Category: Fiction

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

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And Iglesia and Rogers hastened down the service corridor (passing a huge bubbling samovar) in a direction that might as well be called (except for folks who are fussy about that sort of thing)…..east.

And Abraham and Rogers hastened down the badly lit, industrial puke green colored service corridor in a direction that was, well,….if you stipulate that Iglesia and Rogers are heading ….east. Then it could only be said that Abraham and Rogers were heading…..west.

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

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If there was one thing Abe was good at, it was following orders. The fact that this was one of those kind of “if you want to live, do this now” orders, just made his reaction that much faster. And it was. It was unmistakable in Rogers’ voice. And he was running as fast as he could through the long prairie grass. He had been trained well and so didn’t look back until he was at full speed. He was expecting choppers. There were no choppers. So, he didn’t bother with trees or cover. Just ran flat out. Reaching out with his senses for any sound behind him and any ambush ahead or being flanked from the sides. As always in these kind of deals….he was waiting for a bullet in the back. But he had learned long ago that you can’t cringe and run fast at the same time.

He missed his suit and helmet, dammit! He would have to do this one…whatever the hell it was, without the crutch of technology. And, apparently without Rogers…who was nowhere to be seen.

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode and previous pertinent episode

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He had never been much for tea….but he had to admit, as he sat beneath the cottonwood canopy next to the pretty little pond, at a ridiculously fragile looking ornate tea table, on a wire chair….that this was delicious. Beneath the bold flavors it was very delicate and, what was the word….dainty. When he picked up a cucumber sandwich and took a small bite, he noticed in disgust that his pinkie was sticking out.

“So, whose throat do you want me to slit?”

It was nice to see Rogers flinch a little.

“I am afraid what we have in mind is a bit more involved than simple …vivisection, Abraham.”

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

“You don’t know what I value. And I promise you, anything you have to offer me I will do my godammdest best not to want. You can’t bribe me Slim.” But she didn’t mean it and they both knew it.

It was his turn to stare at her.

“How” she said.

“Pardon me? I am not quite sure I comprehend your meaning.”

“How, how will you do……it?”

She had stopped being quite so suddenly scared….at the prospect of getting what she wanted most….and her anger was starting to build heat out of that cold place she had gone to when she realized…very much against her will, that he did have the goods, that he did have what she wanted, that it was she who was going to have to deal. Yeah, the heat of the anger was replacing the coldness real well now, thank you. She loved her anger. This wasn’t the first time it had been the only source of warmth in her life.

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

“My suit is immaterial, the…”

“No it’s not immaterial, it’s shitty material.”

“The important…”

“The color sucks too.”

“…thing is what you were brought here to do, and making sure you are prepared to do it. I cannot begin to even think how to stress it enough to you….”

“I want to talk to your manager.”

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

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“I can most definitively assure you,” Rogers said, “That I am neither God nor Mohamed. Just a humble” smirk “servant, here to assist you in whatever small way I possibly can, within my meager abilities” smirk.

She was very proud of herself for not trying to punch him again, when he did that smirky thing he did. She looked down and saw that she had barely spilled any of her tea when she restrained herself, too.

She was almost positive now that the Indian accent was fake. It was just too stereotypical to be real.

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode and previous pertinent episode.

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There was no blood on her scalp, no cut, but there was blood in her eye. But, she wasn’t completely stupid. She got up and walked over to him, hands at her side and open to show non-hostile intent. She was lying of course, but it seemed to work, and he didn’t react to her approach. In fact he put down his teacup and picked up the tray of cakes and offered it. Instead of accepting, she made her right hand into a fist at her side, but with the index finger pointing out stiffly. She raised it slowly, not certain why she was being so cautious, since he had never actually hurt her. Huh. As he proffered the tray full of cakes, she poked him lightly in his midsection, right above the pockets of his waistcoat. He was solid, his flesh felt like and yielded like any other flesh. She poked him again, harder, just to be sure. As she withdrew her hand she shifted her right foot back slightly….and then let go with her best Bruce Lee: One Inch Punch.  

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

When he woke up, before he opened his eyes, he smelled tea. And cedar. And he was supposed to be meditating damn it, not sleeping.

Shit.

He smelled where the tea was coming from, stood up facing the other way and started walking away from the tree again. He didn’t look over when he was getting up and he didn’t look back as he walked away.  

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

Abraham got up off of the grass and started walking, he had no reason to, and saw no purpose in, ever stopping.

Tears were streaming down his face and he could not remember ever feeling so sorry for himself. And he could not remember ever acknowledging that he felt sorry for himself…while feeling sorry for himself. That’s how sorry for himself he felt.

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode

He opened his eyes when he smelled tea.

He looked beneath the branch he was sitting on and their was a man in a sort of floppy tweed suit sitting at a table with a white linen table cloth and a silver tea service and a plate of …cakes. It sounded like he was humming something….Rule Britannia?

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous episode and previous pertinent episode

He woke again with the sweet and seductive smell of cedar in his nose….and the cry of a raven in his ears. His eyes opened again to the peaceful and wonder full sight of the immensely beautiful and magnificently orderly chaotic grain and texture and….taste….of the blond and tan wood. He, during his untimed sojourn here, had become so permeated and so ingrained on the wood and in the tree that he occupied, that he now experienced it on the level of an actual taste in his mouth, and not merely smell and sight. He could also tell now that the sound of water he had heard before was coming from some cataracts, or a small waterfall. He wondered how long he had been here, how long he had been sleeping. The feel of the soft leather of his strange new clothes on his skin felt wonderful and right and natural and….he just lay there…not moving…afraid to move….lest the feeling of peace and pleasure he felt right now, would flee.

(Iglesia is a serialized novel, published on Tuesdays and Saturdays at midnight ET, you can read all of the episodes by clicking on the tag.)

Previous Episode

She corralled her fear and her anger and resisted the impulse to whirl and charge. Instead she coolly and slowly brought her leg down from the sill, composed her face into a mask of calm and slowly turned around and casually crossed her arms across her chest and leaned back against the window sill. It wasn’t Apu. The slight man in the center of the room did have the coloring you would expect from the Indian accent, but he looked more like Ghandi than Apu, except for the funky English tweed suit that looked like something out of an old Sherlock Holmes movie. He was short, slim, bald and wearing round wire frame glasses….and had a disturbingly smug look on his face. He looked her up and down as she was looking him up and down. when he smiled (smirked???) at her, she instantly wanted to punch him.