I have a new novella available now on Amazon, Morning Star. The story follows three friends who, trying to add a little excitement into their workday, get involved in a geopolitical nightmare.
This story turned out to be particularly difficult for me to write. While I felt I had a well developed outline and knew the direction I wanted to take the story, it became more and more difficult to actually get words down on page. After taking some time to sit and think about the story, I decided to go back and rewrite many of the scenes and changing the outcome of the plot. I had run into a wall and was left frustrated and angry, but in the end came out with something I have very happy with. I hope my readers feel the same as well.
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Morning-Star-Bill-Leviathan-ebook/dp/B013K8C35S
Here is the opening chapter:
The sun began to rise over the horizon, casting long shadows over the village. The village itself was only just beginning to stir. Some were taking their garbage out to the waste compactors, others began feeding their livestock, and others began feeding themselves and their families. Most of the village still slumbered as the chill night desert air warmed with the coming of the morning sun.
From the east, a cloud of dust could be seen rolling towards the village. The air was still, no breeze to be felt. Something was approaching the village.
“Mommy, what is that over there?”
“I’m not sure, Abigail. The waste collectors aren’t supposed to be here for another two weeks.”
The woman handed her bag of feed to the child, instructing her to continue with the morning chores, feeding the chickens and checking on the coops. The woman made her way toward the center of the village and approached a painted mud brick building in the center of a square, the largest building in the entire village. The woman knocked on the door, a thin piece of wood with crooked edges that only just fits within the door frame. The door shook and wobbled as she knocked. The shaking of the door within its frame made more noise than her knuckles pounding on the wood. No one answered.
“John, are you there? Wake up already.” the woman shouted.
The woman continued to knock on the door, looking back over her shoulder toward the approaching cloud of dust. A few moments pass, and the door opened. A man stood in doorway, nothing but a thin piece of cloth wrapped around his waist.
“Yes, Mary? What is it that you need so early in the morning?” the man said.
“John, someone is approaching the village. Do you know who it is?” Mary said.
“No, I have no idea who it is. The next scheduled arrival isn’t for another two weeks. Hold on, wait here and let me get ready real quick,” John said.
John closed the door and left Mary to wait outside. She leaned against the side of the building, looked out over toward the cloud of dust, and tried her best to determine what it was that was approaching the village. John came out through the door, dressed in a simple white tunic, and the answer still eluded Mary. They walked together down the dirt roads toward the edge of the village. John had a pair of binoculars in his hand. They walked until they were past all of the village buildings. Nothing was between them and the cloud of dust but flat, open land. John held the binoculars up to his face, and gazed off into the distance.
“What can you make out?” Mary asked.
“Not much. Whatever it is, it’s metallic. The low sun is reflecting off of it. I can’t see much through the glare,” John said.
“What do we do then?” Mary asked.
“There’s nothing we can do but wait,” John said.
Mary walked away, back towards her home to finish her morning activities, not wanting to excite her anxiety any further trying to sleuth through this new mystery. John stayed and continued to look off into the distance. It had been a month since the last outsider had passed through the village. Whoever it was that approached was driving a mechanized vehicle. No one in the village owned such a vehicle. Only the people who collected the compacted waste ever arrived on something other than animal locomotion. The planes, trains, and automobiles of the big cities had no reason to come out this far. The terrain was far too rough to drive a normal car to make the journey. The payoff too small to fly or invest in rail transport.
A half hour passed, and the vehicle was now visible to John through his binoculars. It was a large hovercraft, explaining why it was kicking so much dust up into the air. It had thick metal plating and a military insignia emblazoned across the front. It moved fast. John judged it would be at the village in no more than twenty minutes.
Nervous about the possible meaning of a military interaction, John turned around and ran toward the center of the village. As he passed by houses, he told families to head inside, to close their doors and shutter their windows. He wanted every precaution to be taken to ensure the safety of the villagers. John had made his way to the center building. The one Mary met him at before. He rang a bell, signaling to the other village leaders to meet him in the village square.
Only a few deep breaths passed for John before one man and two women had entered the square. They stood in a circle near John, waiting for an explanation.
“There is a military vehicle heading towards the village. It will be here any minute now,” John said, still catching his breath after running through the village.
“What could the military possibly want to do with our village?” asked the man to John’s right.
“I’m not sure, Adam. Has anyone left the village recently? Sarah? Rachel? Do you know of anything?” John said.
“No,” Rachel said. Adam and Sarah nodded in agreement.
“Ok, Sarah and Rachel, go around the village and make sure everyone is inside. Adam and I will wait here. We’ll do our best to greet the military,” John said.
The two women walked off in different directions to scan through the village. John and Adam waited. The military vehicle was just at the edge of the village now. It slowed as it entered the narrow passages between the mud brick buildings. It would only take a nudge from the hovercraft to reduce a home to a pile of dust. The vehicle entered the square. John and Adam shielded their faces to keep the dirt from being kicked into their eyes. The hum of the engines lowered in sound, and the vehicle descended toward the ground. After it landed, a door on the side opened, and a soldier dressed in protective body armor and a helmet stepped out. He walked toward John and Adam, both of whom extended their hands out in greeting. The soldier stood still, his arms behind his back. The other soldiers in the vehicle made their exit. John could tell by the symbols on the collar of the soldier standing in front of him that he was their commanding officer.
“Where is the village leader? I must speak with him now,” the officer said.
“Our village is run by a council with four members,” John said, “This here is Adam. My name is John, and the two others are –”
“I’ve heard enough. We’ve been sent here to search through your village,” the officer said.
“On what grounds?” Adam said.
“On the grounds that the search has been ordered by the United Military. Do you have something to hide, villager?” the officer said.
“No, we’re just –”
“Then you should have no problem cooperating with us,” the officer said.
The officer whistled. The disorganized soldiers quickly formed a line to be addressed by their officer.
“Search each and every building in this village until you find something. Leave nothing unturned. Understood?” the officer said.
“Yes, sir,” the soldiers said in unison.
The soldiers moved out in pairs, each going into a different building. They did not wait to be let in, and instead broke through the doors to make their way inside. The disturbed voices of the inhabitants could be heard. Their protests fell on deaf ears.
“Sir, please, what is the meaning of all this?” John asked.
“You don’t have a need to know,” the officer replied.
“I’m a leader in this village, and my people are confused and afraid. Who else has more of a need to know than I do?” John said.
The officer stared at John, his eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched. “We received intelligence that there is a terrorist cell operating out of this village. We are here to investigate.”
“Terrorists? That’s absurd! The people in this village have lived here their entire lives. No one comes and goes from this village. We’re isolated. We’re on our own from the rest of society. Officer, look around you. What do you see? There’s nothing in this village besides a few shabby homes and pens for our animals. What could possibly make you believe there are terrorists here?” John said.
“There is reason to believe that the perpetrators of a recent terrorist attack are hiding out here. That is all I can tell you,” the officer said.
“We haven’t seen an outsider in a month. The only people who come to this village are the waste collectors. Did you see any roads or trails on your way in here? Trust me, you aren’t going to find anything here!” John said.
A shout was heard from one of the homes. A quarrel between a woman and a soldier filled the air of the village with screams and shouts. A gunshot rang out, a moment of silence, and then the wail of a child. John ran toward the home, the officer followed behind him. A soldier stood in the doorway, blocking John’s view inside.
“What’s going on inside there, Private?” the officer said.
“Sir, there was an, uh, altercation between Williams and the woman,” the soldier said.
“What do you mean an altercation?”
“Sir, we were searching through the house and we found a sealed box hidden away in the corner under some bedding. Williams tried to open it, and the woman started yelling at him to leave it alone. The thing was nailed shut, so Williams tried to break it open. Then the woman lunged at him, and, and, uh –”
“And what Private?” the officer said coolly.
The other soldier, Williams, walked up behind the Private and said, “I shot her, sir. It was in self-defense. I thought she was attacking me.”
The officer glared at the two soldiers. His jaw tightened and his fists clenched. A man and a young child tried to make their way out of the home. The soldiers stood aside to let them pass. The man was carrying a small wooden box, nailed shut. He handed the box to John. John held the box, looked down at it, and then back up toward the officer.
“This family lost their infant son two days ago to pneumonia. This box holds his remains. He was to be buried tomorrow,” John said.
The officer grabbed the box from John and said, “Everything must be searched,” his voice harsh and quick. He threw the box onto the ground, and smashed it with the butt end of his rifle. The box cracked open and revealed the tiny body inside. Tears streamed down the faces of the man and young child. The child buried their face into the man's leg as they began to wail.
“Get everyone out of their homes and into the village square. We need to continue searching the buildings and don’t need any more incidents like this,” the officer ordered.
John made his way back to the square. The soldiers had herded everyone in. A restless commotion buzzed through the villagers. Everyone was asking what was happening to them and their village. No one had answers.
“What happened back there, John?” Adam asked.
“The soldiers were searching through Abe and Susan’s home. They were about to break into little Michael’s coffin, and Susan tried to stop them,” John's throat became tight and his voice cracked. “They, they shot her.”
“They shot her!? Is she ok? Is she still alive?” Adam said.
“No, she is not,” John said.
The conversation between John and Adam was overheard by others. News spread quickly. The villagers were stirred into a furor. They began to shout at the soldiers. “Murders!”, “Leave us alone!”, “We didn’t do anything!” The soldiers continued to move from home to home, while the officer looked over the crowd. The tension kept rising. John moved through the crowd toward the officer. He tried as best he could to calm everyone down, but to no avail. They would not hear anything he had to say. They only wanted to voice their anger and fear over the incident.
A soldier walked up to the officer and said, “Sir, we’ve searched all the buildings except for one. That stone building over there. It’s got a thick door that’s sealed shut.”
“Well, then, break down the door,” the officer said.
“No!” yelled John. “That’s the village mausoleum. A shrine to our ancestors. If you want to keep this crowd under control, you better think twice before breaking into our most sacred monument.”
The officer turned away from John toward his soldiers and said, “You have your orders.”
Four soldiers went to the mausoleum. One had a battering ram on his back, which he removed and the other soldiers all grabbed a hold of. They swung the ram back, and then thrust it into the mausoleum door. It hit with a dull thud. Some paint was chipped off, but the door itself did not budge, did not bend, and did not break. The soldiers swung again, and again, and again, all with the same result. The crowd of villagers looked on. They pushed against the remaining soldiers trying to contain them, their guns pointed towards the crowd. The soldiers were harassed with obscene shouts, gestures, and spit. The crowd slowly moved forward, the soldiers inched their way backward. They would soon run out of space to retreat to.
“How do you open this God damned door!?” the officer said.
“The door is a solid foot of stone. It's on a time lock, set to open only twice a year at each solstice,” John said.
The officer spoke to the soldiers with the ram, “Use the explosives to get in.”
The soldiers set down their ram, and went to the hovercraft. The walked back with four small bricks and a bundle of wire. They placed the bricks at each corner of the door, and began to connect them with the wire. Stones were thrown from the crowd toward the soldiers. They ducked for cover, trying their best to complete their work. One stone struck a soldier in the head, knocking him to the ground. Other soldiers turned to help him. The crowd surged past their guards, past the guns that were pointed at them. They shouted in the soldiers faces. Hands held open they beat the soldiers across their shoulders and their backs.
A shot rang out, followed by panicked screams. Then another shot, and another. The gun shots drowned out the pained wails of the villagers. The officer ran from one soldier to the next, shouting at them to cease their fire. The gun shots began to rattle down. The screaming and crying of the villagers was all that can be heard. Half the villagers laid motionless, the other half retched in horror.
The officer stood still, took in the destruction his soldiers had wrought. The soldiers waited for his next order, visibly shaken by panic. The officer paced around the edge of the carnage. After a moment, he faced his soldiers and said, “Pile up the bodies, and line up the living.”
The soldiers dutifully performed their orders. The dead were piled up in the center of the square. The living were lined up shoulder to shoulder. They faced away from the dead bodies. John was at the far left end of the line. He shouted towards the officer as his eyes filled with water, “What are you going to do to us?”
“You've left us with no choice. We can't have any witnesses.”
The officer nodded towards a group of his soldiers. They ignited their flares. They carried the flares into the buildings, lighting the furniture and roofs on fire. The poured gasoline over the pile of bodies. John knelt on the ground as he watched his village burn. He could no longer watch everything he knew go up in smoke. He closed his eyes, hoping everything would just disappear. He felt cold steel press against the back of his head.
This story turned out to be particularly difficult for me to write. While I felt I had a well developed outline and knew the direction I wanted to take the story, it became more and more difficult to actually get words down on page. After taking some time to sit and think about the story, I decided to go back and rewrite many of the scenes and changing the outcome of the plot. I had run into a wall and was left frustrated and angry, but in the end came out with something I have very happy with. I hope my readers feel the same as well.
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Morning-Star-Bill-Leviathan-ebook/dp/B013K8C35S
Here is the opening chapter:
The sun began to rise over the horizon, casting long shadows over the village. The village itself was only just beginning to stir. Some were taking their garbage out to the waste compactors, others began feeding their livestock, and others began feeding themselves and their families. Most of the village still slumbered as the chill night desert air warmed with the coming of the morning sun.
From the east, a cloud of dust could be seen rolling towards the village. The air was still, no breeze to be felt. Something was approaching the village.
“Mommy, what is that over there?”
“I’m not sure, Abigail. The waste collectors aren’t supposed to be here for another two weeks.”
The woman handed her bag of feed to the child, instructing her to continue with the morning chores, feeding the chickens and checking on the coops. The woman made her way toward the center of the village and approached a painted mud brick building in the center of a square, the largest building in the entire village. The woman knocked on the door, a thin piece of wood with crooked edges that only just fits within the door frame. The door shook and wobbled as she knocked. The shaking of the door within its frame made more noise than her knuckles pounding on the wood. No one answered.
“John, are you there? Wake up already.” the woman shouted.
The woman continued to knock on the door, looking back over her shoulder toward the approaching cloud of dust. A few moments pass, and the door opened. A man stood in doorway, nothing but a thin piece of cloth wrapped around his waist.
“Yes, Mary? What is it that you need so early in the morning?” the man said.
“John, someone is approaching the village. Do you know who it is?” Mary said.
“No, I have no idea who it is. The next scheduled arrival isn’t for another two weeks. Hold on, wait here and let me get ready real quick,” John said.
John closed the door and left Mary to wait outside. She leaned against the side of the building, looked out over toward the cloud of dust, and tried her best to determine what it was that was approaching the village. John came out through the door, dressed in a simple white tunic, and the answer still eluded Mary. They walked together down the dirt roads toward the edge of the village. John had a pair of binoculars in his hand. They walked until they were past all of the village buildings. Nothing was between them and the cloud of dust but flat, open land. John held the binoculars up to his face, and gazed off into the distance.
“What can you make out?” Mary asked.
“Not much. Whatever it is, it’s metallic. The low sun is reflecting off of it. I can’t see much through the glare,” John said.
“What do we do then?” Mary asked.
“There’s nothing we can do but wait,” John said.
Mary walked away, back towards her home to finish her morning activities, not wanting to excite her anxiety any further trying to sleuth through this new mystery. John stayed and continued to look off into the distance. It had been a month since the last outsider had passed through the village. Whoever it was that approached was driving a mechanized vehicle. No one in the village owned such a vehicle. Only the people who collected the compacted waste ever arrived on something other than animal locomotion. The planes, trains, and automobiles of the big cities had no reason to come out this far. The terrain was far too rough to drive a normal car to make the journey. The payoff too small to fly or invest in rail transport.
A half hour passed, and the vehicle was now visible to John through his binoculars. It was a large hovercraft, explaining why it was kicking so much dust up into the air. It had thick metal plating and a military insignia emblazoned across the front. It moved fast. John judged it would be at the village in no more than twenty minutes.
Nervous about the possible meaning of a military interaction, John turned around and ran toward the center of the village. As he passed by houses, he told families to head inside, to close their doors and shutter their windows. He wanted every precaution to be taken to ensure the safety of the villagers. John had made his way to the center building. The one Mary met him at before. He rang a bell, signaling to the other village leaders to meet him in the village square.
Only a few deep breaths passed for John before one man and two women had entered the square. They stood in a circle near John, waiting for an explanation.
“There is a military vehicle heading towards the village. It will be here any minute now,” John said, still catching his breath after running through the village.
“What could the military possibly want to do with our village?” asked the man to John’s right.
“I’m not sure, Adam. Has anyone left the village recently? Sarah? Rachel? Do you know of anything?” John said.
“No,” Rachel said. Adam and Sarah nodded in agreement.
“Ok, Sarah and Rachel, go around the village and make sure everyone is inside. Adam and I will wait here. We’ll do our best to greet the military,” John said.
The two women walked off in different directions to scan through the village. John and Adam waited. The military vehicle was just at the edge of the village now. It slowed as it entered the narrow passages between the mud brick buildings. It would only take a nudge from the hovercraft to reduce a home to a pile of dust. The vehicle entered the square. John and Adam shielded their faces to keep the dirt from being kicked into their eyes. The hum of the engines lowered in sound, and the vehicle descended toward the ground. After it landed, a door on the side opened, and a soldier dressed in protective body armor and a helmet stepped out. He walked toward John and Adam, both of whom extended their hands out in greeting. The soldier stood still, his arms behind his back. The other soldiers in the vehicle made their exit. John could tell by the symbols on the collar of the soldier standing in front of him that he was their commanding officer.
“Where is the village leader? I must speak with him now,” the officer said.
“Our village is run by a council with four members,” John said, “This here is Adam. My name is John, and the two others are –”
“I’ve heard enough. We’ve been sent here to search through your village,” the officer said.
“On what grounds?” Adam said.
“On the grounds that the search has been ordered by the United Military. Do you have something to hide, villager?” the officer said.
“No, we’re just –”
“Then you should have no problem cooperating with us,” the officer said.
The officer whistled. The disorganized soldiers quickly formed a line to be addressed by their officer.
“Search each and every building in this village until you find something. Leave nothing unturned. Understood?” the officer said.
“Yes, sir,” the soldiers said in unison.
The soldiers moved out in pairs, each going into a different building. They did not wait to be let in, and instead broke through the doors to make their way inside. The disturbed voices of the inhabitants could be heard. Their protests fell on deaf ears.
“Sir, please, what is the meaning of all this?” John asked.
“You don’t have a need to know,” the officer replied.
“I’m a leader in this village, and my people are confused and afraid. Who else has more of a need to know than I do?” John said.
The officer stared at John, his eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched. “We received intelligence that there is a terrorist cell operating out of this village. We are here to investigate.”
“Terrorists? That’s absurd! The people in this village have lived here their entire lives. No one comes and goes from this village. We’re isolated. We’re on our own from the rest of society. Officer, look around you. What do you see? There’s nothing in this village besides a few shabby homes and pens for our animals. What could possibly make you believe there are terrorists here?” John said.
“There is reason to believe that the perpetrators of a recent terrorist attack are hiding out here. That is all I can tell you,” the officer said.
“We haven’t seen an outsider in a month. The only people who come to this village are the waste collectors. Did you see any roads or trails on your way in here? Trust me, you aren’t going to find anything here!” John said.
A shout was heard from one of the homes. A quarrel between a woman and a soldier filled the air of the village with screams and shouts. A gunshot rang out, a moment of silence, and then the wail of a child. John ran toward the home, the officer followed behind him. A soldier stood in the doorway, blocking John’s view inside.
“What’s going on inside there, Private?” the officer said.
“Sir, there was an, uh, altercation between Williams and the woman,” the soldier said.
“What do you mean an altercation?”
“Sir, we were searching through the house and we found a sealed box hidden away in the corner under some bedding. Williams tried to open it, and the woman started yelling at him to leave it alone. The thing was nailed shut, so Williams tried to break it open. Then the woman lunged at him, and, and, uh –”
“And what Private?” the officer said coolly.
The other soldier, Williams, walked up behind the Private and said, “I shot her, sir. It was in self-defense. I thought she was attacking me.”
The officer glared at the two soldiers. His jaw tightened and his fists clenched. A man and a young child tried to make their way out of the home. The soldiers stood aside to let them pass. The man was carrying a small wooden box, nailed shut. He handed the box to John. John held the box, looked down at it, and then back up toward the officer.
“This family lost their infant son two days ago to pneumonia. This box holds his remains. He was to be buried tomorrow,” John said.
The officer grabbed the box from John and said, “Everything must be searched,” his voice harsh and quick. He threw the box onto the ground, and smashed it with the butt end of his rifle. The box cracked open and revealed the tiny body inside. Tears streamed down the faces of the man and young child. The child buried their face into the man's leg as they began to wail.
“Get everyone out of their homes and into the village square. We need to continue searching the buildings and don’t need any more incidents like this,” the officer ordered.
John made his way back to the square. The soldiers had herded everyone in. A restless commotion buzzed through the villagers. Everyone was asking what was happening to them and their village. No one had answers.
“What happened back there, John?” Adam asked.
“The soldiers were searching through Abe and Susan’s home. They were about to break into little Michael’s coffin, and Susan tried to stop them,” John's throat became tight and his voice cracked. “They, they shot her.”
“They shot her!? Is she ok? Is she still alive?” Adam said.
“No, she is not,” John said.
The conversation between John and Adam was overheard by others. News spread quickly. The villagers were stirred into a furor. They began to shout at the soldiers. “Murders!”, “Leave us alone!”, “We didn’t do anything!” The soldiers continued to move from home to home, while the officer looked over the crowd. The tension kept rising. John moved through the crowd toward the officer. He tried as best he could to calm everyone down, but to no avail. They would not hear anything he had to say. They only wanted to voice their anger and fear over the incident.
A soldier walked up to the officer and said, “Sir, we’ve searched all the buildings except for one. That stone building over there. It’s got a thick door that’s sealed shut.”
“Well, then, break down the door,” the officer said.
“No!” yelled John. “That’s the village mausoleum. A shrine to our ancestors. If you want to keep this crowd under control, you better think twice before breaking into our most sacred monument.”
The officer turned away from John toward his soldiers and said, “You have your orders.”
Four soldiers went to the mausoleum. One had a battering ram on his back, which he removed and the other soldiers all grabbed a hold of. They swung the ram back, and then thrust it into the mausoleum door. It hit with a dull thud. Some paint was chipped off, but the door itself did not budge, did not bend, and did not break. The soldiers swung again, and again, and again, all with the same result. The crowd of villagers looked on. They pushed against the remaining soldiers trying to contain them, their guns pointed towards the crowd. The soldiers were harassed with obscene shouts, gestures, and spit. The crowd slowly moved forward, the soldiers inched their way backward. They would soon run out of space to retreat to.
“How do you open this God damned door!?” the officer said.
“The door is a solid foot of stone. It's on a time lock, set to open only twice a year at each solstice,” John said.
The officer spoke to the soldiers with the ram, “Use the explosives to get in.”
The soldiers set down their ram, and went to the hovercraft. The walked back with four small bricks and a bundle of wire. They placed the bricks at each corner of the door, and began to connect them with the wire. Stones were thrown from the crowd toward the soldiers. They ducked for cover, trying their best to complete their work. One stone struck a soldier in the head, knocking him to the ground. Other soldiers turned to help him. The crowd surged past their guards, past the guns that were pointed at them. They shouted in the soldiers faces. Hands held open they beat the soldiers across their shoulders and their backs.
A shot rang out, followed by panicked screams. Then another shot, and another. The gun shots drowned out the pained wails of the villagers. The officer ran from one soldier to the next, shouting at them to cease their fire. The gun shots began to rattle down. The screaming and crying of the villagers was all that can be heard. Half the villagers laid motionless, the other half retched in horror.
The officer stood still, took in the destruction his soldiers had wrought. The soldiers waited for his next order, visibly shaken by panic. The officer paced around the edge of the carnage. After a moment, he faced his soldiers and said, “Pile up the bodies, and line up the living.”
The soldiers dutifully performed their orders. The dead were piled up in the center of the square. The living were lined up shoulder to shoulder. They faced away from the dead bodies. John was at the far left end of the line. He shouted towards the officer as his eyes filled with water, “What are you going to do to us?”
“You've left us with no choice. We can't have any witnesses.”
The officer nodded towards a group of his soldiers. They ignited their flares. They carried the flares into the buildings, lighting the furniture and roofs on fire. The poured gasoline over the pile of bodies. John knelt on the ground as he watched his village burn. He could no longer watch everything he knew go up in smoke. He closed his eyes, hoping everything would just disappear. He felt cold steel press against the back of his head.