Tag: action

I Finished the Rough Draft of Corporals

I finished the rough draft of ‘Corporals’ the other day, and thought you all might enjoy a snippet of the story. In this story, Burn and Bad Karma are recruited into Rangers due to some issues that come up with Karma’s past.

Enjoy!

“Training under an identity we’re building for you. Makes it more complicated for politicians. Tossing people with no numbers under tank treads is easy. Soldiers and Department team members get ugly for them fast,” the sergeant major explained.

“We haven’t been a country long enough for politicians to be voted out,” Burn faced the soldier.

“Three politicians had tragic accidents,” the general noted, “And the investigations came up to purely accidental causes. Clearly.”

“Wasn’t me,” Bad Karma said.

“It wasn’t,” the sergeant major smiled, her cheeks rising as she spoke, “We checked.”

“What, exactly, are you trying to say?” Burn’s fingers pressed against the table, turning white.

“That it appears that trying to use the Ranger Department for political advantage can be detrimental to one’s health. Many veterans of the war are outspoken about using individuals as trading chips. The Department, of course, is absolutely loyal to the elected leaders of our nation and our constitution,” the sergeant major said.

Silence settled across the room. Burn noted the buzz of the white noise generator and that her comm systems were showing no signal.

“It appears we can trust you. So, why HALO jumping?”

“It’s the nearest start date we have for any training,” the general shrugged, “And I doubt you two would do well in Ranger School.”

“Why’s that?” Bad Karma asked.

“Ranger School lasts for three months. Freefall school is three weeks, and you don’t have to go in knowing military tactics,” the sergeant major noted, “First, you don’t want to be out of the loop in the dropped numbers world for three months. Second, you don’t need to go through the usual military training program. We just need you in a school to have your new core IDs solid. Third, the training will be useful to you and to us, as it opens some options when situations needing your skills come up.”

“New skills don’t hurt,” Karma shrugged.

Spooky Season Is Here! How About a Little Cyberpunk Zombie Action?

As Halloween approaches, I thought I’d share some about how my story “A Simple Escort” got started and how I managed to write a cyberpunk horror story.

Shortly after I’d sold a ‘Santa Claus kicks ass’ story to JR Handley (https://jrhandley.com/) for his Slay Bells Ring anthology, JR reached out to me about the zombie anthology he was putting together, saying that ‘You write dark stories’. While I didn’t think my stories were that dark, even accounting for the cyberpunk and dystopian elements, I sat down and thought about it for a minute. Obviously, I had an idea 🙂

A Simple Escort combined three elements. The first was that Burn and Bad Karma would be involved in a classic cyberpunk data theft job. They would go into a corporate facility to get data on a biotech project for whoever their mysterious employer was. That required them to escort a hacker (Cat, who you may have met in California Chaos), and biotech expert to confirm and vet the data.

The second element was incorporating an ‘uncanny valley’ aspect. This is a term that describes how people react when they see something that is close to human but not quite right. If you’ve walked past a store front at night and seen a manakin in a window and your stomach tightened in a fear response, that’s the uncanny valley response. Because of their levels of implants, Bad Karma and Burn can cause that in unmodded people. I wanted to cause that response to Bad Karma.

For the final, third, element, I wanted Burn and Bad Karma to end up with a house pet, as part of their relationship developing. So, yes, there’s a cyberware implanted cat in the story. And, yes, the cat lives.

If you’re interested in my stories or good zombie stories, hit the link and check out Zombies! Patient Zero.