![]() Aerospace engineer Elena Pyetrov lost her father in space 18 years ago. She finally gets her chance to continue his research and her ship crashes. Alien pilgrims lost their civil war and seek to colonize Earth. Within caves on alien world, the Knoonk execute their plan to genetically adapt to Earth and displace humans. Kidnapped to the closed cave system, Elena finds other humans subjected to Knoonk experiments. With time running out, she must dig deep to uncover the alien plan and stop them before humans face extinction. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE EXCERPT
“Beware what you ask for,” Elena’s father had once warned. Those words rattled about her head while she squeezed out of the lunar shuttle’s sleep tube. As the drug-induced fog faded, she sat facing a narrow sky-blue corridor. The bizarre encounter with Jorgensen kept looping through her brain, making no sense. Despite her pledge to the senator, Elena would soon be on the Moon base, away from all the politics. She hoped her lunar crew had checked out and provisioned Devereaux’s long-range spacecraft, though when she reached the Moon, she would perform her own checks. Then they would launch toward Jupiter. She smiled. This is finally happening, Dad. Stretching, Elena closed her eyes, pictured her father before he vanished, and wished she could share this moment with him. She snapped on antiquated magnetic boots and struggled to put one foot in front of the other to reach the main cabin. Her seamless blue and red transport bodysuit was too tight, the stretchy material clinging. Predictably, Marc Carlisle managed to finagle his way onto her lunar shuttle. At the last moment, he’d shown up with official documents showing that he was replacing one of the passengers transferring to the Moon base. That was when she’d decided on induced sleep for the two-day journey. I’m not going to let him pester me into taking him to Europa. The ship lurched, tossing her against one wall and then the other. Wretched clumsy boots. At least on the longer journey she’d have artificial gravity and other conveniences. She peeled one boot off the metallic floor, pushed it forward, and let it magnetically reconnect. Fighting the boots in zero gravity took all her concentration. That and the lingering haze of induced sleep delayed her recognizing the obvious. It was rare for a spacecraft to shift direction abruptly unless something hit it. The only things that came to mind were meteorites and space junk, neither of which would be good. The boots resisted her attempts to move faster. By the time she reached the main compartment, the nineteen other blue-and-red-clothed passengers, many dazed from sleep, were already strapped in or struggling to reach assigned seats in one of five rows. These lunar miners, construction workers, a cook, and a few agrarians were all heading for the lunar base or a nearby settlement. The view-screen before them showed a starry sky, mostly blackness. The pilot’s seat was empty and Captain Zak Pavlin was nowhere in sight. Elena thought there should have been a partition separating the crew from passengers, so the latter wouldn’t notice such details. To conserve weight and space, NASA had built the shuttles without dividers. Nearby sat navigator Reese Paswitch. Her highlighted brown hair and eyeliner seemed overdone for a transit to the Moon; she was looking forward to a lunar wedding. Her fiancée sat in one of the passenger seats, gripping the armrests. Two crewmembers on either side of the controls, young recruits on a routine lunar transit, were both sweating. They looked as if they hadn’t slept in days. In the co-pilot’s seat sat Marc Carlisle, looking as if he’d pulled all-nighters for a week. Elena sighed. She didn’t need their personal drama replayed in public. She hated shutting him down on their last night together, but she was tired of his insistence that she let him accompany her to Europa. Now he’d moved a step closer. After they reached the lunar base, she would let him stew while she prepared her team. Then she would bid him farewell—again. Maybe this time they could leave on better terms. The transport jolted to the left, forcing Elena to steady herself against the cabin wall. Her attention fell on the forward view-screen, which no longer showed a starry sky. “What the … Jupiter?” She felt dazed, still recovering from the sleep drugs. Am I dreaming? No, she was awake, all right. The magnetic boots were like having her feet encased in concrete. She grabbed hold of an empty seat and dragged her boots toward the pilot’s chair. Have I been asleep for six months? She checked her wrist-com. Two days had elapsed and she was still on the shuttle. “Where’s the Moon?” she asked Marc. “Good, you’re up.” He reached for her hand. Elena pulled away. Weariness and frustration swept across Marc’s face. “What happened?” she asked. “Somehow we diverted to Jupiter, months early.” Marc’s attempt to act calm was betrayed by his face, wrinkled with unsettling terror. “How is this possible?” Elena scanned the jumble of controls and lights for evidence of what went wrong. The whole setup looked like something from the Smithsonian. The shuttle was a generation out of date, since the government refused to invest in space exploration. NASA had assured her that the weathered craft was sturdy enough to get them to the Earth’s moon. Not to Jupiter. “We don’t know.” Marc’s face sagged. “Maybe you can help puzzle this out.” His pleading look reminded her of the night they’d parted. Approaching Jupiter should have excited her, but Elena struggled to absorb what was happening. She was near her destination without her team, no gear, in a shuttle that couldn’t survive out here. Preparation was everything. She shook her head. “The shuttle can’t travel this fast.” Marc returned his attention to the controls and pulled up status charts. “Agreed, but we’ve been approaching Jupiter for hours. I’m open to explanations.” Elena didn’t have any. She stared at the image of Jupiter, with the sinking feeling that she’d survived Jorgensen only to vanish in space like her father. Only one thing made sense, yet it didn’t. “Were you that desperate to be on my mission that you veered off course?” “Whoa.” Marc threw up his hands and let out a heavy sigh. “We didn’t do this. The crew and I have been through forty-eight hours of hell. The controls don’t work. The pilot and co-pilot are checking panels for malfunctions. Tara L’Enfant is helping them.” Elena had bumped Tara, an electronics expert, off her mission in favor of someone she deemed a better fit. Tara had taken the consolation prize, one rotation of work on the lunar base and ended up on this shuttle. “Why are you at the controls?” Elena asked in a harsh whisper. “I have pilot training.” “Not for a shuttle.” Elena took a deep breath. She didn’t want another fight. “I want to speak to the pilot. Where is he?” “He’s working on our thruster electronics. You’ll have to wait until he’s done. In the meantime, why don’t you sit?” “Tell me what you know.” She stopped herself from adding that shouldn’t take long. “Not a single switch, circuit or gear problem.” Reese Paswitch sat nearby; her bloodshot eyes and knotted brow betrayed shell shock. Even her cheeks sagged, hardly the image she would want at her wedding. Passengers stared at the screen. Several got up and approached. Elena tried to focus on the science, but her mind remained foggy. She couldn’t account for traveling so far so fast. Although her sponsors had exhausted every resource to find the fastest way to the outer solar system, even their long-distance spaceship couldn’t achieve these speeds. “What do you make of this?” Elena asked, lowering her voice. “We lost controls an hour into the flight,” Marc whispered. The bulky control panel had no flashing lights. No displays hinted at anything wrong except for that Jovian mass ahead of them. “Why didn’t you wake me?” Elena asked. “I tried,” Marc said. “You must have taken extra sedatives.” To avoid you. A sharp pain stabbed behind her right eye. She dropped into the pilot’s seat and immediately her eyes felt leaden, ready for sleep. She took a deep breath and clenched her fists. “Not much, though my head’s ready to explode.” Marc handed her a mug of coffee. “This might help. It’s a richer blend.” Clutching the mug, Elena sucked in lukewarm coffee through a tube and hoped it would do the trick. A half-dozen puzzled and scared passengers closed in around Elena as they pushed for a closer look. Worry spreading across their faces. She stood to get air. These passengers hadn’t signed on for the challenges and risks of flying to Jupiter. She didn’t want to add to their terror. She handed Marc the coffee, placed her hand on his shoulder to steady herself, and leaned in to whisper into his ear. “I want a complete assessment.” “Gladly,” Marc said, “but you’re not in charge until we land.” “Neither are you. You should have stayed home.” Elena pulled away and stared at the growing image of the gas giant, Jupiter. Four-hundred-fifty million miles in two days. “Any chance that image and the instruments are wrong?” After all, this is a relic. “The crew checked everything a dozen times. I’m sorry; I really did try to wake you.” Elena’s knees trembled as she fought deceleration. “Any thoughts on how we got out here?” Out here? Marc stood. He towered over her by five inches. “I’ve read theoretical treatises on space-time continuum and wormholes. I don’t know. Something bypassed all of our controls and pulled us toward Jupiter.” “You’re saying we have no control,” said Wil Benning, the biggest of the passengers and a construction recruit hired for the lunar base. He pushed his way forward. “What the eff is going on?” He glared down at Elena. “Are we crashing?” another man asked. Passengers pushed closer, all shouting at once. Marc faced the burly construction recruit. “Everyone take a deep breath. We’re doing everything we can.” “Where’s the pilot when we need him?” Wil Benning asked. “He’s checking the equipment. Unless one of you has electronics or aeronautics skills, sit down and let the crew do its job.” Elena couldn’t make sense of their velocity: two percent the speed of light. When her sponsors had brainstormed faster means of space travel, they’d brought in a Stanford physicist who discussed the Alcubierre Drive, a specially designed engine that creates a field around a spacecraft using exotic matter and negative energy that might allow it to bend the space-time continuum and move as fast as the speed of light. It had too many technical problems and no evidence it would work, so her sponsors dropped that option. Nothing else explained this speed. Most passengers returned to their seats, except Reese’s fiancée who hovered over her. Elena sat in the pilot’s seat. She scanned the usual status reports on a small screen in front of her and turned to Marc. “Get me access to the view-screen’s history.” He clicked a file on the small console before her, and up came the video. “What are you thinking?” She played the video from an hour after takeoff and sped it forward. The shuttle veered away from the Moon, which zipped by. Then it lifted above the plane of the planets. Not believing the trajectory, she slowed viewing to real time and was stunned by how quickly they passed Mars. She checked her wrist-com. It registered a two-day lapse, yet at the shuttle’s implied speed, the trip couldn’t have taken more than a day. She wondered why Marc hadn’t said anything. In fact, he’d mentioned two days. To verify, she counted off a minute. The console’s clock registered two. Even Einstein’s relativity couldn’t account for that. She counted again to be sure. The craft lurched right. As others fell against metallic walls, Elena grabbed her seat belt. “What was that?” “We’ve been getting bursts of movement,” Reese said, “as if someone else is navigating.” Elena tried to bridge the gap between Marc’s feigned coolness, Reese’s panic, and the possibility that someone was tampering with time and the shuttle’s speed. The lights on the panel before her were either green or white. “How much fuel do we have?” “That’s just it,” Marc said. “We aren’t using much—only enough for electrical and life support.” “That’s crazy.” She decided not to share her suspicions until she knew more. Reese tugged Elena’s arm. “You guys need to see this.” Standing, Elena stared at an approaching moon, which looked pink, thanks to the screen’s enhanced color contrasting. It took a moment to register that this was her Europa, the ocean moon, as she’d imagined it. Her jaw dropped. Of course, Europa was a moon of Jupiter. Amazing. The image quality was unlike anything she’d seen before—the lines and angles of angry ice pushed and shoved by Jupiter’s tidal pressure. Clarity was so sharp she could imagine reaching out to touch it. Marc tinkered with the controls. “Zak!” he yelled into the communicator. “What do you have? We’re on a collision course.” He turned off his mike and turned to the passengers. “Everyone in their seats and buckle up,” he yelled. “Prepare to crash.” “I’m on my way,” Zak said. “What’s going on?” someone yelled. “Sit and try to be quiet,” Marc said. “Elena, that includes you.” Unable to take her eyes off the screen, she groped for the pilot’s seat. The stark image of crisscrossed pink lines grew, demarking broken ice sheets, until the cracked and haunting image of Europa filled the view-screen. They plunged through the negligible atmosphere. Giant blocks of ice rushed toward them. A chorus of confusion welled up behind her. Passengers screamed. A construction recruit fell against the forward screen with a crunch. Keeping her eyes fixed on an approaching brown ridge, Elena grabbed for the seatbelts. “Do you have thrusters?” “Inoperable.” “Missiles?” Marc glanced over. “It’s a transport, not a fighter. Now get your seatbelt on and brace for impact.” Elena tugged at the seatbelt a moment too late. The shuttle slammed into the icy surface, throwing Elena into Marc’s arms. Air squeezed out of her lungs. She couldn’t move. Her insides heaved. She pressed her eyes shut and begged for relief. Marc held on too tight. “Leeeet goooo!” Elena’s voice trailed distant and hollow in her ears. She struggled to break free. She smelled sweat; Marc was as petrified as she was. Lights blinked out. Elena fell against the view-screen and winced from pain in her left shoulder. Odd screams scratched at her ears, punctuated by elongated blasts and the thunderous crackling of ice … or the shuttle. Time slowed, though she knew that was an illusion. Darkness engulfed them except for sparks from the control panel. The smell of toasted electronics filled her sinuses and left a metallic taste in her mouth. Despite the loss of power, the screen glowed reddish. A cacophony of terror jumbled signals to her brain. Emergency lights flashed on. Red splattered. Blood choked her throat. She was pinned by deceleration as the shuttle slowly broke through the ice. Distorted screams tore at her ears. The screen presented a yellowish glow that illuminated sheets of ice flowing past. If the impact hadn’t destroyed the ship, ice pressure should have, yet they continued descending. Three bodies lay crumpled nearby. Elena couldn’t see faces. Another body slammed against the view-screen: Captain Zak Pavlin, the pilot. Unable to lift her body, Elena slid closer to check his pulse. Nothing. Other bodies hit the screen. Acrid odors of blood, vomit, and electronics attacked her sinuses. Elena was amazed that she was still conscious, still experiencing all this. Onscreen, the wall of ice turned into a brackish-brown slurry: a liquid ocean, as predicted. Astonished by her own calmness, Elena strained to see. If only they had lights to penetrate the murkiness. I’m here, on Europa, Dad. She sensed the sides of the shuttle bulging inward. The shuttle continued its descent. The cabin filled with smoky haze. Her eyes misted and burned. She no longer saw Marc or Reese in the flickering lights. She drew her knees to her chin. Guilt tightened her chest, the nightmare of finding her brother Leo hanging by a rope after their father vanished. She hadn’t been there to protect him. The ship stopped. Metal creaked. Everything fell forward. Voices echoed around her. “Help!” someone yelled. “No!” Elena covered her ears and cried out. She couldn’t hear her own voice. Icy water swept into the compartment. A thousand needles stabbed her flesh. She couldn’t see through the fog. Her entire body was on fire with frigid stabs. Lights went out. Sparks flickered from the controls. Then even they vanished. Darkness enveloped them.
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![]() Very few can see into the spiritual realm of good and evil. Serenity Charles is a young woman given that special gift of spiritual vision. With it, she commits to fight off the powers of wickedness. Her spiritual eyes are open to see evil deceit, and she observes demons that live within humans causing destructive behavior. Wearing a sacred armor, Serenity (Rena), goes into battle to protect those who the demons would coldly harm or annihilate. With her shield she is protected from their flaming darts while using her sword of the Word, she cuts them asunder sending them screaming away in panic. Three of Gods Waring Angels, Avigdor, Ariel, and Akim, are her guardians and collaborators, supporting her to accomplish a victory. Aiden Baker, a mining boss, meets and is apparently taken by Rena’s beauty. He fights his attraction for her by either ignoring or voicing his reluctance to pursue a promising relationship. Will this angry man remain stubborn or will he chase Rena when she leaves town to return to her birthplace? CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE EXCERPT
It was dark and quiet in the house when Rena awoke with a start. Three huge golden angels stood at the foot of her bed. Dressed in white each carried a sword in a breast band around their shining bronze bodies. The angel in the middle began to communicate from his mind to hers. No words were spoken aloud to Rena, and his mouth didn’t move, yet she completely understood every word. “My name is Avigdor, it means, the Lords Protector. These two with me are my helpers, Akim and Ariel. I am the leader in charge and will do most of the communicating. Father God has sent us to instruct you on your work and also to go everywhere with you helping to overcome the encountered evil.” Every word received was spoken to her in the heavenly language, not English, yet she understood. She also knew demons did not know this language so it would be an extra strength. “Come,” Avigdor motioned to her to stand. “Tonight we take you on a journey through to the spirit world. You need to behold the places of good and evil. There should be no fear because the holy armor of God is your protection.” As he spoke, a breastplate covered her chest, with a wide belt around her waist, a helmet sat down on her head, and her feet became shod in golden boots. Through the air spun a sword that secured itself into her hand. Seeing her image in her full-length mirror, she glowed, just like the angels. “Take your shield to guard you against the flaming darts. Be ever mindful lest you are struck.” Avigdor handed her the shield; it was enormous, big enough to cover her yet light in weight not to cause a hindrance. Strangely when holding it, she could see straight through, yet when Avigdor held it she could not. Of course, it - like her armor was spiritual and more powerful than an earthly covering or weapon. In the time since her heavenly visitors appeared Rex remained asleep. Glancing down at him snoring Rena wondered why he didn’t wake up. He was a guard dog and liked to be a part of everything. “He will remain here,” was spoken with authority. The angels raised their arms, flying upwards through the roof and to the open star-filled sky. Astonishingly, Rena found she could fly beside them. Out of the earth’s dome and into the magnificent atmospheric space, her planet disappeared, left far behind. Rena propelled faster than light up into an ambiance of strange sights that continued forever. It all seemed inconceivable. They traveled in unison, with planets and stars flashing by and yet - when looking to the horizon; it always seemed the same distance away. No words could explain what Rena saw or how she felt within herself - it was beyond words and beyond everything that she comprehended ![]() Teenage girls don’t believe in fairy tales, and sixteen-year old Elena Watkins was no different. Until the night a fairy tale killed her father. Now Elena’s in a new world, and a new school. The cutest guy around may be an evil dragon, a Prince wants Elena’s heart, and a long dead sorcerer may be waking up to kill her. Oh. And the only way Elena’s going to graduate is on the back of a dragon of her own. Teenage girls don’t believe in fairy tales. Now it’s time for Elena to believe – in herself. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE EXCERPT
A GIRL SINGING HER heart out about a miracle boomed inside my ear. A miracle would get me what I needed: a chance at a semi-normal life. The bedroom door hitting the wall expelled the thought from my mind. With his hand tangled up in his copper hair, and with huge brown eyes, Dad’s figure filled the entire doorway. “Pack your bags.” He had that set to his jaw, the one that meant there was no way out of this. He bolted out of the room just as suddenly as he had appeared. I ground my teeth, hard. A sharp pain behind my eyes, I guessed from the lack of sleep, grew stronger. Every fiber of my being wanted to explode. Ever since I could remember my name, Dad and I had been on the run. From what? Beats me. For the past two weeks, I’d been pacing through the house, struggling to fall asleep at night, waiting for this day. For the love of blueberries, no sixteen-year-old should live this way! I climbed off my bed, and the first step I took left my toe tangled in the wide leg of my jeans. I tried to regain my balance as the closet inched closer, but with wildly flailing arms, I came crashing down. The thud reverberated across the wooden floor, and it sounded as if I’d broken something. Dad darted back into my room. “Are you okay?” He lifted me back onto my feet as if I weighed nothing. Tears lurked in the corners of my eyes, as I stared up at him. “Don’t give me that look, Elena. Please, we need to hurry.” He pulled my suitcase from the top shelf and chucked it haphazardly onto my bed. “We need to go. Now.” “Dad...” He started to grab my clothes from the shelf and tossed them messily inside my small suitcase. Then he paused, sighed, and looked up with soft eyes. He stroked the side of my cheek. “This...” He looked past me. “...wasn’t the right place, Bear. Please, you’ve got to trust me.” He reached back to pull everything off my shelf, while I curled my hands into balls of fury. My heart pounded fast as those two words bounced inside my skull. “Trust you?” “Elena, we don’t have much time,” he yelled. “Pack your bags! You can ask questions later.” He left, and the hollow thump from his stomping footsteps rang loudly as he made his way into the hall. Ask questions? Yeah right! I’ll only get answers that don’t reveal why we are on the run for the gazillionth time. “Trust me” and “I’ll tell you when the time is right” were the only two answers Dad gave. Guess the time with him will never be right. It was no use arguing with him anyway. Once, he had thrown me over his shoulder and carried me out without any of my things. So I grabbed the stuff I needed: my MP3 player, a photo of Mom and me on my first birthday that Dad didn’t know I had, and my journal from underneath my bed. I tossed them into my backpack. It wasn’t much, but it was the stuff that made my miserable life feel less pathetic. I zipped up my suitcase and took a deep breath. Looking around my bedroom for the last time, I said goodbye to my sixtieth-something room. Dad almost ran me over in the hall, his army bag slung over his shoulder. He grumbled, which I assumed was an apology, took my suitcase, and ran downstairs. He always rented these huge old houses, pre-furnished and near the countryside, and we always left after three months. The pickup’s horn honked as I shut the front door. I closed my eyes and took another deep breath. Just two more years, then I’ll be eighteen and free from this freak show. Huge raindrops fell hard onto the ground. The smell of wet dirt filled the air. It was my favorite smell. The water that pooled on the ground covered all the gaps in the driveway, forcing me to hopscotch around all of them. My shoe got caught in one of the gaps and I smacked down hard in a huge puddle. By the time I reached the truck, my jeans and shoes dripped with water. Warm heat from the vents inside the truck hit me full blast as I jumped in; a million goosebumps erupted across my skin. As soon as I shut the rusty door, Dad floored the gas pedal. Tires screeched and the truck spun away as if the devil were chasing us. My lower lip quivered softly as he swerved onto the road. The streetlights flew by in a blur, and I plugged in my earphones. The same stupid song about a miracle boomed from my MP3 player, drowning the sound of the engine and the hard dribbles on the roof, a percussion that became the perpetual soundtrack to my misery. A feeling of utter loneliness consumed my heart while I stared out the window. Homes with white picket fences and a convenience store whizzed by in a flash. A tear rolled down my cheek. Saying a silent goodbye, I released my breath and watched as it created a foggy condensation on the glass. With my index finger, I reached out and drew a small heart. These were the reasons why Mom had left. She couldn’t handle his paranoia, but why she’d left her two-year-old daughter to deal with it was a mystery. Dad constantly reminded me of the latter; that was the only time he ever spoke of her. If he ever discovered I had that picture, he would kill me. That was how much he hated her for leaving us. The lights of a vehicle in the upcoming lane shone directly into my face. I shut my eyes, waiting for it to disappear. When I was little, I used to watch Dad as we drove away from yet another house. He would glare into his rearview mirror every five seconds, all the muscles in his face clenched, and his knuckles white on the steering wheel. I hadn’t been able to force myself to peek out the window then, as it used to scare the living crap out of me to consider the possible reasons why he was fleeing, or who might be following us. Now, I didn’t look at him or care much about what he was going through. He’d created this problem, with me becoming the luggage. It was a ritual I endured every three months, and nothing during the past sixteen years had ever changed that. The “Interstate 40” sign flew by in a whirl, and the pickup slowly moved onto the turnoff lane. My eyes started to burn as I stared at the rain running sideways against my window. Each rivet resembled another town, another place I could never again call home. Exhaustion consumed me and my eyelids felt heavy. I laid my head against the window and struggled to stay awake. Suddenly, a huge figure flew past me. Dad swerved to the left, which made me crash into his side. My entire body pumped with adrenaline. I jumped straight in my seat and tore out my earphones as I wrenched the seatbelt over my shoulder to buckle myself in, while trying to process what had just happened. “What was that?” I looked at Dad. His eyes huge, he kept checking his rearview mirror every five seconds. Beads of sweat rolled from his hairline down to the side of his temple. Sure, he was paranoid, but I’d never seen Dad this scared in my entire life. This was something more than his usual paranoia. “Dad!” “Did you see where it went?” he asked, attempting to inject calm into his voice, but I could hear the fear lacing each syllable. “See where what went? Dad, what was that?” “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” “For once in your life, just tell me!” I screamed. Sixteen years of frustration exploded from my lungs. I couldn’t take the unknown anymore. “Fine.” He mumbled something else that I didn’t catch. “Do you remember the stories I used to tell you?” “Stories? What stories?” “The stories about Paegeia, Elena.” He looked in his rearview mirror again. Vaguely, but I didn’t tell him that. “What does that have to do with this?” “They’re real.” I froze and stared at him. “All of it, it’s real. The dragons, the magic, the Wall, everything is real.” “Dragons!” I couldn’t believe this. “Is this why we’ve been on the run my whole life? That’s your reason?” I took a deep breath. “You can believe what you want, it doesn’t change the fact that they are real, and somewhere out there.” He looked over his shoulder. A figure with huge paws and talons flew in front of the truck. Tires screeched at the same time as I shrieked. The truck spun around a couple of times and came to a standstill on the dark stretch of road. My heart jumped at a great speed. My throat and lips became dry from my deep, heavy breathing. My face pushed against the cool glass of the passenger window, I searched the horizon for any sign of life. Apart from the pickup’s headlights, not a single light peeked through the blanketed darkness, and the rain crushing down made me see figures, but I couldn’t tell if they were real. Dragons don’t exist. “You okay?” my father yelled. “I’m fine.” I tore my gaze away from the window. His hands were on the door’s handle. “Elena, I need to get out—” “No, no, please don’t leave me here!” I grabbed his jacket. I could feel the fear beginning to rise again, and my vision became blurry. Why am I afraid? Dragons aren’t real. He cupped my face and made me look at him. I only noticed now how his hands trembled. “Listen to me, Elena. Listen!” I tried to swallow my tears, but it was no use. They were caught in the back of my throat, silencing me. He hugged me tightly and kissed me on my forehead. I could feel the love he had for me behind that kiss. “You drive like hell, you hear me? Don’t slow down for anybody. There’s a motel on Interstate Forty. Just stay on this road, you can’t miss it. Someone named Matt will meet you there.” “Dad, it’s pouring outside. I can’t leave you here with whatever...” We can sort this out rationally. Dad cringed and stared at his jeans When he looked at me again, that set to his jaw was back. My words hadn’t made any impact on him whatsoever. He had already made up his mind for the both of us. My strength returned as I slowly came to terms with what I had to do. A man appeared in the middle of the road. We both stared at him for a few seconds. I squinted, as the rain made it hard for me to see him, but the headlights of the truck outlined his figure. I looked back at Dad and could tell from the look on Dad’s face that this guy was no stranger. My gaze turned back to the guy in the rain. He was tall with long black hair; wet strands clung to his face. He wore a pair of pants, no t-shirt, and it looked like no shoes either. He stared at the pickup and it made my heart pound faster. He began to walk slowly toward us. “Dad?” I slapped his shoulder, trying to expel the fear from my body. “Elena.” He grabbed my wrist. “I’ll be fine. You need to go. Now. And, Bear, I’m so sorry. Whatever happens, don’t stop for anything.” “Dad?” My lower lip quivered again. He kissed me one more time on my forehead and wiped away my tears gently with his thumbs. “I’ll meet you there.” He sounded stern, climbed out of the truck and slammed the door. My gaze switched back to this macho loon making his way toward Dad, who stood right next to the pickup. I quickly moved into the driver’s seat, took a deep breath, and buckled up. With my hands trembling on the steering wheel, I took another deep breath. You can do this, the voice in my head rambled a few times. The key sat lazily in the ignition, and I jerked it to the right. The pickup sputtered and died. The guy disappeared into the darkness, and a new fear pumped through my veins. “No, no, no, no! Please don’t die on me now,” I mumbled as I tried to restart the engine. The man appeared again in the faint glow of the headlights. He was getting closer. “Start you stupid piece of crap!” I yelled over the roar of the blood pumping in my ears. The engine came to life and I screamed as the man leaped toward the pickup. Dad jumped and tackled him in midair. “Go, Elena!” he shouted over the pounding rain. I floored the gas pedal and the pickup’s tires screeched as I drove past Dad, who’d wrestled the guy onto the road. Tears blurred my sight. I can’t just leave him back there. I struggled to come to terms with what was going on. My father and the other man quickly disappeared into the horizon of my rearview mirror. I wiped away my tears with the back of my hand and lowered the mirror so that I could see Dad, but they had vanished into the night. Don’t stop for anything, his voice replayed inside my head. My hands trembled on the shift as I found third gear. A strong force hit the pickup on the passenger’s side. The impact of the blow jolted through my body as the truck rolled a few times then came to a halt on its roof, leaving me suspended in the air. My head and body throbbed, and my hand went automatically to the ache on my head. It was warm and wet, and when I brought back my hand, it was smeared with dark blood. My head began to buzz and my vision started to slip away. Lightning struck, and the road was instantly engulfed in flames, leaving me wide awake. Something to the left grabbed my attention as the fire slowly began to creep toward the overturned truck. Something lifted the truck, righting it on the asphalt once again, and a shrill sound left my lips. The belly of a huge, blue beast on four legs the size of tree stumps stood in front of the pickup. The sight left me breathless and my entire body froze. Dragons don’t exist. A part of its head popped in front of me. Huge horns on the top of his nose lingered inches from the windshield, leaving a foggy condensation on the glass as he breathed. One of his frilly ears lay flat against his head, like a cat’s when sensing danger. He placed a front leg on top of the hood, and my body trembled as the truck started to crumple. A part of his wing came into sight. It appeared to be shredded, with a sharp talon located at the end. Oval-shaped blue scales fanned over its entire body, glistening in the flames on the side of the road. Maybe it only looked that way through the tears blinding my sight. Beady eyes, sunken deeply into its skull, locked with mine. The picture in front of me just became my nightmare. I yelped as the dragon’s weight shifted, forcing the pickup to crumple even more. Another dragon sank its jaws into the one in front of me. Two huge copper horns lay flat on top of its copper head. The blue dragon growled, and snapped with gaping jaws at the copper one attacking it. With powerful force the blue dragon was dragged off the pickup’s hood and thankfully away from me. The truck shook slightly and groaned, while my heart pounded as if I’d just run a hundred meters. A bolt of fire came from the sky and lit up the entire scene in front of me. More dragons landed with thuds in the middle of the road. One seemed to be green with a long neck and a fin-like mane running from the top of its head to its tail. A cloud of dark fog emerged slightly from its nostrils. Another was red and oddly beautiful, but something evil derived from its aura. They attacked the copper dragon with startling savagery. Get the hell away from here, my inner voice shrilled. Quickly, I tried to unbuckle my seatbelt, but the clip wouldn’t release. The earth shook with bolts of fire, and lightning flew through the air, while I tried to free myself. My father wouldn’t just leave me here! As each second ticked by, I worried more about Dad. The dragons came close to the truck a number of times, but the copper one kept driving them back, as if it was trying to protect me. I shook my head, trying to expel that thought. Dragons don’t exist. Wake up. The tips of my fingers felt raw as I hammered endlessly on the buckle of the safety belt. My face was soaked with sweat and blood, and I knew that I had to get out of the truck, quickly. With trembling hands, I pounded on the buckle with my fist until it unlocked. Throwing the restraint from around me, I watched in horror as the copper dragon bit fiercely into the blue’s neck. Blood squirted everywhere and pooled in thick puddles on the road. The blue dragon staggered and dropped down to the ground. Electricity still sparked off its body, but soon died away. The green and red dragons jumped on top of the copper, but it knocked the red one onto the ground forcefully and crushed the green dragon with its huge front legs. The sound of flesh ripping was sickening, and I had to lean over as tremors wracked my stomach, but for some reason I couldn’t look away. The picture of the copper dragon shredding the green dragon’s wing sent a stab of new fear deep into me. “Dad, where the hell are you?” I pleaded into the darkness. The red dragon got back up and flew away just as the copper one moved from the green’s wing to his neck. I flinched and finally looked away as more blood squirted out of where the green dragon’s neck used to be. When I looked again, the copper dragon had turned its gaze to me. I started to kick at the windshield with my newly freed legs. A new sense of urgency punctuated every kick. C’mon! I kicked three, four times, but it only left long cracks in the glass. Watching the copper dragon trudge toward the pickup through the jagged cracks made the scene before me even more terrifying. The dragon stopped right in front of the pickup, our eyes locked, and I could see the vertical pupils inside a pair of dark, rich brown irises. My heart thumped wildly as it hooked one of its talons gently into the windshield and ripped it off. It paused, stared at me for what seemed like an eternity, took a few steps back, and nodded in my direction. It wants me to get out? You’re imagining things, Elena. Dragon’s aren’t real. I didn’t act. I couldn’t. The dragon started to shrink. Its wings and legs dwindled into a smaller size until they disappeared. Its big head and horns shrank into nothing. I watched as the dragon’s huge shape melted away, and the heap transformed into a low-crouching figure. He lifted his head, and huge cuts seeping with blood became visible. It felt as if somebody had squeezed all the air out of my lungs. I’d finally found my father—without a shred of clothing. ![]() Metatron: The Angel Has Risen "A wild wish fulfillment juvenile romp that should be great fun for 12 year olds of any age." --Piers Anthony, New York Times bestsellingfantasy author CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE Twelve-year-old Tyler Thompson has a secret: he's not a "normal" boy. After his father's tragic death, Tyler finds himself in one predicament after another, until one day he and his faithful dog Maxx fall into a cesspool of mysterious green goop. When his grandfather bestows him with an object not from this earth, Tyler soon discovers he has strange powers. Unfortunately, so does the sinister Dr. Payne. Together with his best friend Lukas, who also has a special ability, and Maxx, Tyler embarks on a journey to put an end to Dr. Payne's evil scheme to control the world's children. To do so, Tyler must make a life-altering choice-one that could change the world. ![]() Metatron: The Mystical Blade "St. John has done it again with The Mystical Blade; another novel 13 year olds of any age will really enjoy!" --Piers Anthony, New York Timesbestselling fantasy author of the Xanth series CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE Thirteen-year-old Tyler Thompson is on the verge of becoming a superhero, but he must prove himself so he can earn the remainder of his superpowers and fulfill his destiny. When his grandfather, Benjamin, is held prisoner at AREA 51, where the eternal powers are presumed to be hidden, Tyler attempts to penetrate the base's heavy security. However, Dr. Mason Payne, the evil scientist who killed Tyler's father, has insidious plans of his own. Hunted by an unknown entity, Tyler races against the clock to retrieve the superpowers, rescue his family and help the others who are depending on him. And when all hope seems lost, help comes in a power he didn't know he possessed--a mysterious weapon known as The Mystical Blade. ![]() THE ABDUCTION CHRONICLES is an abridged version of two books, An Abduction Revelation and its sequel, Abduction Revelation II. Based on some true mysterious and compelling life events of the author who experienced some unusual phenomenon in his life. His ex-wife claimed they were abducted, on several occasions, by beings who were not of this world. He was unaware of them until he melted their instilled memory blocks. Who are the abductors? Where are they from? What do they want? The answers will torment his reality. An intriguing adventure packed with action, drama, mystery, romance, comedy, and a few exhilarating plot twists that will surely knock your socks off. The dialog is written in a memoir conversational style. So pull up a chair and join ‘The Comeback Kid’ on his incredible life’s journey as he unravels the secrets behind his abductions and comes face to face with his abductors. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE EXCERPT
“Tom. It’s CJ. (My ex-wife was calling herself CJ these days). I really must tell you this. No, wait. Listen. Don’t hang up. Please. You remember how I talked about the night we drove to Carmel, and they took you. Well, actually they took us both. I’ve been fasting and abstaining from sex. That helped me to melt their mind block. Yes, their mind block. I thought then they were aliens, but they’re not. Now I have discovered the whole truth. I’m not me. You’re not you either. No, wait. Let me explain. We’re someone else. We are...(spoiler). No, I’m not insane. No, no, I’m not delusional. You need to become a vegetarian and abstain from sex, and then you can melt your mind block and discover the truth. No, don’t hang up.” But I had heard enough. Her babbling made no sense. If you remember, right after our divorce, she said we had been abducted by aliens. Now she claims that we are...(spoiler) and the abductors aren’t aliens. Needless to say, I figured she had to of had a few loose marbles. Keep in mind, that at this time in my life, I hadn’t yet melted my mind blocks, so I had no idea what the heck she was ranting about. ![]() Set 80 years into the future, Nelson Jones, a young military cadet full of optimism and hope is enlisted into the New Era - a fascist regime that arises to rule the world after a horrifying attack from an alien species known as the Great Tribe. Under the leadership of Earth's dictator, President Jacob Freeman with his ruthless enforcer, Major Ira Bilis, Nelson witnesses horrible abuses of power and is forced to confront his values and his world view to make difficult choices. When he happens across a small fraction of resistance against this tyranny, Nelson must consider whether to risk his life to do what he feels is right. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE ![]() Love in the Cretaceous akes place in a dinosaur park in Oregon a hundred years in the future. Ted Beebe has lost the love of his life and must suddenly find his way alone in old age. He finds young people to take the place of his wife and himself in assuring the survival of Cretaceous World, the park his wife and he created. Global warming has proceeded as predicted, and the fate of Homo sapiens has become obviously uncertain. People come to see the genetically engineered recreations of dinosaurs and are made more aware of humanity’s own vulnerability to extinction. Ted succeeds in creating a new family structure whose three generations will guide the park through the immediate future. He also keeps alive his wife’s memory while coping with the challenges of the uncertain future. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE EXCERPT
Love in the Cretaceous: [chapter 3] Tumtum by Howard W. Robertson It takes your breath away to see a Brontosaur run. Bud sees the two of them thundering towards us though and has plenty of breath left to holler, “And down the stretch they come!” We know from fossil thigh-bones that Brontosaurs were capable of a slow run, so we designed our pair to do about a dozen miles per hour. To see an animal 70 feet long and weighing 50,000 pounds move that fast seems nothing less than miraculous. Lana has used the giant crane to drop a couple tons of mixed ferns, horsetails, and gingko and araucarian leaves into the Brontosaur area. The crane is 50 feet high with a long arm so the two sauropods won’t bang their heads on it, since they can only reach up to about 25 feet with their long necks. It’s May 2117, and the angiosperms are in bloom all around these two colossal creatures from the end of the Jurassic. We called it close enough and just sort of rolled them into Cretaceous World, our magnificent dinosaur park. Brontosaurs flourished around 150 million years ago, well before the rise of the flowering plants about 30 million years later in the Cretaceous period. When our genetic engineers designed the genome for our pair, they tried to make them as authentic as possible, so the two of them really prefer the kind of food they would have eaten way back when. That’s why they come running at feeding time when we give them the ancient gymnosperms that they like best. There’s actually a large nursery in the neighboring town of Dewberry that’s dedicated to supplying our herbivores with food from the time of the dinosaurs. Lana gets down out of the crane and walks over to me. She says, “I’d sure like to see a whole herd of these moving together.” Lana has a Ph.D. in paleontology from SUNG and knows full well why we couldn’t handle that. Our pen of seven miles by four miles is barely big enough for the two Brontosaurs we do have. By the way, I’m so glad the alternate name has died away over the past hundred years: “thunder lizard” is so much more appropriate for these giants than “deceptive lizard.” I say, “Wouldn’t that be grand?” She smiles and tosses her long blonde ponytail. Then she goes over to Bud and gives him an assignment to do. Tumtum – p. 2 Howard W. Robertson, P.O. Box 50204, Eugene OR 97405, 541-344-6206, robertsons2@earthlink.net ![]() Ian Prattis transports you to a faraway planet. Earth is dying due to Humankind’s damage to the environment. The clash of cultures, late in the twenty first century, opens this epic novel of pioneers establishing community in a nearby galaxy. This futuristic finale of a trilogy stands on award winning books Redemption and Trailing Sky Six Feathers. Buy a print copy and receive the two prior books for free. Order through: http://ianprattis.com/NewPlanet.html Amazon, Indigo, Barnes & Noble. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE ![]() When the unearthing of the Ark of the Covenant results in the discovery of the bones of an angel, a government program seeks out descendants of the divine being. Scientists confirm the existence of Nephilim, descendants of the Divine Bloodline who exhibit unique supernatural abilities. These individuals soon find themselves at odds with society. Sisters Piper and Wren knew they were different, but after the discovery, the two have evidence to explain their maturing abilities. But the government has the power to condemn and crucify Nephilim, locking them into ADAM compounds across the globe. The sisters are next, and Piper and Wren will need to act quickly to avoid being captured. In order to survive the two must embrace the stigma and master the very gifts that God has bestowed (or cursed) upon them. Mysterious forces who have been plotting these events for decades shift the balance of power, and soon all parties involved will need to pick a side. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE THE SERIES![]() Animal Graph by M. Black This novel came to her in a dream. SUMMARY: Set in the Amazonian jungles of South America, M.Black weaves an action-packed tale in this original YA Amazonian Eco-Fic Dystopia set forty-two years after a nuclear war. Jin—a prisoner of King Borran—and Adan—another Graphed—have to fight for their survival in a utopia gone wrong. In a world where animal cells and neural tissue have been grafted into humans, and humans are connected by brain waves to chosen animals from the Amazon, will Jin and Adan survive? Will they ever find their Animal Graph counterparts? Can the Earth find harmony with humanity and the animals or will those wanting to destroy it all win? Socially relevant, dark and sexy, with themes that hang on environmental concerns and animal welfare…ENTER TOMORROW with ANIMAL GRAPH. A novel along the lines of Hunger Games meets X-Men. If you’re a fan of The Treemakers, The Sowing, Simulation, Age of Order, A Brave New World or A Canticle for Leibowitz, you may also enjoy this novel. EXCERPT My feminine bottom slides down the wet, slippery cliff at the end of the path of foliage, dropping me forty meters into the abyss below where I thrash, arms flailing about me in a sure drown, water gulping down my tight throat in a struggle for air. My long, auburn hair is drenched to my side like a second skin. I barely know how to swim, but I have no other choice but to sink down where I won’t be seen. They’re on my trail and the choking gas has almost reached me. Glancing skyward, under a thin layer of water, I see a cake of the pinkish fog choke the plants and moss above, that grows off the dark stones there—the only elegance out here. Water cascades into a beautiful waterfall toward me in a steady stream, and I hear the loud fog horn-like sound from my pursuers alerting everyone in the vicinity that I’m nearby. They’ll need to find me before sundown or risk encountering the savage wildlife of the Amazon rainforest, like Radguars, a mutated form of the Jaguar which began to appear after the radiation hit. No one ever lives after facing one. They’ll tear a man to shreds. I hear them coming, five of them—they always come in fives—their thick boots hitting the forest floor in a scratch-scratch as they approach the end of my path. I’m not even sure how I do this—hear them. The distance is more than thirty meters away and the rush of water interferes with my ears. I never would have been able to do this before they took me. Taken in the middle of the night by Borran's soldiers while asleep in my cell, a two-by-three-meter room in which I’d been locked for a year, since I was sixteen, after I’d stolen a loaf of bread from a village vendor. Too many of us end up behind bars for petty crimes, to ensure as a whole we comply with the laws. When they registered me for prison, they scanned the bar code on my upper arm, denoting my full name, region of residency, and any prior arrests. I didn’t have priors before, but now my bar code will always show I was in prison. Block D, Cell 47; D47 was my designation. Hadn’t heard my real name—Jin Maharaj—in a year. Even my cellmate referred to me as D47. By cellmate, I mean he shared the concrete cell next to me and we could speak only through a barred opening between us, the size of my hand. We all got used to calling each other numbers. When they first took me, I’d sit in my cell for hours daydreaming about my family, about Lila—our good family friend. She was married to a medicine man and tried to help Papa and my sister May when they got sick. I’d remember her words of encouragement, ‘Nature has all the answers. Stick to nature.’ But I’d always be interrupted by our mandated chores: washing clothes, floors, toilets, gardening, or working in the shops to make rubber. Slop three times a day was pushed under the cell door to keep us alive for all the work. Prisoners were the first to undergo the Graph procedure to enhance human abilities by grafting animal cells and neural tissue into humans. As a side effect, electrical pulses from animal brain waves would fuse—or Graph—into the human’s brain waves and form an intuitive bond with the animal. I struggled, kicked, and maybe even screamed before a team from Borran’s Animal Graph facility injected me with a sedative, their faces growing fuzzy, my hands grappling for something—anything—to hold on to, before I fell asleep in the arms of my enemy. From under the thin layer of water, I watch the edge of the cliff, forty meters away, where two soldiers turn their heads left and right in a frantic search for me. I can see so much detail I shouldn’t, like the lines over their left chest pocket designating rank, and the mud splattered on the sides of their boots. Even the freckles splayed across the nose of one of them. They’ve been ordered to hunt me—to find me and then kill me, as part of their training. I feel weak, as if I could drown at any minute, because I can’t hold my breath any longer; surely I can’t. My brain tells me I need to breathe, and breathe now! Yet I’ll have to ignore the incessant thought creeping into my mind. Maybe the water can take me, take my breath and end me, make it all come to a close. I’m exhausted, tired of running, and it’s been a year since I’ve seen my mother—Ariana, and my younger brother—Carlos. They were forbidden to visit me in the cell, as all visitors are nowadays. My padre and older sister, May, both died from illness six months before I was thrown into prison. It’s easy to die in this world where medicines are kept only for the Prestige—the upper class that makes up 3% of the nation’s population. The rest of us poor live in sporadic villages or face the nights alone, and food is hard to come by. Meat, including fish that survived all the radiation from the Atlantic or rivers, is supposed to be given to the village guards when they come in for their monthly visits. Villages only get to keep 5% of their catch. That’s why I stole that loaf of bread for my brother. He’d gone two days without eating. Some villages grow flax or chia seeds, and others wheat or barly, still some lucky ones have chickens and eggs—but it’s never enough. If we try hiding our fish or eggs, if caught—we’re killed on the spot. I’ve seen a family murdered when I was just ten in Guiana for storing forbidden meats. Because of the radiation, good meat is hard to come by. ![]() Graph Secrets by M. Black "I READ IT IN A FEW HOURS!" -Von "ALL FIVE STARS, NO SURPRISE THERE. IT IS A GREAT STORY." -Marina "I HAVE NEVER READ THIS CONCEPT BEFORE!" -Amazon Reader Check out a new Survival-Fiction! Animal Graph is an original, NEVER BEFORE SEEN CONCEPT, a YA Amazonian Eco-Fic Dystopia with themes on wildlife and nature conservation, which asks questions about what happens when a greedy dictatorship rules the nation, and the harsh consequences to the Earth of a nuclear war. Animal Graph series is the third ebook release from author M.Black (Simulation, Exotiqa, Animal Graph) whose brand is ENTER TOMORROW, if you dare. Enter http://MBlackDystopianThrillers.blogspot.com for more dystopian thrillers that will take you into our future. In Graph Secrets, Jin finds out her Madre, Marina, is kidnapped by King Borran Khan and she learns the truth about her origins, and she is propelled back into the Amazon...this time to hunt Borran down. Will she rescue her madre in time? Will she get her capture? Find out in this breath-taking, fast-paced unique thriller about survival and fighting for freedom---book 2 of Animal Graph. EXCERPT Inking our backs with Borran’s mark feels like a betrayal to everything I believe in, a permanent stain to remind us that we belong to Borran—whether we like it or not. And if we’re caught, Borran has one more reason to kill us. Inking is illegal in the villages, to prevent any false Borran marks on Graphs. I close my eyes, and focus on Mama’s photos as the needle pierces my back, leaving trails of blood to sink to the crevice of my bottom and splashing on the cave floor beside me. Memories of blood flood my mind. …Blood slides down my inner leg and my palms clasp my round belly. Six months in this hell hole and I’m showing. I’ve kept my pregnancy a secret for months, afraid of being transfered to the white building. No one returns from the white building. No one ever sees their baby again. As the inking needle pricks my back, I’m jolted back to the present. Juan inks me—performs yet another illegal thing—I begin to suspect that he was the one who leaked the Graph technology to the world. Who else? He’s obviously brilliant, and had mixed feelings about what he was doing. Ostir already confessed that he and she were both at a PAPE meeting. As I wash up in the waterfall basin, Juan needles Klen and Ostir. By the time I return to the cave, the siblings are heading to the basin to bathe and Adan is biting on another branch. Seems all Adan does around me lately is get torn up somehow. “Stay still,” Juan implores while leaning into Adan’s back. “I was stung by bullet ants once. Hurt like hell. Not going through that again.” “I’ll stay still,” Adan says firmly, the bite over the branch harder as the needle goes into his back in a precise poke, poke, poke. Juan keeps both hands on the needle, instead of one on the back as he did with me. Afterward, Adan’s back is soaked with blood and he exits for the falls fast. Juan turns to Lila and she shakes her head vigorously. “No way I’m getting one of those on my back. I won’t be flaunting my nudity anyhow.” Juan half grins. We can all imagine what that image is. I lean into Adan’s chest at the falls after he’s washed off the blood and shirted himself. I hang there like I could stay all day, letting my forehead and cheeks rub his stubbled chin. Adan looks down at me, half-grinning, satisfied, but with a brow arched as if to ask ‘what the hell?’ I’m not sure what else to say. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” “I do.” Adan explains. I’m almost hopeful. “But you’ve got to learn to control your urge to mark.” He laughs, and then I laugh with him. “Sorry.” “Don’t be. It’s cute.” He clears his throat. “And makes me feel guilty about being so curt with you when we first met in the Amazon.” “Yea, what was up with that?” I glance up, my eyes meeting his. “Impatience at needing you to keep up, and pressure. Lot’s of killing of people I knew, led me to save you that day. I guess a part of me was angry at you for being saved.” “But you helped save me.” I feel my brows twist as I gaze up at him. “Still, too many mixed emotions. You got to live. Friends I knew died. I couldn’t kill another illegal Graph, and yet looking at you reminded me of everything my dead friends would never have. I guess I expected you to learn quick—to be worthy enough.” “And did I?” “Yep, you did.” He grins, and leans his lips over mine, close enough to almost feel him, but not close enough to touch—to contract my blue dart poison. We’re all exhausted and haven’t slept for over twenty-four hours, but we have to do this. Spider and Borran’s soldiers won't give up and we don’t have time to rest. We should wait until we’ve gained more distance. At least we all ate soup at Lila’s. Before we head out, I grab Juan’s wrist. “Wait. You need to take a sample of my blood.” Adan nods. “Smart. Keep evidence here of your birthright.” Ostir keeps her hand over my shoulder. “When you challenge him, you’ll definitely need proof.” “And a fight to the death,” Klen adds. “We all know that’s how things are done nowadays. Borran won’t just give up his kingdom to his half-sister.” “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.” I stretch my arm to Juan. “For now, I need a vial of my blood.” After Juan shambles for a tube and needle in his supplies, he sticks my vein and withdraws enough blood to run several tests on my DNA to prove I’m a Khan. He adds some kind of fluid to the vial of blood, and then hands it to me to hide. I keep the blood in the basket with Mama’s things. Then, we head out to make new friends. If we’re going to ambush Borran and his BAG facility, Juan is right we’ll need more than just us. Juan takes us to the outskirts of Annai, further southeast, to where several illegal Graphs that he’s performed operations on live. They keep quiet and off the grid. Living outside the cities and villages allows the illegal Graphs to avoid being discovered by Borran’s guards and killed. Getting to where we need to be to meet them is almost a diagonal path downward from the waterfall and takes about three hours. We arrive at just about two p.m. After Jade sniffs the air, I hear a man shout “Over here!” He’s a robust man with no shirt on, shouting to another man of almost equal stature, girth and attire; except that the first man has black, matted hair and the other’s is blond. Both have dark complexions and are too muscular to go unnoticed. The blond man throws a small pinecone into the air and yells “Incoming!” When the pinecone comes dangerously close to hitting the matted-haired man in the face, he whips out a long stick and bats the pinecone away, sending it across the field and hitting a palm tree trunk, the cone shattering. “You are going to have to throw better than that!” the matted-haired man grunts in a chuckle. “Right you are, Cai, right you are.” Juan waves his hand, drawing attention to himself, causing both men to turn in our direction and jump into an attack stance. I then notice the matted-haired man’s set of teeth. His jaw crunches open and shut with an awkward smile on his face, as normal human teeth become sharp and long. Juan leads us ahead, toward them, gesturing with his hands in a downward motion for the two men to calm themselves. ![]() Graph Lies by M. Black A Never-Before-Seen-Concept! A YA Amazonian Eco-Fic Dystopia! HUNGER GAMES meets X-MEN! JUNGLE BOOK meets DR. MOREAU! Safe in San Felipe, the team will have to scrounge for food to survive which leads them to the lost girl who draws them into Guambi mountains with the Prestige. After Jin, Adan, and the misfit band of Graphs head to the Experiment Facility in the jungles on the Amazon to rescue friends, they'll have to face Borran head-on and their greatest nemesis, spider. An action-packed series that leaves readers guessing. "Unputdownable!" "This Series Rocks!" and "I can't wait for the next book!" are just some of what reviewers are saying! Pick up your copy and find out why! EXCERPT “Dammit! They’re still coming!” Adan yells, entwined in a few vines. I toss up my head and glance back, my bottom still on the ground and my knees scraped with wet grass stains. My auburn hair whips around and slaps my cheeks. Sum frantically pulls vines off Adan to untangle him, but my eyes can only zero in on the oncoming madness. Behind the thicket of swamp titi, I hear the booming screams of howler monkeys warning us to stay off their territory. I scramble to my feet, gripping on to a low-rotting branch. My neck is tilted back to keep my eyes on them. So many of them with spear-like teeth aiming for us, and their eyes—their eyes are crazy! Sum grabs Adan’s arm and yanks him forward. “Come on!” I race in front of Sum shouting, Adan close to his side. “Get moving!” I don’t hesitate. The monkeys look ravenous. My feet dart across the wet grass beside the Orinoco River in an anxious padding as we race toward Puerto Carreno. “Just leave the raft?!” I ask worriedly. It took a long time to reinforce after our trip from Manaus. We lost about half the raft by the time we reached San Felipe. “We’ll pick it up on the way back!” Sum shouts from behind, his voice gravelly, while I turn my head forward. My eyes catch the warm afternoon sun in the sky. It took just half a day to get here, but getting what we need and getting out will take longer. I listen to Sum; next to Carlos, he is the closest thing I have to a brother, and I’m not sure when I’ll ever see Carlos again. Though Mama and I want to send for him, we know he’s safer where he is. The large, embracing hand of Adan plops against my back when he and Sum catch up to me. “We’ve got our work cut out for us.” Glancing to Adan, half teasing, I respond, “And you said we’d be in and out before the day ended.” “How could I have known?” His cheeks glisten in the sun and rise with his trademark half-smile. “What the hell is going on? Monkeys don’t act like this.” I see the worry line between his brows, the furrowing, like they did when we landed in San Felipe and found Cai’s village nearly empty. An illness spread through the villages there, killing three-quarters of their inhabitants. Vendors had been cleaned out by surviving village folk, leaving no food to spare. We ran out of our Amazonian supply in a day. Adan shakes his head. “It’s like they’re drugged.” “Crazed,” Sum adds. I must stay focused on the goal ahead, and forget that we’ve become prey to a savage pack of hungry, wild beasts. They don’t look Burned, but they act like they are. We keep up our pace, but the loud screeches of howlers aren’t far behind, and the warning call reverberates throughout the shaking trees as they jump from limb to limb. There are large mountains in the distance, some within the Puerto Carreno boundaries and most to the east where the Guiana Highlands sit, where the Prestige live high and mighty. We just need to make it to Puerto Carreno, and then we can steal a crate of food meant for the Prestige and return to San Felipe. Our friends haven’t eaten all day. We at least had some Brazil nuts and dwarf bananas on our journey. We even managed to illegally catch two fish from the river. Most of the area near San Felipe is barren, fruits and nuts picked daily and packaged weekly for delivery into Puerto Carreno, and there is no one left in the villages to make bread. If we can’t get this crate of food, we’ll risk starvation. There are just too many of us to rely on the sparse resources in this area. That’s why it’s so barren of people. Suddenly, Adan pushes into me, knocking me over into more red and black titi. Two howler monkeys leap out of the trees, and all I can see are their sharp, pointy teeth as they pound on top of Adan and Sum. Sum’s apricot hues stain with dirty howler pawprints and I hear a thunderous scream before the monkeys open their mouths to bite, but Adan quickly expels his leathery bat wings, and the heavy flapping pushes one monkey off him. When the other monkey is about to bite Sum, Sum instead bites the monkey in the neck, and the small primate howls in agony before leaping off Sum and scurrying away in a panic. Adan pulls me to my feet as Sum yells, “Keep going!” The three of us traverse across the wet terrain, interspersed with shrubs and river plants. All I can think about is how pissed I am that the Prestige get all the goods. Even in Colombia, it’s no different than in Guyana—worse, even. At least in Guyana there are still sporadic trees with fruits. Of course, all the tasty food like guavas we have to give up to Borran. Exhausted, sweating, and hungry, I just want to get to our destination so we can head back to San Felipe. The sooner we return to our new home, the sooner we can devise a plan to free our friends, and the sooner I get to face Borran again. This time, it’ll be to kill him. When we meet another thicket of trees, another howler lunges towards us, but this time at me, and lands on the back of my neck. It screeches like it’s caught a coveted meal, and bounces up and down on my back. I react instinctively, lost in the moment. I grab its neck with one hand twisting behind me, and grab its leg with my other hand. I yank the monkey forward, pulling it off me and tossing it with a jerk to the ground. Adan just stares at me, as dumbfounded as I am. The monkey writhes on the ground as if I’ve twisted something in him—and maybe I have without realizing how hard I’d thrown him. When the monkey’s mouth falls agape, tongue sticking out and body lifeless, I can’t believe what’s just happened. “How did I do that without feeling anything?” “No pain?” Adan confirms. “None. It’s like I have no Connection to it whatsoever.” “I didn’t feel anything either when I hit the monkey with my wings.” “That doesn’t make any sense.” I turn to Adan, while Sum just watches us a few meters away, unsure of how to relate to all this mysterious disconnection. He never had the Connection anyway. “Maybe it’s us? Maybe something happened to our Connections?” Adan says fearfully, his almond-shaped eyes bending to mine. I shake my head. “No, I can still feel my harpy, my Bengal. I’m still Connected.” Adan’s contorted expression leaves me with no answers until Sum suggests something. “It’s not you two, it’s the animals. Look at ‘em. They ain’t normal. Something’s wrong with ‘em.” “But what?” The three of us poke our heads closer to the monkey, now dead on the ground, a white foam sticking to its crooked mouth’s corners. “I think we should hide him, take him back with us for Juan to examine,” I suggest, as I tuck the dead monkey under a bush, and Adan nods. “Sure.” We trek further up along the side of the river, keeping to the trees, and almost to the gates of Puerto Carreno. Howlers scream in the distance farther behind us, and I can even hear a few of them biting at each other and maybe even killing each other. At least they seem to have lost interest in us. We had to vacate our raft because of the monkeys, the moment we passed Puerto Ayacucho. Riding the raft on the mini river from San Felipe for a few hours worked, and then we had to walk till reaching the second mini river that took us into San Fernando, blending into the Orinoco. We followed the Orinoco all this way, only vacating once when we spotted a BAG patrol heading downstream. Probably sent to pick up a crate of goods from Puerto Carreno. But things got bad after Puerto Ayacucho. More BAG patrols and crazed howler monkeys. Still, we had to leave our raft eventually anyway, because there is no way the Puerto Carreno port patrol will allow Adan and me through this time. Both of our arm barcodes surely now read wanted: dead or alive. When we reach the gates of Puerto Carreno, I look to Adan. “What are we going to do?” “The gate is made of wood,” Sum answers, “maybe silk floss. Can’t be too tough.” “You suggesting we break it down?” Adan shakes his head. “No, no, we need to climb it.” He points left. “If you look at the western wall, there aren’t many guards. Just one there, and one towards the end.” Sum looks at Adan’s stump of an arm and his forehead twists in disbelief. Even with a wooden peg sewn into his sleeve, he can’t climb with that. I squint, using my eagle vision. “We can scale the wall,” Adan repeats. “How?” I ask, perplexed, with Sum still eyeing his stump. “You can stand on my shoulders and I’ll lift you up. You can reach the ledge if you stretch. I’ll stand on Sum’s shoulders. He can’t get in anyway. They’ll identify him as a Burned in no time.” Sum looks at Adan, his brows all ruffled, like he must still be joking. “This can work,” Adan insists. Sum argues, “And how do we avoid being seen? There’s a guard right there.” Adan’s face lights up. “I’ve got an idea.” “An idea?” After Adan turns from us and races back into the thick trees, I shout, “What are you doing?!” “Just follow me,” Adan insists. If he were any other man, I wouldn’t. But we’ve been through so much together and he’s always come through for me. So, I follow him, with Sum beside me, both of us unsure of where this will lead and what Adan’s getting us into. After all, he told us that this excursion would be quick. He should know, being from Truezuela and having ridden the Orinoco many times. A quick trip to Puerto Carreno to steal a crate of food so that we could have food for the next few days while we rest, heal our wounds, and devise a plan to rescue our friends. Sounded easy enough. “What are we doing?!” I demand in a huff as I catch up to Adan. He looks up and I see the howler monkeys just staring at us, salivating. Drool spills from their mouths and onto my sleeve. “Howlers?” “They’ll be our distraction.” Adan throws a fallen twig at two of them, which immediately stirs a reaction—the reaction he wants, I guess. After the two monkeys drop from the trees to chase us, another four monkeys come racing behind them, their movements erratic, eyes bloodshot, and mouths covered with white foam. “Our distraction, or our death?” I ask as Adan, Sum, and I all sprint back toward the wall. When we push through a cluster of bushes, where the wall sits, Adan pulls me aside with his good hand and we duck with Sum behind a large Brazil nut tree. The monkeys dart forward in reckless abandonment, leaving the safety net of the forest, and hurdle at full force into the wall, scaling crazily upward like ravenous beasts and toward the unsuspecting guard sitting in a chair, smoking a cigarette. The event takes less than thirty seconds. Before I blink, four howlers are toppling the guard while the other two are screaming in a frenzied dance on top of the wall. The two dancing monkeys snarl before lunging at each other, and the guard at the far end finally hears the commotion. When a crazed howler savagely bites his neck, the first guard screams and falls backward off the wall. Adan looks to me. “Now’s our chance.” |
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