"WOO HOO!!!"
Avat's heart raced as he tore through space in the Drakon II, his brother and the rest of their squad behind him. He ran his fingers along the control pad and the shuttle rotated quickly until he was "upside down" relative to the others. "Easy there Hot Shot," Vish chided. "This isn't a race. The controls just need a light touch."
Avat cursed under his breath. "Understood," he said louder and easily righted his ship. The Drakon, named for its resemblance to the beast of ancient mythology, and moved effortlessly in the vacuum of space, sending data directly...
"Millions of stars," Avat breathed as he gazed out at the Universe.
"More like one hundred billion," Vish corrected quietly. He stood beside his little brother, an arm around the boy's shoulder.
"There are more stars in the Universe than grains of sand," Vish quoted. He lifted his hand, pointing. "There's Sol," he said.
"What can you tell me about that star?"
Avat glanced at his brother with amused exasperation. "It's Terra's home system," he said as if reciting a lesson. "The site of our old home, and Mars, and Europa, our great colonies." His aquamarine eyes focused on the...
The ransom never came, poor fools.
The two kidnappers waited with young Jacob Cartee standing between them. The boy looked well, unhurt by the men who'd taken him. That was good. James despised child abusers. "In ten," James said softly, speaking into the mike on his collar.
He shifted his weight, noted the direction of the wind. Slowly, he inhaled as he gazed through the scope on his M99. Time counted down. At "one" he exhaled and pulled the trigger. One of the kidnappers - he'd taken to calling him Ogre - went down instantly. A second bullet escaped the...
He had climbed the steep Acropolis, seeking Athena Parthenos (the virgin), every time work or pleasure or strange fates called him to Athens. Yet today he paused by the Temple of Dionysis, only about a third of the way up the olive treed slope. One of the several custodians, some in plastic and metal cells, others, like this young lady beneath whatever shade the Gods (and strategic umbrellas) could provide. Something about her effortless attention, seeing all who paused or passed, while seemingly merged into a thick hard back, caught his attention.
She sat, regally, letting the Sun and people...
Froniga, or Fron (as most of her US friends and relations called her) was a patient sort of soul. More in touch with her forebears than many Americans, perhaps because she was closer to her immigrant roots than most. She'd married into the "Land of the Free" as much as she had been born there, not really considering where she lived as something to define her. Maybe that was the Romany spirit showing through. She couldn't tell. She didn't care.
Of course, her attracted neighbour did present a problem. She was who she was, and it was hardly her fault...
It was the quiet way Fron did the simple things - anticipating a glass of water, settling to a joint task, silently prompting something urgently forgotten - that Wilhelm noticed more than anything else. She would just eye smile at him when he, yet again amazed at her casual thoughtfulness, would gratify his mutterings. As if words were not necessary.
It was as bewitching as it was uncanny. He felt she could pluck a dropped desire out of the air, well before its longing weight would shatter it on the hard stone floor of the bakery. Slowly, quickly, her careless...
That part of New York was home to several artisan outlets and small, incubated, cottage industries. Rather like a hipster vision of battery farmed chickens, Wilhelm noted. Right next door to his bakery - Purveyor of the Finest Home-Baked Goods* (* all dietary requirements catered for) - he was aware dimly of a bespoke micro brewery, although no liquor of any kind had passed his ancestor shudderingly German lips in over forty years. Wilhelm didn't approve of alcohol. Not for a long time, though he had once courted the hop and the grape until their avoidable, but probably inevitable divorce....
I'll do anything… No, not that!
Wanted. Crib. Last one sold prematurely.
Ill do anything to keep that pretty crooked smile on your face. I love the way your eyes twinkling when you laugh. We are so different. It such far away places and times. I can't imagine my life without you. I love your little round cheeks and bouncing brown curls. I love it when your hair is pulled tightly in a bun on top of your head with a big bow holding it in place. I admire your twirls and shasays as you dance about the house like you own it. "Sister" It'll never get old hearing you say it....