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Flash: Bumping into Dorian

Erin Penn

freedigitalphotos.net

 

I recognized him. Oh god, why did I have to bump into him? “I’m so sorry.” I dropped my eyes as he steadied me by holding my shoulders.

 

At six foot and a bit, he stood out even more for his perfect build, great abs, wide shoulders, tapered waist, strong legs, and great abs. Did I mention great abs? I was staring at them right now through the thin layer of cotton of his shirt. I could do my wash on those abs. My hand wash. All day. My hands all day on those abs. Wow, what a suit of Teflon armor will hide.

 

“It’s all right.” He smiled down. I felt the smile. Never thought the Revenger could smile, especially at me, the Ice Queen. “The museum is crowded today with the opening.”

 

I wanted to look up and smile back. Smile into those green eyes I glimpsed for just a second. Eyes normally hid by red goggles, at least any time our paths crossed before. A part of me really wanted to look back up into those eyes and drown in them.

 

Not good, not good, not good at all.

 

His hands slipped down a bit, just past the capped sleeves of my summer dress as he pushed me back a step, touching my flesh, before he dropped them all together. Electric shocks went through me and I caught a name, the name he thought of himself by. Just like my mother said would happen.

 

So not good.

 

Dorian. I really like the name. It suits him.

 

“Thanks.” I said, keeping my blue eyes firmly on his perfect, mouth-watering abs. Meeting his eyes right now would be beyond not good.

 

I still had bruises from our battle last week. Well, skirmish. Okay, he tossed me through a window to get at the Overbearer and I flew away like bat out of hell once I was outside the building. But, I had bruises, big purple, green, and yellow ones.

 

I, for one, am not build for hand-to-hand. At five foot flat footed, five-six in the ridiculous heels I wear with my barely there fur, crystals, and silver chain mail outfit, I don’t have a chance … physically … against someone like the Revenger. One of the reason I am not a costumed hero.

 

Magically, psychically, I can go toe-to-toe with the best. With a great deal of preparation.

 

I hide the psychic part. Just like the layer of skin-tight white silk covering every inch of me under the fur and simulated diamonds hides my skin from the casual brushes when my psych is at full throttle. I limit the magic to just cold and water magic. At least all overt magic. Most think I just have a ice machine tucked in somewhere; best speculation by the press was the boobs were fake, disguising the power pack. My twins aren’t fake. But I ain’t telling. I ain’t telling about the magic or mind reading either.

 

A girl has to keep her secrets.

 

Especially from a hero like the Revenger.

 

Secrets that should not come between soul mates.

 

Oh, this is so not good.

 

The abs moved away from my sight. I swallow hard before going back to pickpocketing my way through the crowd, getting this week’s spending cash. Once I had enough wallets tucked into my roaring twenties style clutch purse, beaded of course, which was much bigger on the inside thanks to a little dimensional folding, I debated cutting my losses rather than run into the Revenger again, Dorian again. He of the green eyes to drown in and the abs for my hand wash.

 

But I had actually come to the museum to see the new exhibit, ancient Russia glass. I love historic pieces, especially glass, which carried special magics I could tap into. Covering the week’s grocery and light bill was only a bonus.

 

Just one pass through the special exhibit hall. Who knows when I will have another chance.


(words 663; first published 4/9/14; republished new blog format 8/11/19)

Book Review: Freehold (Freehold Series Book 1)

Erin Penn

Book Cover from Amazon

Freehold (Freehold Series Book 1) by Michael Z. Williamson

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON

Sergeant Kendra Pacelli is innocent, but that doesn’t matter to the repressive government pursuing her. Mistakes might be made, but they are never acknowledged, especially when billions of embezzled dollars earned from illegal weapons sales are at stake. But where does one run when all Earth and most settled planets are under the aegis of one government? Answer: The Freehold of Grainne. There, one may seek asylum and build a new life in a society that doesn’t track its residents every move, which is just what Pacelli has done. But now things are about to go royally to hell. Because Earth’s government has found out where she is, and they want her back. Or dead.

 

MY REVIEW

First quarter of book is about Kendra leaving her home planet and integrating into Freehold society. We learn about it from her perspective. Mr. Williamson presents a new culture similar to Mr. Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, but brought into the new millennium and made his own. It idealizes extreme individualism, which one would expect from a recent colony; weak, stupid and average need not apply to this high gravity planet. (I had a lot more to say about whether I think this society is viable long-term (it’s not however much parts of it would be wishful-thinking nice) but that is more of a book group discussion than review material.) Discovering the world through her eyes, we learn both about Kendra’s new society and her old society (Earth North America). Some very, very nice worldbuilding takes place – layers upon layers.

Worldbuilding includes dealing with a higher gravity (tiring easier), air differences (constantly needing water in the dryer situation), individualism being important, how to pay for governmental projects without taxes (some things just have to be done on such a large scale governments or corporations need to organize them), etc. Still not exactly sure how the education system works – it wasn’t important to the full-grown immigrant Kendra, so not introduced here. A lot of the cultural description reads like a treatise, but then so did Heinlein’s stuff.

Second quarter of the book focuses on Kendra joining the military while tensions between her home planet and her adopted planet escalate. About the time she finally finishes specialist training, war erupts.

Leading to the third quarter of the book. I will stop here, because anything further will have spoilers. But war and the action begins. Takes a long time to get to this point. If you like non-stop action from the very beginning, this is not the book for you.

Note the main character is in a three-way relationship with a woman and a man, and several times this gets graphic. Plus it is open, so the three-way sometimes introduces other sexual relationships though no one steps away from the emotional commitment. Some readers might find this uncomfortable. (Like the culture, the sexual attitudes are very similar to Heinlein.)

Trigger Alert: There is a gang-rape in the second half of the book.

Flash: Cleansing Team (Part 2) – Target Up

Erin Penn

Picture from freedigitalphotos.net

A light glow emanated from a twitching hand. A hand that was never supposed to move again.

Unnaturals did not heal when unconscious. Knocked down, all they needed was a final bullet through the brain to put them out of mankind’s misery. … A big bullet.

If they woke up again, Unnaturals were cranky.

Andros tore his fingers loose from the hot metal, leaving being permanent fingerprints, and tried to realign the ammo without taking his eyes off the freak. When she pushed up, the broken bones on her shoulder pushed out even further until she found her balance and stood on the rubble. Ice black eyes holding the heat of stars met his plain brown; both his eyes and hers had tears flowing freely from them. Dust and panic drove his body to produce the salty fluid; Andros could not guess what the Unnatural felt, but her face emotion mimicked compassion.

Rapid fire needles tore up the floor until finding target. Parker must have thrown the now useless rail-gun aside and gone for his secondary weapon. None penetrated the woman.

Her right hand had closed in a fist and the light was growing brighter. Fire started licking up her arm, baking off the blood pattern and scorched her flesh black. The Unnatural took steps, each terrible and graceful, until she was off the bricks, stones, and metal pile which had been formed when she had been blasted through the building mere seconds ago.

Green breams burned through the dust. Dreanna’s laser had a new power pack. A stream of poison, a quarter the volume previously used, joined the dismal response against the Unnatural’s forward movement as Maron brought his reserves online. Andros did not know what the other three were doing, hopefully running for their lives while the rest of the team laid down theirs. Someone had to get the word out.

Andros raised his overheated gun, mirroring the young woman raising her right arm.

Her shoulder was nearly healed. Charred flesh flaked off her arm with baby pink skin showing for a second before burning too.

Too bright to look at, Andros forced his eyes back to her hand again and again trying to make out the stone she had picked up. It was black winking through her fingers … no, not black, but lack of light. A black hole in the middle of fire.

Ignoring his tears, the whimpering voice his mind refused to process, the trembling of every portion of his body but his independent hands, Andros clicked full release and pulled the trigger. The explosion left his gun, condensed amadium, the heaviest alloy known to man, pushed out at Mach four. Time slowed as he watched his barrel shatter and the projectile race sound toward the target.

The fire streamed down her arm back to her hand, brightening the impossible light another magnitude, searing Andros’ eyes open. He saw his fatal projectile nearly reach her.

Then the Unnatural opened her hand.

(Words 496; first published 4/2/2014; republished new blog format 8/4/2019)

Other Cool Blogs: Magical Words 10/6/2008

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of Phil_Bird at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

A Post About Anachronism by David B. Coe is over at Magical Words. You know I had to be all over that one.

Anachronism is something out of time, such as my linen aprons with drawn thread embroidery circa 1530 being worked on 2019.

Mr. Coe warns about bringing anachronisms into a fantasy piece, which will throw a reader out of the story. The areas he focused on are worldbuilding, language, and dialogue. I’ve talked about this sort of thing before, mainly in Editing Rants complaining about fact-checking; Mr. Coe discusses it from the creative standpoint from inconsistent technology levels and POV observational limitations. Take a gander at it.  (“Take a gander” being an early 20th century phrase and should not be in a fantasy, an example of anachronistic language.)

Again, the link is:

This post can also be found at Mr. Coe’s website: https://davidbcoe.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/a-post-about-anachronism/