The Gaming Outpost

I’ve read more than a few books recently, and two of the authors of these books I’ve conversed with. A few years back, I had the pleasure of spending a very late evening that turned into morning with John Ringo and some other fans standing outside a hotel lobby door because Ringo, if I remember right, wanted to smoke. He was fascinating, kindly, and so gifted in so many different ways that it made one suspect that God did not love you as much. Heh.

But, a few weeks ago, I also had the fun of talking to CJ Henderson on Facebook as he gave me some writerly advice about promotion. I’d already known about CJ, if I may call him that, from Mark Young’s (elite rpg designer and philosopher of time travel) frequrent references to him, and so I paid attention, and was very glad to chat with the man.

And then about a week ago in my tiny public library, I saw to my surprise a CJ Henderson fantasy novel, Brooklyn City Knights if I remember the title. Edit: I did not remember the title. Mea culpa. It was Central Park Knight. Right now, its sitting on a side table on top of a pile of papers in my bedroom, and I’m at a McD’s so I can’t just look across the room to check.

I read it pretty quickly, and found it interesting with its lead character Piers Knight and his associated sidekicks being original and believable.

The magic system was good, and having mana be stored at famed comic book stores is clever and amusing.

The turn from ally to enemy of a lead character was insightful.

I hope to read a Teddy London story of his in the future, even if this was not one of them. Also, this was a sequel novel, not the first in the tales of Piers Knight, but that was not much of a problem at all even though I’ve never read the first.

I see that CJ wishes to be box-breaking. For more on that, let me reccomend Andred Klavan’s Empire of Lies which smashes more boxes than you could fill a landfill with. I’d read some of his articles as he talked about culture on Pajamas Media online, and enjoyed his strong writing, and viewpoint.

Klavan is trying strange things with the English language, and his reinterpretations of the meaning of a string of commercials from his temporarily drunken character’s pov is inspired. If I saw an advertisement for Doritoes followed by one for a zipping new car followed by Chlorox Bleach followed by Vote for Me “I’ll give you lots of free stuff by robbing the other guy”….he’d see….yellow crunchies get in your car seat when you drive too fast but are cleaned up by a helpful politician using cleaner. But more amusing, and better phrased.

Its a trick to learn.

More, CJ has a blurb from William Shatner on his front cover, and Klavan has a Shatner inspired character who mostly serves as a clown, but perhaps an inspired clown. At first you think Klavan is just being unkind, but I think he’s saying what I’ve said about the Human Condition: Good vs. Evil with a laugh track in the background cause humans are just silly on so many levels.

With John Ringo, I got to see Live Free or Die in my same small public library which made me happy. Its got aliens, ginormous space structures, local politics, interstellar politics, and a wicked old woman who poisoned at least a couple of her husbands. Not to be missed.

Rick Riordhan is most famous for Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, a truly unwieldy title, but he continues. And he’s written The Red Pyramid which is set in the same universe, but deals with the Egyptian gods, and the Blood of the Pharaoh, and the House of Life (magicians). Its good. I may use it in one of my worlds as unpaid online gm (not suggesting pay, just saying that so lawyers won’t be weaponized and dispersed like aerosol. Copyright y’know.).

“Whaa-a-a?” I spoke, fighting back nausea as I was forcibly awakened, dripping in warmed up cryo capsule ‘soup’.
“Come along.” A flat male voice reinforced the message of his hand under my arm. I went, dragged over the low lip of the capsule, barely able to stand, my head drooping, and swaying back and forth. My stiff eyelids fluttered open, and I saw the brown grating of the outer corridors under my feet. I lost a few minutes to get from the freezers to the outer hull walkway.
“Wha-a-a?” I tried again, and then the hold grew harder, and suddenly I was flung forward to smack face first in to white velour seat pads. I knew those pads, I thought as I slid my face down them, and headed bonelessly to the floor.

WHOOMP.

Lifeboat Rocket Assist kicked in for a second to separate the escape pod from ‘home’, and I remembered where and when I was. I was on board the interstellar exploration starship, the Sarasota. We, except for the watchstanding crew, a gang of misanthropes and broken hearts and the sort who like a good long uninterrupted time to cogitate of several years, had been frozen because travel beyond the Stretch, into the older part of the universe remained a long journey even for FTL starships.

I sat up in rising fury as I remembered, and like a flash speculated more, and hit the comlink.
“Shaun! I’m going to kill you. Going to skin you alive with a potato peeler.” I raged into space my radio com expanding in a sphere at c and it would reach Earth in about four thousand years. Light, mocking laughter came back.
“Royles. Tsk, tsk. Such language, and from a god-fearing man too.”
“Listen you traitorous scumbag…turn this lifeboat around, consent to being put in cryo and I won’t have you up on charges before the High Court.”
My breath thundered in my chest, and I looked about the small, oval of the interior done in various shades of white. Shaun, or Wilson Albert Shaun the III, was an ensign on the Sarasota. A small man, with a belief in his ultimate significance which I sympathized with, but he would not see others were important too. And that I did not forgive.
“Well…I would, but in taking over the ship, I’m afraid I
had to kill Doctor Ranuark.”
My heart sunk as I thought back to the lively conversations, the gentle wit, the way he rubbed his nose when he was losing in chess. Jimmy Ranuark had been a wonderful person.
“So, at this point, they’re going to kill me for murder. Might as well add treason, mutiny, and revolution to the list. They can only kill me once.”
I listened and heard the steel will under the laughing words. Shaun was a first class snot, bitter, but he knew when to roll the dice. The Third Explorer Team on the Sarasota had found an ancient alien computer on that far world. A device that was as far beyond ours as ours were beyond the abacus. A man with control of a starship and the alien computer might make himself King of Earth.

Do what he says, or your house is going to release halon gas into the air to combat a non-existent fire. And halon is poisonous. There were innumerable ways a man with that tech could threaten Earth. And Shaun was smart enough, ruthless enough to kill thousands even if he ultimately failed.

“I am going to kill you, Shaun.” I spoke softly promishing retribution.
“I know you are going to try, Royles.” His voice was quiet. “And I know about your Verser Detector System back home. So you’re not going to fool me into killing you now. But, your system is crude, non-directional.”
The lifeboat swung to the left and started rocking and shaking as the upper atmosphere of some planet began buffetting it.
“You’re a sneak, Shaun.” We, in the Deep Space Command knew we had a spy, evidently it was Shaun. “A spy for the Yorkian Aristocracy!”
He laughed.
“I used them. I never worked ‘for’ them. Its always been about me. Don’t fear. Once I conquer Earth, those arrogant twits with their underused brains are next. Its buh-bye time, Royles. You’re getting exiled on some nameless planet off the main trade routes where you can live forever…alone.”
“SHAAUUUUNNNNNNN!!!!” But static from the atmosphere gutted my fury, and left me weeping as I plunged on an auto-guided course down into the planetary atmosphere.
Eleven minutes later, I was down, and the outer door opened. One of the Old Races had terraformed practically every planet in the galaxy with nanites so finding a planet without any sentient life was easy. I stepped to the door, and felt heat and humidity, and smelled green grass which was a change from filtered air, and a good one.
“Ten seconds until self-destruct.” The lifeboat announced, and I felt a surge of unbelief even as my hands grabbed the nearest box, and my legs propelled me down the hatch on to the ground. Sprinting away, and then WHOOMM, I was lifted airborne and tossed tumbling down the grassy hill on which I had landed. I hit the ground, and things went black.

I stood in attention, or charyeot, with my bare feet warm on the mat, my heels touching, and my toes slightly apart. My dubok crossed over in front, grayed from use and wash in the river by the servant women of Seng Yil S’Tran Dojo. All around me, my brothers stood as I did waiting for Master to inspect us.

He walked out from his inner chambers to my right, and moved so lightly on the glowing oak wooden floor at the end of the silk-screened grand room, that even with my cyborg ears, I could not hear his step over the gentle sussuration of breathing in my chest, and that of my brothers. His eyes were bright, and searching, despite his near hundred years, and I noted that he held in his right hand the walking stick, and more importantly the red Gideon’s New Testament that I had given to him.

He looked us fifty over, and easily found many of our eyes. Mine easier than the rest as I stand six foot five, and have my blonded hair in a pigtail. The tallest of my brothers, called Giant, is only six foot. They call me Tree.

“Dwi gibi-sogi!” He barked out, rattling the silk walls and echoing off the pine wood rafters of the dojo. The low granite edging, of three feet high that served as the base for the walls did not move or recognize its master’s voice. Even he is not that powerful.

We spun in unison to our left, facing the front door, spread our legs while pointing the right toward the ‘enemy’ in front, and put the left foot at almost ninety degrees sideways.

“You are being swept.” We all popped up our front leg, which was easy as the back leg in the Back-L Stance holds most of the weight, to avoid the imaginary enemy.

“Counter ap chagi!” The knee was already near the waist, and went the rest of the way, and then snapped straight out. We came down in the same stance we left, but quickly shifted to closed stance at the master’s command.

Our feet came together, still facing forward, and then we put our hands out, and covered our right fist with our left palm to act as if we were restrained. A twin forearm block ‘broke’ our imagined restraint, and we moved on to more complex patterns.

With the floor resounding to our stomps and kickk, and our foreheads and chests coated with sweat, we suddenly felt a cool breeze race in and around our naked ankles. The master ordered us to reverse our stance, and we did so, and then came to charyeot.

In the doorway were several practitioners of Kung Fu, small, but very fast men, and behind them a cruel man took in the sight of all of us with a mocking grin on his broad mouth. He was grotesquely fat, but he carried it well.

“This property belongs to the Emperor.” He said.
A rustle of unease flittered through the crowd.
“I had it from my father, who had it from his father, who received it from Most Noble Lord Hwarang in recognition of his bravery in battle. I owe nothing on this land. It is mine.” My master said strongly, but with the attitude of one who takes the first block and counterpunch in a major fight.
“The Most Noble Lord may not overrule the Emperor.” The fat man said with a cheerful gloating smile that drew a growl of anger from us. He gave us an eyeball.\
“I have troops. Right now they are beseiging Wukan, a town of rebels who deny the Emperor his due. But they can come quickly here, and we will see how well you lot do against machine guns.”
The master stilled us with one raised hand, and came forward.
“Let me see your warrant.”
“I need not show you my warrant. You will obey.” The fat man growled back.
“Then I must assume you are robbers, and we know how to deal with robbers.” The master turned to us, and made a slight hand gesture. We all leapt forward two feet at the exact same time.

Let me tell you, having been on the receiving end of this a year ago, when I versed in nearby, that it is awfully unnerving. Power, mass, organization, unified precision are dreadful things to face. They all wilted a bit.

“Here.” The fat man handed the warrant, a square piece of paper with gold tassels on it to the master who bent himelf to read it. After a time which had the fat man rolling his eyes, the master nodded.
“It is as I thought. You have permission to take unused land.” He smiled at us, and we cheered.
“But I say this land is not properly used.” The fat man interrupted the cheer with a deadly quiet voice.
“You are a treacherous, corrupt baseborn scum.” The master said, and the fat man chuckled.
“Do you believe in the Wheel, in Balance? You are honorable, a good man. The Balance requires me to be as evil as you are good.”
The master frowned.
We all could see he had no answer for that. For in his cosmology, Evil and Good were the Balance.
I caught his eye by a slight shift, and with relief he looked at me.
“My lord. The Balance is a truth of things less than ultimate.” I said, and stepped out from my place in the crowd of my brothers.
“Good and evil are brothers.” He replied, his face frowning.
“Not so, my lord. Good is real. Evil is simply its baseborn corrupted copy. The way of the rebel against the True Emperor of Heaven. You would not wish to be a rebel against your emperor, would you?”
“Hunh? I’m not…” He floundered, and I pressed onward.
“By choosing Evil, you rebel, and we know what treatment a rebel gets in this land.” I chuckled darkly. Rebels got to live, for several days, as they died.
“You slander me.” He puffed out straigtening himself.
“You slander yourself.” I said as I came to stand above him.
“I’ll be back.” He hissed, and turned to stomp out of the dojo with his minions. And the master closed the door, and my brothers came up to silently hug me, to pat my back. I had driven back the corrupt official once. And that was enough evil for the day.

“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin….” The clerk Randall Thierry muttered in English as he bit his thin, winter-struck lip. He looked back and forth between his propped open copy of the King James Version translation on the book stand, and the parchment scroll held down by rotating wooden arms that pinned it to the drafter’s desk. Even with the coals in the wrought iron grate to his immediate right, just out of range, of his deep blue cotton overcloak, and the four layers under it, he was still cold which did not help him thinking.

Agnus Dei was Latin for Lamb of God. The language of the City-state of Waveryhill was a variant of Latin, but not one found on Earth. Turning the ultimate mongrel, and hugely outsized language English into the much more pure and simple and trim Waveryhillian was enough to make him yank out his beard.

The long narrow hall, stone-walled and notched with a tall thin glass window between each small fireplace, was a clerk’s room in Prince Radamir’s castle, and others here worked on bills of lading, and proclamations of honor, and lists of the dead, and suchlike which was needful to keep a large trading city running even if it was the Age of the Caravel and the rediscovery of long-distance navigation.

Randall popped his neck. First problem was that there were no lambs or sheep on the lands ran by Waveryhill. This was cow country, for the low plains hereabout, except for the goat farmers near Waveryhill’s jagged hills. If he wrote ‘lamb’, no one local would have a clue what he was talking about. Possibly he could write ‘kid’ or ‘calf’, but he did not really like either. Then he saw the young Princessa with her even younger brother, Lakiana and Wroclaw, eight and five years of age respectively, enter at one end of the clerk’s room with their multiple minders trailing close behind.

And then he saw as they walked up to him that both had silvery, soft-haired bunnies in their arms.

“Look what the Castle Gardener gave us!” Lakiana cheered as she presented the new acquisition to the children’s zoo. Randall grinned at the little sweetheart.

“Story. Story.” Wroclaw reminded even as he held up his squirming bunny for inspection. Randall laughed.

“Aye, Little Prince. Just one minute. You two have solved my problem.” And he dipped his feather pen into the inkwell, and wrote on the scroll (with a prayer for blessing) in Waveryhillian….

“See closely, the Bunny of God who….”

Dark demons chased me, nipped at my hands, and shredded my body until I fell, and plummetted to dash my abused body…on the irregular surface of cool clay in the darkness. A goosebump ran up my unclad arm, and down the similarly shielded chest.

Two minutes ago, I had been standing bare-footed in the Nile River, splashing water along with my work crew on our break. Towering above us, the still uncompleted Sphyinx which before the end of the Ice Centuries was right next to the Nile. We were building it as a reminder to future generations of where the Tale of the Zodiac began, the Story that the Creator had placed in the stars telling of his plan of Redemption. In my world it had become a curiousity, and the source of a degenerate riddle instead of its truth. I hoped for better for this universe.

My shenti, a kilt-like linen, was thin enough that my workers near the river bank were pointing at me with open mouthed laughter, probably because a shenti is quite immodest when soaked, and I sent a splash of water back toward them. And then I heard a larger splash behind me, and with a feeling of true horror realized that my workers were not laughing at me, but yelling in fear, warning me.

I spun about, and saw that Phaedric the Paeleste (who’s descendants might include Goliath of Gath as the man was huge) was facing a killer of the Nile, the alligator in chest-deep water. Even he could not defeat such a monster, but he figured to fight it I could see from the tension in his huge shoulders, and give the other smaller men near us a chance to get back to shore.

I could escape.

I am a verser as Peter Andrews said (an ancient verser.) My life for theirs. I’m immortal. They have a flicker of a candleflame. Why should I be greedy when I have so much wealth?

I charged out toward the alligator, splashing and yelling.

“Get it on the side, Phaedric!”
“But…” He objected to my attracting the gator to me, to my taking his role as sacrifice.
“Now! Or I’ll whip you raw!” I howled.
“Yes, Gordon. May the God be with you.”

And my gambit worked. The alligator turned from the others, from Phaedric, and came at me. Its mouth was huge. Its teeth were so many, so very many, and I felt fear as I looked into the face of certain death. But I saw Phaedric coming up on my flank, and I knew that I would be revenged upon Death. For Phaedric, once he got his great arms around the back of the beast would crush it without remorse or relent.

And then I was yanked under, my legs snapped as the tail of the gator smashed into them. Before another second past, my mouth full of dirty Nile water, I felt the teeth on me, felt the gator take another gulping bite, and for the sheer novelty of it, opened my eyes.

After all, its not often you get to see the inside of a crocodile’s mouth from close up.

And then the crocodile shook me, and something went pop in my neck. Things went black, and I stood their with my Friend as we just smiled at each other.

==========

And then I was being chased by dark demons.

I woke from the versing integration nightmares into complete blackness, and still felt something nipping at my fingers. My fingers were wet. I pulled them back, and feeling about, found the edge of a pond or river in the pure dark.

I was laying in what I thought was a cave next to a pool filled with albino fish who had been nipping my fingers, I thought. Of course, it could be that I was on an abandoned space station, with my fingers trailing in the water of an experimental tank filled with a genetically engineered super smart kraken who had been tasting me to insert mind control bacterium into my bloodstream.

I was rooting for the first theory.

My shenti, held up by a girdle with one golden thread amidst the plainer red-dyed others (as I had been a little important, a work crew supervisor) was completely dry, but I shivered, and longed for the Egyptian sun.

I began to crawl toward my verser sense of things. Each verser has things they bring with them from universe to universe, and you could feel their presence, like a ‘hmmm, I left something over there, not sure what’ feeling. So I crawled, and prayed that I was not going to bash my skull on an unseen rock.

Soon, enough, my fingers closed on my kalasiri, a linen robe that went down to my ankles. Two feet further, I found my open-topped hat which was dyed with pictures showing the various worlds I had been too. Not that you could see such here. Still, I was not shivering, and with the hat to warn me of bumps, I felt as if I could go a bit faster.

Several bumps forewarned and carefully navigated, and aching muscles later, I took a break. I kept on, taking various passages, looking for a way to my gear. Sweat broke out on my forehead, and along my chest, and I pushed on.

Shortly thereafter I was shivering and chilled, and I stopped and huddled into a fetal ball. Too late, I remembered that letting yourself get sweaty in a cold environment was a very bad idea. So, I hoped, and waited out the shivers and banked on the fact that I was healthy and well-muscled.

My name is Gordon Guitteriez, Mexican on my father’s side, Scottish on my mother’s (Hence the name of Gordon. Mother wanted me to remember her ancestors too.) I’m five foot, nine inches tall, and weigh a hundred thirty five pounds of muscle. Being a Large Rock Movement supervisor in the building of the Sphynx sweats off any excess poundage. My skin is dark, but my hair is a curly red, and I’ve been told by more than a couple girls that I have ‘a very nice smile’.

So, I figured I’d get through this chill as I was in good shape. And about five minutes later, counting by my heartbeat, it was so. I was still cold, but not shaking. And my kalasiri was dry instead of sweat-drenched.

Taking more frequent breaks, I searched. When I reached four breaks, it occurred to me that the old Yankee joke might be true. You can’t get there from here. The gear was in the caves, but it was possible there was not connecting passage.

I squirmed through fat man squeezes, and under dripping rocks. After the wet rocks, I took the time to wait and warm up again. Finally, when I reached the tenth break, I forced myself to stop.

And with great reluctance, I moved away from the gear. Now, you cannot move directly away as what you sense does not tell you distance, but you can do vectors and geometry. I was not so good at geometry in my first world, in primary school, but after Lord Jhiaxus (another verser who believe it or not, serves Odin as personal troubleshooter, err axesmacker) showed me that vector trick, I made a special point of getting very good at geometry.

I went away, and hoped I was not in some place like the Underdark of Waterdeep, or the Labyrinth, I had heard tell of from another verser. I came back to water, and being thirsty, and desperate, drank. I did not instantly turn into a frog, or awake a vengeful naiad, so I drank more. Hopefully, the water was not superradioactive (a little radiation can be good for you…hormesis invigorates the body), or filled with diarhea causing bacterium.

Pushing onward, I found that I was so tired that I needed sleep. And so I did, being careful to pray for protection before I slept. Later, after an uneasy sleep, I woke. And I saw that a banded snake was pressed up against my belly.

Panic surged, but it hit the wall of my will and bounced. I did not move, and barely breathed. Especially when I felt a slither on my back. Evidently, some snakes had been attracted by my warmth and cudddled up to me, being cold-blooded creatures, to take a nap.

But that would mean they were native to the cave, and I had noticed no prey creatures in my explorations. Or, that they had come from outside. Something twigged at my brain.

Puzzled, I looked at the banded snake, and saw that I could see the yellow and brown bands, about a tenth of an inch wide running up and down its eighteen inch long body.

Umm. My brain struggled to wake up. I…I saw. Light. I was no longer imprisoned in the dark, and I felt tears of relief course down my cheeks as I threw my head back, and looked up to see the mouth of the cave thirty feet ahead. It was an irregular oval shape about ten feet across, and lit with the gray light of morning.

Relieved, I forced myself to wait. Eventually, I snoozed, and when I woke again, the snakes were gone. I scrambled to my feet, charged uphill, ducked around a stalactite stuck to the ceiling, and emerged into a chill piney maple forrest with few green leaves, and drizzle dropping from the silvery gray sky. Low clouds and green undergrowth over rocky hillside waited for me, as I stood there, half out of the cave mouth.

Shrugging, I went out into the weather. No way was I going to stay in my cave any longer. Wishful that I had chosen to wear my sandals to work, ah, yesterday, I carefully placed my feet not wanting a bruise or a sliced foot from the pointy, and occasional jagged rocks mixed among the brown vines with their bark shivered off in small peels that if dry would be excellent tinder.

I put off thoughts of fire, and warmth, and turned to climbing carefully downhill. And then it was climbing uphill, using my gear as a target to move away from. For most of the morning, I kept on with my stomach occasionally growling.

The day grew warmer, and eventually the rain stopped although the clouds never went away. And I came to a creek, and following ancient wisdom, I went down the small vales with it. After a couple hours, it had joined with two more, and became a sizable river of twenty feet in width.

Exhausted, I surveyed the dense thicket of trees near the life-giving water, and realized I would have to follow the river, but from a distance. Tired with lack of food, I made camp under a thick, blue-green spruce.

Later, after a fitful nap, I head some splashes, and went to investigate. Two large white-feathered birds with long spindly legs, and beaks of dull yellow six inches long were occasionally flying above the river with eyes down on it. Sometimes they landed on a stonebank in the river, similar to a sandbar, but made of round river stones, and their deep reddish black tailfeathers went skyward while their beak sought the ground. And they would come up with something small, translucent and wiggling.

Shrugging, I decided that if Mr. and Mrs. White could hunt for crayfish, so could I. I slipped and slid and wove between the thick green trees and bushes down the slope, and then plunged into the water. But the water at the edge was neck deep, and faster than I expected, and pushed me off my feet and away. I guzzled some water, and started flailing, but then came up on a shallow spot, and without more ado went up on an almost island of round stones, and out of the main current.

My feet were in six inches of water, and three feet away there was six feet of rushing water, but it was here I wanted to be for more than one reason. No crayfish would be in fast, deep water. So I looked, and spotted the little water insectile things by their spots, and their almost translucent, brown tinged bodies. The minnows were too fast for my hands, and although I’ve heard of American Indians catching big fish with their bare hands, I was too tired to try it.

Instead, I caught crayfish, and then slammed a rock on top of one after releasing it on top of another rock. Then I began eating it as well as I could, spitting out bits of shell. Not much food, and not that good tasting, but it was protein. I hunted on. After about eight, I felt chilled, so I killed a few more, and took them in the palm of my hand, and back up. But, given the quick current on that side of the river, I took the other side which was shallower, and had a more gentle, open bank.

On the other side, I crouched under an oak, and used a few spare branches I had found as a very poor windbreak, and then finished off the last of the crayfish before falling asleep.

The next day was much the same. And any fat I had was gone by now.

The third day I noticed the river had become passable by boats, not that I saw any. And I was staggering with weariness. I found myself sitting down at times, wondering later why I had stopped.

And then as night fell, I noticed the most delicious odor. It promised joy and fulfillment and life. So I staggered on, and over a hill, and then down a slope of manicured grass. From thence, I went onto sun-warmed asphalt that felt delicious to my cold feet.

I saw a parking lot full of automobiles, and laughing families entering what could only be a restauraunt sitting on a small bluff over the river I had been following. Knowing that I could not afford to be turned away, I searched, and found an openable water spout at the back of the eatery. Using it, I cleaned myself discreetly, and my clothing. I was then wet, and it was true horror to just sit there, and dry.

Finally damp, and unable to stand it further, I walked around the front of the eatery. A tall man, talking of music with his numerous family, and looking replete with good food gave me a curious look, but held the swinging glass door open for me, which I appreciated even as he and his horde were leaving. I was weak.

The next door was difficult, especially with just one hand, as I had to use the other to hold the kalasari close in around me to be modest. In this cool-weather land, most of the body was covered, and I was afraid to be thrown out if I appeared solely in my shenti.

Inside, the women, an attractive blonde, waited and I saw that others in front of me were giving her plastic cards which were probably food privilege cards, I thought, rather like the cafeteria card I had used in Lunagrad U. Others gave coins and paper money. I reached up into my hat, and pulled down the emergency money that Magehammer (another verser, frequently mistaken for Thor) had convinced me to carry.

I held out the small golden coin with hope to the pretty blonde, and she took it perplexed. And when we found that neither of us spoke any languages the other spoke. She made an open-handed ‘wait’ gesture, unless she were planning on fireballing me, but I thought not, and I raised my hands and dropped them in sign of aggreement. With a doubtful look, she scurried off.

I cared not for waiting. The room was square-built, a bit bare, but warm and well-lit. I stood in a corner, and waited while others came in and were served by a kindly looking brunnette.

A bit later, a harried looking man that I sympathized with as he looked much like the clerks I had worked with on the Sphyinx came up to me. He tried to explain something. I tried to explain that I wanted to eat, and he could have the gold coin. It was not working, but then my stomach rumbled, and we all three, the blonde, the clerk, and I laughed.

The clerk made a decision, and on his own authority, opened the box of cash under the counter, and gave me a hundred bills, and freedom of the food. I bowed to him, and a bit more awkwardly, he bowed back.

And then I went in to the food. And to my utter delight, not only was it hot food that I regcognized, but it was all you can eat. So many civilizations have not discovered this essential ingredient of civilization.

My hot plate soon held creamed spinach, and a large slice of steak, along with breaded shrimp. The waitress and I figured out what I would drink by my pointing at things on other’s tables. So I got a glass of water, and cup of steaming coffee with plenty of sugar.

On my next trip, it was bourbon chicken on the right side of the white plate, and on the left side was melting soft pot roast with vegetables. I was slowing a bit, but third time up, I had fish, a tilapia I believe, or something similar, and then mashed potatoes and macaroni with three cheese goodness and browned on the top in the way that Mama Grande used to make when I was a kid convinced that starvation was but seconds away.

Lastly, I got two plates of dessert. Chocolate covered macaroons, whipped topping on strawberries and pineapple chunks were one plate. The other plate was cobbler heaven, with peach, blackberry, and cherry a la mode’.

Following the lesson of the others around me, I left one of the bills, and not the smallest, but a ’10′ on the table for my waitress. She bid me wait with her hand, and came back with a to go cup of coffee, and a white jacket such as the men in the kitchen wore. She mimed shivering, and told me with hand gestures to go right after I left the restaraunt.

Which is how I found myself entering under a neon cross, and along with other dispossessed men, hearing the words of the Creator. Even if I did not know their language, it comforted me. And so did the rest upon a cot, even if half the men in the room snored like horses.

The ground shook, and the copper covered lamps swung from their hooks on the tent poles. We get several earthquakes a day, and so I had given up my ambition to teach the indigenous people in the Great Valley the art of clay brick building. Around here, they built in massive stone blocks, or not at all because of the tremors.

A slave girl came in with tea, which is a modification thats really taken off. Most of the well water is muddy, and a good, hot, strong tea dosed with camel milk and sugar from the sugar cane to make it drinkable is preferred to being half-buzzed all the time on the only other safe drink an adult can dignify to drink. Pure camel’s milk is for children.

I enjoyed looking at Mayesah with her dancing eyes and long, dark hair as she dipped gracefully low to serve me, but if I bedded her, she became at the least a concubine, which meant she had more rights, including a tap on my wallet much larger than a female slave had. And I had lost half my remaining goats to raiders after giving a quarter to the young Prince Alin d’Ug.

Said prince sat on a pillow across from me, and grinned at Mayesha’s antics. She had been enslaved because her father was thorougly unreliable, a drunk, and a violent man so he had been driven out to live among the cavemen. But no one wished to put this on his children or his second wife. (His first wife being dead in what in hindsight looked suspicious, but no one had proof so we merely turned our faces from him, and pointed to the hills above the Great Valley where he could live with his barbarous kind.) With Mayesah being the eldest, she had been enslaved to provide money for the mother and her three younger children for the mother was old, and not well suited to labor.

I would sell her, but she refused to be sold. Instead, she made doe eyes at me, and saved her salary. I told her to leave with an impatient wave, and she left with a sway.

“You might as well give in, Lord Verser.” The Prince observed with a chuckle. I scowled at him. “When a woman gets a thought in her head, even camels can’t pull it out.”

“And for this wisdom, I support you against the Tazi Clan?” I said, and instantly felt ashamed as the prince began to apologize to his host. I cut him off as soon as I decently could by opening up a wine bottle for a toast.

“To the new High King of the Great Valley. Alin the First.” He accepted the toast with a blush on his young face, but I had pleased him I saw from the shine in his dark eyes.

“This is what I have come to tell you. My father, blessed be his name is in his three hundredeth year, and he begins to fail.”

This is what shocked me about the locals. They looked Human, but they lived to astounding ages with some of them being above five hundred years old. It would probably take his father another fifty years to pass, if he did not quickly recover from his ailment which he might.

“I like your father. He’s a good king.” I spoke sincerely. The King of Ug was a good man, even if a number of his followers were worshippers of the New Gods, their own ancestors. It was a way of worshipping one’s own self, and besides, it was less scary to worship a man than the One True God.

From his city, he ruled the northern plains above the Great Valley. To put it clear to Earthers familar with history. His father was Phillip of Macedon, and I was talking to Alexander the soon to be great. Alin d’Ug was scary good. I’ve been versing for over two hundred years. Alin is twenty-one years old, and if not yet my equal in all things, he’s close, and in a number of things, he’s better. The kid really could unite the Known World aka the City Dwelling Lands as no one wanted the cavemen’s hills, or the tribes that lived up near the Big Ice. They were violent, and disorganized brutes whose only virtue was personal courage.

“I was ambushed twice on the way here, Lord Verser.” Alin told me, and I was not surprised. The Tazi Clan, headed by Old Man Tazi, had founded a dozen cities. He was a grandson of Japheth, and a difficult and contentious jerk in my opinion who had a much higher opinion of his own skills than reality would support. He agreed on the need for a High King. Its just he saw his own head under that golden crown.

He had power, it was true, and influence over the others, but his countryside was played out for the best farms. He was the past, and a thuggish one at that.

“I was hit by ‘raiders’. I expect that its Lord Tazi’s boys sending me a message. Next time….well, I’m keeping my flocks close in.”

“Not as good pasture land close in.” Alin observed with a raised eyebrow. I nodded, and what was left unsaid was that my wools would be not as good, and my cheeses fewer, and that I would slip from the first rank to the second rank. No longer would I be accounted a lord, but a master. And no one counted the opinions of the masters when it came to installing a High King. Tavi had me in a bind. One way or the other, I was being removed from the playing field.

“I have a solution.” Alin said.
“Shoot Tavi in the head?” I grunted and sipped my tea as Alin gasped in shocked dissapointment.
“I forget you are from another land. Another world.” He said, hiding his shame at my barbarous ways. Actually, he was right. In ways, I’m more kin to the cavemen than to the citydwellers in their tents.
“But,” And he skillfully went onward. “That does bring up the idea I was aiming for. They attack me for I am in line for many thrones if I can but claim them.”
I nodded. He spoke but what everyone in the world already knew, except perhaps for the bow-legged icehunters.
“My brother is younger than I, Darin, and a goodly fellow. If there were two princes suited to take the many thrones, then the attacks on me would cease.”
“Three problems. One, your brother if eligible would threaten your own throne.”
“He’s swore by Heaven and the bones of the Water Crossing Man that he would not take my throne from me by force or guile. Besides, I trust him.”
I shrugged.
“And he would be eligible eventually anyways.” Alin added.
“Two, why not kill both?”
Alin shook his head.
“Very hard to do. In the worlds you told me of, where one may speak with someone on the far side of the globe, yes. But here, camel riding messengers. Chances are, one of us dies, and the other escapes, and then sheer outrage at the barbarous attack plants the other on the Throne with ease.”
I sighed, and noddded. If he was just one, then there would be rage, but it would have no place to go, and would eventually wither away. Give it an easy revenge of placing the surviving brother on the throne, and the wrath of the many peoples would have a place to go.
“Third and last. Your brother is twelve…”
“Fourteen. Two years since you last saw him.”
“Ok. Fourteen. In order to be a King, one has to slay a dragon.” By ‘dragon’, they meant ‘dinosaur’. And I don’t care how brave you are, no fourteen year old kid is going to kill a T-Rex.
“And this is where the shooting comes in. He can handle your big rifle. And he need not slay a land dragon, but one of the air flyers. We have rumors of a wyrdfloga snatching children and sheep from a village three days toward the hills.”

I blinked. This could work.

The prince stood, and walked toward the door.

“Okay, I guess we can do this. Send for the boy…”
The prince opened the tent flap to reveal a strong looking lad with a determined look on his face. He was an impressive sort, although not up to Alin’s standards, and he bowed his head to me.
“May I enter your tent, Lord Verser.” Prince Darin asked firmly while Alin beamed on proudly.
“Welcome, young prince.” And then I tilted my head back, and bellowed. “Mayehsah!”
She stepped in from the next room in my tents immediately. Evidently the little minx had been eavesdropping.
“You called, great lord?” She said with an engaging smile.
“More tea…” I looked at my guests. Both were young chaps. “A snack, largish. And the rifle, the big one, and the bullets.”
She bowed, and left, and then I hollered again as the two princes settled themselves on pillows.
“And several towels as well. Not wet.”
She furrowed her face, but nodded and went.
I turned to look at young Darin.
“Sir. I will teach you how to fire my Weatherby, but it is going to hurt. Which is why we need the towels as a buffer for your shoulder. But first! We feast! Then I teach you how to shoot. By tommorrow, or the next day, we hunt for the dragon.”
The two cheered even as Mayeshah came in with two large bowls of grapes in one, and bread and cheese in the other.
“You will need me on your hunt, master.” She informed me. That started another discussion which to my surprise I found I did not mind losing.

An hour later, the magic troupe was sweating, and tired. Paul had a mild sprain wrapped in an Ace bandage, but it helped him as it kept him from moving around so much.
“One more quick run through.” The leader ordered, and then frowned as groans rose to meet him instead of Power.
“Do it!” And there was a Lash in his Voice as he expended Power from their previous workings. The troupe flinched back, and set to work on their Basic Rectangle which was fairly solid, and on the Basic Square which was not solid, and the Basic Circle which was downright airy in comparison.

But it was done.

Houston Taylor waved for them to go, reminded them of the next practise, and to wear their coats before they went outside into the utter cold. He had to keep them healthy.

Wiping down in the tiny bathroom, and wishing for a shower in the dancehall so he did not have to walk ten blocks home to his apartment on the Rue Villanelle, he took his time because he did not want to talk to any of his troupe. As the lead Magician, an honor to be sure, he was supposed to know more than the rest, to be wiser. The problem was, as a barely functional Troupe, he got almost nothing in the way of information. So, if he wanted his Troupe’s respect, which he had to have, that meant he had to lie to them. Which meant that he traded their respect for his self-respect.

Exiting, clad in a blue woolen running suit, and boots with a grounding patterns in the tip, he looked up to see two large, sleek men in suits and matching overcoats waiting for him. He knew one, and so he spoke to the man on his right.

“Mr. Stone, a pleasant surprise.” He lied easily.

“Not so much. The All-Star Team got hit by a bus.” Mr. Stone said, and that triggered frowns on all three men’s faces as they stood in the cool entrance area.
“An accident…?” Taylor began, and then shook his head as the other men did.
“The vampires struck. We cannot prove it according to the Sillinger Protocols,of course. The fire burned away all trace of magic, but we know.”

All three of the men leaned back on their heels contemplating the disaster. Magic was raised, and then consumed. In the old days, the vampires and humans had fought bloody wars, now expunged from the history books. Now under the Sillinger Protocol, whoever could raise the most magic, took the Directorship of the Walnut City.

It made sense. Whoever had the most magic in possession could dominate the rest anyways. It made the struggle less bloody.

But since human dancers were not as skillful generally as vampires, it was a case of vampire takeoer. That is, until someone came up with the bright idea to draft all the very best players, and form an All-Star team that would have a chance to win. But the Vampires struck first.

“That’s bad.”
“Its gets wore. We still need a team to face the vampires. And after due consideration, we’ve decided to use your team.” Mr. Stone said, while his black eyes studied Tayler closely.

“Why us? We can scarcely do a rectangle.
“It’s neccassary.” Mr. Stone begins, and then Taylor burst in.
“We’re the sacrifice. You have to have one team to go or face severe penalties, like allowing vamps to feed on hospital patients. But none of the other teams, the Roebold Knights, the Mage in a Cup…they’re not ready. They would lose and some key people die.”
Mr. Stone shrugged and looked a bit uncomfortable.
“But we all will die because we don’t have enough power in our blood to satisfy the bloodthirst of the victorious team. They won’t stop at one or two!”
Mr. Stone sighed.
“Taylor, yes, you are correct. But you have to see the larger picture.” His voice plodded out, and Taylor grabbed a trophy off the wall and threw it at Mr. Stone’s face, and before the heavier man could pull himself back from his toppled against the wall position, or the other silent fellow could move around to get at him, Taylor had used his dancing feet to leap a line of chairs, and hit the door. Running out into the ice-cold air with streams of tears on his face, he sprinted across the empty parking lot until he came to a sliding fall.

And there he sat on the ice as his tears froze on his cheek, and heavy footsteps walked up to him.
“Should I?” The other man spoke first, for the first time, and it was a threat in his voice.
“No, Carl. I believe Taylor knows.” And there seemed to be genuine sorrow in Mr. Stone’s voice as he kneeled down next to Taylor.
Taylor raised his head, and looked at him dully, and then Mr. Stone rose to his feet, and clapped Taylor on the shoulder.
“Good man.” He paused. “Let’s get Taylor back to…oh, take him to Rowdy’s…on my tab….keep an eye on him but give him some room.”

Which is why twenty minutes later, Taylor was staring into a beer at a bar, and thirty feet away Carl was sipping another beer at a table while occasionally checking on Taylor. Occasionally Taylor would look up at the dancers who’s accidental movements created a Pattern, and gave rise to a bit of Power fog before it dissipated. There were a couple low level Latents in the hall tonight. But nothing that would save him.

He had dreams. He was not hardly even a serious player yet, but he had dreams of becoming important, of doing New Magics, of finding a way to free the Human Race which did not even realize it was held in bondage by Vampires and Riverdance. Instead, he was going to be a pawn, and get sacrificed so the Human Race would have one more year to try to get its act together. Because even now, the Vampires were agitating to rework the Sillinger Protocols, to give the victor more power, which made sense because they had won it for the last fifteen years since Moro had danced.

Mr. Stone was right. All things considered, getting blind, stinking drunk was a truly excellent plan. And so, Taylor set about it was a vengeance.

And when someone said something stupid, or glared at him, he flipped them off because he could. And if they were not frightened by his strange intensity, well, he smashed the young giant in the mouth with his mug. And when the giant’s pals came over to ‘dispute with him’, well Carl came over, and opened his jacket to show a wallet with money on one side, and a highly illegal pistol (vampires really don’t like humans having effective weapons) on the other, the pals took the money and left to go to another bar.

Carl looked as if he would say something, and Taylor just glared at him. Carl shrugged and went back to his table.

The ballet dancers filed out of the mirrored wall hall at the impetus of the owner, Marjorie Adams, with the little girls in pink tutus and slippers looking wide-eyed at the looming men in overcoats and fingerless gloves, and driven eyes waiting by the entrance to use the hall.

The owner sighed as the last of the resentful mothers of little girls left, and then turned to the new group which slowly filtered out into the open space with its glossy oak strips flooring it, and the acoustic tiles on the surface.

“I’m sorry for the delay. You’re a dance troupe?” She smiled, and then frowned as she saw boots and heavy jackets not suited for dancing.
“Something like that. Street work as it were.” The leader, an intense looking man with short black hair flopped over on the side of his face in untidy fashion spoke in calm evasive style, and the owner nodded, and then left.

“Paul, Rick, Joe, Jack, Joseph, and Mack form Line One.” The athletic men jumped to it, and got themselves lined up running from mirror wall to mirror wall about a third of the way from the entranceway.
“George, take the others minus Walker and Dex, and make Line Two.” A third of the way from the opposite wall, with its exit sign above the doorway that led into the shoe-changing and receptionist area and the final exit into the cold air of the North Hamilton hills winter.

The lines were ragged, and the spacing between them was varied, to be kind. The leader, Randall, sighed, and dragged each one of his troupe into position.

“One yard and a half between each of you in the lines. Not one, not two.” Randall snapped, and then waved Walker and Dex into their positions to form a rectangle.

“Now everyone focus, and breathe in, and out. Envision the Power as a rising fog…”

James threw out an interesting idea about magic based on military formations. Thankfully, we’ve already established we can use each other’s worlds in our practise with him writing a most entertaining bit with the Guardian trying to shut down a rogue AI.

So….
=====================

“Mighty Prince.” The Commandant bowed deeply as His Serene Highness descended from the stagecoach even as the pilot cracked his whip to keep the team of four pegasi pulling it from going airborne. The Crown Prince’s face was masked by a still, ceramic object, nearly twice as large as a normal face, and the Commandant decided, three times as disturbing.
“You ordered me to provide you means to fight back against the invading demons from the Abyss that has opened in the East. I have done so.” The Commandant said after the prince flicked his fan slightly to signal the other man could stand straight.

Out on the flagstone paved plaza in front of the vast expanse of the Academy for Military Arts, the wind off the high steppes was cool, but the commandant still sweated. He expected that the ‘divine’ descendant of Genghis was comfortable in his seven-layer robe of silks, but he himself had been born in South Carolina in another world, and a steady chill breeze that blew all day in one direction was hard to take. And he yearned to see green mountains instead of flat, brown grassy plains.

“Show me.” The Crown Prince commanded.

And the Commandant escorted the prince over to a viewing stand made of virgin wood (for a Prince of the Realm could not sit in a chair made for lesser men.), and seated him so that they were twenty feet above the surface of the stone. An awning was raised over them, and the commandant tried to ignore the two samurai bodyguards five feet behind him.

Both were to have slain an evil Western dragon by their own self, in order to be accepted into the Prince’s Personal Guard. Perspiring, because although he had versed out twice, both times had hurt a lot, and he was not sure that third time was not the charm, he blew his whistle.

Up rushed a dozen men with long blades and heavy shields, but no armor.

“These are not our troopers. Nor are they mages.” The Crown Prince obsered with just a touch of asperity in his voice.
“Very wise, my prince. It is as you say.” The Commandant’s voice caught, but he pushed on. “We have little money for the war against the Demon King. Mages require great training and much money. Our troopers our not as expensive man for man as a mage, but still, they cost much.”
“And this is a solution? Instead of Imperial troops, you say we arm the natives?” The prince’s voice was rising.
“Ah yes, let me show the prince…..” The commandant paused, and hoped desperately for a reprieve. In this world, failing the leadership had one penalty…death. Well, okay, if you brought them their tea cold, they would merely hack off your hand.
“Show me this foolishness of yours.”
The Commandant carefully did not wipe off his face, but instead tweeted his whistle.

The warriors jumped into Formation One. It looked like a lower case ‘r’ with a slash across it. And it looked useless as a military formation until sudddenly sparks were spilling off each warrior. And then each warrior was enclosed in lightning.

A gasp of shock from the prince let the commandant know he had been reprieved.
“Bring up the targets.” He ordered, and a line of wooden boards with back boards to prop them up, and the bodies of demons on them were put to the right of the lightning clad warriors.

At a tweet, the warriors rotated carefully, and then began to flick the point of their swords at the targets. And with each flick, a bolt of lightning launched from the sword point to the target to usually blow them down, and scar them with removed wooden shrapnel, and black burn marks.

Once the targets were ‘dead’, the formation bowed, and then stepped apart and the lightning was gone.

“This is a Rune of Lightning in the tongue of the northern barbarians.” The commandant said as he showed a paper with the same rune that the soldiers had demonstrated down below them.

“Impressive. Magic, and attack, but with…”
“Relatively little training, my prince. Just a month is needded to turn a barbarian into a member of a lightning throwing unit. And the cost is but one-tenth of an Imperial unit.”
“But you can do so much more with an Imperial unit.” The prince replied.
“True, but can they do this?”
And the Commandant tweeted his whistle again, this time for the Rune of Fire.