GIDEALIS ENIGMA. Chapter 2 To Lose a Friend I do not want to startle the girl by the water, who is weeping quietly, oblivious to the ghost standing over her, and my stealthy approach alike. But the men fix it for me. They break noisily through the brush like a couple of moose, drunk on berries on a hot afternoon. “Domiarn!!!” Yells my father nearly in my ear as he can’t see me in the grasses. “I’m here. I found Akahida.”...

"Shit!" I spit as I trip. I spin around as I drop, rifle raised and finger on the trigger. I lay there panting, scanning the bloodied walls of the colony houses. God knows what happened to the people who once owned all that blood. Blood on the streets, the walls, and hell, I'm sitting in blood! Lucy coos uneasily in my left ear. Say what you want, but this lil' blue bird which is miraculously still on my shoulder is the b...

When the Leonids came into our world we didn't have any idea where they had come from. They appeared late in November as the annual meteor shower called the Leonids put in its appearance, and so some scientist somewhere called them Leonids. They were not anything like lions, of course. They were, in fact, more like rabbits in appearance. If you can imagine a rabbit with no ears and eight legs and no fur. They did have a s...

GIDEALIS ENIGMA. Chapter 1 The Girl In The Water I’m used to running in complete darkness. If I stumble at some point, I always stumble on somebody’s mystery. My name is Domiarn Gidealis, and as of tonight I am eleven years old. I’ll tell you more about me, as soon as I find out what the commotion downstairs is all about. There is a carriage by the door of my father’s house with a crest on it. The crest has two flags and...

A three foot ring of crystal plants were illuminated around us. If any Solarites were around, we would have been spotted almost immediately. The thought made me shiver, but I highly doubted there would be any lurking about. I pause and reconsidered that last thought. They may not be out here, but the guy who set off the explosives in the mine most certainly could be. I strained my eyes, trying to see past the darkness jus...

I heard a voice... While I was asleep. She was calling out to me, telling me it was okay. She was okay and waiting... For the moment, I was happy to see her and hear her voice. She was like the younger sister I never had. Then the moment ended and I opened my eyes to the silent elf that was sitting at the foot of my bed. I noticed she had horns, like Fei, but they were like a stag's and looked to be polished wood. My dism...

The release of tension and fear was widespread through the colony and was shown in myriad ways. Although there were not many churches of organized religions in the colony the ones that were present were filled with people of all beliefs giving their thanks to their Creator. Many who claimed no religion at all yearned for a place to express their gratitude and to pray for their dead. At the other end of the spectrum were t...

The first meeting of the new government was held on a Friday evening. The first order of business was swearing in the new elected officers by the Marine's chaplain, the Reverend Stark. The first to take the oath of office was Eric Reid, the Territorial Governor. He was a mid fifties man, looking quite fit, with a broad smile and a full head of white hair. He had been Governor of one of the the ninety two States in PanAmer...

In the late morning Kari stood at the kitchen sink in her robe, a little bleary eyed after being up late explaining to the members of the colonists’ groups how and why Ida had accomplished so much as head of the transition to civil government. Most of them were very satisfied with the results, although a few groups were unhappy that their priorities had not been paramount. She looked up from rinsing her coffee cup and gla...

He was a tinkerer ever since he could remember; plastic bricks, tiny fake logs, that’s how it all began. Since then, he had graduated to bigger and better things–they weren’t actually very big things in any literal sense of the word, but definitely much better, definitely more serious, definitely more important. It sparked and sizzled out between the cold, steel tongs holding it in place. This one failed, again. If it wer...

I couldn't cry, the tears refused to leave my eyes as my face burned. There was nothing to say as she lay motionless, like a doll. An empty doll now, nothing left on the inside; no life, no soul, no Fei. Even knowing that I couldn't leave. I wouldn't until I saw that spark in her eyes and her perky voice going at 500 mph about nothing in particular. It wasn't until Raven stopped sobbing and pried me away. "Let's go, Pirat...

It was an evening like any other in Rail City, which means an incredible amount of crimes were going on. One such crime was a bank robbery on the corner of Blank and Generic Street. Our fearless hero was on the scene in record time. When the Captain arrived, he found three raccoons robbing a bank. No kidding, they were really raccoons--not just burglars with bandit masks. Raccoons! Anything in Rail City is possible, of co...

The Council sat there for a few moments, stunned by Troyal's announcement that they may be at war. But then he continued, “I'm sorry if I have led you to a hasty conclusion that war is imminent, I don't think it is or even if it means war. Who knows how far this ship has traveled or how long ago it left its starting point. When I said soon I meant within some hundreds of years, not next week. Who knows how long it will ta...

The note- “I bet one-day this letter opener will save my life” I thought to myself as I drew it from the inside pocket of my thick, firm coat. I am the kind of guy that is constantly stopped by police authorities, and I live in a place that breathes danger… Weapons are wise here, but the police condemn them. If I am caught with a weapon I will be thrown in prison, and with my skills of observation I’ll be sentenced to mod...

The dim hue of the sun stone lanterns casted ghastly shadows on the rock walls. There were no soft echoing chinking of pickaxes at this late hour. Instead there was a nerve wracking silence that swamped our ears between each slow echoing step. Fei stalked closely behind me, shivers ran up and down her spine. I figured she would be scared, I mean she has a right to be, but she does have super strength. I halted at the corn...