Eighteen-year-old Nicholas Hammerstein is at the cusp of finishing high school in his hometown of Los Alamos, NM. He has a seemingly ideal life and is blessed with loving parents, a cute baby sister, and great friends. Nicholas is a gifted student and martial artist who has dreams of leaving for college at the end of his senior year. But, living in a world of Emergent humans, he will soon find his life turned upside down as his life and the fate of a kingdom hang in the balance. His future and theirs will be determined by how he navigates the drastic changes in his body and the magical and superpowered Mergent population he joins.

Britt and I went on a couple of dates that month, taking Desiree with us and snuggling with her. On one of those dates, we went to the mall in Catesville, venned into little girls, and played on the playground until closing time. We didn’t run into Melinda and Melanie that time, but we played tag with a couple of little girls and then chatted with them after we got tired of chasing each other around the playground, up the stairs and through the tunnels and down the slides.

[At a wedding reception]
Josh Fisher, the Best Man stood up and tapped a glass to get everyone’s attention. The level of conversation in the hall dropped away until there was a sea of faces looking at the ‘Top Table’.

The next period of my life lasted…well…an unfathomably long time.

Just a few highlights:

Danny Collins in…

Pick Me Boy

By Jmaster

Danny Collins was the new student to Westwood High, a school in the middle of Suburban Illinois. He was a wildcard at his past school always getting good grades and sometimes even girls but his long hair and skater boy appearance often was a turn off for some, now entering into Westwood smack dab during his Freshman year he had to make some friends.

(This chapter was previously posted as Chapter 29)

Jeff Farnum picked me up at seven AM right on schedule. I grabbed my backpack, and jumped into the passenger side.

“You look like shit,” he said.

“Yeah.” I yawned. I felt like I hadn’t slept in days. I ran a hand over my face and my hair, trying to wake up.

“That was a great game last night.”

“Thanks.”

One awful side effect of being unemployed is how much it fucks up a sleep schedule. Falling asleep in the very late hours of the night and waking up in the afternoon felt so horrible and wrong on so many levels. In Nathan’s case, it made him feel like a slob.

Thankfully though, every morning Astian made sure to come to his room to wake him up, usually just by shaking him.

Nathan pretended to still be asleep when he heard Astian come into his room. He just needed a few extra minutes to rest.

To anyone following along -- I accidentally preposted some of the later chapters as chapter 29 and 30. This has been worked out now, but if you haven't read the *revised* chapters you might want to go back and read them since they're new material. Oh yeah, and forget everything that was posted before in their places. ;)

Raine

Desdemonia in April’s body went to bed a little while later, leaving me and April in her bedroom.

“Are you sure you want to try this?” she said. “There’s no going back, once the process is initiated.”

Natalie thought that she had expended all of her tears. The adrenaline from putting a gun in her mouth and being one twitch away from ending it all had long been filtered out of her system, her sadness and confusion going with it.

But after she heard Sara say she was sorry, she didn’t know what came over her.

She just lost it.

She cried. Hard enough to fill an ocean, probably. And it seemed nothing could stop her.

Eighteen-year-old Nicholas Hammerstein is at the cusp of finishing high school in his hometown of Los Alamos, NM. He has a seemingly ideal life and is blessed with loving parents, a cute baby sister, and great friends. Nicholas is a gifted student and martial artist who has dreams of leaving for college at the end of his senior year. But, living in a world of Emergent humans, he will soon find his life turned upside down as his life and the fate of a kingdom hang in the balance. His future and theirs will be determined by how he navigates the drastic changes in his body and the magical and superpowered Mergent population he joins.

And this is the real chapter thirty. Apologies again for the mistake.

As I pulled away from Mr. Stewart’s house, I had a conundrum. April had texted me several more times, but I wanted to go home and compare notes with Mom and Dad regarding the new information Mr. Stewart had given me.

Meanwhile, the clock was ticking, and the Who was coming. I didn’t know how much longer I might have in this dimension, or reality, or whatever, and I wanted to find out as much as I could before I was pulled back into the clutches of Desdemonia’s mind.

A group of friends streams their gaming on Wednesday nights. But not all the action is on the dining room table.

Eighteen-year-old Nicholas Hammerstein is at the cusp of finishing high school in his hometown of Los Alamos, NM. He has a seemingly ideal life and is blessed with loving parents, a cute baby sister, and great friends. Nicholas is a gifted student and martial artist who has dreams of leaving for college at the end of his senior year. But, living in a world of Emergent humans, he will soon find his life turned upside down as his life and the fate of a kingdom hang in the balance. His future and theirs will be determined by how he navigates the drastic changes in his body and the magical and superpowered Mergent population he joins.

(Two chapters today so we can get to the end of this)

The next morning, I made a phone call to the hair-dressers. “Bonnie!” I said, in my most enthusiastic voice. “This is Desdemonia Landcaster. I’d like to book some time with you today.”

“Oh, Hi Ms. Landcaster! Sure, I have some time today. What do you want done?”

I put a hand to my head. “Oh, a brighten up, I think. What time can you work me in?”

“One o-clock work for you?” Bonnie said.

“That would be perfect, dear.”

“Just highlights like last time, or full color?”

Uber Love
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

After being laid off from my job I started driving for Uber. I had a good car and it seemed like a way to make money, but to be honest it was more that I enjoyed the company of people and couldn’t stand being stuck at home. Even after I picked up a new job, I kept driving for Uber in the evenings.

CHAPTER 58
The paramedic met us at the centre, seeming oddly satisfied with the state of my nose.

“It’s not broken, Enfys. That’s the good news. What it looks like is that the septum, the bit of gristle between your nostrils, has been bent”

“Hurts like it’s broken!”

She laughed.

“Aye, but it has to be there to hurt! What I am going to do is place a little bit of plastic over the top… Hold still… Got it. Try not to bang it again, and see your own GP when you get home. I know Cubby’s lot keep some basic painkillers here, but try not to overdo them, or those he’s about to give you in Aviemore”

“Eh?”

“At the pub. Don’t get plastered tonight just because I didn’t plaster you right now”

Every now and then
The darkness tries to chase me
And my legs are getting tired of running
Ohh, please don't,
Please don't let it get to me
Ohhh, I don't want to give up that easily
But the darkness keeps chasing me, me