Robin always said that when her Love Mobile finally quit working she would settle down, where ever that happened to be. It broke down in Santa Fe outside a small gift shop that was owned by a man called Sam Raveneyes. A Help Wanted sign hung in the window. She felt drawn into the shop as if an invisible cord was reeling her in. From the moment their eyes met there was a recognition of the two spirits. They had met in a long ago time. I have been waiting for you, Sam whispered. He had said aloud what she felt in her heart. She knew she was home to stay and so was the Love Mobile.
The wild fires had prepared the site, El Nino rains brought the mudslides, and the hillsides gave up some of their secrets. Two skulls and a femur were found by some mountain hikers. The police said they will open their missing persons files. The call came in to the Sheriff’s Station on a quiet Sunday morning. Another hiker had spotted something. The deputy dispatched to the scene called it in, I think this is a job for Animal Control. Yeah, it looks like a tentacle. Wait a minute, it’s moving! The dispatcher heard a muffled scream and then nothing.
Friday Fictioneers is hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. Image provided by Connie Gayer.
I came to Angel’s Camp to work as a printer’s devil for the Calaveras Gazette. I first saw Meili at the local laundry owned by her father. Her beautiful smile won my heart. Soon we were in love and talked about a new life together. A marriage had been arranged to a wealthy San Francisco merchant when Meili was a little girl. Her parents planned to take her to The City when the pass cleared of snow. We left late at night planning to hide out in one of the old abandoned mines in the back country. The trackers found our bodies down in the shaft where we had fallen. The old timers say that they can hear us calling to each other late at night out at the old mine. They call it the Lost Lovers Mine.
“She lived a life that some would describe as being on edge.” She had only two nickels to her name. This was a familiar experience, at least lately. It was hard to stretch her Social Security check to the end of the month. She didn’t want to tell her kids about how she was struggling. She had worked hard but never made enough to save anything. Besides, much of the work she did was not paid work. Taking care of her own kids, cleaning her own house, chauffeuring her kids to all their activities, car pooling kids to school, grocery shopping and preparing thousands of meals, caring for her family when they were sick, and taking care of her parents and her husband’s parents when they needed help, all of this was unpaid and not recognized by society as being of much value. So why should Congress think she deserved enough in her Social Security check to make it through the month?
Yes, Tribune. We monitoring from small dwarf orb at edge of it solstar system. It signaling to our solstar structure at Zonar 3.
Transmission image by Ryan Somma
So indicating action you proposing, Centurion?
Yes, Tribune. Transmission meaning techno evolving. It understanding basic techno. We have needing, slave labor for completing Zonar 3 project. The Empress be pleased for completing.
The Empress
Will causing insurrection, our native workers?
If causing we know how we eliminating.
Let us going forward. Transport the new slaves in from what calling…What do it calling orb?
Earta, Sir.
Such strange naming and such strange species. You say it walking on two legs?
Yes, Sir.
Will it adjusting to appearing are we?
If it not we having way to exterminating.
Desire we finishing Zonar 3 before we must the exterminating.
Our first transporting to occur this night. Our vessel approaching Earta now.
It not detecting the transport and be warning?
No, transport disguising and it naming The Halloween Asteroid.
Strange, so very strange!, the Tribune’s mandible made a clicking sound.
The Centurion bowed and performed the ritual antennae touching with the Tribune.
The consensus of the conference of leading astronomers was we are not ready for Active SETI. The issue of whether or not to attempt contact with extraterrestrial species needed to be approved by the people of the Earth because there are risks involved. This wasn’t going to hold back Dr. V. He had the high-powered device ready to begin operations. Private donors had funded his research. He would direct the high-powered signal toward KIC 8462852. The transmission was picked up first by the alien’s sensors on Pluto. It triggered the devices buried on earth. They rose from their hiding places.
My contribution to Friday Fictioneers hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. Image by Dale Rogerson.
This Halloween season has been especially exhausting for Buffy the Vampire Slayer ever since the vampires joined forces with the zombies. Buffy knew how to dispatch a vampire without breaking a sweat. But these zombies were another story. How do you kill the living dead? She could hear them pounding on the castle doors as she tried to collect her thoughts. She looked up and, as her eyes caught the flicker of the candle flame, an idea sparked in her brain. I think I still have some of those old flame throwers in the dungeon that Granny picked up from the Army Surplus Store. It’s a good thing I listened when she told me not to throw them out. She said I might need them someday. Granny you were so right!
“I watched the vulture looking at me hungrily as I lay on the ground bleeding and injured.” I felt like such a klutz. I knew better than to wear those high heals but I wanted to look good. I was late and rushing to get to the Halloween party when I tripped on the hem of my Glenda the Good Witch costume and fell in a heap.
I gazed up at the vulture and our eyes met, Didn’t your mother ever tell you that it’s not polite to stare! I shouted.
Don’t worry about Agatha. She’s already had her dinner, a stranger said in a low voice as he helped me to my feet.
Thanks for stopping to help, I replied as I limped along on his arm.
No worries. You were irresistible, he smiled and the moonlight gleamed off his fangs.
The Senior Center sponsored the trip to Las Vegas. The package included a hotel and 2 meal vouchers at a cheap price. The bus had seen better days but it was a cheap getaway for those with low paying jobs or on a pension. The bus made a stop in the middle of the desert which was not listed in the trip’s brochure. The passengers looked around confused. The front door creaked open and a dark figure climbed on. Thank You Roy, the Master will love this bunch, as he spoke they could see his sharp pointy teeth.
This is my contribution for Friday Fictioneers hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. Above image by Ron Pruitt.
I remember going to the Saturday matinee at our local movie theater when I was a little girl. We would usually see comedies like Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein or a Jerry Lewis movie and eat a lot of candy. Those movies weren’t scary but made me laugh hysterically. I loved the scenes where the monster keeps appearing to Costello and then, when he tells Abbott, the monster has disappeared from sight. The old horror movies were not so funny but would be considered campy and dated today. There were a couple that stuck with me for a long time and in a bad way. These were ” The Fly”, ( 1958), screenplay by James Clavell and “The Tingler” (1959), directed by William Castle. Both had Vincent Price in the cast. He was great in all those old horror films. Which reminds me of “The House on Haunted Hill,” (1959), also directed by William Castle. Now I want to go out and get that one. The others still creep me out too much. What was disturbing about The Fly was how the main character ends up with a fly head, for a head, and then in the end is going to get eaten by a spider. AAAAH! With The Tingler it was that creepy centipede like creature that was supposedly in our spines and the bathtub full of blood with an arm reaching out of it. The centipede creature is supposed to break your spine if you don’t scream. Vincent Price plays the mad pathologist who uses LSD in his research and autopsies executed murderers for the state. I probably shouldn’t have been allowed to watch those movies….
Posters via IMDb:
Now for my story:
Darkness Comes
On Samhain, the villagers tell of a stone circle that is in a grove of ancient oaks deep in the forest. There you can see upon old pikes the severed heads of the Cinn Dorcha. They were placed there by the Druid Priestess Aine in the olden times. The heads are covered with rotting flesh, the eyes bulging, and mouths contorted. People swear they can hear them talking to each other when they walk through the grove late at night.
The Druid Priestess
I am a Druid priestess. Some say I am a witch. I descend from a long line of Druids through my maternal side. My earliest memories are of my mother making beautiful swirling clouds of color appear over my crib and hearing the voices of all my maternal ancestors singing enchanting lullabies and cooing to me, “Aine, the blessed one, our beautiful child, and joy of our hearts!”
I watch over the village near the sacred grove. The people come to me for divinations and interventions with the gods. It is a peaceful time but it has not always been so. It was around this time of Samhain, two years ago, that a dark evil descended on our village.
I stood in the sacred grove after the Samhain bonfires. I was in despair about what had come to our land. Darkness was descending. Ta dorchadas a thagann. Ta dorchadas tar eis titum thar ar dtalamh. Cloisim an caoineadh mo mhuintir. Mo mhuintir caoin amach. Ta fulaingt i bhfad. Ta fulaingt i bhfad.
The Darkness comes in the form of the Cinn Dorcha, the Dark Ones, and their quest to coerce my people to their ways. Whether it be by tricks or by intimidation. They speak against the old ways and call them evil superstitions. They tell the people that in order to survive they need to reject our old ways and practices. They tell us how we have to dress and how we are to behave as men and women. The women of my country were used to freedom and shared with men equally. The Cinn Dorcha tell us that this is no longer to be allowed. Women who resist this are made their slaves and are abused and violated. They replaced our old holiday celebrations with their own. They destroyed the ancient temple of Tlachtga. Their leader, Olc, labeled our Druid priestesses as witches. The people are afraid and do not know how to fight them. Ni mor dom a cabhru leo. Ni mor dom a cabhru leo!
I have been in hiding in the forest. Olc has proclaimed he will give a great price for my capture. I have been able to shield my cottage with a powerful ward. The enemy have searched the forest many times and walked past it only seeing an old burnt out ruin.
I began a campaign of harassment against the invaders. I use my shape-shifting ability to become first a falcon strafing them with my talons and next a wolf tearing at their throats. The shape-shifting takes a lot of energy and I am exhausted for days afterward.
The Day of Fire
I was resting in my cottage when I heard the raven. Bran alerted me with his shrill cries as he swooped down into my garden, “Aine, hurry they are near the grove and they have Isibeal!”
I questioned Bran as I ran toward the grove, “Why would they take Isibeal? She is only a herbalist who mixes potions for the villagers. She is not a threat to anyone.”
I was able to blend into the surrounding trees with my cloak and from there I watched them. Olc was with them.They dragged poor Isibeal by a rope that was wound around her neck. Her hands were tightly bound behind her back and her face streaked with dirt and tears. They took her to the stone circle in the sacred grove and tied her to a tree.
I stepped out from the trees and called out, “Olc, I heard you will give a great price for my capture.”
” You will join your friend at the stake,” Olc snarled. ” Seize her, seize the witch!” he cried to his men.
I raised my arm and called upon the powers of the wind, Thogairm me an ghaoth! A dark cloud blew across the sky covering the sun and the sky turned a metallic grey. The air, cold as ice, circled around the men like a whirlwind. It blew with such force it sounded like the wail of a thousand banshees. The cinn olc were all immobilized with fear. I quickly untied Isibeal and told her to run into the forest. Stepping outside of the stone circle, I raised my arm, and recited the ancient incantation, Teacht chun cinn laochra mor. Scriosann ar naimhde!
The ancient oaks in the grove began to sway and moan. With a loud roar the trees released their sharpest branches like spears toward the enemy. The Cinn Dorcha and their leader were impaled where they stood. I raised my arm again and called upon fire, Thogairm metine! ,and an arc of flame shot out from my fingertips setting them all ablaze. They met the fate they had planned for Isibeal.
Like the Cinn D’aois in long ago times, I placed the heads of my enemy on pikes at the entrance to the sacred grove. The villagers say that when you walk through the grove in the dark of night you can hear them talking to each other.
Aine
The Sacred Grove
Tlachtga
Isibeal the Herbalist
Bru na Boinne
Cnoc Aine
Bran
Sacred Grove
Aine’s cottage
Goddess by Banks Vevo on You Tube:
Rhiannon [a cousin of Aine] by Fleetwood Mac via muzicchnl on You Tube:
This Halloween season has been especially exhausting for Buffy the Vampire Slayer ever since the vampires joined forces with the zombies. Buffy knew how to dispatch a vampire without breaking a sweat. But these zombies were another story. How do you kill the living dead? She could hear them pounding on the castle doors as she tried to collect her thoughts. She looked up and, as her eyes caught the flicker of the candle flame, an idea sparked in her brain. I think I still have some of those old flame throwers in the dungeon that Granny picked up from the Army Surplus Store. It’s a good thing I listened when she told me not to throw them out. She said I might need them someday. Granny you were so right!
Notes Tied On The Sagebrush 