Nemo

That's a working title, might keep it, might not. This story is set on my world Hyldrassil and is just a little side story that helps establish a bit of background and workings to the world beyond the main story from the 'Mana' project. The story presumes that the events of the Mana stories have not taken place yet, and is set in the Duchy of Tithonus as the war approaches between it and it's northerly neighbour the Empire of Strenia, and follows the journey of a young woman who has been robbed of her mind and left for dead.

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A frigid wind blasted the frozen high places of the world lifting waves of powdered snow across the crags of the mountain and howling in the lonely emptiness.
Beneath a gray outcropping of rock shaped and blasted dry by the chill wind a drift of snow had formed in that sheltered place, flakes and powder dropping out of the wind to pile gently against the cold stone.
There was a certain contoured smoothness to that snowdrift, the shape of something that did not belong in this barren and unforgiving place.
Moving slowly there came a soft groan, the snow was falling on pure white clothing not light but entirely too fine for such a place, a robe of white woven with silver embroidering had fallen to cover the head of the person underneath.
Groaning again, the robe was pushed back to reveal the delicately featured face of a young woman with eyes of such a pale blue as to resemble the hue of frost and hair blindingly white. She shivered in the cold and rose unsteadily to her feet, not noticing a silver necklace with a fine talisman fall from within her outfit into the snow.
Wrapping the robe about her body she felt a pain in her head and pressed her hand against her temple.
Something wasn't right here, apart from the fact that she was half way up a mountain wearing the clothes of a spring morning, something was missing, out of sync or just hidden beyond plain sight.
She backed further into the shelter of the outcropping and tried to remember how she had got here, and why she had chosen to come so woefully under-dressed. Then she tried to remember where she had been before coming to the mountain.
Then she tried to remember who she was.
"Oh Hells!"
Looking around the lonely mountain across a gray sky filled with the whipped up eddies of snow, she felt despair set in with the realization that she had no memory of ever existing.

***

She struggled against the wind, the cloak pulled tight about her for whatever shelter it was worth and the hood pulled over to shield her head as she trudged through the snow. She had no idea the time of day, only that it was day time somewhere beyond the vast gray sheet of the sky above.
She had struck north, there were fewer peaks this way and it was the downhill path, chances are she'd find some semblance of civilization on this course before freezing to death. Or so she hoped as her feet sunk into the deep snow, her boots were only of a light leather and already her toes were growing numb.
The dark void in her mind gnawed at her, more terribly because there was not so much as a fragment of memory upon which she could rebuild her life or even the last few hours prior to her current predicament.
Her name? Surely that at least should still be in there, how can a person forget something that has been with them their entire life?
Stumbling in the snow she went down on one knee, her skin sinking into the numbing coldness. Picking herself up again she staggered forth feeling the very air try to say the life from her.
Deep inside she cursed the mountain, cursed all mountains, not out of hatred or spite but because right now she had no one else and nothing else to blame. The frigid wind was blowing harder and harder, the sky getting darker, she was losing the feeling in her hands and feet, and she was getting weaker.
She knew she was dying.
The cold snow came to meet her as she collapsed once again, this time on both knees. Shivering, she barely had the energy to stand, she fought against the cold with every ounce of her reserves and stumbled forward in the face of the bitter onslaught until at last falling all the way down.
Lying with her face in the cold snow she thought what was the use in fighting any more, let the ferryman come and take her from this wretched place.
In this cold she doubted that she would even feel it when the embrace of death came, she would slip from this world anonymous even to herself.
She watched each breath steam from her mouth against the chill wind, each getting shallower, weaker, getting closer to that final sigh.
And beyond that breath she saw across the desolate and lonely mountain, frozen gray stones and drifts of snow so keen to sap her life.
In the haze of her breath she saw something else, a structure made of dark wood and built against one of those sheltered outcroppings. It looked like a kingly hall, and it was close, so tantalizingly close.
Summoning all of her will, all of her strength she pushed herself up against the final embrace of the cold, crawling first on all fours she made her way toward that building.
Burning with inner fire, determined that she should live she forced herself to stand and walk, to make one final push for that sanctuary.
Her muscles burning and her sapped body straining against the flame of her will she pressed on, the hall getting closer and closer.
The wind howled at her as if the very mountain had cast its lot with death, the cold wind cut at her and snowflakes melted on her skin as she burned with the exertion.
She was almost running by the time she reached the worn stone steps and with one last effort she slammed hard into the door. It was solid and it held fast.
With the last of her strength she banged against the heavy wood, trying to call out but felt her voice strangled. She kept hitting the door, but all around her was becoming dark.
Light was leaving her.
Sobbing at the cruelty of fate she slid down the dark stained door, trying to hit it one last time she found at last her strength had failed.
Her thoughts grew slow and she knew that her time was at hand.
And the darkness took her.

***

There was heat, and it was black, so very black.
She had no feeling, no sense of time, no sense of self. She was a mind adrift in an infinite void, and from where the heat came she did not know for there was no sign of light or life.
There was just the darkness, yawning and eternal it had her now in it's sweet embrace, not terrifying as she first thought it might be. No, if anything it was welcoming, it enveloped her and held her wrapped up and safe, there would no longer be any pain, any fear. These thoughts all washed away in the black, the darkness would care for her, would sustain her forever.

***

Brother Konsidine tended to the lamp oil of the chamber, working delicately as to not spill any over the manuscript he was illuminating for fear of ruining what would have been ten years of his life.
Not yet in his thirties Konsidine had came to the monastery a troubled youth, wracked with dreams and visions of great and terrible horrors, dread things untold of in the lands.
Writing provided catharsis, took the teeth from the demons in his mind, freed him to examine the beasts that revealed themselves every night when the lights went out. He found too in the archives that he was not the first to see such terrors, that these beings of such bottomless malignancy appeared in the writings of poets and madmen through the span of recorded history.
It was the work of the Order to catalog and track these ramblings, to find the coherency in the gibberish, to give definition to that which wishes to remain unseen. For the monks know that not every force in the world can be seen with the eyes, heard with the ears, or even touch by the hand, they knew that there was much mankind did not understand and might never do. And they knew too that from the human perspective most forces would have a predisposition to the malign, for how could ageless forces care about such brief lives as man?
Konsidine laid the jar of oil back in its box and sighed as he stared at the bare wall of his chamber, watching the light play on the walls from the dancing flames of his two small lamps. His eyes were on the light but his mind was on the woman in the chamber at the end of the hall who had arrived barely clothed and half dead at their door two days past.
His thoughts were not carnal in nature or the erotic musings of one who led a sequestered life hidden from the opposite sex, abstinence was not a requirement of the Order and those within the monastery had as complete lives as any from the nearby town of Tol Barad.
No, he was thinking about how she came to be so far up the mountain in such ill suited clothing, as nearby Tol Barad was it was still the better part of a day's hike straight up to get here. She bore no identifying emblems or talismans, her clothing resembled nothing seen in the mountain or the surrounding region.
And so much white? To say it was unnatural would be wholly superstitious but it did make a statement about her, either as a priestess or as some other figurehead. Perhaps some virgin cult?
He jotted thoughts idly on the edge of the manuscript, words like white, delicate, like a Sylph, frost eyes...
Pondering this for a few moments longer his eyes fell to the words he had written and at last a connection was made, he stifled a curse because he had been doodling over the manuscript he had so carefully worked on.
A knock came on his chamber door as he tried to scratch the ink from the parchment, one of the elder monks, brother Gregor excused himself and with few words handed Konsidine a tome bound in ancient and cracked leather. It bore a single faded emblem of an ankh within a sun, the book being an artifact held in trust at the monastery until such time as it would be required elsewhere, a book with the rather ominous title of 'The Truth'.
Konsidine had need of the book for some of the more cryptic visions that had came to him lately, some of which if interpreted literally were both gruesome and terrible.
"Father Michael requests that you tend to our patient this evening," Gregor said, "then if you wish you may join us for a late evening sherry in the library."
"Thank you, brother, I'll tend to the young lady and I shall join you when I can."
As Gregor excused himself Konsidine looked to the ancient volume in his hands, he had waited this long, one more evening would do no harm.
He placed the tome next to the manuscript, took one look at the notes he had inadvertently jotted and decided that it would be far simpler to cover them with a decorative border, and then he left his chamber.

***

The warmth she had first felt was now a burning sensation all over her body, her skin felt as though it was on fire. She flailed and tossed in the burning dark, trying in vain to pat out invisible flames on phantom limbs.
Fear came upon her, was she bound now for some underworld of fire and darkness, hot tears streamed on her cheeks causing her face to burn.
She screamed and her eyes were wide open, she was suddenly heavy as her body felt real once more as she kicked and fought against a heavy cloth on top of her.
A man appeared above her, trying to hold her shoulders and saying something that was not registering with her, though his actions did suggest a certain calmness.
Relaxing from her struggle she began to take in her surroundings, a darkened room lit by a couple of oil lamps, bare walls and spartan furnishings ave a wooden desk on which lay a basin and a few books.
"There," the man said, a monk she realized, "be calm, you are safe here."
Her skin still felt as though it were on fire. Of course, the cold, she vaguely remembered a struggle through snow and bitter winds and the hope of salvation beyond a heavy wooden door.
"Can you tell me your name?"
She fixed him a blank stare, the memory coming back to her that she had no memory.
"No."
"You are perfectly safe I assure you," he persisted, "I am brother Konsidine, you are in our monastery."
"I can't tell you my name because I don't know who I am," she croaked, her throat dry, "I don't know what I'm doing here or how I got here."
"I suppose that spares me a few questions."
"Can I have a drink please?"
"Of course," he said with a fluster before reaching for a ladle in the basin and drawing a cup of water from which she drank noisily.
"Go easy, you haven't had fluids for a couple of days."
She lay back on the bed, the void in her mind still gnawing at her but at least now she had some warmth in her body it didn't feel quite so tragic. Exhaling deeply she stared at the plain white plaster of the roof, watching the shadows of the lamplight, allowing a moment of pause for perhaps the vaguest fragment of memory to reveal itself.
But the moment was in vain for no thought or sense of self was forthcoming. She pondered what that meant for surely to have lost her memory such basic functions as speech or the ability to walk should have been lost to her, certainly she should not be able to think so clearly as she was now. It was though the memories had been selectively wiped from her mind, that somehow everything that made her who she was had been removed leaving only a lost and alone young woman.
"Do you have any idea how you even came to be on the mountain?"
"I don't even know where this mountain is," she said, "everything is gone, or hidden from me."
"Well, we're on the far north of the Duchy of Tithonus, on the range separating Tithonus from the Empire of Strenia, near Tol Barad."
"Those names mean nothing to me, you may as well be listing places from a storybook."
"I'll bring a map on my next visit," he suggested, "perhaps something there may jog your memory."
They spoke for perhaps an hour, Konsidine talking of places in the world and local history, the girl for her part persistently having no knowledge or recollection about such persons and places. She hid her frustration well, deep as it ran, to be so completely stripped bare of such things as her personality and even the most basic things about herself.
In the end Konsidine left her to rest with the promise that he would return shortly with some food and a map.
She felt safe here in this place, that whatever darkness that had sought her out in the world could not reach her here. She could put no name or image to that though just a strong feeling that her present condition was no simple accident.
Here at least she could recuperate, try to get herself together and plan what she would do next, to find first herself and then whoever it was who took her mind. She would find no solace or peace here, but for the time being at least she could find rest.
There was an indefinable aura of protectiveness here, like something greater watching over them all, even from the monk, Konsidine. She had watched him leave and he nearly seemed to glow, there was something like a silver sheen or half light as though some energy surrounding him was barely contained within his body that reached out with a life of its own to thwart the darkness in the room.

Crossing the Midnight Line

Originally entitled 'Dark World' and might go back to that title at some point because it is possibly more apt and definitely less pretentious. This story revolves around Claire Twining, a forensic photographer in New York, and a mysterious blond man called Soren. Claire has been involved in the case of a violent serial killer operating in the Manhattan area, whilst the cryptic Soren claims to be searching for a 'dead man' hiding somewhere in the city. Watch for the brief cameo of Det. Lucifer Hill, because if I'm going to do a noir story in New York I have to let one of my favorite characters make an appearance. Also, this is a first draft so don't get too wound up about inconsistencies or repetition.

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Prologue

Sterile taupe walls, stainless steel tables and a green polyester curtain, such a depressing way to leave the world, listening to a heart monitor beep as if counting down the final moments of his tragically shortened life.

Beep. Another moment of lying in bed.

Beep. Another moment of the nurse holding his hand.

Beep. Another moment of a tear running down his cheek.

Beep. Another moment of a song he'll never sing.

Beep. Another moment of a woman he'll never love.

Beep. Another moment of his heart aching.

Beep. Another moment of his life counting down.

Beep. Another moment of fear about the unknown.

Beep. Another moment of the void drawing breath.

Beep. Another moment of the cancer eating away at his body.

Another moment, each more fleeting than the last, and somewhere in his mind the thought barely registered that the monitor didn't beep.

He lay on the bed fighting the terror, he tried to squeeze the hand of the nurse as she held him, he just wanted something to hold onto in the world, an anchor to keep him here and away from the terror beyond the veil, he wanted a rock to hold fast against the inevitable. He could feel his soul separate from his body and tears in his eyes, he could feel the weight of the world literally falling away as the edges of reality fell to shadow and misty darkness.

A new light was born before him, a splendid and glorious light as the world behind became weaker and more insignificant until at last the black curtain of his eyelids came down for the final time and the walls of the universe crumbled to ash.

The heart monitor hummed a long, sorrowful note as the final release of breath sighed from the lungs of Aaron Young, thirty years old, his hand now limp in the hold of the hospice nurse who had stayed by his side this day.

She laid his hand gently across his chest, rubbing the tips of her fingers against his as she did so, the sensation as though allowing him to play one final chord of the music of life. She would like to have heard the young musician play his guitar in person, she had his album and he was a man of such heartbreaking talent, his words filled with such honesty, the deep sincerity of someone who knew he was already dead, the pancreatic cancer in his body just catching up with the fact.

Had life been fair and just there might have been no bounds to his fame, instead he was destined to pour his heart and soul into one beautiful, tragic album.

She rubbed the hair back from his forehead, then reached out to silence the sonorous buzz of the heart monitor.

Before she could do anything Aaron opened his eyes and sat up ramrod straight, he looked around the room, confused, he stared at the nurse who stood in shock. He felt his chest then stared at his hands gaunt from the disease that had wasted him away, he looked at the machine beside him making that relentless, unceasing buzz and the leads running from it to his chest.

Grasping the leads he yanked hard and they pulled free, the buzz changed to a repetitive beep and a message flashed 'lead out'.

Swinging his then legs over the edge of the bed he stumbled to his feet as though getting used to gravity again, he staggered to the curtain, looked back once at the nurse still standing in stunned silence, and then he walked away.

Chapter 1

THE WORST DAY SINCE YESTERDAY

The moon was high in the sky over an old and abandoned farmhouse, it's old timbers partially collapsed and windows long ago smashed by children from neighboring farmsteads, what remained now only a decayed sentinel of a once happy home. Weeds had long ago reclaimed the pathways and the building itself home now only to a few feral animals and a couple of spiders.

Across what had once been a yard stood an equally dilapidated barn with cracked rust-red paint looking crisp in the silver ethereal glow of the moon, all was still this night save a lone cricket singing it's nocturne and a light breeze causing the slightest whimper of a creak from the broken door of the house.

In a field of grass swaying gently under that crystal sky was a pole that had once held an ancient scarecrow, the lone guardian of the empty field with clothes long frayed and straw stuffing bursting through seams in sackcloth baked dry with the sun and age.

On a small hillock in the distance a figure silhouetted in the moonlight strode toward town.

***

There was a blinding flash as the first snap was taken, the inside of the hollow ribcage illuminated as the body lay splayed open on the edge of a bathtub. The victim, a young black man, had been sliced from the neck to the groin and with the skin rolled back the internal organs had been removed. Heart, lungs, liver, stomach, intestines, pancreas, spleen, and kidneys, none were to e found anywhere at the crime scene.

Claire raised the DSLR camera and snapped another shot, this one of a bloody hand print on the yellowed tiles of the bathroom wall, most likely from the victim trying to push himself away from the tub. From the blood splatters on the floor he had probably been tabbed five or six times already.

The smell was horrible, disturbing for it's familiarity, like freshly cut meat in a butcher's shop awaiting the frying pan. The killer was a suspected cannibal, where these the thoughts that passed through his deviated mind, that all flesh is the same, that humans were just some form of self-domesticating livestock?

She took a deep breath and tried to remain detached as she adjusted the zoom of the lens and captured a shot of what looked to be part of a scalpel blade that had broken off in the third rib near the sternum. The metal gleamed sickening and alien against the red flesh between the pale ribs, she fought against retching as she snapped it again from another angle.

"You got something, Dr Twining?"

It was the homicide detective, Hill, standing at the entrance to the bathroom as she worked and surrounded by his usual haze of cigarette smoke. He was a good man, good cop, knew when to stay out of the way, though desperately unlucky, this was his second serial killer case, and this one just as gruesome as the last.

"Scalpel blade, third rib. Scratches going both directions. Looks like the point of entry."

"Anything else?"

"Yeah, I need some air because I'm going to be sick."

She stepped back from the corpse and turned to the blond detective, he nodded silently as she walked by then he stepped into the room.

Claire stooped at her case to load away her equipment, trying not to look back at the scene in the room behind her. Down the hall she could hear Hill's partner Burke question the landlord of the apartment, asking the usual questions about the victim's character, known associates, known enemies et cetera, et cetera.

Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath she slipped off her latex gloves, threw them in the case and then clicked it shut. Brushing back her raven hair she stood and gave one glance back at the body lying prostrate and hollow across the bathtub then walked to the front door, the soles of her shoes clicking on the laminate flooring.

A uniformed patrolman stood just outside the apartment door talking to the captain of the precinct, Claire gave him the curtest nod then continued on her way down the dim corridor that smelled of ash and stale liquor. The stairs creaked and protested despite her slight frame, the building was old, decrepit, should have been torn down ten years ago but would probably see another thirty.

A cockroach watched impassively as she trod by, the creature observing with indifference the comings and goings of the large faceless ones preoccupied with affairs that made no sense to it. When it was by itself once more, the large one having descended into the deep, it scuttled off along the sticky carpet past some rat droppings and into a dark crack in the woodwork.

A drunk sat in the front porch of the apartment building, seeking shelter from the rain and a place to sip from the bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag that he gripped as though a lifeline. He stank of piss and huddled in his dirty brown coat against the cold gray plaster of the wall, rain blew in around his feet and drops sat on the drained skin of his face.

Claire barely paid him any heed, the city desensitized you to such sights, over time you saw so much neglect and suffering that it simply ceased to register. This was part of life in the big city- some people had none.

Others though had it taken from them. She felt the weight of her case in her hand, it brought some measure of comfort, the weight was reassuring, strong in it's way.

It was late evening and the rainy sky was turning to darkness under a neon glare, the fall of yet another day as changeless as those that came before. Today again Claire was shown the darkness in the heart of humanity, with each day the world was able to reveal that despite her best intentions it was still a dismal place.

She steps through impatient and listless traffic, heading not for home but to a seedy bar, one with sticky floors, a jukebox turned up just slightly too loud, and piss-poor watered-down whiskey.

This is what it takes she tells herself, this is what it takes to do her job, to get over death in the city you have to remind yourself that life here is shit anyway.

Some dickhead will probably try to hit on her, offers of drink or food, some fake and insipid lines that he probably read in some men's magazine that he thinks come across as charming. She'll casually reveal her gun in it's holster, take another shot of whiskey then maybe go throw in a bathroom stall before heading home and ordering Chinese takeout.

She would try to forget today, to forget the body and the mindlessness of it all. She would try to forget and she would fail. Then maybe she would drink from the bottle of Jack Daniels in her cupboards and pass out on the couch to some 90s sitcom.

Pausing under a sign offering live XXX sex she figured passing out on the couch would be nice.

***

On a gray and overcast afternoon the small country town was busy with the comings and goings of daily life, over the hills to the west the black clouds of a storm brewing loomed heavy and oppressive. To the east the sky was dark with heavy rain already hitting far away New York City, but this was the calm little center like refugees trapped between opposing armies.

A man in ragged clothes strode with an almost carefree aloofness down the main street, not noticing or not caring about the looks of disdain from passers-by. No one wanted to say anything to an obvious down and out but they would have preferred he not walk the streets and shatter their illusion of the perfect community.

Soren, his name, smiled to himself as if reading their minds by the looks on their faces, a storm was coming, the economy was in no great shape, a war loomed in a faraway land, and what preoccupied these people most was a vagrant upsetting the decorum of the town.

Sometimes people were truly fascinating, how they manage to compartmentalize the world around them so that the bigger picture as it's called is no longer so threatening, its just something that happens to other people.

He decided maybe he should do something about his attire, people have little tolerance for that which makes them uncomfortable and it served his purpose to move unnoticed.

Beside him was a sports store but he quickly dismissed that idea, the thought of wearing a tracksuit anywhere outside of a gymnasium was about as classy as wearing a hakenkreuz to a synagogue.

He felt the shadows start to lengthen, the evening was drawing in and soon he'd have to be under way to the city, he had too much to do to waste time seeking something fashionable and inconspicuous.

A shop that looked the sort to sell menswear exclusively to grandparents was next door to the sporting goods store, a gray and blue faded sign declaring it a 'gentleman tailors' and the suits on the mannequins declaring it to be the pinnacle of 1950s fashion. It would do the job he needed.

Inside the store was musty and dimly lit, a silver haired man stood by a mahogany counter and cast a snide look at the straw haired transient who had just entered his store.

"Can I help you... sir?"

This was a man who could only have been more condescending if he had a stiff upper lip and a strong desire to get this business with the natives over and done with in time for afternoon tea.

"I need a suit," Soren said, glancing idly over the stock, "preferably something from the last decade."

"And what is sir's price range? I'm afraid I don't carry much in the line of... remaindered goods."

"It all looks remaindered to me," he replied, at the same time holding up a billfold of more hundred dollar bills than the clerk had ever seen in one place before.

Half an hour later a different man stepped onto the street, in a pinstripe suit, white shirt and purple tie he pushed back a lock of blond hair and stepped into the dark of an alley next to the tailors, and promptly vanished into the shadows.

X-4

This is the opening chapter of a sci-fi story about a team of UN weapons inspectors sent to investigate a corporate facility on faraway world Athena Parthenos. After an accident at a Keres Corporation facility in Mongolia involving a deadly bio-weapon not engineered on Earth the United Nations has dispatched inspectors to all Keres extraterrestrial facilities. What they find on Athena Parthenos is something else entirely, and what the Keres Virus has done may prove more devastating for humanity than anyone yet realizes.

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Part 1: Arrival at Athena Parthenos

Space.
No matter how busy science fiction tries to make it, no matter how colourful or how full of asteroids, comets or shooting stars, no matter how much beauty is painted across the heavens space is still largely just that: space.
Once in a while you might come across some interesting stellar gas, but overall it is just lots and lots of nothingness punctuated by the occasional lonely rock.
In this void the sound of Bach echoed as if playing through a tin can, which maybe wasn’t far from the truth. The timbre of the lonely cello humming the notes of the Prelude reverberated off the exposed metal walls of the lounge as a solitary man drifted in the zero gravity with his eyes closed.
He wore a loose fitting jumpsuit in sky blue, the back of which bore the legend UNITED NATIONS EXPLORATORY FORCE, it wasn’t a uniform so much as it was something comfortable to wear when floating in the zero g sections of the needle-like ship.
He twitched his fingers along to the rise and falls of the piece as it built toward its crescendo, savouring the moment, the rising wave-
The music vanished to be replaced by an intermittent beep and then a man’s voice.
“Agent Westwood, Athena Parthenos is directly ahead, we’ll have locked orbit in thirty minutes. ExFor station Magellan anticipating dock in forty minutes.”
“Thank you, Captain Nicolette,” he replied.
It was time to go to work.

***

An icy blue orb hung before the needlepoint nose of the United Nations starship ExFor Holst, and looming in the distance beyond the icy moon was the massive gas giant Cicerone, the gases of the world swirling purple and green as the vortex of a storm several magnitudes of Earth rolled by.
Between the moon and that raging storm hung a small silvery shard, the Exploratory Force station Magellan with its huge solar panels reflecting the cold blue of the moon far below, the station seemingly insignificant against the celestial canvas.
Drawing closer the scale of Magellan became more apparent, the wheel-like central hub rotating around the stanchions supporting the solar array came to dominate the forward display on the Holst. Beyond the solar arrays on either side were modules with a distinctive disc shape similar to a 1950’s idea of a flying saucer, these were the zero gravity lab areas, cargo holds, and docking bays.
In an observation dome overlooking the moonside docking disc station commander Mila Qwan steadied herself against a brace next to the viewport, her magnetic boots holding her to the deck but her body moving as though submerged.
She watched as a blocky cargo shuttle dropped from beneath the long hull of the ExFor craft with the slightest hint of apprehension. These were armed troops, military men, coming to an enclosed space were the only thing between them and oblivion was a few inches of alloy. She suddenly felt very far from Earth.
Behind her stood Dr Meyers, the Magellan’s chief medical officer and he was equally concerned.
“Why do you suppose they’re sending weapons inspectors?”
“I have no idea,” Qwan replied without taking her eyes off the shuttle, “there must be some mix up at Vandenberg.”
Meyers stared over her shoulder as the Magellan docking arm reached out for the shuttle as it turned broadside to the station, the dark purple X-4 like a silhouette against the white sides of the craft.
For its massive size the Magellan had a crew compliment of less than 50 and being so far isolated from Earth they lived as a tight knit community. News that the UN was sending inspectors had spread like wildfire through the crew, and Meyers like the rest of them had the same question in mind: what if one of these jarheads puts a hole in the side of the station?
Why they were sending inspectors at all was another matter entirely. Magellan’s primary function was an observation post to survey potential colony worlds within the sector, but since they were in deep space they carried out all kinds of experiments from bacteriology to physiology. What they did not do was anything remotely related to weapons research, and even if they did this was a UN station, the computer sent updates back to Vandenberg regular as clockwork.
“Better go greet them,” Qwan said with a resigned sigh, disengaging the maglocks in her boots and pushing off toward the ladder to the docking level.

***

Weirzbowski was already at the docking console when Qwan and Meyers drifted down, a synthetic cigar smouldering in his lips as he cycled through the last of the docking procedure.
“That’s our guests tucked up nice and tight,” he rumbled, “cargo transfer guides moving into place.”
Two large rails rose from the floor of the docking bay to lock against the wall on either side of the larger of the two access ports.
On the smaller port a console beeped and the display changed from red to green, the atmosphere had equalized.
“Here we go.”
A hiss came from the port and the heavy doors slid open to reveal a Middle Eastern man, a square jawed blond man and a raven haired woman, all in ExFor purple.
“Agent Westwood, I’m Mila Qwan, commander of ExFor Magellan,” she addressed the blond man, “welcome aboard.”
“Thank you,” the Middle Eastern man replied, “can I introduce Chuck Brewster, biocoms, and Mary Dowd, EWD.”
Qwan blushed at her mistake and began to stumble an apology.
“Don’t worry about it, everybody makes that mistake.”
Recovering from her error of judgement the commander introduced chief medical officer Meyers and chief engineer Weirzbowski. They shook hands and spoke in a cordial manner which threw the station crew off kilter given their earlier apprehension, it had been expected that the inspectors would be barking orders from the moment of their arrival, now they didn’t know what to think.
“Commander,” Westwood brought her to one side as the first of the cargo pods began to drift between the magnetic guide rails from the shuttle’s hold, “can I have a word while the crew unloads?”
Weirzbowski and Meyers watched as Qwan and the ExFor agent pulled themselves into the lateral tunnel that led back to the station core.

***

When the last of the inspection team and their gear had been brought over and the station’s outgoing waste had been loaded the shuttle returned to the patiently waiting ExFor Holst.
A second, smaller craft dropped from the shuttle bay, a delta winged ship with a wide body and two large scramjet engines, gun turrets on either side and below the tail fin hung menacingly. A Gal-X1 combat utility dropship, the latest rapid deployment vehicle currently in use by the UN on Earth, it rotated on it’s axis and set course for the Magellan docking disc.
“ExFor team, Holst preparing to disembark for Raleigh Outpost. See you in four weeks.”
“Roger that, Captain Nicolette,” Brewster ansered the hail, “see you on your return.”
In the distance over the icy form of Athena Parthenos the two enormous rail guns mounted on the top and underside of the Holst retracted until they sat snug against the needle hull. The rearmost section of the stardrive behind the stubby wings broke apart and began to fan out, rotating around a central core glowing blue white.
“They aren’t hanging about?”
Meyers was surprised to see the starship preparing to leave the system, he had figured that the inspection team would have the run of the ship.
“It costs a lot of money to send those things extra-solar,” Brewster replied, “once they’re out here it’s best to make use of them.”
Modern starships utilised a system that created a wormhole around the hull of the ship, the long term effects of which on the fabric of the universe had not been fully tested, the fear was that it could one day create a rift that wouldn’t close. To that end the UN did not allow rift drives to be fired whilst within the Neptune Orbital Boundary, which meant that ships had to burn a lot of fuel through their sublight drives in order to leave the solar system.
“I’d rather see them hanging about,” Dowd said as a flash of light washed over the Holst in a wave, and then it was gone, “this job is always easier when you have a battleship parked behind your back.”

***

“Have you had much contact with the Eris complex on Athena Parthenos?”
Qwan paused on her drift through the long tunnel, Eris was a corporate facility on the moon surface owned by the Earth multi-national Keres. It had been part of the Magellan Project during construction but was sold off when the station was brought up to full capacity, the sale of obsolete facilities on the open market was one of the ways the UN encouraged expansion and exploration.
“We occasionally swap parts or use each other’s supply craft for urgent runs,” she replied, “is that why you’re out here?”
“Any unusual activity?”
“None,” she didn’t appreciate that Westwood had flat out ignored her question, “would you mind telling me why exactly you are here?”
“In due course.”
“No, Agent Westwood, now,” Qwan’s nostrils and blue eyes flared, “this crew has been on edge since we heard an investigation team was being sent, and unless you are carrying signed orders stating otherwise then I am still the commanding officer of this station. And I want answers.”
Westwood said nothing for a few moments, gripping the bulkhead his dark eyes moved as if trying to decide whether the best course of action was to pull rank or acquiesce.
“I am sorry,” he said at last, “the orders sent ahead of us were deliberately vague. I’ll brief the crew at 1100 hours and clarify everything, for now you can assure them that Magellan’s only involvement is to play host to my team for the duration.”
Qwan didn’t think that he was trying to be deliberately confrontational, watching him hover in the zero gravity, his dark hair rippling in the air current that flowed through the tunnel, she suspected that he was doing his best to be open whilst still telling her nothing.
“There hasn’t been any unusual activity from Eris,” she relented, “we haven’t had reason to communicate with them for over a month now.”

***

A brutal ice storm swept across the surface of Athena Parthenos, battering the frigid black mountain Thantatos Mons and the lonely little complex nestled up against it.
Snow drifts piled high along the walls and stalactites so windswept that they were almost horizontal had formed on windows that had their blast shutters sealed. The three garage facilities all linked to the two storey central complex by an underground basement system were locked up tight and caked with layers of ice, a lonely survey truck sat outside piled high with snow.
A solitary red light blinked on a beacon mounted high up the mountain above the silent facility, the only sign of life from a base that was in lockdown against the storm.
Between the beacon and the complex in a high up sheltered crevice was a man in only a lightweight grey jumpsuit, frozen to death as his fingers had desperately sought grip.

The Devil's Boots

Also known as 'When The Man Comes Around, part 2'. This is the prologue and opening chapter to the sequel novella to When The Man Comes Around, set ten years after the events of the first story it begins in San Francisco with Patrick McElhone now a man reunited with one of the other survivors of the first story, the Mescalero Nautzili, who has came to warn him of a threat in the form of a mad monk/witch hunter Xavier. Meanwhile an agent of the newly formed Secret Service, Aiden Muir, has arrived in the town of Armageddon to investigate the events reported by Captain Mitchell and why a representative from the Vatican, Xavier, has been sent to investigate the perpetrator of the events.

And binding these people together is the enigmatic force, The Man.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Prologue
August, 1872

There was still gold in those hills, not much but there certainly was some. Not that miners ever really such much benefit from it, the only people to see profit were the merchants, innkeepers tradesmen, craftsmen and basically anyone else doing business during the waning years of the Gold Rush other than mining gold.
The town of Shasta was doing exceptionally well out of the boom, mule trains and stagecoaches rolled in to this hub of trade before heading further north along the Siskiyou Trail toward Oregon or back south toward Sacramento.
With all the comings and goings and the legends of rivers of gold there was inevitably going to be another type of person also attracted to the town, the grittier sort, men of spit and blood.
Two large gangs had established themselves in the surrounding countryside, engaged in a bitter rivalry with one another that more often then not came to bullets and death. Shasta was spared much of the violence as out of necessity it became something of a neutral territory, a place were either side could trade or otherwise entertain themselves without having to watch their backs.
Not that this did anything for the local population. The Oregon Regulars, a legion of deserters formerly a regiment in the Union’s Continental Army took the view that the locals were a nuisance, whilst the California Defenders simply took what they wanted.
You could not have referred to one side or the other as good, the Oregon Regulars had deserted the army for the sole purpose of making it rich off the sweat of the miners’ backs. The California Defenders on the other hand were simply carrying on the tradition of making life as difficult as possible for the Union that had annexed the territory over twenty years ago.
Where the two met, north against south, was as violent and cataclysmic as that fault through San Andreas, and embattled Shasta was the buffer zone.
For the past two months the Regulars had held the Hotel Royale as their base in the town whilst across that very same street the Defenders had claimed the saloon, marking out the borders of one another’s territory.
Carriages rolled down the street as a fine breeze lifted a layer of dust from the gutters of the busy street, a man stood in the centre as stage coaches and wagons berthed around him casting glares in his direction but remaining silent.
Wind caught his long, navy blue coat revealing a pair of pistols at his side that gleamed as if lit by the fire of angels, the navy blue garments underneath could easily be mistaken for the uniform of a Union officer. His white hair was blown about a face that gave no clue to his age save that he was no coddled child.
Looking first to his left and then to his right he seemed at last to come to a decision.
Walking down the street ignoring the vehicles rumbling to his left and right, the brim of his had casting a shadow over his eyes shielding him from the sun as it set fire to Heaven as it drifted toward the distant horizon. He turned north to the Hotel Royale, its red and white painted sand blasted and sun baked, stepping onto the porch he reached out a gloved hand and gently rapped the door.
This was as good a place to start as any.
He waited patiently as a barrage of cursing came from the other side before a few moments later the door was flung open by a young man in a Union uniform, clearly drunk.
“Yeah? What do you want?”
Without a word and fast as daylight the white haired man reached out and strangled the drunk silently on the doorstep.
Drawing his guns the man stepped inside and closed the door.

***

Chapter 1
San Francisco
That same day.

The wharf of San Francisco was a forest of masts swaying with the gentle rise and fall of the sea, schooners and merchantmen that had been abandoned as their crews sought their fortune inland.
The city itself was booming, what had once been a small coastal settlement serving as a stopover for ships heading to better places was now the hub of California’s growth.
In the hustle and bustle of the area now known as Fisherman’s Wharf a young man sat on a jetty sketching the Italian immigrants toiling on their fishing boats. He ignored the crowds about him and the stares of the curious young women as he carefully etched the crooked lines of a gnarled old fisherman unloading nearby.
There was something about the old man, an adventure or strife, some hardship hidden beneath the lines on his face that gave him energy and determination. He was an excellent subject that the young man loved to try and capture, if even only the slightest glimpse he wanted to find a way to express the vibrancy under the sea-worn skin. If only he could speak Italian, the conversations they could have.
The artist, Patrick, was no more a native of San Francisco than his subject, his family were not part of the Gold Rush mania that had spread across the eastern US. Ten years ago they had been ranchers in New Mexico, but those days were long gone and would burn forever, the memory of a father and brother.
Things had been hard at first, adjusting to a new life and finding employment, but they persisted with the determination of people who refused to be defeated or browbeaten by their past.
His mother found work in an assessor’s office and Patrick when he turned fourteen found work on the docks, and in his spare time he liked to draw. And draw he did, every free moment for the past five years. He found serenity in art, being able to detach oneself from the world and observe dispassionately the ebb and flow of human emotion, to try and capture some of that energy in a single moment.
A young woman sat next to him but he paid her little heed, people always gravitated to him when he drew, he supposed that in some subconscious way they wanted to become subjects themselves.
She smiled at Patrick when he gave her a glance, he briefly returned it before lowering his eyes back to has etching. In truth he was a handsome young man, curly brown hair and green eyes that burned with intensity when he was bent over his sketch book, but he was also shy and distant in the way only a murdered family can make you.
“You’re very good,” she said, looking over his shoulder.
“Thank you,” he smiled but didn’t look up, “it’s just a hobby really, and I doubt my work will ever see the light of a gallery.”
She continued to watch him for a few minutes, sitting in silence as he smudged shadows across the fisherman’s face, his fingers making delicate strokes across the yellowed page.
“What’s your name?”
He paused in his drawing to look directly at her, curly blonde hair and blue green eyes like the ocean, she was dressed as a lady of some culture, not the sort that would normally associate with a dock hand or artist.
“Patrick,” he replied, “Patrick McElhone.”
“Patrick,” she smiled as she said his name, “that’s a nice name. My name is Patricia, Patricia Telford.”
He knew the Telford name, the family were big cotton traders from Louisiana originally but had come west when the Civil War became bad for business. They owned property all over the city and land as far out as Sonoma, including it was said a vineyard in Napa.
“Can I see your sketchbook please, Patrick?”
He handed it over without a word, struck dumb being spoken to by a woman whose family wealth was positively terrifying.
She flicked through images of the docks, the fisherman, the bay, even a sketch of Alcatraz Island before pausing at a drawing of a captivatingly beautiful woman, she looked to be in her early forties with flowing dark hair and slightly sad eyes.
“She’s beautiful,” Patricia whispered, “she looks so haunted. This is amazing work, who is she?”
“My mother,” he replied, “I drew that about a year ago, when she got engaged.”
“Why does she look so sad?”
“She has looked like that for a long time, it’s only since meeting my step-father that she has started to soften.”
“I take it this isn’t something that you want to talk about, not with a stranger certainly.”
“Not really.”
She scanned through the remaining images, pausing to study the lines on each before moving on to the next, until at last she came to a blank page.
“May I borrow your pencil?”
Turning to the back side of the page she wrote a few brief words before closing the book and handing it back to Patrick.
“I have reserved a page in your book,” she stood and gave him a slight nod, “I would like to commission a picture when you have the time. You can find me at the address provided.”
He nodded, unsure and dumbfounded.
“Good day, Mr McElhone,” she offered her hand.
“Uh, good day,” Patrick found his feet, and taking her hand he gave it a gentle kiss, “Miss Telford.”

***

The exchange on the docks, between the McElhone boy and the Telford girl was watched by a figure standing in the shadows. He watched not only Patrick but everyone around, scanning from person to person, eyeing everyone, looking for something.
He had journeyed far to be here now, and it had been a journey in haste but now above all times was when he must be at his most cautious. There was far too much at stake to be reckless and impulsive now.
The Telford girl curtsied and left Patrick standing on the dock looking like a lost idiot, smiling to himself and gripping the sketch book, blissfully unaware of the imminent danger.
The man stepped out of the shadows and pushed through the crowds on the wharf keeping his hand on the knife hidden underneath his jacket.
Young McElhone was staring out to the bay, his back to the advancing figure, his mind full of wonder and new curious feelings.
The man stood directly behind him, hand still on the knife handle.
“She likes you.”
Patrick spun in shock and found himself staring at a tall Native American man with deep eyes like the heart of the earth and a tight lipped smile that only slightly curled at the edges.
“Nautzili!”