "Get your hands in the air!" as they all drew their guns. The new chief of police had declared that he would make the subways 'safe and family friendly' again, but no one expected that the crackdown on gang activities would begin this soon.
The invasion was a surprise, but the gang was not unprepared. Whenever they gathered for official business, and a number of the group would be together and thus at risk, they held an open phone line to one of the boys a few blocks away at a power relay station. He was standing ready to cut the power to the lights, in the event of an emergency, such as this one.
The cop had barely barked his command and the lights were out.
There was a large enough wave of gang members surging up the stairway to the street that the few officers at the top were bowled over, unwilling to shoot into the suddenly dark platform below, the youth and young adults melted into the crowd on the street.
Blocked from escape up the stairway, a group of youth jumped down to the tracks and ran along the rails hoping to find a ladder to the street or some other alcove or utility room where they could hide. Small blue lights placed along one wall every twenty yards generated a faint silver light that gleamed on the steel rails to guide them. The tunnel filled with the shrill whine of an electric rail car that they could not yet see. The four boys raced forward in a desperate effort to find safety from the rapidly approaching inevitable death.
A burst of wind lifted them from the ground and hurtled them forward ahead of the subway car, battering the young men against the walls of the tunnel and rolling them across the ground. The rail car was upon them. They should be torn apart, their bodies mangled between the rail car and the walls of the tunnel, their limbs and torsos severed by the heavy steel wheels as they were drawn beneath the train.
But they weren't.
They got to their feet, dusted themselves off, and looked around. They could hear the subway car fading into the distant tunnel. The blue lights were gone and someone was missing, but they couldn't figure out who it was. They limped along through the dark, following the fading sound of the train.
The sound of the train didn't fade completely away, but stopped suddenly and left only the a ringing silence in their ears. They stood panting not knowing which way to go, with out light or sound to guide them. Very far off, and very faint, came the sound of a single hammer on a bell. But not a bell, and not a hammer, only similar. They stumbled forward in the direction of that single sound, stumbling over unseen rubble, bumping into unexpected turns in the walls. Then the sound again, still distant, and still faint, but not quite as much, so. They increased their pace for a time, but finding their route impeded more frequently with blocks of stone, and twisted pieces of metal, they slowed, and proceeded with a sliding shuffling gait, hands gripping one another's shirts or belts.
They inched along slowly, the temperature increasing in the tunnel with every step. Eventually, in the distance they could make out a dim light, glowing faintly as if from around a corner. Creeping forward they began to make out the objects they had been stumbling over; blocks of stone and broken and rusting rails. The increasing light allowed them to move forward much faster. The sound came again, much louder this time, not nearby, but much closer than before. The sound came again and again in rapid succession; like a tap, tap, tapping, on a metal pipe; and then stopped.
Red light glowed far down the tunnel and they moved toward it with determination, their path increasingly more visible as they traveled. The ringing sounds came more often and were joined by similar sounds, some distant, some close.
They reached the opening in the side of the tunnel where brilliant red light lit up the tunnel. Carefully they peered into the opening, shading their eyes from the intense light. The walls of the room were covered with rubies, each facet reflecting and multiplying the lanterns of the men that worked in the room. The hairy men were short, but wide and had massively muscled arms and shoulders. They were shirtless and wore either leather breaches, or knee length tartan kilts. They hammered metal spikes into the wall of rubies with heavy sledge hammers.
The men stopped to look at the three interlopers, who stood, dumbfounded. The leader of the miners grinned, "You three there!" He boomed with at deep broagh, "You've a choice to make. The dragon will be coming down that tunnel where you stand, in just a few moments. She'll eat you before you've felt her rotten breath on your scrawny necks." It was true, they could hear the pounding of great footfalls echoing down the tunnel, increasing in volume as the creature rapidly approached.
Calmly the squat giant continued, "You can remain where you are and die soon, or enter, here and help us mine fresh rubies for the dragons bed; at which time she will most likely eat you. Quickly boys, you're in the magic quadrant now, and decisions must be made with out delay."
The youth were baffled, the situation was too far outside their understanding and experience; their confusion made their choice for them.
The speaker turned back to his mates, "Well, men, that wont hold her for very long. Let's get back to work and see if we can get enough rubies to satisfy her."

The End
By Jeff Hite

With a spectacular blast that would have made any story teller proud the mountain sized piece of hydrogen ignited as it passed through the super hot jets, of oxygenated fuel from the admirals ship. And in that instant, the war was over.

"That is how the story ends right. The Battle is over, the evil over lord is dead, the universe is saved right?"
"Mark, that's how stories end. this is real life. Yes, the battle is over. Yes, Admiral Weston is dead, or at least we think he is. And, yes the war is pretty much over. But, the story does not end. I mean it does not end there for us. We are still on the outskirts of the Kuiper belt. I would like to get home some time, There are millions dead, the rover colonies are in tatters. There are years of work left to do."
"Wow you are a kill joy."
"Mark."
"I guess this is what happens when you don't really expect to make it out of some place so you through everything into it."
"You mean you don't have a plan?"
"No, I really don't."
"Guys," Lee leaned our of the control seat so he could look at them. "I hate to interrupt this stimulating conversation, but um we do have a couple of problems here."
"Alright lets have it."
"Well you know all those incredible maneuvers we did to draw Weston's ships in here?"
"Yeah."
"Well they were very expensive, fuel wise. We don't have a lot of fuel left, and we have a very long trip home."
"How expensive?"
"We are all going to be in stasis for a long time."
"How long a few months?"
"More like a few years, unless they send some one out to get us."
"They who? Earth never acknowledged our claims from the beginning, and crazy or not, Weston was the commander of the Martian fleet. So who exactly do you think they are?"
"Mark."
"He has a point Lee. But, jeez you called me a kill joy."
"Well if we are going to face reality, lets face it. Lee, give us a full ships status."
"Right give me a minute or so." He turned to the console in front of him and flipped through several screens. "Right, if we can believe everything here, and we all know that we will have to make a visual inspection of more than a few systems, we have enough fuel, for one good long burn. It should get us going fast enough that we can reach he inner solar system with in five years, the power for the stasis tubes should have no problem, as there appears to have been little or no damage to the solar array or the reactor. Again we need to check those things. If we can use the solar sail even a little, we might be able to cut as much as 6 months of that time. The problem comes in that, that gets us into the inner solar system, not by anything, like a planet."
"I can't believe that we made it all the way out here, and" he trailed off.
"There is more," Sharron had moved back to her station.
"More?"
"Yeah, let's say we do this burn that Lee suggests. What planet, or object do we head to. As you pointed out, no one is really going to be happy to see us, and most of the rover colonies were destroyed, it maybe that even if we aimed at one of them, it four and a half or five years there might not be a colony there for us to come home to, they might have abandoned it depending on how badly it was damaged."
"So, do either of you have a plan?"
"I thought you were the brilliant leader," Lee shot back.
"I know strategy, I dreamed up this wild idea on how to draw Weston out here to the magic quadrant. But it was, as I said, supposed to be a suicide run, that is why there were only three of us."
"So we win but we lose? That is sad."
"Wait, a minute, you just said that we had enough fuel and power to make it back to the inner solar system, it will take us a long time, but we can send out a beacon when we get closer and someone will pick it up."
"But like you said, who is going to want to pick us up?"
"Yeah, we will be like the trash that no one wants to take out. They will have plenty of time to see us coming, they could either blow us out of the sky or, just more likely, just let us coast on by, become a long period comet or something."
"We don't have enough water on board to be a comet. We might have a tale for about three or four hours and then we would be like every other dark body in the solar system."
"Alright you too, enough gloom and doom. There has to be a good side to this. I mean we won the war, or at least we ended it. Someone would want to take us in. Even if it is to lock us up for killing their commander."
"I don't know about you, but I would rather take my chances with becoming a short lived comet that be locked up for the rest of whatever."
"I have to agree with Lee on that one Mark."
"So how long can we wait until we have to make a decision?"
"I would say we have three days until we all need to be in hibernation."
"Ok then here is the plan, we start making some calls, we call some of the rover colonies, and the moons of Jupiter, and Earth and see who would be willing to take us in. We see who gets back to us and make a decision based on what sounds like the best answer."
"That is going to be cutting it close. Round trip messages from the inner solar system and then we have to agree on a decision."
"I know but do you have a better suggestion. If we just shoot for the middle, we will be trusting to luck that some one will pick us up, but if we plan to go somewhere."
"We are trusting to luck that whoever answers us is telling us the truth."
"It is better than your comet idea."
"Alright I can accept that."
"So much for the happy endings."