Storytime

A short story. This was first published on figment.com. Enjoy!

The Collectors

“Is this the end, do you think?”

 Evon, the youngest of the companions by far, asked the question in earnest, although his fellows found wry amusement in his words. The blue-black night enveloped the threesome; the soft orange glow of the dying campfire forced deep, eerie shadows into their faces. Fodir looked up from the fire to stare at the boy, a crooked smile on his face. A single, cough escaped. Or it may have been a mirthless chuckle.

 “How long you been on this job?” Marco asked. “This is, what? Two missions?”

 “Three,” Evon said.

 Fodir hissed a strange, strangled laugh. “Why, you’re a regular combat veteran.”

 Evon shot the old man a fiery look and opened his mouth to retort, but Marco interrupted.

 “So you’ve been with the Service eight pay-cycles?”

 The youngster nodded.

 A dark look came over Marco’s face. “Wait until you’ve been in for eight years. Or eighty. Or longer.” He picked up a long, leafless branch to stir the dying embers. “Wait until you’ve been on the job for as long as me.”

 Evon watched the embers as they rose to join the stars. “But when I signed on, I was told that the job would only last as long as man continues to take up arms on the field of battle. Surely, he will soon see the error of his ways and there will be no more wars.”

 The older men chortled.

 “They’re still using that old line?” Fodir wheezed.

 “An old lie, but a good one,” Marco said.

 A shallow line formed between Evon’s brows.

 “What?” he asked. “What’s so funny?”

 Between gasps for breath, Fodir cough-laughed. Marco, however, fell silent, and the smile faded from his lips.

 “Nothing,” he replied. “Nothing at all.”

 Evon was certain the old men were making fun of him in some way he couldn’t understand. At times like this, he hated being the junior member of the Collections Crew. Silence fell between the men once more, and Evon, feeling that he was the butt of their unknown joke, seethed in silence. Staring first at one craggy face, then the other, resentment grew in him until he felt that if he didn’t get out of there, he would end up saying something that he might regret later.

 Pushing up from the dead log on which he was sitting, Evon announced, “I’m going for a walk.”

 “Don’t go too far,” Marco said. “It’s nearly time.”

 The boy didn’t answer, but continued walking toward the wood. “Don’t know who they think they are,” Evon mumbled as he stepped over a tree root that buckled up in the trail. “Think they’re so smart. Think they know so much. Well, I know a thing or two, myself. After all, I was Chosen. Out of all the villagers who died in the battle, I was chosen.” Another exaggerated step as he climbed over a fallen tree. “That means something. That has to mean something.”

 An arm locked hard around his chest and shoulders. The breath was knocked out of him as he was pulled back hard against a leather breastplate. His eyes focused on the blade that flashed in the moonlight. The edge settled against his neck. He knew the man could not kill him, but he could cause a great deal of pain, something Evon wished to avoid, if at all possible.

 “Speak one word and it will be your last,” came the warning in his ear. “Do you understand me, flatlander?”

 Evon nodded almost imperceptibly.

 “How many are you?” the gravelly voice demanded.

 A sharp intake of breath was the only sound Evon dared to make. He couldn’t answer, not without taking the risk that the knife would find he vein.

 “I said, ‘How many are you?’” The speaker tightened his hold, crushing the boy’s chest more forcefully.

 Evon squeezed the answer from his throat in a hoarse whisper. “Three. We are three.”

 “Three,” the voice repeated. As he spoke, his grip loosened and the tension that held the blade so dangerously close eased. “And you have been sent ahead to spy, boy?”

 “N-no. I needed some air.”

 “You lie. You sleep under the stars. Air is all about you.”

 Evon considered this.

“Maybe I didn’t need air, but a moment away from the company.”

 “Very likely. The company you keep — the company of flatlanders — is poor company, indeed.” The man was quiet for a moment. Then, as suddenly as he had been taken, Evon was released. His captor, a tall man of half-life years, stepped in front of him. When he spoke next, his eyes bored intently into those of the boy. “If you do not care for your companions, boy, you should seek company more suited to your temperament. Perhaps you would find our cause more suitable. One as young as you may not have heard the untainted facts. Shall I take you to the fire, where you can hear of our grievances against the flatlanders?”

 Finding courage now, Evon answered. “But you are mistaken, sir. I am not a flatlander. I am a Collector.”

 “A collector? On whose side do you fight?”

 “I do not fight, sir. My only job is to Collect.”

 “And what is it that you collect, boy?”

 “That which with every man must eventually part.”

 The man’s dark eyes narrowed.

 “You’re a scavenger? A vulture who lives on the tragedies of others?”

 “No. Nothing like that. I simply Collect what is lost.”

 The soldier opened his mouth to speak again, but something behind the boy caught his attention. Shoving Evon to the ground, the man screamed as he raised his blade and swung it around. The arc of his sword halted as it met flesh and dug in. The face of an attacking flatlander, so full of fury, transformed — first to surprise, then to resignation — at the blade’s entry into his gut. He fell hard to the ground, dropping his battle axe as the sword delivered his fate.

 Evon’s captor, breathing deep, stood shaking. Three deep breaths. Then, his jaw set firm, the soldier raised his weapon once more and drove it into the wounded man’s heart.

 The deed was done. Evon rose and moved to the side of the dying man.

 “Here. Boy. What are you doing?”

 “I must do my duty,” the child said as he knelt next to the man. “I must Collect.” With that, Evon’s tiny hand touched the forehead of the man, who released his final breath and was gone. When Evon pulled his hand back, golden motes floated upward. He watched as they rose to join the stars.

 The soldier stared at the boy, the boy at the soldier.

 “I Collect,” was all that he said.

 ***

“This has to be it, right? They’re calling it the War to End All Wars. This has to be our last assignment,” said the new recruit.

 The old men sitting around the campfire chortled. The small boy, who was standing beyond its glow, stepped forward.

 “Why don’t you tell me that one again in about a century,” said Evon.

The Wait is Over...

Last weekend, I blogged about how my novel had been with an agent for over four months and that I was just waiting for some kind of replay. Well, the reply came in today, and the search is not over. The agent passed. It was a personalized rejection note with a couple of pointers as to why she didn't accept it. I'm going to take those pointers into consideration. If she took the time to give me advice, I should definitely consider it.

And so, it's back to the list to find a new name and start all over again. For those of you who are keeping score, that's five rejections and no acceptances. But I'm okay with it. Really. There are so many agents out there and such a broad range of tastes that I'm sure someone is going to love it!

Reflections on a Tragedy

September 11, 2001. I remember it as a crisp, slightly overcast day. Of course, my memory may be playing tricks on me. I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that it was raining, or that it was sunny and 105F, or that there was a blizzard and twelve inches of snow. Some of the details are fuzzy.

But other things I remember as clearly as if they happened yesterday. I was teaching class at Emerson Alternative High School, in my very large classroom on the second floor. In my English class, a group of misfits and mischief makers of all ages and abilities from all over the city were working on their individualized assignments while I was discussing the history of computers with a group of more-or-less enthusiastic academic team members. A perfectly normal start to a perfectly normal day.

Until one of my students arrived late. I started to ask her for her admit slip, but when I looked at her face, I could see something was seriously wrong.

She looked at me and the first words out of her mouth were: "Why did they drive that plane into that building?"

I had trouble processing what she asked. Plane? Building? What?  Nothing she said made any sense. I found my voice and asked, "What building?"

"The building. The big building!" she said, gesticulating wildly. She was obviously shaken, and she wasn't the sort of girl who was easily ruffled. "It's on the TV," she added, pointing to the wall-mounted television in the classroom.

So we turned it on and watched. Watched as the live feed showed the aftermath of the first plane hitting the first tower. Watched as the second tower was hit. Watched as the reports came in from the Pentagon and from a field in Pennsylvania. Watched as a man jumped to his death. Watched as the buildings tumbled to the ground, again and again, on what seemed to be a continuous instant replay loop. Watched in stunned silence. Watched in horror.

We watched with tears in our eyes and pain in our hearts.

Because we knew what this meant. Better than most people in the country, the people of Oklahoma City knew what it meant to be attacked by a terrorist. We had lived through the pain and the chaos and the months and years of rebuilding our lives. We knew what the people of New York were facing. And we knew that our tragedy was miniscule compared to theirs.

It's September 11th again and I find myself trying once more--and failing miserably--to ignore and forget and hide away from the obvious. Try as I might to ostrich, the elephant sneaked into the room, and now I have to deal with all its leavings.

On this day, as on all days, I wish for peace.

Waiting...

I'm going to share a little secret, something I haven't told many people in the electronic world. As most of you know, I am trying to break into the writing business--trying to become a publish author. Preferably a New York Times best-selling author with a huge bank account, a comfortable home with an indoor Olympic-sized swimming pool, and multiple bidding wars over my next project. (Hey. A girl can dream, can't she?) But for now, I'll just settle for published.

As most of you probably know, the publishing world is undergoing some growing pains, with drastic and sometimes frustrating changes occurring on a near-daily basis. Traditional publishers are changing the rules to try to keep up with the invasion of e-books. Traditional bookstores are failing left and right. E-pulishers, while the new kids on the block, seem to be the current Big Dogs, and everyone is scrambling to get on the bandwagon.

One of the changes that has been lurking in the background for the last few years has come to the fore recently. Namely, that most traditional publishers will not even look at unsolicited manuscripts. A lot of editors don't keep slush piles anymore. They prefer that the manuscripts they look at have been vetted by agents, and preferably by agents who know the editor's needs and tastes.

For the last several months, I have been in search of an agent for my completed manuscript. I've sent out the query letter and waited for the response, hoping to be able to send the entire manuscript. An author has to hope that he or she has written the Magic Query Letter--one that will entice the agent to invite the author to submit the entire manuscript. The first agency I sent it to was having a strange, but fun, little contest and my manuscript was a part of that for ten days before it was eliminated. The second agent had my query letter for a week before she declined. Potential agents three and four each rejected it within 24 hours.

Then, back in May, Agent Number Five invited me to send my manuscript to her. I sent it immediately. And then, I waited. And waited. And waited. At the nine-week mark, I sent a follow-up, just to make sure the manuscript had arrived and was in the queue. Yes, I was assured, she had received the manuscript. Her reading pile was simply overwhelming at the time, but please be patient and she'd get back with me.

As of today, I'm still waiting for a reply. I'm not sure how I should feel about this.

Part of me thinks it's a good thing: a first time writer whose manuscript is good enough for an agent to keep for over four months. I would like to believe that the agent has a minion who has read and recommended it, and that it's just sitting on the pile, waiting for the agent herself to okay it. At least, that's what I want to believe.

Another part of me wonders if this is normal. How long is too long? How long does a writer have to wait on average? Is this agent a bit overworked, and if so, will she be able to represent me well if she decides to take me on as a client? Or does she already have so many clients that she can't represent any by the high-profile authors well?

Still another part of me wants to just sit back and let nature take its course. If it's going to happen, it will happen. If not, well, there are a lot of other agents in the sea.

And there's always e-publishing.