UNEDITED

QBBS Merideth Reynolds

Giannini walked into the little kitchenette she shared with Sia. It was a nice two bedroom, two bath suite often referred to as a roommate plan on earth. The kitchen, living room, and dining room were situated in the middle between the two bedrooms. She had the room without the ensuite bath, since she was the neater of the two women and would keep it cleaner for guests. Giannini opened the little refrigerator they had, which had technology for cooling that she was completely in awe of, and snagged a bottle of beer.

She looked at the little label that All Guns Blazing had placed on the beer and raised an eyebrow. It said that it had a hint of berry in it. She reached to her right and opened a drawer, grabbing a bottle opener to pop off the cap. She tossed the cap into a bag with the others.

She would take all of the other bottle caps back to the guys when the bag was full. She walked into the living room, sat on the couch and grabbed a tablet to turn on the news. She took a sip of her beer and had to admit that it did have a nice hint of berries. She turned the beer bottle around to look at the label again and reviewed the different contents.

It was raspberry that they used in this recipe, or at least that’s what they claimed on the label. Knowing Bobcat, William, and Marcus, it could be anything. So long as it tasted like berries to Bobcat, it probably went on the label that way.

She picked the tablet back up and scrolled through the different channels that were available from both the internal options, and those from the Yollin networks which would be translated. While she could ask the entertainment E.I. to choose a station, she still preferred to review the information in text form and pick one herself.

Giannini noticed that when one of her favorite Yollin newscasters had a special on, and asked the E.I. to turn on channel twenty-two. The suite’s projector turned on, and a nice forty-eight-inch picture appeared on the wall opposite her.

She took another sip of her beer as she watched the news about another public riot on the television.

R’Chkoklet, Planet Yoll

The young female Yollin reporter turned to view the camera. “Hello, this is Pehl-eck, and I am reporting from the town of R’Chkoklet, in the upper Caste Business Zone. As my camera person pans to the five-story building over my shoulder, you will notice there is a mob of protesters throwing stones at the building and shouting slogans at those inside. It seems there was a violent outburst here just hours ago. Some of the upper caste members have refused to accept the edicts coming from the Etheric Empire. When an individual who would, traditionally, be a lower caste member refused the commands of three previously upper caste members, in a small breakfast shop this morning, they grabbed him and pulled him out into the street. Then, it’s reported, they kicked him over and over again, leaving him severely injured. Others nearby, I understand, called in medical, and they were able to provide him care. The one who was attacked suffered multiple head wounds and cracks throughout his chest and arms as he tried to protect himself. These upper caste members are shouting against Empress Bethany Anne, who challenged and defeated our alien infested King just mere weeks ago. The whole revolution has upended our religious and societal understandings as many of those at the top are contending that the video of the King was faked. They are also accusing those of us in the news for supporting the overthrow and are critical of us giving our support to the aliens. There has been a lot of strain between caste members as all Yollins seek new equilibrium in our relationships with each other.”

Pehl-eck ducked her head when a large explosion reverberated down the street from the building behind her. Turning, she gasped in shock when she saw the destruction wrought by those inside the building. It appeared that they had used military weapons on the rioters surrounding them. There were now bodies lying in the street as screams of pain and fright could be heard all the way from her location.

She put a hand up to her mouth and continued reporting. “Oh my God! The upper caste members have attacked the rioters around their building! This is no longer merely an angry group of people yelling insults and throwing stones at each other. This is now a war zone!”

Pehl-eck turned back to the camera. “We all know that changes in society can be hard, however, what will be done to those that refuse the edicts coming down upon us? That is an open question that I would like to ask the Empress of the humans. What are you going to do to those members in the upper castes that refuse to accept that all Yollins are equal?”

Pehl-eck waved a hand, the gesture encompassing the building and the dead and injured people behind her. “Will there be any justice for these people? Or is this something that we Yollins will have to figure out ourselves?”

FROM MICHAEL >>>  Ok, I’ve just dropped 3 chapters in 2 days to Stephen, and will be finished w/ Chapter 20 in about 2 hours of writing tomorrow morning.  Then, I hope to start Chapter 21, have lunch with Author Richard Fox, then finish chapter 21 before going to meet friends from California for dinner and a show.  Then, Chapter 22 and (I hope) Chapter 23 finished by the time I fly back home on Wednesday night.  That means 24 by Thursday and 25 by Friday at the latest (the last chapter.)

While the edits are finalized, I’m going to try and figure out how to insert some artwork into the book.  I have some art pieces of some of the aliens, and I’d like to have them in the book (specifically as small images in the front of the chapter.)  We shall see how effective I am on that 😉

New Effort to draw in readers from a metric SH#T ton of Sci-Fi authors.

Annnndddd Four Free Books right off the bat.

As any of you know, I am a huge supporter of sharing authors.  Justin and I were approached to join in an effort to cross promote a BUNCH of sci-fi authors.  Typically, I’m not huge into these things – but Justin IS huge into it and I frankly like a lot of the authors taking part in the first and second effort.  Felix R. Savage is in the 20BooksTo50k Group along with Richard Fox (who I mentioned above), I like Jay Allan’s work and check out many others.

SO…

If you would like a shot at a bunch of free books, some of the signed copies, you can sign-up for the giveaway chance- and share your email – with a metric sh#t-ton of awesome sci-fi authors including:

This IS a chance for some of these authors to email you, so do be aware of that.

If you would like to learn more, just click here: http://www.scifibridge.com

MORE TO COME!

Michael

UNEDITED

QBBS Merideth Reynolds

Tabitha opened the door to her suite and strode in, calling out for her roommate, “Anne?”

She walked over to the kitchen table and dropped off her tablet. Turning around, she noticed Anne coming out of her room. She seemed better than when Bethany Anne had brought the young woman to stay with her. Sure enough, Jinx, one of Asher’s and Bellatrix’s young puppies, came scooting out of Anne’s room a moment later.

“Hey R2, what’s up?” Anne turned around and dipped down with her arms held open, Jinx jumped into her arms while Tabitha shook her head. Now that she was on the receiving end of playful nicknames, as she would commonly do with Barnabas, it could be quite annoying from those much younger than oneself. Saint Payback, truly was a bitch.

“It’s not R2, it’s not Ranger Two, it’s not Queen’s Ranger Two, it’s not just ‘2’, the name is Tabitha. It’s also not Tabby, with a ‘y’ or Tabbi with an ‘i’.”

She eyed the young woman.

“How about Tabbie with an ie?” Anne smiled, wondering what the Ranger would say next.

“If a few of the Tonto’s and I didn’t need to leave shortly, I would make you eat those questions. Further, I don’t think you have enough bruises on your body for the amount of workout time that you’ve been spending.” Tabitha raised an eyebrow as she looked up and down the teenager.

Anne quickly shook her head. “Nope, workout time won’t be necessary. Tabitha is what you want to be called? Tabitha is what you will get. As for the bruises–” She waved a hand up and down her body “–Bethany Anne suggested that as a researcher, I needed to know self-defense, but did not have to work out as hard as all of the rest.”

Tabitha drew her eyebrows together. “Is that the truth?”

Anne looked at her roommate and bit her lip, finally deciding to nod her head in the affirmative.

Bethany Anne?

What is it number two?

Tabitha rolled her eyes before responding, Is it true that you told Anne she didn’t need to work so hard on her physical training because she was going to be doing research?

No, have you ever known me to suggest such a thing?

No, I haven’t. So, you can imagine my surprise when your new Etheric Researcher suggested that this was exactly what you had said.

Huh, so my new Etheric Researcher is acting all teenagerish, am I understanding you correctly?

That’s the way it appears.

Okay, since you have to go out with the Tontos on the slave issue, I’ll make sure to take care of this with Peter. He should have some insights on recalcitrant teenagers and getting the best results out of them.

Very well, I will consider this a closed issue.

Bethany Anne added, You can let her know that Peter is going to have new instructions, from me, when she is due for her training session three hours from now.

Will do, my Queen, have a great one.

You, too. Go kick some pirate ass.

Tabitha smiled. Oh, I intend to, this ought to be a hoot.

Make sure you say hello to the Twins for me.

Tweedledee and Tweedledum? I’ll let them know.

Bethany Anne cut the connection between the two of them. Tabitha raised an eyebrow. “Bethany Anne says that Peter will have new instructions for your workout when you see him in three hours.”

“Three hours!” Anne’s face opened up in shock. “I’m supposed to be meeting a couple of friends over in the library in three hours.”

“I suggest … next time that you do the workouts that you were told to do, instead of trying to get out of them. I especially suggest …” Tabitha reached up and tapped the side of her head ” … not lying to one of the Queen’s Rangers who can talk to Bethany Anne directly.”

Anne’s eyes closed when she realized her mistake, she turned around and then kicked the air in the direction of the couch. “God, it was so much easier getting away with stuff when it was only my mom and dad.”

Tabitha pursed her lips, “I understand you’re doing well with your dad now, is that right?”

Anne turned back around to face her roommate. “Yes, we spoke a couple of weeks ago, and he apologized for not intervening with mom when she got so upset with me all of the time. He says that mom is going to take a little while in the therapy sessions before she’s going to try to connect again with me.” Anne shrugged. “I’m okay with it all now, but it was pretty scary in the beginning when I thought I’d be on the outs my parents.”

Tabitha walked over to the young woman and put an arm around her shoulder and pulled her in for a hug. “You don’t need to worry about that. Your parents will forgive you, no matter what the problems are. You might just have to give it some time before it happens. They love you, but your mom was under some incredible strain and she broke. That’s nothing against her, and really, it helped a whole lot. Now, we understand classes needed to be created for those of us who aren’t coping as well as we had hoped, once we left Earth. Some of us get so involved with the next goal, we forget that a lot of those who are supporting us right now are maybe having their own troubles and difficulties.”

Anne mumbled a response into Tabitha’s chest, “Brgrlfllrrrckraghen.”

Tabitha pulled away and looked down at the teenager. “What did you say?”

Anne smiled. “I said, ‘I can’t breathe!’” Anne pulled Tabitha back in for a hug before releasing her. “I know that now, but it was pretty scary when the Queen emancipated me in the first place. I’m super excited to be working on the Etheric research, and it’s kind of cool that I sometimes get to talk to my dad about it as well.”

Tabitha turned and started walking to her own room in the suite. “Well, he did all of that work with that stupid black-ops shell company, so some of this is not that far out from what he was working on.”

Her voice came from inside her room, “So, who knows, maybe you and your father will be famous researchers into Etheric Travel!”

Tabitha didn’t see the small tear that Anne reached up and wiped away.  She waited a moment to get her emotions in order. “Maybe? That would be pretty rad.”

FROM Michael >>>  I’m presently up in the air, about … Well, hell if I know…. Wait a minute..

Ok, 32,994 feet it looks like.

I put up my laptop, and decided to try and take a nap. But then a “oh shit” happened.  As in, “Oh shit, I forgot to put up a snippet!”

Pull out the laptop, click on GoGoInflight and grab 30 minutes of internet connectivity and BOOM BABY!  Yeah, I’m uploading a snippet.

Why yes, I AM the shizzz.  (Shit, I hope that is spelled right!)

Actually, I say that, but I feel bad because I could have done this while waiting at the airport, but forgot.  So, for those who are reading this on Saturday, I’m sorry!

For those who have purchased Joey Anderle’s second book (or first!) I wanted to let you know he ALMOST pulled off a $100.00 day!  He got to about $99.52 I think.

SO CLOSE.

He also got under 1,200 in the store (meaning, he was so close to being in the top 1,000 books being sold for that hour, a HUGE hallmark for any author, anywhere.)

For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, my youngest son (17 years old) started his author efforts with his own series in December with The Courier Chronicles. In it, he has built a fun universe that I would happily read if I wasn’t the ‘beta reader’ for it in the first place…

As in, “Dad, I’ve written another 500 words…” and then his Macbook Air from 2010 is shoved in front of my face.  Talk about early author anxiety, he certainly has it.

I told him back when he released book 00 that I would support his efforts and tell all of my fans everywhere and call in a few favors AFTER he released his second book.  Because, that would tell me he was dedicated to doing more stories.

And, I’m happy to say I think he has done a pretty fine job. (But then, I’m his Dad….so?)

THIS IS HIS SECOND BOOK BELOW  (Book 00 – his first book – is here: Her Royal Runner)

The Messengers Menagerie (The Courier Chronicles Book 1)

It was supposed to be a simple weekend job…

Just protect Her Royal Princess Auralee from harm.  

Now, Sterling Booker Wells hasn’t been in charge of her for 24 hours and they have already busted up one effort on her life, and even worse, there is a crossbow bolt hole in Alphonse’s prized, painstakingly accurate, exquisitely restored, vintage replica of Steve McQueen’s 1968 Mustang from the hit movie Bullitt.

However, Booker argues in his defense, the Princess hasn’t suffered a scratch.

The Messengers Menagerie continues the first weekend when Sterling Booker Wells meets the Royal Elven Princess Auralee, what (else) could possibly go wrong?

How about a new crew sent to do him in?

And the Princess who will be by his side.

Join runner Sterling Booker Wells as he attempts to keep the Elven Princess out of harm’s way…

Again.

CHECK IT OUT ON AMAZON RIGHT HERE! (US STORE)