Briane Pagel has released the much ballyhooed Temporary Anne. And he's celebrating with a blog tour. Over the course of the past week or so he has been writing an entire tale based on the recommendations of commenters. So, please, contribute ideas so the story can continue. I'm such a fan of Choose Your Own Adventure styles stories that the latest book I ordered off Amazon was Space Vampires: Choose Your Own Adventure # 71. Because, how can you not love that? So let's see where that story takes us today.
And as a side note, I did read and review Temporary Anne, check that out
here if you'd like to see my thoughts, which surprisingly enough, barely mentions the book I was rating. Still, great job, Briane, it's always a huge treat to read something of yours.
Please, take it away...
This is DAY FOUR of the release tour for my newest book, Temporary Anne.
Temporary Anne is a horror story about a woman so desperate to avoid Hell -- the fate for the evil she's done during her life -- that she makes things infinitely worse after her death. To celebrate the release, I'm doing a blog tour in which I'm writing a short story, LIVE, with your help! At each stop, I'll do an installment of the story and you can suggest where it goes next!
Below is PART FOUR of the story. PART ONE appeared on Tina Downey's Life Is Good, PART TWO on Andrew Leon's Strange Pegs, and if you didn't catch either,
click here to read PART ONE and
HERE to read PART TWO. Then Part Three was on Laws Of Gravity, and now
PART FOUR of "This Is How I..."
(Special Thanks to Crystal Collier for the intro to today's installment. She wrote the first paragraph. (Check out her blog here!)
I froze, standing stick straight as uniformed men funneled around me, fixed on the Drum Major's steely eyes. A sucking sensation tugged at my gut, curling upward, like the smoke essence of my very soul leaking through our connected stares.
I didn't want to look down.
I didn't
want
to
look
d
o
w
n
and the Drum Major held my gaze.
"Don't," she said, softly, so softly I could barely hear her.
"I..." I said.
The soldiers were rushing forward, shouts of don't move and arrest and the like ringing out. They were almost to the stage.
"... have to," I said.
And suddenly I was
f
a
l
l
i
n
g
down
down
down
down
spinningheadover
heelsoverhead
overheelsover
down
down
down
(you
get
the
point)
at one point when I turned over I saw above me the Drum Major standing on the edge of the abyss that had sucked me down the moment I'd turned my eyes on it -- the real things of this world becoming less real in my eyesight just as the imaginary things of the other worlds could be made real by my thinking about them -- her own beautiful eyes wide and her mouth saying something as a soldier grabbed her from behind and tried to wrestle her hat out of her hands.
I saw her struggle on the edge of the abyss, in flits and flickers as I tumbled overandoverandover the dim light of the auditorium spinning away from me and the circle that represented safety -- a smashed auditorium filled with soldiers ready to shoot everything, and containing a captive, angry, ENRAGED, Beast was now safety! -- getting smaller and smaller and smaller and then I
stopped.
I stopped falling but had no idea why, there in the darkness of the pit. I could see nothing, hear nothing (even the gunfire and struggle above was a tiny speck of light and distant shouting), and I tried to lift up my head to look around, but couldn't move it.
Fighting, I pulled my arm up but couldn't move that, either.
I kicked with my legs but they wouldn't move, either.
"This... like some kind of..." I began
Don't say it don't say it don't even think it something in the back of my brain, the part of me that still thought I had some sort of control over this, screamed at me as loudly as it could.
"Spider web," the rest of my brain rather unhelpfully finished.
Clikkerclakk
I heard.
tikkittatikkittatiktiktisk
I heard.
I closed my eyes as tightly as I could, hoping against hope that if I didn't look it wouldn't be real.
I heard a tiny faraway shout above me.
I opened my eyes, almost inadvertently.
For just a second I saw a speck drop or be thrown or dive or something into the opening far far far above me.
Then I saw eight eyes, the smallest the size of bowling balls, the largest terrifyingly bright and shiny and close, looming over me and just below them a set of fangs as large as my legs but far far sharper.
Clikkerclakk, the fangs went.
Clikkerclakk...
_________________________________________________
What happens next? Use the comments to help Rusty decide, and follow the story on the next tour dates:
The FIRST REVIEWS ARE IN: "It's fascinating. If you like horror, this is definitely a book worth reading."-- Andrew Leon
"Another chilling tale from the author of The Scariest Thing You Can't Imagine. ...Pagel's style reminds me a lot of Vonnegut's work in that while the narration seems jaunty with its humorous asides and such, there's a lot of hidden depth to that narration."-- PT Dilloway.
