Eminence on October 5th!

~ Kell Inkston ~ Leave a comment

First, my current music:

Now, onto business.

Eminence_Kindle

The second book in the Voidstar Empire series, Eminence, is set to be on amazon digital shelves for $2.99 on October 5th! I’m pretty proud of this one, but it might push the envelope a little much for some people’s tastes. This is, of course, the greatest sin an author can commit, as people’s opinions and sensibilities are far too precious to ever be touched.

Just kidding.

It’s nothing groundbreaking, but I’d say there’s plenty of nice morally gray segments that will keep some readers reflecting on the nature of some of the characters, particularly Cole, who’s been a little difficult to write this time around.

All things considered, I’m happy with the way it’s turning out, and I think you will too. This one’s going to have its fair share of combat, but also a whole lot of world-building and dynamic situations as well. Ever wondered what an Ardian queen looks like? What are VR sims like nowadays? How badass are O.E.L. scribes? The secrets are all inside!

What’s more, on October 5th, we will also be celebrating Valiance’s permanent price drop to $0.99! More readers, more fun, more money. *cue evil noises*

On other project notes:

-The Valiance audiobook contract has been squared away and production has begun, expect a nice, smooth, listen-to-able version in a month or less.

-Walking the Scar WILL continue, just not on storyshift. Expect it to be the next completed novel, and for chapters to be uploaded to kellinkston.com on a periodic basis.

And just between you and me: if you could have a sequel to any of my books asap, which would that be? I have a lot of open series, I understand, so I’d be interested in your opinions to better direct myself. Shoot me an email at kellr.inkston@gmail.com, or just comment somewhere. I’ll see it eventually.

I hope your day is wonderful, your harvests plentiful, and your campaigns successful.

All the best,

Kell

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A high-level update on 7/29

~ Kell Inkston ~ Leave a comment

Good tidings, reader.

In case you’ve been wondering, I’ve been at work on Eminence for nearly a month now, producing a good-looking batch of 21.5k words toward the project; this means I’m neaaaarly halfway there!

I don’t want to leave you empty-handed for trekking all the way to this little corner of the internet. So I’m going to give you one of the very first chapter in rough-draft form.

But first, reflection:

This is the second book in the series and feels more difficult to write. I don’t think it’s any more or less complicated than the first in the series (though it is markedly more complex than my non-sci-fi books) so that can’t be it, and yet I’m lagging behind. If I recall I was roughly 30k at this same time with Valiance, so I wonder what’s been holding me back. For the longest time I’ve only written what I expressly enjoy, so perhaps writing to the grindstone/schedule like this can slowly burn a person out – that must be it: burnout.

Be warned, writers: if you’ve not yet felt the power of weakness, and the speed of slowness, steel your heart, for even now I feel tugged away to go do something other than writing- Like cook, or go for a run, or play video games. So much to enjoy in this wonderful life of ours!

*ahem*

Regardless, expect to see Eminence either 100% on time in late September, or sometime early to mid October.

I wish you all the best and genuinely hope you’ll enjoy the segment below.

Much love,

Kell

 

 

Chapter Two: A Cool New Amigo and Frightened Adults
At first it was a flash, a painful light as Cole realizes he’s not dead, and was in fact just struck senseless. He was always told atmosphere suits were good at taking big drops, but he never expected they’d hold up with a drop like that. He mentally flicks through his Glass’ GUI to the medical tab: the system’s telling him his bones are crushed and that he shouldn’t be physically capable of walking, and yet…
Cole pulls himself to his feet in the deep greys of the block, his suit burnt over with a brief flame and scarred deep with debris. He stumbles for his rifle, but can’t see anything in the flowing storm of dust. He flicks on his thermal to make sense of it all, he spots someone coming forward just meters away- an Ardian.
“Hey,” Cole says. The Ardian, obviously shocked, starts up and lifts his rifle.
“Freeze, identif-…” after a second, he lowers his rifle. “Shit, sir, my apologies,” he says, amidst a chorus of chuckles over the comm line, filled with Lascardians who can stay stupid even in the midst of an aggravated fight like this one.
“For shame, Sergeant” The Captain says, over the line.
“Sorry, sir,” the male Ardian says to Cole.
Cole clicks to a private line. “No harm to it,” he says with a lax wave. “You got a sidearm?”
The sergeant flips up his pistol and Cole takes it from the handle. “Of course, sir. Sergeant Jeran, second platoon, pathfinder. I wouldn’t thought a drop at that speed would kill a life form, but I guess humans are full of surprises.”
The Lieutenant scoffs as the sergeant takes up Cole’s left. “That we are, Sergeant,” Cole says with a professional nod. “Now what’s the situation?”
Jeran hums. “You don’t know, sir?”
“Well I did sort of drop in first. Takes a little time to regain the bearings, you know.”
“Right, I get you.” Jeran looks out to the street, practically indistinguishable from the other directions due to the intensity of the wreckage. “Apparently one of the mech squads spotted out our drop and brought in some kind of artillery. Flew up and shot through the street- separated us. We’ve lost six thus far, sir. Current order is to disseminate into the city and take up buildings for cover as we wait it out.” Jeran starts pushing into a door to one of the identical towers that litter the city in neat, uniform rows- this is a residential district.
“He’s right, Lieutenant,” The Captain says in Cole’s head, closed link be damned. “They’re signatures are very faint, and they’re definitely using jammers somewhere. Myself and a few others are tracking them down to clear up the space, so for now you just need to survive with Sergeant Jeran.”
Cole passes through the dark and debris into a tenement building, the air cleaning up instantly. “Rodger. I’ll wait your call.”
The quiet of the building contracts sharply against the blows and shots of the outside. Cole swaps back to the immediate-zone comm. “Weird place,” Cole mutters as he looks over the rows and rows of produce, stacked neatly into bins across the floor.
“What?” Jeran asks as they both duck. “You’ve never seen a supermarket, sir?”
Cole scoffs, leading to a minute long silence as the two listen for any movement inside. “Well, of course I have, it’s just they’re usually way smaller,” he says after a silent while as they get to the other side of the floor, weapons at the ready.
“Do humans not have much food variety?”
“Well, no… Gah, why are we talking about this?”
Jeran, concealed in his atmosphere suit just like Cole, glances over his way cluelessly. “I don’t know, sir. Just sort of interesting to meet a human, is all.”
Cole thinks on it as they silently fold around a corner before talking again, not so much that they’re worried someone might hear them through their suits, as they might get distracted and be slow to react. “Well we have something call endless supermarkets. Basically it’s just a… well a machine that creates anything of any flavor and texture you want, and it’s all super nutritious.”
“Whoa, that’s sort of… huh,” Jeran mutters.
“What?” Cole asks as they pile up at a door into the main center section of the building.
“Just like a human to value practicality, I guess. That’s why you guys are so cool.”
Cole inhales sharply, praying that this guy isn’t going to be another Eqarne. “Eh, thanks?”
At Cole’s ready, the two open the door, only to meet a duo of armed Ardians.
“Who th-”
“Shoot!” The blue-red Ardian scream over the brown-black one.
Cole and Jeran snap to cover in a flash, dodging the red-blue’s pistol shot.
“Friendly, dammit, friendly!” Jeran shouts through his speaker.
“Yeah fucking right, traitor!” the large red-blue Ardian shouts, her pistol trembling in her group.
“What are you talking about?!”
“You have a human with you! You’re gonna fucking kill us!” She shouts, holding a committed, if wavering aim on the doorway.
“I’m Lieutenant Cole Outstar of the R.L.S.N., I don’t mean you any ha-”
“Bullshit! As if we’d fall for that!”
“I think…” the brown one clips her mandibles in consideration, “They both had AB patches.”
“They…” The red-blue Ardian seethes as she gestures further down the hall to some unknown recipient.
“Miss,” Cole says, totally unsure how to address an Ardian female in the civilian dynamic. “We’re 55th, Star Knife. We were dropped here to fight the terrorists.”
The red-blue Ardian scoffs with a beat of the wings. “But you’re human! You eat souls!”
Cole takes a deep breath, “That’s… that may be true, but I’m not after yours. I’m loyal to Eiza.”
“Yeah,” the brown-black one says, “It was on my new app. This is the galaxy’s only human, and he saved us from the Serronites.”
The red-blue one looks aside as if needing confirmation, though her pistol’s still pointed downrange. “Those rocky immigrant bastards?” She looses an awkward hum, and then refocuses her sights. “Sure, you can come out.”
The Lieutenant rounds the corner slowly, but suddenly Jeran shoves him from the other side back in cover as the red-blue takes a shot, scarcely missing Cole’s chest.
“Wh-What?!”
“Aidak! What the fuck?!” The brown-black one shouts over to her cover mate.
“You actually believe them? Even if they were us, we can trust them. They’re both male. No military can be run with male operators. Hey, human!” She shouts across. “How does it feel being let in as a side-effect of our empire’s weakness? Everything’s going to hell in a handbasket and it’s your fault!”
Jeran holds fast as a shocked Cole regains his bearings. He thinks of the most “Captainly” comeback to a social accusation like that. As if by reading his thoughts, The Captain feeds him a response. “Ardian, you will respect me like any black blooded female officer. I am not the cause of your problems in this advanced age, I but a result of that advancement. New times bring new problems, and new blessings, and I am your blessing, Ardian. Humans are unkillable in a fight. We dodge bullets to humor our physically-inferior comrades.”
The red-blue rams her elbow against her cover element. “You fucking think you could take me?”
Without even a tug from The Captain, Cole tosses his weapon out in the middle, and the red-blue crashes hers down as well. “To assume otherwise would be an insult to my race,” Cole says with a certain calculation. They meet in the middle, and instantly throw punches. Obviously a biological human would be crushed instantly by an exoskeletal creature of a comparable weight class, but Cole has his accelerator kit… and something else- he’s not sure what. He spryly dodges the first punch, and throws his fist forward like and order, undeniable and backed with the authority of the queen. The red-blue takes the hit stupidly, and spins out into the wall.
Smacking an Ardian feels weird, Cole muses, like a cheap plastic container filled with meat- the blood looks cool, though.
As both Jeran and the brown black aim down the altercation, Cole gently kicks into his downed opponent’s shin. “And let that be a lesson to you.”
“D-…bastard,” she says, groveling to her feet as Cole regains his weapon, and not a second too soon.
A dense crash crackles through the hall to the left, the very same the two Ardians were guarding. Both spring into action as Cole and Jeran move up to check the corner, and what they find does not please them: a mech, one of the battle suits from earlier, but with “23” mark. Its profile is wide to accommodate its several weapons systems, and its movement kit is obviously of a high grade, producing next to no sounds from its skeletal movement. Aside from the large black skull painted over the hull, one thing catches Cole’s eye that really worries him, the faded text line “U.P.M.F.” is under the front plating rim.
Huddled up to the side is a group of about twenty civilians. Most are children, identifiable as they’re just a notch shorter than Cole and the females all have their abdomens still fully intact. Their cover is really just a set of civilian counters, quite capable of protecting against small arms fire, but the suit has a Federation low-velocity grape-shot rifle, a weapon infamous for its ability to ricochet and fill an entire room with lead in a single, lazily-aimed shot.
The second remaining as the suit takes aim for the shot that’ll paint the hall fifty meters down with Ardian blood, Cole snaps off Jeran’s grenade, tosses it and fires directly into it, detonating it over the crowd. Just as the suit squeezes the trigger, it falls flat along with Jeran and Cole, who lost their systems. The two soldiers tear off their helmets as the flood of children run from the downed mech. The second they’re clear, the two covering Ardians open fire on the mech, shots clanging in the air.
“It won’t work, the armor’s too-” Cole stops himself, as the screams have turned into the monotonous, droning buzz of Ardian wings – his translator’s screwed with the rest of his suit, but only for a moment as his O.E.L.-make restarter begins whirring into motion. He grabs a grenade from Jeran, a frag, and dashes for the mech, which is already flinching back to life. As the careless gunfire from the red-blue Ardian zings past his ear Cole slides to the suit’s backside, thrusts his hand into the small latch handle, and taps in his own federation I.D. number. As expected, whoever designed the mech’s illegal firmware didn’t remove the code for officers to have preferred entry over the usual pilot.
The hatch begins the opening process, the back plate sliding up and around as the mech takes to its feet and the pilot re-aims the weapon. The moment he can, Cole tosses in the unpinned grenade, closes the hatch, and swings his body round, smashing his boot into the giant weapon’s safety. The mech clicks against the trigger, no bang, and then a bang from inside the suit. The combat suit stands eerily still, the pilot quite dead and the auto-pilot function also destroyed in the blast.
Cole leaps down from the mech the moment his accelerator kit comes back online, helping him stick the landing flawlessly in front of an intimidated crowd of frightened children. Don’t screw this one, man. As per the badass code, he walks forward with a lax pace as the fire inside the mech burns into the fuel supply, causing a sick explosion.
“I…” The red-blue Ardian botches a salute, “I’m sorry we doubted you, sir.”
The brown-black one shoves the apologetic one. “Who’s this we? Also no saluting indoors.”
“Nothing to it,” Cole says coolly amidst the cheer of the children. He puts on his helmet, the pressurization system hissing as it at once seals his system and makes him look even cooler. “All in a day’s work for the fifty fifth. Now find new cover. This place is compromised.” Cole turns away to the downed mech, now a cindering pile of Federation polycarbonate and complex metallics.
“Kon’s mandibles…” Jeran mutters in awe. “You’re inspiring to men everywhere, sir. You’re living proof that we can be just as strong as fema-”
Cole chuckles over Jeran’s words. “Keep your head in the battle, Sergeant. We’re almost through this.” He taps into the ops comm. “23 neutralized.”
“Copy, Lieutenant,” the surprisingly cheery voice of the opscomm coordinator says. “Four more unknown tags remaining in the area. Still really hard to make out, sir.”
Cole clears his throat as he switches to a private with the opscomm, “There’s… there’s the possibility I know the tag sequence.” There’s a silence as Cole surveys the street.
Opscomm clicks her mandibles audibly. “Wh-… and how’s that, sir?”
“Try…” Cole starts just as The Captain’s voice enters his head again.
“I’d advise against that, Lieutenant,” The Captain says.
Cole shakes his head. “Try the 22573 series,” he says, referring to a sequence of radio-proxies used to protect comm lines during fights. Usually commtags are open to anyone who wants to join in, but private conversations require series codes, each number of which requiring roughly a minute to peel through with modern equipment before figuring if it contains the signal or not. 22573 just happens to be the Federation’s most common tag – he knows it from experience. He guesses that if the firmware maker was too lazy to switch the door access codes, he must have also been too lazy to change the more-complicated proxy series.
There’s another pause, and suddenly four commtags ping blatantly onto the Glass systems of Cole and every single soldier in the company in Serne. Everything from their statuses to their positions are posted up. “H-How did you…”
“Later,” Cole snaps as he clicks over to a new line, at once adding all the 22573. “This is Cole Outstar of the L… uh, the L.R.S.N., we have your tags.”
Four voices, those of the four remaining pilots in the assault sigh, cuss, and gasp in disbelief. Picking out someone’s tags in the middle of a fight is incredibly rare, as the process for pinging it directly will, in the process, make one’s system a giant semi-transparent target for the enemy. Of course, Cole had to give them his tag in order to open the line, but he knows it’s worth it.
“Wh…” A gruff voice stops in the middle of his words. “We surrender.”
“Lyka, no! Black Skull doesn’t su-” Another shouts.
“Shut up,” a third says. “You’re too fucking green to know better, but if he wanted this guy could give away our positions right now if he wanted.”
“I…Rondifuckitall…”
“We surrender,” the first voice concedes again.
Cole hears a crash from the roof of the building next to them. He looks up to see a suit, having tossed aside its rifle. One of them had their building scoped in.
In the upcoming set of moments, Cole follows procedure, feeds the info to his superior, The Captain (who already knew, of course), and from there, complete the detainment of the terrorists. While everyone’s glad the situation was disarmed, casualties were low, and that loss of life was prevented, there’s a dark stench over the company on the way back to Arda —Nobody just knows an enemy’s Glass series five digits in; that’s information that would have to be told, not guessed or parsed through with scanners.
Through it all, Cole doesn’t bother thinking on it. What’s far more worrying is how he fell that distance and yet is in such good condition— No discomfort at all, as if he mysteriously regenerated during the fight.

The Best Launch yet, and wowie, did I mess up!

~ Kell Inkston ~ 2 Comments

Good day,

I’m writing this today a week off the heels of Valiance and Defiance‘s launch! Due to several factors (you, my readership being one of them) we were able to ascend Valiance to #1 in all of its categories.

That’s right.

For half of July 5th, Valiance was in the amazon top 50 in the kindle store. It had a best-seller tag, it was a really good feeling to see my book up there with the likes of Nora Roberts and Stephan King- but only for a moment. I broke water to take a breath, and sunk back into obscurity… at least I’ll have a little money to show for it, *sad laugh*.

So that said, a huge breakout hit that didn’t happen, and I didn’t expect it to, but Valiance is a great read and I think people’ll respond well to it. This is good. It feels like a step in the right direction, solidly so. If people react with good reviews and feedback, that’s all the more reason to continue. Though until that point I’m just here writing the sequel. I was planning on writing it anyway, but now I have all the more reason to do so. Expect to see the second novel, Eminence, to be released late September.

This was a wonderful launch, and really helped me get the feel of dealing with amazon’s “upward curve” of sales method of advertising.

Now, about that screw up:

An important aspect of the “upward curve” is to ensure a steady upward trend of sales, moving from low to high. It’s rather counter productive, which is why amazon’s algorithms tends to treat it with more weight if it happens. Causing the upward trend tells amazon that people like the book, and that its conversion rate is high, and possibly growing. For that, they’ll advertise your book more often to possible customers.

In attempting to create this trend, some of the promotion services I paid to do their work… didn’t do such a good job. There were some that couldn’t outdo my own launch momentum, (email list + social media + The Dank Kult) even with an email list that they claimed were in the high five digits- quite unexceptional! That said, the upward trend didn’t operate perfectly and looks more like a lump. Turns out the highest performing service was the ereaderiq / booksends joint promotion: thanks, you people are seriously rad at what you do.

So that said Valiance has plummeted back down the charts, but I’m still moving a lot of amazon unlimited page reads! I have no idea what the check from them will look like, but I have a sneaking suspicion I can buy two packs of ramen noodles for myself as a reward tonight!

What I learned from this launch:

-Yup, covers are super, super important

-Blurbs are super, super important

–Test advertisers/promoters before putting them in action for a launch – I only get one shot at these launch thingamajigs, but it’s worth getting right the first time.

-Lead magnets work! – I’m happy to say I’m adding roughly an extra 3-5 emails to my list each week thanks to Defiance. Offering a short story for a sign up really seems to be a win-win!

-Doing kindle table of contents stuff is actually super easy, and I might be an idiot for having taken this long to learn it

-Book covers… really, book covers.

I’ll do my best next launch as well, especially when you’re my readership. You blow me away daily with your support, please keep it up! Every email, review and like brightens my day so much, it reminds me this is all worth going forward on.

For those of you who’ve read Valiance, what do you think thus far? Do you think Cole’s a relatable main character? You can leave a comment or just shoot me a missive at kellr.inkston@gmail.com .

With much love,

Kell Inkston

 

 

 

Valiance and Defiance – Right on time!

~ Kell Inkston ~ Leave a comment

Good day to you!

As said, Valiance and Defiance are now available for 99 cents each until the 5th of July, in which Valiance will bump up to its sitting price of $2.99. The best way to get Defiance is to be an email-list subscriber, which will get you the book for the delicious price of free!

This is really all I have to announce at this time, as you can imagine I’m mighty busy with, well, everything.

I wish you the very best and hope you’ll be in touch with your feedback.

Enjoy the reads,

Kell

 

You are not alone. (Release date incoming!)

~ Kell Inkston ~ Leave a comment

First, some sick space jams:

Hello, my beloved humans ❤

I apologize for the radio silence for so many days, but I’ve been mad busy getting things ship shape for the joint release of Valiance and Defiance! I think we’re at that point where I can securely announce a release date for them, so here goes!

Valiance_Kindle + Defiance - High Resolution on the 30th!

You can pick up all 12,000+ words of Defiance and all 55,000+ words of Valiance for the low price of $0.99 each from the 30th of June to the 4th of July.

Consider the low price thanks for sticking with me all this time; you people blow me away on a daily basis. Keep in mind, at the 4th the sale will end, upping Valiance’s price to $2.99, so you’ll have to move fast.

This is the projected plan, and if the launch goes well (like, really well) then I’ll get right on book two. If not, I think Kingdom through the Swamp‘s a bit overdue for a sequel, don’t you?

That said, look forward to it! You can keep up to date with any new plans by visiting kellinkston.com, or watching your email if you’re a subscriber. And remember, email subscribers will get Defiance for 100% free!

Roger wilco cosmic out,

Kell Inkstar

The Death of Flash Fiction Friday… And from the ashes, comes…!?

~ Kell Inkston ~ Leave a comment

Hey friend,

Flash Fiction Friday at Five, (for the three weeks I’ve been doing it, at least,) have been nice, but I’m afraid the experiment’s already run its course.

I expected that a weekly batch of super-quick fiction would be an enjoyable diversion for you, and that it wouldn’t get in the way of my main projects, but I’ve been pulls in a good many directions recently with work and I think focusing on one or two projects would be better. It’s for this reason that this is the final Flash Fiction Friday at Five post. It’s a goofy short about some magical wizards complaining about puns and silly things- I thought it was funny while I was writing it, judge hard.

In its place, I’ll be posting chapters from my new projects, starting very, very soon. This way I can still provide you with fiction you love, while keeping myself on task with the upcoming novels.

Sounds exciting? Well I certainly feel that way. I’ll probably post it up on https://royalroadl.com this time around, as it seems like a very frequented spot for fantasy fiction that I only recently found out about. LOL I’m so out of the loop…

Anyway, expect new chapters of my next project coming up there, so you can read it for 100% free! (It will be quite unlike that radish.com business with Valiance. Not that it was bad, but the primary audience for that app are all into erotica and romance. I outpreformed among the other sci-fi entries, but was crushed in the wider scope when battling the greatness of abs and titties- curse them! I have a good feeling about this place though.)

That said, look forward to the upcoming chapters, and please enjoy the final offering of flash fiction below.

All the best,

Kell

 

Arch-Mage Nias blasts through the triple-frozen double doors of Lord Elsano’s palace of ice. Neither of them are prepared for this- their final day on Earth and their greatest duel.

“Well well well,” Elsano coos with a pretentious sneer, his ridiculously long and pointy nose curling upward to reveal his crooked teeth. “It appears as though my guards weren’t quite frosty enough to prevent even a weak intruder such as yourself,” he adds with an uppity squeal.

Nias shakes his arm to put out the magic fire clinging to it. His profane, pulsing crimson tattoos inscribed across his body slowly sizzle out to a common black ink in appearance. “Weak? Your burns are weak, sir. This is your end,” he says, also putting emphasis on his stupid pun as he scrapes his right foot across the icy floor to enter a fighting stance.

Elsano snickers, sniggers, snorts and even honks in laughter. “Me?! Wow, you really need to chill out!”

Nias smirks as he raises his fists to conjure up another divine explosion. “Say what you will. Things are about to heat up in here, and it won’t just be me!”

“Whoa, that’s a cold shoulder,” the Ice Lord says with an exaggerated shudder.

“You must mean the cold smolder!”

“Your weak puns make it obvious that you’re not the frozen one of legend!”

“I’m about to kick your ash!”

“Ice think not!”

“I thi-”

“Holy shit,” comes a voice from the side.

The two swing around to see an unassuming, shockingly-quiet knight in full armor, cloaked over and folded over each plate to muffle the sound of his metal.

“Ice to meet you!” Elsano says with a raised, white brow.

“You already used that one!” Nias snaps at his frozen foe. He turns back to the knight. “Look, kid, it’s about to be a holocaust up in here, so-”

“Wow,” Elsano interrupts.

“Yeah dude, holy shit,” the knight adds.

Nias flinches and throws up his hands. “That’s a fire word, guys! I’m not talking about the actual Holocaust! Dammit!”

“Yeah, sure,” Elsano peeps with a curling smirk.

“Even so- you knew that, man. Kinda insensitive,” the knight notes.

“Wh- you can’t just repurpose a word exclusively,” Nias argues. “Language is fluid, you can’t just-”

“Oh boy,” the knight starts, “I’m feeling pretty gay today.” He lifts his visor just a notch to shoot an insinuative glare at Nias, who groans immediately.

“Ugh… I guess, but it’s like, that’s different! Holocaust wasn’t a proper noun for an event at first, but gay is still being used as an adjective.”

“Sure,” the knight admits, “But even then you can understand the context it’s being used. Gay’s implications is like way, way less extreme than Holocaust’s. I think maybe you could probably get away with using it when describing an actual fire, but to just throw up a pun like that is sorta uncool, not gonna lie.”

“Yeah,” Elsano notes. “My grandad’s Jewish.”

Nias grins crassly. “Guess that’s where the nose comes from, hu-”

The knight gasps as sirens flare in the ice castle’s windows. “You didn’t fucking just say what I think you sai-”

The beautiful stained-ice windows of the keep shatter brilliantly to reveal Armus, master wind-mage and a powerful social justice warrior.

“The fuck did you just say, shitlord?” Armus screeches, flying in with his magic while furiously typing up a reply to this short in the comments below- though he ultimately won’t post it because he’s afraid it might hurt his cred as a “supportive” blogger.

“Dude, puns,” Elsano notes.

Even Armus isn’t so deluded by his self-righteous pseudo-intellectual Nat-Soc outlook on life that he would dare disrespect the ways of the pun. “Uh-” he mutters. “Right, I’m going to blow you away… you racist, homophobic, drumpf-supporting shitbag!”

Nias holds up a hand as if to halt the insults. “It’s just a facial feature, dude. Chill out. Noses are just noses.”

“But you used it in a derogatory way, man,” the knight explains. “It’s true that everyone’s different and that may look aesthetically dumb or whatever to you, but you can’t just go tearing people up about how they look. They can’t change that.”

“Just like how a person can’t change their gender after birth!” Elsano says- just trying to be helpful, but oh, he was wrong.

Armus drops to the floor, heaving his all-kale breakfast onto its surface. “Did you…” Armus takes a deep breath after coughing up another pile of green. “DID YOU JUST FUCKING SAY PEOPLE CAN’T BE FREE TO CHOO-”

“What a shocker!” A voice clears out from the wonderful skylight.

Elasno gasps. “N-not the skylig-”

At that same moment the beautiful, 80,000 Euro skylight crashes in with a bolt-fast man, his hair like conduits of leaping electricity.

The knight sighs. Not another one.

“Isroy!” Elsano yells with a furious stamp of the foot.

“Shocked?” Isroy asks with a grin. “I came here to take the elemental throne for myself!”

“Yeah?” Elsano scoffs. “Well you can’t have it.”

“Hope you’re ready for to restorm yourselves!” Armus says as he charges his wind magic.

There’s a silence as Elsano squints. “Like…. Re… reform?”

Armus looks about at the four others awkwardly. “Y-yeah… b-but at least I have puns!” He doesn’t point because it would be rude, but he sort of gestures over at the knight. “I don’t even know what element you are!”

Nias laughs as he heats up his flames. “Yeah!” he starts. “You all are going right into the oven, but you’ll be the first, knight. I bet you don’t even have an element!”

Everyone just decided to let that other probable holocaust reference slide, but Armus is totally accusing Nias of being a white supremacist after this fight; even though Nias is Latino, it’s obviously white enough.

“Yeah you… cur,” Elsano says with pursed lips and a disgusted look. “I’m going to have to let it go on you if you don’t identify yourself!” he says, gaining an awed chorus from the others.

“Hey, that wasn’t half bad,” Nias said.

“Yeah,” Armus agrees, “I fucking LOVE that movie.”

The knight just shakes his head. “I’m ‘The Grey Wind’,” he says simply, laxly drawing his broadsword, dulled exceptionally with mundane runes.

All of the wizards exchange confused glances. “Yeah, and?” Isroy asks, arcing energy between his fingers as if he were juggling raw power.

The knight’s set back by their demeanor. “Well, I sort of thought you guys would be trying to escape.”

Armus scoffs. “Well why would we? You think you can scare me with your heteronormative gender representation?”

“Well, I’m sort of that knight that’s been running around killing mages for a few months now. Pretty sure it’s been all over social media,” the knight says, clicking on his phone for just a second to display the numerous @thegreywind retweets he has in the latest auto-alert. In just the past ten minutes over seven thousand people loved his most recent tweet: “Bout 2 go fukkup sum moar sparkles. Wish me luck, magic h8erz!! #fuckmagic”

Everyone flinches and scrambles the second he activates his sword’s mundane managraphy, approximately ten-folding the blade’s cutting power against those who have well-used magical veins.

And then the knight killed them all, took a monster shit on the elemental throne, and posted it to his Instagram. Wendy’s nuggets didn’t stand a chance the day magic was wrought and scattered from the Earth out into the black ether of the cosmos.

-The End- :^)

 

 

 

Flash Fiction Friday @ Five PM – 6/1/2017 A DOUBLE FEATURE OH WOW

~ Kell Inkston ~ 1 Comment

Hey friend, it’s a double feature today. One’s stupid, and the other is stupider. Can you figure out which one is which?!!?1

The titles are as follows: The Toll, and Deathkill McSatanman Fights the Doom Dragons of Fuckdeath Mountain

Please enjoy. 16+ for language, violence, and more violence.

The Toll

“Ugh, another toll booth?” Traci groans as Tom shrugs.

“Well it’s not against the law here, so every county tolls it up anyway they can,” he says, just happy little Lewis is sleeping soundly.

Traci sighs with a huff as she leans back into her passenger’s seat. “Whose idea was it to fucking go to the Keys, anyway?”

Tom smirks. “Yours.”

“Well this is garbage, you should’ve told m-” Traci stops herself, seeing the car in front of them swerve off the side of the elevated highway, plummeting into the depths of the ocean. “Oh my God.”

Tom shakes his head. “Was… did that just…”

“Yeah… yeah it did, I don’t know w-” she stops herself again, peeking over the side to discover a sunken reef of cars, each one having swerved off this one point before the toll booth. “What… what the fuck is going on?!”

Tom squints forward. His face pales in fear. “The guy at the booth… it’s the grim reaper!”

“W-what?!”

Tom’s breathing picks up sharply. “We have to… we have to…” He grasps the steering wheel rigidly, as if he’s about to dive them off the highway.

Traci leaps over to secure the wheel. “Don’t do it! Don’t you dare!”

Tom sputters in horror. “B-but we’ll die!”

“We’ll die for sure if you turn off. Just keep going, he’s probably just a… a cosplayer!”

“What?! No! Look at that scythe! And that skull! Oh God, oh God, we’re so close.”

They reach the covered part of the toll and he slows down, because breaking the law by speeding through a check point would be far worse than death, as everyone knows.

Traci places her hand over the mouth of her crying husband. “Chill out, I’ll do the talking,” she says as the flowing, horrific visage of the cloaked darkness approaches them. The scythe shines with surgical, iodine-scented horror, ready to split-through any human that crosses its path.

Traci rolls down the window, leaning awkwardly over a frozen stiff Tom as she presents their I.D.s. “Good afternoon!”

There’s a long, guttural, nasal sound as the grim reaper swallows a quart of mucus. “Wischense ahn fwee fiddy, pwese!”

She pays the tolls, gets back their identification, and sits snidely in her seat as Tom drives through. “Told you.”

 

Survived? Well try this one on for size!

 

Deathkill McSatanman Fights the Doom Dragons of Fuckdeath Mountain

The bitchin’ sandpaper winds of this subspace wasteland are  shitty as fuck, but Deathkill McSatanman doesn’t give a bitch about that. He has his hands full getting jugulars for his master’s jugular collection back at Castle X for Overlord Torment, who’s totally at least a million times better than Overlord Chaos.

Deathkill swipes his hand across a battle jaguar of rapezone 5, separating its body from its jugular easily as the cat’s skin is quickly torn off from the powerful winds.

“Fuck you, bitch, easy,” Deathkill says laxly, flawlessly insulting the battle jaguar’s battle cred by saying the word “easy” at the end.

“RAWRRRRR FUCK YOUUUUU I WAS  OFF GAAAAAME!” The jaguar roars as its body disintegrates into a bunch of stupid fucking bones and shit.

The sandstorm dies down, and Deathkill shoves the stupid jugular vein into his backpack filled with jugulars. He pulls up a magic chat stone, great for dissing the shit out of nerds and scrubs dimensions away.

“Yo,” he says into the stone.

“Heya there, amigo. How’s it goin’?” An alright voice from the stone responds.

“Got at least a hundred more jugulars for your collection.”

“Sweet. No damn way Chaos’ll compete with that. He’ll be like, ‘Oh, look at my vast collection of exotic teas and magic spells!’ And I’ll be all ‘Well check out these jugulars, ya’ biiiiitch!’ Yeah, hehe, it’ll be good. So there’s one more target for you to hit, and then I think we’ll be goodto move on to the anus collection.”

Deathkill rubs his manly stubble as he surveys the savage wilderness around him; there’s a great black mountain sprawling in front of him, spewing sick amounts of lava and heavy metal guitar. “What’s that?”

“Check out that mountain in front of you. Locals call it ‘Fuckdeath Mountain’, because you’re fucked and then you die if you go there.”

Deathkill cranes back in suspicion. “Whoa, like getting fucked, or fucked up?”

“Whoa whoa whoa! Sorry man, yeah, definitely fucked up. This isn’t that part of subspace.”

“Good cuz’ I was gonna’ say-”

“Yeah, we’re not doing that shit man, sorry again I wasn’t totally clear on that.”

Deathkill looks over the far-off mountain, hoping to find an easy route up. “Alright, so what am I killing?”

“Right back to business, I like that,” Torment says with an impressed tone. “I need you to kill all the Doom Dragons of Fuckdeath Mountain.”

“…You said only one jugular.”

“Did I say one? I meant one.., ty.”

“… Onety?”

“Ten, Deathkill. Ten jugulars. There’s ten dragons up there, I want you to take a jugular from each.”

Deathkill nods. Not what was expected, but he doesn’t give a single bitch. “Alright, sounds cool.”

“Rodger dodger, my amigo. See ya’.”

“Deathkill out.” He stuffs the stone back into its place on his person. Without a thought or a word, Deathkill starts through the dunes toward the shadowing mass of Fuckdeath Mountain.

It’s at the base of the mountain when The Subspace Orchestra plays a sick folk-industrial tune from a super niche band, warning Deathkill that something’s nearby, and it’s probably a badass. Deathkill, however, has no bitches to give about badasses running around at the base of what is now his mountain, so he only gives it minimal heed.

Suddenly, an ambush.

Deathkill’s not a giant fucking pussy, so he doesn’t move his head from the black-iron bolt’s path, allowing the projectile to attempt to imbed itself into his skull. The bolt shatters against his skin, fortified with what seems like an eternity of training.

“Weeel weeel weeeel. Wut ‘eev we got ‘eeer’?” A voice emerges from behind the rocks.

Deathkill slowly turns his head to look over the assailant. It’s a drakeman, one of those dragonkin bastard bitches, who fail at being both human and dragon, so usually just fuck about pillaging and being menaces to society. If Deathkill gave even one percent of a bitch about it, he’d murder any dragonkin he met, ‘cuz it was one of those fuckers that killed his mom, and only shitty people kill moms.

“Get the fuck out of my way,” Deathkill says, just as another bolt flies into his face, this time his eyeball. Again he decides not to dodge, and the bolt curls harmlessly against his fortress-like body.

“Yeeeer een dreeegen teeeritry, seeerender or yeeel know a feet werse then deth!”

“Bye.” Deathkill walks on, and after another bolt’s shot at him, the dragonkin decides he’s too much of a pussy to back his shit up.

Deathkill travels up the mountain, fending off the occasional ambush by not giving a bitch about it, until he reaches a dark, dank, 420 cave, emitting only the dankest of scents. Deathkill spitefully passes a smattering of posters for “socialist” democratic candidates, each old flavor of candidate covered by whoever’s fresh, though their ideas are still the same old shit.

“Hey maaaaaan,” comes a voice from the darkness, as a mystic flame alights deep in the cave. It’s a wise shithead stoner, posting something “deep and woke” on social media with one hand, while holding his cannabinoid vape set up to his mouth with his other hand.

“What?” Killdeath asks, almost giving one single fucking small bitch, just enough to answer the guy.

“I’m the wise keeper of the cave of trials! Only the worthiest of individuals may pass.”

“Sweet. Let me through.”

The wise monk holds his social media hand up in peace. “Let us test you…” Dramatic music churns up by the Subspace Orchestra, enjoying this spectacle enough to drum out an anticipative piece.

A golden glow overtakes the room as a chalice emerges from the depths of the center pedestal, some mystical well probably used for stupid shit that doesn’t matter.

“Behold, the cup of truth! You must drink this and see your inner being!”

Killdeath picks up the golden cup and smells the silvery liquid inside. It’s obviously poison, but he doesn’t give One. Single. Bitch. He chugs the cup, issuing a chuckle from the evil stoner.

“Now, tell me the truth, you’ve come here for the treasure of the dragons, haven’t you?!”

“Uh, no.”

“W-…” The stoner draws back in shock. The poison really does double as a truth serum, but it seems as though Killdeath is immune! “Well then why are you here, man!”

“I’m just here to tear out their jugulars. Let me through.”

The monk gasps and trembles; vape juice jars leap from his pockets to the floor and he almost drops his really sweet eight-cylinder rig! “B-bro! You can’t fuckin’ do that! They’re like, immortal!”

“If you don’t open this door right the fuck now…”

The monk stumbles over himself as he hits the secret switch. “Man, whatever, just go!”

Killdeath steps through the open door of the cave into a dimly-lit stairwell.

“But don’t say I didn’t warn you, man! You’re gonna be more lit than me! Heh, get it?” The monk says as he inhales another puff.

Onward down into the deep, deadly stairwell, a slew of traps trigger and slam against Killdeath, but not one bitch is given. He moves through a dark chamber, filled with doomworms of Hell X, who he also doesn’t give one damn bitch to.

Finally, he climbs up to the peak, a massive valley-like crater at the summit. All ten of the Doom Dragons rest in a ring around the crater as they stare down upon their massive treasure, containing riches far beyond puny human reckoning. The greatest of their kind raises its head in noble disgust.

“And you, human, dare to steal away our great riches?” it reverberates with draconic majesty.

“Naw. I’m just here to kill you nerds.”

The dragons stare down with humored contempt, as if Deathkill were just a spider crawling across their table that they all are simply allowing to live for the moment solely for the entertainment of its pathetic, crawling existence.

“You surely must be the greatest fool to cross into our bounda-”

“Stop wasting my time and get down here, scale fuckers.”

The ten Doom Dragons of Fuckdeath Mountain breath upon Deathkill, the heat of a molten core slung upon him. Deathkill leaps forward, his fists raised to tear the dragons’  skulls from their stupid fucking necks.

 

Ten minutes later, Deathkill says only one thing:

“Easy.”

 

That was an alright day for him, and Deathkill almost gave a single bitch, but he didn’t want to have to trade that for ten dragon jugulars, so he just got the jugulars and left without giving a bitch.

Not one single bitch, and they were mighty proud of their brother.

“Say Deathkill,” Jaina says, one of Deathkill’s “bitches”.

“Yeah?” He grunts, carrying his heavy pack, now overflowing with jugulars.

“Can we get ice cream after this?”

“Ice cream, ice cream!” Little Yuu exclaims, hopping up and down cheerily.

Deathkill smiles. As annoying as they are, it’s nice to bring his sisters along every now and again on quests.

“Sure thing,” he says, agreeing to give every one of his bitches some ice cream.

 

Yeah wow, that sure was some fiction. Did I write this while drunk? Probably.

That all said, guess what? Valiance‘s prequel, Defiance, is well on its way to completion. Expect to see both published in late June (oh my that’s only like a month away!!! Now I scared myself, I need to recover with some coffee.)

Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next week (or earlier),

Kell