Author Archives: Rick Cook Jr

The Shape of Family – Part Eight

Posted on by

Tuesday is here! It’s time for Part Eight of The Shape of Family, where we’re gonna see what Claire’s been up to in Jeffrey’s absence.

<- Part Seven – Reveal

_____

The Shape of Family

Part Eight – Betrayal

by Rick Cook Jr

Claire and Private Hughes tended to the girl’s wounds while she was unconscious, and then put her to resting in the bed Claire had vacated this morning.  Hughes dropped into a chair, bundling up the bloody cloths and bandages.

Having removed the girl’s jacket and shirt, Claire saw two things: the new wound was not as bad as it looked through the layers of clothing, and this wasn’t Marie.

“This is Renee,” she said after the girl was settled and resting fitfully.

Hughes started. “What?” Continue reading →

The Shape of Family – Part Seven

Posted on by

Tuesday is here! It’s time for Part Seven of The Shape of Family. Sadie is back under the saddle today!

<- Part Six – Den

_____

The Shape of Family

Part Seven – Reveal

by Rick Cook Jr

Sadie had never run so hard in her life. And they’d almost made it unscathed.

For the briefest of moments both Renee and Marie were on Sadie’s back, and then the creature, the not-bandersnatch, dragged away Marie.

And though Jeffrey Combs tended her wounds, she hadn’t recovered yet. She couldn’t even stand.

She didn’t know what exactly was happening inside the inn, since she was still lying on her side beside the door. Did they even know it was Renee?

I can tell them. You’ll put yourself in the same danger. Then Jonathan is caught and so are you.

They were facing something different, something lethal. They’d listen to her, wouldn’t they? Continue reading →

The Shape of Family – Part Six

Posted on by

Tuesday is here! It’s time for Part Six of The Shape of Family. Let’s see what that old bandersnatch is up to these days..

<- Part Five – Sun-Baked

_____

The Shape of Family

Part Six – Den

by Rick Cook Jr

He released the mirror image from his silken, smoky grip and she clattered to the ground, scrambling away from him and babbling. He swirled with delight at his success and she watched without really seeing. He knew the look. Fear and shock.

His den was undisturbed, as it always was. No creatures dared enter the great redwood even while he was away. The mushrooms within never shied from his presence, though, and he cultivated them for their glow.

He had taken the girl deep into the hollow tree. If she attempted to flee, well, that just made the chase more exciting as she fled blindly in the maze of roots and tunnels. Continue reading →

The Shape of Family – Part Five

Posted on by

Tuesday is here! It’s time for Part Five of The Shape of Family. Checking back in with Claire and her retinue today.

<- Part Four – Priority

_____

The Shape of Family
Part Five – Sun-Baked

by Rick Cook Jr

After she was alone, sated for the night, Claire tried not to let it get to her. Any number of reasons why the girl would be late. She tossed and turned all the same with a stomach churning worries, and by morning when her Wings first stirred she couldn’t tell if she’d slept or just kept her eyes closed hoping for it.

Claire pushed up from her bed, mouth dry, head pounding. She hadn’t meant to drink. That damned Combs wouldn’t take no for an answer, bordering on insubordination.

Bordering but never crossing that line. Continue reading →

Touch, Color

Posted on by

248 words to create a character, as per Chuck Wendig’s most recent Flash Fiction Challenge.

_____

They quarantined me when I turned someone purple. Then they started paying me. I could try to explain it, but that would require knowing the first damned thing about it.

It just started one day in a most indelicate position. Mid-coitus, if you prefer a polite term. I tend not to. When you can’t even touch yourself without becoming cerulean blue or neon pink, you kind of stop giving a shit about social nicety.

They flew me to Hollywood first, and I can’t even tell you how many rainbow dogs are running around now.

Once Paris got wind the fashion industry just about shackled me to the runway. Oh, they paid well for their dazzling dresses and wild lavender hairdos, but I don’t even know how many bottles of hand sanitizer I go through in a day. They cart it around in a suitcase, and even though it dries quickly my hands always look splotched with paint.

I get to touch a lot of beautiful people, though.

Scientists have poked me, prodded me, biopsies. You name it and they’ve done it. All the equipment is in a lab somewhere, untouched. Turns out people aren’t too fond of a CAT Scan machine that’s blood red inside and out.

I don’t know. It has its upsides. Coloring Easter eggs has never been easier. I’ll never have to work again with the obscene millions they pay to be yellow, orange, midnight blue.

But no one wants to sleep with a freak.

The Shape of Family – Part Four

Posted on by

It’s Tuesday, so strap in for about 1,000 words of this wild and weird shapeshifter story!

<- Part Three – Wild

_____

The Shape of Family

Part Four – Priority

by Rick Cook Jr.

Sadie felt the malevolent presence leave them as Marie’s twin rode their backtrail. She panted and snorted with relief when Marie finally let her rest a bit, walking along the road that would lead to the capital.

The other girl was in danger. Sadie refused to think about it. Not her problem. She had saved Marie, wasn’t that enough?

I’m not their mother. Continue reading →

The Shape of Family – Part Three

Posted on by

Time for Part Three of The Shape of Family! There will be no more new POVs after this Part, just Sadie, Claire, and the uh… thing below.

<- Part Two – Wings

_____

The Shape of Family

Part Three – Wild

by Rick Cook Jr

The thing that was not a bandersnatch followed at a safe distance. He knew her by the scent of blood. Scent was curious; he did not always possess it, and wished never to need it, so abhorrent was it to him.

He should take her now. If it wasn’t for that thing under the girl…

What is it? he wondered. Not a horse, that much he knew. It was interesting, piquing the curiosity that came with the bandersnatch, but he overrode its instincts for his own. There might be time for curiosity later, once his quest was complete. Once his bloodline was secure. Continue reading →

The Shape of Family – Part Two

Posted on by

And away we go with Part Two of The Shape of Family! This Part is entitled “Wings”.

<- Part One – Shadow-Dancer

_____

The Shape of Family

Part Two – Wings

by Rick Cook Jr

Wing Captain Claire Claymonte wanted to stay and search for the rider of this beautiful horse. It rankled that they were not able to sneak up and catch him unawares. But if the Forest didn’t kill him, a patrol probably would.

She sighed as they mounted up and Sergeant Combs continued to work his skill at calming on the animal. Dark blue and gray patches on a coat of midnight black. She had never seen horseflesh of this variety before. Her white stallion Moxie was a sight to behold, but pure white breeding was in vogue even among the civilians. A horse with coloring like this one… Envy of the entire military, she’d be. She could claim it as spoils of the road if she wished.

“Hand over the saddlebags,” she said to Combs as they left the forest and took up the route. Continue reading →

The Shape of Family – Part One

Posted on by

Part One of a Seventeen-part serialized story, firmly in the fantasy camp, so fantasy fans rejoice? Find a Table of Contents at the bottom of this post.

This is the start of Volume 1 of my Shapechangers series. If you’ve read this one, you can hop on over to the start of Volume 2, The Wings Take Shape, right now!

The Shape of Family

Part One – Shadow-Dancer

by Rick Cook Jr

From Sind’s Sundry at the edge of town, Sadie bought the star map and a singed pamphlet with the last of her silver and struck out for the skinyard, fingers twitching to be gone. Sind hisself hadn’t said a word. No one had. They all knew she was going, that she couldn’t be stopped.

She tucked the papers within her pack and hucked it over her shoulders, ignoring the tension in her neck and spine. Just a little ways, she thought. I can make it just a little ways.

Her feet pounded the packed dirt, and though it was getting on dusk and all the changers should have been on their way back, the road lay empty.

She sighed as she passed the tall barricades and entered the skinyard, and here discovered why the changers hadn’t left for home. Naked as the day they first changed, they stood in a circle in the corral of sand and gravel. Eyes on her. Continue reading →

Weeping Thief

Posted on by

For best reading, turn on some instrumental scary music from Youtube, turn down the lights, and listen carefully for the call of the Weeping Thief.

Updated 2015-10-31: If you want to hear this tale told instead of reading it, head on over to Blurry Photos and feast your ears upon Ghost Stories 4, where it is featured as one of their submitted stories!

_____

Weeping Thief

by Rick Cook Jr

The Weeping Thief is outside my inn door and I don’t know what to do.

How she knows me as a wanted man, a robber of banks, is unimportant. She is here. The Weeping Thief has come.

I know the stories. I could call out, but she’d silence me before help arrived. I could barricade the door but she’d find another way in. I could arm myself with flintlock or saber, but she’s impervious and relentless.

The song that children sing drifts out from under the door, a woman’s voice and yet somehow thin, translucent:

The Weeping Thief is come
to sweep away your dreams,
when night forever falls
no one will hear your screams. Continue reading →