The
Chinese find eight lucky. What the Chinese thought about eighty...

It
had been eighty years since last time they had been alone at an
orphanage. Without little one. Eighty years ago they had met little
one. It had taken almost an entire revolution of this world to find
this building. This office within it. St. Gertrude's had quite the
front of addresses, owners, partners, associates, and properties
across The United States of America.

But
find things was what they did. Things w

"Marshal
Niacean, reports of abominable acts have reached the King's ear
about..." The High Marshal took a deep breath, running a hand
over his weathered face. "Jennifer, listen, I'm sorry, but
someone has to be pulled from the war effort to go check these
stories out. When the King heard of little children being gathered up
off the streets of one of his towns and carted out to Melza wood at
the edge of his lands to appease some monster and save local
lives..." The man's stee

The black
Tahoe pulled into the multi-level park garage after the security
booth gave them clearance. Driving down to the lower level it took
one of the assigned 'special case' open spots nearest the elevators.
The engine shut down and the front doors opened.
The driver
was an older man with salt-n-pepper short hair and hazel eyes. The
passenger was a 30something taller man with dirty blond hair equally
short. Both had on dark blue business suits. The younger man waited
at the door behind his fo

Yvonne's doey brown
eyes stared out the limo's tinted passenger side window, watching
west Houston slip past. She was only vaguely aware of their passing
from the I610 loop onto southbound I59. But the 6PM, Friday,
mid-July view was not what her eyes saw.
Instead it was how she
had met Jana; the woman she was going to be spending the evening
with.
***
Sasha, Yvonne's college
dorm sister had introduced them. Yvonne had been Sasha's roommate
for three years of college after a dismal college f

“Are you sure you
want to go through with this, Elaine? I mean, technically you’ll be
dead for a little while.” The young blonde took another confident
step into Elaine’s apartment, more like a landlord than a visitor,
but her hand lingered in the crook of Elaine’s arm.
“La petite
mort, eh?” Elaine flashed a quick, toothy grin as she turned
the deadbolts in her door. She was a vivacious brunette, long-legged
and slender. Whether she was in the back of a classroom wearing
cat-eye gl

"Captain." A woman's voice called softly into the dimly lit room. "Captain? Wake up."


Natasha struggled to pull herself up out of the warm lassitude that had overtaken her. "Yeah,” the reddish brown haired young woman slurred. “Yeah, I'm here, Big Sister"


“It is time, Captain.” Big Sister announced gently in her heavy accent.


“I know.” Natasha tried to nod, but the deepening lassitude left her not knowing whether she

This is where I am going to store away some of the words of advice I have received from various writers over the last eight to nine months. Well and a few others too…


It is to help me remember them but also to share them with others that may need these words of advice and wisdom in their own writing. I will add to it when new pearls present themselves, but for now, these are the basics. “~~” being the symbol for material added later.


- Learn from Your Mistakes.-

“Daddy's little girl is on the prowl”, broke the silence. Careful not to jostle the baby blue laptop cradled against her thighs, Anya reached for the nightstand next to her. Without her eyes ever leaving the screen naturally tanned fingers slid open her pink cell phone. Pushing send as the young woman raised it to her ear, “Hey Trish...”


“Please tell me you changed that obnoxious ringer.” Trish demanded with a giggle.


“Hmmm? Oh yeah, long ti

((I experimented with a new formatting for dialogue for this writing. I am STRONGLY considering reverting to more traditional dialogue formatting, but this is a forewarning to any that read this: the dialogue may look funny compared to what you are accustomed to))


“Daddy's little girl is on the prowl”, broke the silence. Careful not to jostle the baby blue laptop cradled against her thighs, Anya reached for the nightstand next to her. Without her eyes ever leaving the screen,