Anne's eyes closed when she realized her mistake, she turned around and then kicked the air in the direction of the couch. "God, it was so much easier getting away with stuff when it was only my mom and dad."
Tabitha pursed her lips, “I understand you're doing well with your dad now, is that right?"
Anne turned back around to face her roommate. “Yes,” Anne shrugged. "I'm okay with it all now, but it was pretty scary in the beginning when I thought I’d be on the outs with my parents."
Tabitha walked over to the young woman and put an arm around her shoulder and pulled her in for a hug. "You don't need to worry about that. Your parents will forgive you, no matter what the problems are. You might just have to give it some time before it happens. They love you, but your mom was under some incredible strain, and she broke. That's nothing against her, and really, it helped a whole lot. Now, we understand classes needed to be created for those of us who aren't coping as well as we had hoped, once we left Earth. Some of us get so involved with the next goal, we forget that a lot of those who are supporting us right now are maybe having their own troubles and difficulties."
Anne mumbled a response into Tabitha's chest, "Brgrlfllrrrckraghen."
Tabitha pulled away and looked down at the teenager. "What did you say?"
Anne smiled. “I said, ‘I can't breathe!’” Anne pulled Tabitha back in for a hug before releasing her. "I know that now, but it was pretty scary when the Queen emancipated me in the first place. I'm super excited to be working on the Etheric research, and it's kind of cool that I sometimes get to talk to my dad about it as well."
Tabitha turned and started walking to her own room in the suite. “Well, he did all of that work with that stupid black-ops shell company, so some of this is not that far out from what he was working on.”
Her voice came from inside her room. "Who knows, maybe you and your father will become famous for research on Etheric travel!"
Tabitha didn't see the small tear that Anne reached up and wiped away. She waited a moment to get her emotions in order. “Maybe. That would be pretty rad."
Tabitha's voice called back out from her room, "Hey, so, while I go on this operation with a few of the Tontos, what you going to be doing?"
Anne walked to Tabitha's door and leaned against the opening. "I've been told that I will get my own small suite in about three or four days. So, when you get back you won't have a roomie anymore."
Tabitha looked up from the little gym bag of extra supplies she was taking with her. “Really?” Tabitha looked around her room. “God, it will be so good not to have to be so clean all of the time."
Anne looked at her, annoyance on her face. “What? Are you saying you're not naturally this clean?" She pointed around the room to all of the areas that were spotless.
Tabitha chuckled. "Hell no. I'm only this clean because I had a teenager here sharing my suite all of the time. I had to set a good example. If you weren't here, I would have been messy. When I know somebody is coming over, I will throw it all into a basket and stick it somewhere in the back of the closet. I'm not that much older than you for Pete's sake."
Anne continued looking at her roomie, mouth open. Finally, she threw up her hands and turned around. "I'll bet you I'm cleaner than you are without you putting in the extra effort." Tabitha smiled as the young woman walked away.
---
Two and a half hours later—no way Anne was going to add being late on top of everything else—Anne and Jinx walked into the workout area. When she saw Peter glance over at the clock on the wall and smile, she figured she’d been right to be early. To her surprise, Peter motioned for them to follow him. Anne, with Jinx holding tightly to her side, followed Peter through a door into what turned out to be some kind of office. Peter sat behind the old primer-gray metal desk and motioned to a bench that could double as a seat for some of the four-legged Yollins.
Peter watched as Jinx hopped up on the bench, and had to work to keep the smile off his face as Anne sat nervously beside her dog. “I know that you have been through some issues that could bother anyone. Combat is almost second nature to us Weres, but I can understand why a person might not desire to fight. However, you two have targets painted on you.” Peter was amused at the fish-out-of-water expression on Anne’s face, and he held up a hand to forestall comments before she was able to get her voice working. “You,” he pointed at Jinx, “are one of only seven dogs on this station, and sooner or later some rich person is going to offer enough money that someone is going to try to dog-nap you.” He held up both hands while shaking his head to keep the two silent. “Now, if someone puts a bounty on a dog, do you think the slimes trying to poach a canine will go after Bethany Anne?”
Anne and Jinx looked at each other, eyes widening as they went through the list of people who were dog companions.
Matrix and TOM, which also meant Bethany Anne.
Devi was with the two Academy administrators.
Snow was with Kael-ven.
Which left her and Jinx, or… Oh my God!
“Dio is unprotected a lot of the time,” Jinx growled.
Peter nodded, smiling like a sensei whose student finally understands. “He’s the most vulnerable, so we’ll have extra observation on him. But he can hole up with Yelena and Bellatrix and not be seen. You two, however, have school, training, and now work. And that brings us to Point Number Two. Anne, why were you on a bed full of explosives?”
It was clear that Jinx actually connected the dots faster than Anne because she started to growl, hackles up, before Anne replied. “Some bad guys wanted …”
“The research information that your dad was involved in.” Peter finished for her, once again nodding his head. “There are only a couple of us in the know right now, but it’s not going to stay secret forever. Once you start working with others, and especially once the Etheric Empire exhibits or implements the results, people are going to start taking a lot of interest in finding out who is responsible for those ‘results.’” Peter finished with air quotes on the last word. “If they can link that research back to you, then you, or maybe your parents, are targets. As distasteful as it may be, you’re going to have to become another Bethany Anne. Someone who is so powerful and frightening that people will think twice or three times before trying to attack you or those you are protecting.”
Peter actually looked apologetic at this last statement, and that more than anything eased Anne’s mind some. She still didn’t like the idea of hurting people, and she really detested getting sweaty and bruised, but…
We’re going to have to commit and do this. Jinx sent to her partner, and heard Anne’s mental sigh.
I know, I really do hate bruises though.
You bruise less since we came out of the Pod-doc, Jinx observed.
You’re right, and there’s a way to bruise even less.
Anne looked at Peter and stood. “I believe we have three hours of training scheduled.”
Anne turned and led Jinx back into the gym, sending a final thought.
We need to be the ones handing out the bruises.
FINIS
Author Notes - Stephen Russell
August 7, 2017
First and foremost a big THANK YOU to all of you who have read this far.
As a volume reader myself there have been a lot of books that I’ve started that I was not able to finish, so if this has held your interest long enough for you to get here … Woohoo!
I’ve always had a very active imagination, and I’ve thought of hundreds of stories over the years but I’ve never tried to publish anything because I’ve always felt my writing style was too minimalist. Then almost two years ago I had a ‘recommendation’ from Amazon for a story by some guy called Michael Anderle, and hey, he already had three other books written. So, instead of jumping in at Bite This, I happily started Death Becomes Her.
A day and a half later and the fateful passage asking for beta readers. Having just recently been placed on long term di
sability I thought, why not? Now I have the time to do something like this.
I’ve never claimed to be a professional editor, and I didn’t make that claim to Michael either. However, it seemed I was better than the system he was using at that time and that earned me a seat on the crazy ride of Michael Anderle trying to publish a book a month.
What has this to do with my writing, you ask? Simple … Michael is another minimalist author. He’s been living proof if you write a compelling story with characters the readers become invested in, you don’t need paragraphs of descriptive content.
One of the things I’ve done over my years is breeding, training and showing dogs, so when Ashur entered the story I was quite happy. Well except for the messages to Michael complaining that some of the things he was writing were not factual. Probably not a big surprise to him considering all the complaints I had about his firearm information.
Once we had Bellatrix and then puppies, I decided I would try to write a story for one of the pups, and since Anne was already somewhat special in her ability to understand Ashur, it seemed like an obvious match, so I asked Michael to ‘save’ Jinx for me to write about and you have just read the result. Unfortunately, I type extremely slowly and I can’t keep pace with Michael’s output. However, now that I’ve managed to churn out one story I’m working on plot lines to see what sort of mischief Anne and Jinx can get into in the future.
Stay tuned …
Author Notes - Michael Anderle
Written 09/13/17
First, thank you for not only reading through this book, but through STEPHEN’S author notes, and now mine, as well!
This book represents (to me) an incredible journey of people helping people, and how each of us can help make dreams come true.
When I was first publishing, just 90 days into my effort to make a living writing (Jan/Feb 2016) I had asked ‘for a little help’ and Stephen Russell raised his hand and said ‘I’ll help.’
I can imagine he has wondered about doing that at least once or twice since then.
(Stephen, if you have wondered three times, don’t tell me that. Let me live in my little cocoon of ignorance and bliss, please.)
Stephen, like me, read thousands of books…But, he read thousands more than I. As a long haul truck driver, he had beat the shit out of his body over the decades and was willing to do what he could to help another fellow follow some dreams.
Thus was born the Production Editor role. I’ll allow Stephen to share more of his story in future author notes (the ****** will author note block me, for sure!)
Stephen was instrumental in becoming the liaison between the Beta Reader teams, and me as I pounded away at the keyboard, threw the (mostly) finished manuscript to him to edit the stupid out and manage the beta reader process.
We still use that core process today with The Kurtherian Gambit series.
Like me, Stephen had a desire to write a book but had never really been able to manage it. We played with a couple of his ideas, and then I talked about how you, the fans, wanted more dog stories. The problem is I’m not really a dog person and don’t know dogs extensively, and Stephen does.
How do you think I got German Shepherds into the mix? He was an advocate and had my ear… Or, I just don’t remember what I said, and he tweaked the document, and I looked at it thinking “I’m a damned genius!”
(That part isn’t true. We did go German Shepherd after a discussion, and he didn’t change it after the fact. But that would be funny as hell if he had.)
So, I get to introduce you to my friend, production editor, badass firearm knowledge support and previously a Dog breeder who knows how to help me put out stories.
That includes our furry friends.
WELCOME Stephen Russell to the MADNESS that is authoring in The Kurtherian Gambit.
It is now my turn to laugh my ass off when the fans give you shit!
Ad Aeternitatem,
Michael
Michael Anderle
Kurtherian Gambit Series Titles Include:
First Arc
Death Becomes Her (01) - Queen Bitch (02) - Love Lost (03) - Bite This (04)
Never Forsaken (05) - Under My Heel (06) - Kneel Or Die (07)
Second Arc
We Will Build (08) - It’s Hell To Choose (09) - Release The Dogs of War (10)
Sued For Peace (11) - We Have Contact (12) - My Ride is a Bitch (13)
Don’t Cross This Line (14)
Third Arc (2017)
Never Submit (15) - Never Surrender (16) - Forever Defend (17)
Might Makes Right (18) - Ahead Full (19) - Capture Death (20)
Life Goes On (21)
**New Series**
The Second Dark Ages
The Dark Messiah (01)
The Darkest Night (02)
The Boris Chronicles
* With Paul C. Middleton *
Evacuation
Retaliation
Revelation
Restitution 2017
Reclaiming Honor
* With JUSTIN SLOAN *
Justice Is Calling (01)
Claimed By Honor (02)
Judgement Has Fallen (03)
Angel of Reckoning (04)
Born Into Flames (05)
Defending The Lost (06)
Saved By Valor (07)
The Etheric Academy
* With TS PAUL *
ALPHA CLASS (01)
ALPHA CLASS - Engineering (02)
ALPHA CLASS (03) Coming soon
Terry Henry “TH” Walton Chronicles
* With CRAIG MARTELLE *
Nomad Found (01)
Nomad Redeemed (02)
Nomad Unleashed (03)
Nomad Supreme (04)
Nomad’s Fury (05)
Nomad’s Justice (06)
Nomad Avenged (07)
Nomad Mortis (08)
Nomad’s Force (09)
Nomad’s Galaxy (10)
Trials and Tribulations
* With Natalie Grey *
Risk Be Damned (01)
Damned to Hell (02)
Hell’s Worst Nightmare (03) coming soon
The Ascension Myth
* With Ell Leigh Clarke *
Awakened (01)
Activated (02)
Called (03)
Sanctioned (04)
Rebirth (05)
Retribution (06)
The Age of Magic
The Rise of Magic
* With CM Raymond / LE Barbant *
Restriction (01)
Reawakening (02)
Rebellion (03)
Revolution (04)
Unlawful Passage (05)
The Hidden Magic Chronicles
* With Justin Sloan *
Shades of Light (01)
Shades of Dark (02)
Storms of Magic
*With PT Hylton*
Storm Raiders (01)
Storm Callers (02)
Storm Breakers (03)
Tales of the Feisty Druid
*With Candy Crum*
The Arcadian Druid (01)
The Undying Illusionist (02)
Path of Heroes
*With Brandon Barr*
Rogue Mage (01)
The Revelations of Oriceran
The Leira Chronicles
*With Martha Carr*
Quest for Magic (0)
Waking Magic (1)
Release of Magic (2)
Protection of Magic (3)
SHORT STORIES
Frank Kurns Stories of the Unknownworld 01 (7.5)
You Don’t Touch John’s Cousin
Frank Kurns Stories of the Unknownworld 02 (9.5)
Bitch’s Night Out
Bellatrix: Frank Kurns Stories of the Unknownworld 03 (13.25)
With Natalie Grey
AudioBooks
CLICK HERE TO SEE ALL LMBPN BOOKS ON AUDIBLE
Available at Audible.com and iTunes
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Etheric Recruit: A Kurtherian Gambit Series Page 11
