Chapter 3

The next morning, Marilyn sat in the rear while Hannah drove them to work, finding a space in the area for DCI parking. They went in and spent all morning in the range, with the armourer, firstly getting upgraded with their handgun use.

Although Marilyn had trained with a handgun, this was the first time she had been given the full training as a likely AFO. After that, they were shown how to use the Heckler and Koch MP5 carbine, which was a lot scarier than she had expected.

They went into the canteen for lunch. Hannah was serious.

The laptop screen casts a blue pall over Caden's hands as he scrolls through endless grids of sports bras — women in mid-stride, frozen in athletic poses, all of them grinning with their hands on their hips like this is some kind of victory. His fingers hesitate over the trackpad. None of these are designed for someone who still lifts weights but needs to strap down what shouldn't be there in the first place.

When Samantha wants to help Jenna, she finds out her friend is the victim of a three hundred year old family curse...and a whole lot more.

Cover art by Erin Halfelven
©2026, SammyC

After a man is stabbed in the back and dies, he wakes up in the Labyrinth with a new body, new power, and another chance.

This story takes place in the same universe as my story Invoker.

Altered Fates: The Legacy of David - Part 1

By Marie7342231

To act as bodyguards for the mob witness Val, Sheila and Martin have infiltrated the strip club where she works. Martin's hard job is to sit around drinking beers, while Sheila has to wear a short skirt and high heels, while serving drinks. Preventing a mob hit is a tough job, but it's much harder to hold down a cocktail waitress job without getting fired.

Leo was an ordinary guy until he discovers a strange program… the Master PC program. It allows him to edit the people around him and alter reality (including himself). What will a young man bored with life use it for? Well, depravity of course.

Just when we thought things were getting normal, on Saturday morning before we left the house, another pickup towing a trailer showed up. It looked like our pickup and trailer, if we’d let hippies decorate the outside.

Chapter 2

Marilyn went and stood on Coppergate and tried to visualise the scene. There was something wrong if the carnage was just a byproduct of a targeted hit. The Ram must have been waiting nearby, with a spotter in the Walk. If there was forward planning, the killers had to know, in advance, that the target would be there at that time, which meant a meeting had been set up.

The next day comes with a heaviness I don't recognize at first - not the cramping, which has mostly eased, but something underneath it. Behind the sternum. In the legs when I stand. I eat breakfast and drink coffee and it doesn't lift the way tiredness lifts with caffeine. Just sits there, systemic, the whole body running slightly below its usual output.

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