Front Porch Rambles

General Arcturus Bracken climbed the last stair, and stood at the great table. He was a large man, and his armor made him seem like a living statue, stoic and gleaming under a clear violet sky. There were long ribbons, scraps of old banners, tied to his pack, and they danced in the neverending wind found in high places. Arcturus reluctantly drags his gaze away from the table, a massive ring of bright quartz carved from the very mountaintop on which he stood. Below him some 200 or more steps was his squire, who had made it quite clear that his sire should go on without him. He appeared to be resting on the stone stairs, beseeching the ancient ones for the strength to go on. It didn’t matter. the young Steeg would play no part in what was to happen next. In truth, he had only allowed Steeg to persuade him at last when his protege had made a good point. “General Brackon, sir, I couldn’t bear to let your body lay up there with the rest of them. You owe it to the people to have a heroes...

With a focused mind and a healthy heart I can do good work; Complete what I start.

Muk fiddled with the lockpicks tucked in the secret pocket of his shirtsleeve. To the finely dressed men and women strolling down high street he must have appeared another louse-ridden street urchin scratching at his infestation. He was seventeen, but he was small for his age as a result of poor nutrition throughout his childhood. His black hair was sleek with sweat under the ragged hood, he was nervous. He sat huddled on the dirty cobblestone at the edge of a long alleyway that he knew to have many exits and stared out at nothing. His dark eyes were cold and emotionless, like those of a veteran of a war campaign who has seen far more trauma than they’ll ever say. Muk could summon up a glare that would freeze wine, and invariably made people look away, as it was intended to. He didn’t want to get close to anyone, he didn’t want to make any friends. Never again. Elora. Without warning, he was twelve again, and with her. Muk could clearly see her smile lit by the breaking dawn...

The Australian Shepherd Dog sniffed at the object. It was a small metal cylinder, no larger than a can of spray paint. There were bright green and black bars painted across the middle. It was humming ever so slightly. "I don't like it." Rufus was a plain statement of truth kind of guy. "The Duke thinks it's interesting." "Duke thinks sniffing his own turds is interesting." We sat in silence for a moment, facing each other. There was silence. Then it hit him. He pulled his t shirt up over his nose and clutched it tight, cursing. "Now, ain't that interesting?" It's the silent ones that's the deadliest. "

There was no silence after the battle. The storm of blood was over, but the distant boom of shells still rolled like distant thunder over the trampled field. Rifle shots from the receding conflict popped like twigs in a hungry fire, but here there were only dying embers.  Christina coughed as she passed through a drifting cloud of sulfurous smoke.  Her knee-high boots were covered with the slick red mud she had been trudging through for the last hour or so. The beautiful blue coat commissioned for her by Lawrence in Vienna was speckled and torn, one sleeve nearly in half from when she had fought her way through the barbed tangles at the front line. What was left of the front line. She was beginning to grow desperate, the bitter lump of fear trying to lurch up into her throat was becoming harder to force back down. The murmuring groans of the injured and dying weren't helping, and the occasional wail of some unseen soldier threatened to make her lose her poise. She screamed sud...

I wanted to doodle in my universe, so here I am. I just checked out the notes I posted last, and realized I needed to do a little work on the setting. Here we go... ...in the beginning, there was a cluster of inhabited stars so close to one another that when they called out to the stars in search of life, someone answered. From there, the worlds worked together and eventually developed the technology to travel between star systems in a series of jumps involving technology on both ends of the connection. A long time later... interstellar civilization thrived, as the Council of Planets reached further into the cluster and discovered more alien life. The connections were constructed, the alliance welcomed new planets, and grew. There were those who sought unprecedented power and were thrown down, but cracks formed in the pillars of society. The Council became corrupt, and clandestine dealings became power grabs, and teetered on the verge of a massive, interplanetary war. Gene...