Tangents

Tangents

Steve Rzasa

Published by Steve Rzasa, 2023.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Tangents

The Interstice Universe

Covet Not

A Remorseless Fang

The Garrison Holds

Amid the Winter’s Snow

Greet the Rising Sun

A Love to Keep

Tempo

Garvey’s Day Off

Mercury in Spirit

Sovereign Exit

The Hastening of My Ninth Life

The Vital Collection

Also By Steve Rzasa

Tangents by Steve Rzasa

www.steverzasa.com

This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise—without prior written permission from the author, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

INTERSTICE BOOKS and the INTERSTICE BOOKS logo are trademarks of Steve Rzasa. Absence of TM in connection with marks of Interstice or other parties does not indicate an absence of trademark protection of those marks.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, and/or events is purely coincidental.

Cover illustration: Tithi Luadthong

Layout and design: Steve Rzasa

COPYRIGHT © 2023 BY Steve Rzasa

All rights reserved.

The Interstice Universe

Remains*

The Echo Watch

Airfoil: Origins

Airfoil: Drake City

Mercury First Up*

Mercury on Guard

Mercury for Hire

Mercury at Risk

Mercury is Hot

Mercury out Cold

Mercury off Course

Mercury with Style

Become the Past

Covet Not

I needed a different story.

That sounds like an excuse but honestly, it’s the recurring thought that gives birth to any new adventure I think up. Thankfully, if you’re a writer like me whose brain is always churning, somebody somewhere has a writing prompt aimed at helping you put your creative puzzle pieces together.

In this case, the good folks at Havok had asked me before if I intended to write a story to submit after a lengthy hiatus, and I finally reached a point in 2022 where I was ready. Season Eight was Vice & Virtue. I submitted Covet Not under the theme Selfishness & Sacrifice.

This and other writing opportunities were the perfect excuses to expand the Interstice story world of Mercury Hale, his allies, and his enemies.

It also features a character I made up for another submission, which funnily enough I’ve put at the very end of this anthology–and who appears in the middle. Tash is never without Tome, no matter what world she inhabits.

Then ...

JAGGED PUMICE SCRAPED my palms bloody. 

The sword loomed above me. I was nearly within reach. Violet lightning reflected off the four-foot blade. My bearded face stared back at me, distorted by the weapon’s bulging middle.

Almost there.

Haggai! Tashmetu’s voice was faint beneath the thunder’s rumble. It mingled with the beasts’ shrieks.

Ignore her. I shrugged off the now dead creature’s tentacle. Blue sludge mingled with the crimson blood coating my arm. The stench did not stop me, no matter how my stomach heaved. The prize was in reach.

My fingers brushed the sword’s curved edge.

Power surged through my body. Aching muscles, bruised bones, torn flesh ... None of them mattered. This was everything I’d sought. Not even the bodies had stopped me.

I dug my boot into the mountainside and pushed until my hands wrapped around the hilt.

At last.

A bellow rose from the beasts below. Tashmetu’s anguished scream fought through their cacophony.

Let them wail. I needn’t fear them.

Not with this power in my grasp.

I yanked the sword free. Purple sparks mimicking the lightning flashing around me scattered across my trousers and boots, burning tiny holes. They stung my skin. I didn’t care.

A steady hum cocooned me in sound, drowning the noises of the dark landscape below while filling my head with a steadiness so profound, tears filled my eyes.

The blade was mine. I could rend this foul place.

I swung the blade around my head, and with a hoarse shout, thrust it straight ahead of me at waist level. It sank deep into the air, as if I’d pierced the hide of yet another beast.

Light exploded. I ground my teeth as I wrested the blade up, then down, widening the gash in the universe.

Warm air and sweet smells washed over me in waves of pure joy. The landscape beyond brimmed with life. I gazed upon sprawling emerald plains hemmed with rivers. Amber leaves shivered from alabaster branches. A spring breeze carried their fragrance.

Haggai! Please!

I turned at Tashmetu’s plea. Singed tentacles recoiled where they smashed against her golden shield, its blazing edges as intense as the midday sun. Black hair whirled around her, wild as stampeding horses. Fear contorted her features as she bashed monsters aside. They screamed from gaping, fang-filled maws. You’ve forgotten everything! Do not let it take me from you! Not like Mixalis!

I froze. The sword’s hum intensified, but I refused to budge.

Tashmetu’s warning had pushed aside the visions of victory, replacing them with smaller but stronger pictures—two brown-haired boys playing in the same fields I had glimpsed through the rift.

Mixalis.

Winds rushed around me. I shifted my stance again so they couldn’t blow me off the mountain, but when I did, the crunching underfoot felt different.

My boot wasn’t grinding rock beneath its tread.

It instead broke bones in my brother’s wrist.

Mixalis lay still. His eyes were wide and pale, catching what little light seeped through endless storm clouds shrouding the desolate landscape. Blue ichor soaked his tunic and dribbled from his steel armor. The severed tentacle I had pushed aside remained wrapped around his neck, fingerprints visible on the swollen hide.

My fingerprints.

I had strangled him. And for what?

The blade hummed until it scraped against my mind.

I released it but it remained wedged between worlds.

Haggai! Tashmetu swung at the nearest beast. She missed. Its tentacles wrapped around her midsection. Her cries melted into moans and her eyes went glassy. Sucking sounds echoed in the valley below as the beast fed. Her life would seep away in minutes.

And I had killed my own brother for the strength to rend the walls between universes.

I wrenched the blade free. The barrier snapped back into place, waves of power slamming across my body.

I would not fail another loved one.

The beasts stood in my way but with the blade in hand, they burst into mist as I cut through their ranks. Blue filth stained me from head to toe. Misshapen bodies and severed tenacles lined my frantic slide down the jagged peak.

There was no counting the slain I left in my wake. I glared at each screaming monster as I killed it, desperate to memorize each hideous visage in hopes I could banish Milaxis’s tortured face from my mind.

So much suffering. Never again.

I bottomed out in the ruined valley mere feet from Tashmetu. She had gone deathly pale, but the instant I sliced away her captor’s tentacles, color rushed back into golden brown skin.

Tashmetu staggered against me. Please. We must leave this place. It has turned you cold and me violent.

No easy task. More beasts slithered in from the surrounding ravines, blocking every path of escape.

I slit the barrier between worlds again. The blade stuck, having opened a gap big enough for only one.

I smiled. Perhaps it was fitting. I had grappled with fate and proved avaricious. I could not return Mixalis, but I could save Tashmetu.

My love. I kissed her. Go.

She pressed her hand to my chest, leaving its imprint in ichor and blood.

I can’t leave you.

The shrieks battered us. The beasts slithered closer. I could feel their hunger.

But I can’t let you stay. I broke free and pushed her into the simmering breach.

Tashmetu threw her arms wide, mouth forming words I couldn’t hear. She stumbled back into a vast seascape of shallow waters and sprawling trees.

I picked up her shield. It melted into a tattered, heavy journal with glowing pages. Keep her safe, Tome.

Always do. Tome’s reedy voice sighed. The sound reassured me that Tashmetu would never be alone. Are you sure—?

I tossed the mystical book through the gap as the tentacles took me. Searing cold froze my blood and bones. Stinging pain abated, faster than I expected.

The rip between worlds vanished right before my vision faded and my heart stopped.

Brother.

Wait for me.

A Remorseless Fang

One of my favorite means of producing new tiny tales is the NYC Midnight Short Story Challenge. Around five thousand writers compete in the first round. Judges take the top five of each category, whittling down the competition to about 1,200 for the next round, and so forth.

The best part is you base your story on the three randomly selected elements generated for your group of about thirty writers. In the case of A Remorseless Fang, the category required incorporation of the genre Suspense, the subject Impossible, and a character who was a Deckhand.

I wound up leaning into more of a horror vibe for this 18th century story, which the judges dinged me for, but I knew once I started which way it had to go—because it ties together the lore of the medallions the superhero Airfoil uses with that of Mercury Hale’s adventures.

Plus, we get to see what happened to that dangerous sword Haggai coveted, a sword whose power would plague Mercury centuries later.

March 1787

IGNACIO CLUNG TO THE main mast as rain pummeled him. He feared bruising when he dared look at his exposed skin, where the slashing winds had rent his sleeves and shirt but found only flesh reddened by the downpour.

Captain Tyler wrestled the ship’s wheel, either oblivious to the storm or not having the devil’s care for the mountainous waves looming over Deborah Anne. He turned her so she was running into the storm, then reaching across it, with the result she came dangerously close to heeling over with each spin.

The tattered mainsail broke loose with a crack like a cannon’s discharge, audible even over the thunder. Ignacio pushed his crewmate Nathaniel from the mast and together they flattened themselves to the deck as shattered wood crashed atop them. Only the ship’s rail prevented the debris from crushing their skulls.

You boys! Mr. Hawley snagged them by their collars. Ignacio was sure they would die of broken necks rather than crumpled heads. What did I tell you? Secure the rigging!

He shoved them toward a web of tangled ropes. Ignacio grabbed Nathaniel’s shoulder. God bless you for your keen mind and quick action.

I would not let you die, Ignacio. Nathaniel wiped water from his face and sputtered as they struggled against the knots. Your death would mean facing Mr. Hawley’s wrath and more labor.

Ignacio’s hope was not lost, no matter Nathaniel’s dark humor, for Captain Tyler was not a man to give in to anything, not even Nature. Flashes of lightning cast his craggy face in sharp relief. His scowl could have been carved from the treacherous rock through which they’d risked passage at Tierra del Fuego weeks before.

It seemed uncharitable to have survived that peril only to die within fleeting sight of the coast.

Ignacio was loosening the largest