Release the Dogs of War

by Michael Anderle

  Time to wake up, Joshua Guildenstern.

  Joshua’s eyes flew open to see a woman sitting across from him.

  “What the hell?” He turned to look around, but found himself in the airplane as expected. His bag was missing from the seat beside him. “You can’t be here, it’s impossible!”

  “Oh, but I’m here,” she told him.

  A man came from the front of the airplane and Joshua looked up to call his pilot, but found himself looking at a man he didn’t recognize. “Who the hell are you?”

  The man smiled malevolently at him, “I’m the Queen’s Ranger, Barnabas.”

  “Who?” Joshua practically squeaked, “Ranger?” He started to stand up when the woman lashed out with a kick and shattered his kneecap. Joshua screamed in pain and dropped back into his seat, trying to cradle his knee.

  “The defendant wasn’t told he could stand up,” she admonished him, “In fact, the defendant is only here for the punishment phase, the trial has already happened.”

  Joshua bit down on his pain, “You can’t be here!” He looked around, “You weren’t here before we took off!”

  She turned in her chair, “Did you hear that, Barnabas? Apparently, your ability to play with memories is impossible.”

  “What?” Joshua tried to make sense out of the two of them talking.

  She turned back to Joshua, “Your useless organization was created in seventeen seventy-six. Barnabas was born hundreds of years before that.” She looked over to the strange man as she spoke. Joshua tried to look back and forth between them, but a sudden stab of pain got his attention. It was then he noticed she had a well-dressed shoe pushing on his kneecap. He tried to slap it away, but it was gone, and all he accomplished was twisting his own leg.

  He wanted to cry, but grown men didn’t cry.

  “Pay attention,” He looked up to see she held his treasured hard drive, “We appreciate you grabbing this, ADAM, our pilot at the moment, will enjoy reviewing the information and finally pulling apart everything your perverted group has tried to create.” She tossed the drive to the other man, who caught it easily. Joshua was watching the catch when she snapped fingers in front of his face, startling him to turn towards her.

  “You have no idea how badly I want to cause you untold pain, pain that wracks you for years. Something, by the way, I could easily accomplish,” she told him. Joshua’s eyes widened as she put a hand up in front of her face and the two of them watched as one of her fingers grew a black nail three inches long. “Pain of just a few cuts, with rubbing alcohol, I don’t even need to use nanites to waste your body.”

  Both of them were mesmerized by the ebony gleam of her nail in the light of the cabin before it slowly receded, leaving a typical finger and she looked at his face again. “But, alas, I’m not allowed to fall into the cycle of retribution that my feelings call for, so I cannot, must not, do that which I crave.”

  Joshua’s face was covered in sweat now, beads of liquid starting to slip down the surface of his cheeks.

  “So, I’m here to let the Ranger do what he chooses to do. I’m here to tell you that you stole my love from me, you guilty fucking savage. May you rot in HELL!” She hissed at him, her eyes flaring red at the end. She stood up quickly, turned away, and walked towards the front of the plane.

  Joshua turned to the man and tried to smile, but Ranger’s face was a mask. And that mask was the essence of promised pain, pain that was coming, coming for him.

  “Hello Joshua, my name is Barnabas,” he started, “while it is true that Bethany Anne is limited in what she can do…” eyes turned red and fangs grew out of his mouth, as he finished,

  “I am not…”

  —-

  An hour later, as Joshua’s Learjet flew towards the islands, two figures disappeared off of the plane to appear in a closet on a small island just east of Miami, in Key Biscayne.

  The man needed to take a shower, to remove massive quantities of blood.

  The woman would seek the screams she had heard on the plane in the lonely nights, when her empty arms and heart ached in loss, to feel the satisfaction of justice in her memories.

  Now, she still had one to find. If it meant she tore up a country to locate the bitch?

  Then so be it.

  The Etheric

  Johann couldn’t see in the grayness of everything. He was just about out of supplies and wasn’t sure what to do, now.

  He didn’t know the amount of time he had been staying in this one location, this one place. Occasionally, a box with supplies would appear, always in the same location every time keeping him chained to the only lifeline of food that he could discern.

  This place was a void, it existed without a sun and moon, without stars or clouds, trees or the wind, just mist.

  Just, nothing.

  He tried yelling but heard no return sounds from the grayness. It consumed his voice and gave him silence in return. He never felt anything looking at him. It was all quiet, all loneliness, all himself.

  He was trying to read the words on the box of crackers he had eaten, carefully parsing them out one at a time when he caught something in his peripheral vision.

  He turned to look in that direction and thought he might have seen a light.

  There it was again! He strained to see what it might be and looked at his meager food stash. Should he leave this area? Could he find this area again in all of the grayness?

  He looked up hurriedly to see the one light had become two, both red. Both coming at him.

  He started sweating in the cool air when he realized they weren’t lights, they were eyes.

  They were the eyes of Bethany Anne.

  Johann started grabbing what food he could, stuffing his pockets and then grabbed the fork and knife, his only weapons and turned away from the direction of the red eyes and ran.

  She had been in his dreams, promising him pain. More pain than he could possibly imagine when she came for him. He had awoken thirteen times, every time sweating and afraid.

  She was here.

  He could hear her voice in his head, drilling through his ability to think, to plan. He could only run in his fear.

  I’ve come, Johann.

  Johann did his best to jog, but every time he turned around, her eyes were the same distance away, flaring red in the gray mist.

  I’VE COME! She screamed into his psyche.

  Johann bolted upright, his heart beating wildly, his clothes soaked in sweat as he looked around in desperation trying to slow his breathing. The remains of his food were stacked in a pile near him.

  “God!” He cried out weeping, wiping his red eyes, “What is the bitch doing to me?” he spoke out to the nothingness.

  Like always, it never replied.

  Johann used his dirty shirt to wipe off his face as he crawled to the food stash and opened the cracker box. He pulled out six crackers and started eating the first, a tiny nibble at a time. He reached over to pick up the cardboard piece he was using to figure out how many times he slept. He used his fingers to tear another small rip in the piece. He grabbed another cracker and started counting the little rips.

  His face turned ashen in the gray light.

  There were thirteen.

  AUTHOR NOTES - June 26th, 2016 - One month after the previous books release.

  Hello again!

  It’s the end of June, 2016 and this is the TENTH book you are reading…Well, if you didn’t read the short stories (which you totally should, because they are kick ass!) Either way THANK YOU.

  It is due to your continued reading, enjoying and feedback that these stories still make it out each month. That it is WORTH doing each month. Because, without your reading, what’s the point? Without your support, where would the extra energy come from to keep this crazy schedule going?

  My challenges this month were different than previously. I was having a serious issue with trying to pull together the threads, the arcs if you will, for this book. I have a great friend by the name of
Kat Lind who happens to be an Industrial Psychologist among many other degrees, and she helped talk me through some of my issues.

  Thankfully.

  I am a visual person, I like to think in images (as I’m learning) and I didn’t have an image for this book. Oh, I could do a bunch of explosions (kind of got that out of my system in Bitch’s Night Out - sorry). But, I wanted to lead the direction towards so much more while still destroying a few people along the way. Just, not individually every time. Plus, the desire to introduce the next big thing…MORE KURTHERIANS…Mwuhahahahahahaha…

  <*cough* *cough* *ach*, Ugh, furball>

  Sorry, I got ahead of myself there.

  Bethany Anne, how I wanted to just let her rip and tear and destroy and kill and so on and so on. The problem with that, is she is constrained by her role and the expectations that others have on her as much as she is constrained by her personal desires. Well, the logical personal desires, not so much the emotional ones. Plus, who wants to read a book of just killing and more killing? (Yes, my hand is up, But I don’t count.)

  There is a LOT going on. We have the Queen’s Rangers now and I can say that I didn’t plan that at all. When I was typing the “what am I going to do with you, Barnabas?” from Bethany Anne, I was really talking out loud to myself, what the hell am I going to do with you??? So, that was a new thing and I loved how it is working out with Tabitha.

  That brings up a good point. You know that story that we are going to read in about 4 or 5 weeks? Next month or so? SUED FOR PEACE. Yeah, neither of us know what is in that book, yet. No kidding, no lying - just truth. No f#cking clue. Well, except Stephanie Lee, Kurtherians, China, Politics and a ‘Fucking HUGE’ spaceship.

  Speaking of big-ass spaceship. Sorry on the cover!

  I seriously thought we were going to have that scene in this book, but it ended up with a submarine pulled out of the water like a fish. They just couldn’t get the ship done in time. Which, I completely realize sounds wierd.

  My bad.

  Then, the episodes with the ladies talking. Hell, that was so much fun! I did have some concerns when I wrote that, so I asked some fantastic ladies to look it over to make sure I didn’t go too far with their talking. These are older ladies, grandmothers full of decorum in fact.

  They told me I didn’t go far enough.

  Wow, I have some more learning to do, apparently.

  I look forward to kicking a piece of China’s ass. A lot of those assholes are doing EVERYTHING I point to in my books. They are stealing company secrets and using them. They are placing hidden spy software in the hardware we buy from their companies and while I admire it from a survival of the fittest mentality, it pisses me off because it is just wrong. Like, ethically wrong. Their leaders are morally bankrupt. Not exactly the type of people you want to face the future of our world alongside. Not that we have a choice. Oh well, maybe another future is coming for us, not the dystopian one I can imagine. Remember, China’s leaders are thinking and implementing plans for fifty to a hundred years in the future. Their descendents finishing stuff they start now. Damned impressive.

  Our leaders can’t think beyond the next election.

  Oh, speaking of ‘imagine.’

  Imagine that something goes wrong with all of the computers, a cyber-war is unleashed, in fact. Civilization implodes because our interconnectedness across countries, reliance on technology and inability to procure fuel, food and parts incites such a civil disturbance that we damn near kill ourselves across the globe.

  Those spy satellites up above us? Useless. Most power systems have melted due to the cyber-warefare fought.

  Now, imagine a person finds himself brought back to reality, having fought for a hundred years to break free from another dimension, one he used, but didn’t have near the affinity to use like one he loved.

  The one he needed to find because she had left the Earth a hundred years or so before. Before this time had happened. She had made sure the Earth was safe, and was still protecting it, even if she was unaware of the present issues.

  She’s out there, among the stars.

  Now imagine this man had to force the world to his will to drive it back from the edge of the catastrophic results of their stupidity. Whether they wanted to make his future happen or not.

  The Dark Messiah - The Second Dark Ages will be arriving this winter. He has a promise to fulfill and he will help, or destroy, any who dare come between him and fulfilling his promise to her.

  Because, whether it happens that day, or a hundred years in the future or more, Michael will fulfill his promise.

  A promise even Death has learned to respect.

  ——

  Now, for something completely different. I decided I wanted to see about giving a few Kindle Fire’s ($50) away to some Readers who are presently serving in the Military. I thought, how cool would that be to give away four of those? I get to support both readers AND some members in the military which I love. I have a lot of military fans, and quite a few who are helping me put these books together with their insights and corrections and stuff.

  Then, I found out (thanks!) a Kindle Fire sucks for reading on base out in the sun, it’s heavy, it has poor battery life etc. etc. So, I asked about the next higher one. Then, I asked which Kindle would be best to give away to active military or vets who are interacting with me on Facebook and received their input.

  The answer, it seems, is the $210 Kindle Paperwhite 300PPI with Wi-Fi and 3G.

  That was a little bit of a surprise. A tad more than I was budgeting and frankly made me swallow once or twice. That was until I said ‘fuck it!’ and decided I was going to do it.

  And I did. The first Paperwhite to give away is right here with me as I’m typing this. But, here is the problem, how do we figure out who wins the first one?

  I figure a raffle is the best solution.

  Next, I’m trying to figure out how to give more of these away? I can afford four Fire’s a month right now, but I’m not so sure about four or five PaperWhite’s each month.

  So, guess what I did? I brainstormed until I think I came up with a way to make it all happen, if I can get enough support from readers (not only just Kurtherian Fans, but a lot of readers) we can make something REALLY COOL happen.

  Here is the plan - you will have to let me know if you want to get involved, the plan sucks, or whatever. Either way, I’m giving away two Paperwhites, minimum.

  This idea is to see if we can come together as readers where I support you, we support the military and I get to highlight other Indie Authors like I’ve been doing before.

  Finally (and really, really important) - Keep it self supporting (as in, it helps pay for the Kindles and the infrastructure.) I think I have an idea and this is what I’m thinking:

  1) Readers sign up for an email newsletter that promote books - Each book highlighted is from an Indie Author with prices from ARC (Please read for free, and give a review if you would - so helping complete newbie authors) to $0.00 (free) and KU and full price across multiple genre’s. Think of it more as a weekly catalog perhaps? Maybe once a week or every two weeks, depends on how much freaking work it takes for me to do it.