Michael Clark

Tunnel Rat Chapter 268

"Police! Stand where you are and raise your hands!"

Four members of an Interpol squad wearing bulletproof vests and helmets with guns deployed were walking swiftly toward Victor Seimovich and his bodyguards. I reached into his jacket, but a forceful whisper made him stop. All of them raised their hands. Another squad was moving up from behind, surrounding the two men directing the medical pod. One by one, everyone but Victor was separated from the group, handcuffed, and searched. No on...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 267

Heathrow Airport in Great Britain is one of the world's busiest hubs for air travel. Besides being the main airport for the UK, flights from the Americas heading to Europe and the rest of the world funnel into it and back out, crossing paths with the flights heading the other way. On any given day, over 1300 planes take off or land there, with 250 of those involving travel to the US. Three of these flights are from Philadelphia, and on one of them were two weary doctors on the first leg of a ...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 266

It was 4:30 A.M. eastern US time when Sydney began pounding repeatedly on the door to Steven and Samantha's apartment. She'd sent emails and called his phone, with no answer. In an actual emergency, Wally could wake them up immediately, but she couldn't involve Wally in this. Security was alerted by the noise and looked to see who was launching an assault on the apartment. Seeing that it was Sydney with a cart loaded with three pots of coffee and several mugs, they turned off the alert. Steve...

Thank You for the Feedback and What's Next.

I wanted to thank the people who helped make the sausage. The feedback helped with forming the Legendary feats and made me swerve into a different path on one character. (Ben) That work continues, along with all the stuff for leveling up.

I'm going to release the last of the chapters in the Fae arc on RR today, rather than cliffhanger the last chapter. Then nothing new on RR for a week or two while I finish things up, work on Tunnel Rat for the writathon (lots of Milo chapters), and b...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 356

"Shut yer yaps an' gather round. I only want to have to say this a dozen times!" Rory was standing on the back of a cart and trying to get the clan's attention, a difficult job in the best of times, made harder by the fatigue of a long journey and the excitement of seeing unicorns. The Summer Lord's lands were infested with them, and by now, both Rory and the goats were getting tired of the horn ponies. They were playing silly games, running in to tag one goat after another. Rory had finally ...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 265

"I'm beginning to have regrets."

Belinda's voice came to Milo from forty feet further down the medium duct. "Does that do any good? Whenever I regret something, it usually means I'm running for my life from an angry monster. I've got too much to think about when that happens. Regrets are better for when you're dead and have a time-out."

"I was thinking specifically about insisting that you drag me through a mile of dusty, dark, and claustrophobic tunnels."

Milo got to th...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 264

Turnabout was fair play, so Eric felt no guilt at all about rudely waking John up early when something important was happening. And today was a very important day. He'd already sent John an email, two phone calls, a call on his 'emergency phone that I always answer' and was walking into John's apartment with a pot of coffee after getting no answer. To Eric's way of thinking, if John hadn't meant for Eric to have a master keycard that opened all the doors in Manpower's HQ, he should have had s...

How the Sausage is made: Possible things to come and a chance to toss opinions.

For those unfamiliar with the saying "How the sausage is made." It refers to things that the average person either doesn't see or doesn't want to see. Mr. Webster defines it as the practical and often unpleasant or messy aspects of a process that are usually not made public.

It can literally refer to sausage making, which is a messy process of grinding up all the bits of meat not used for anything else, along with fat, blood, spice, ground vegetables, or grain. This ge...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 263 (Raw)

No energy left to edit. Tomorrow.
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"Don't worry yourself, Two-Screws, they're just fisher people. Quiet and reasonable folks. That's what you said, wasn't it?"

Senior Chief Engineer Sledgemonkey glared at his friend as the two of them contemplated the angry mob standing in front of them, looking quite unreasonable and not at all quiet. "Quiet, you. I just have to go over some facts and figures, maybe pay out a little coin, and point out the economic advantages of...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 262

So...Jake can't host the Halloween party. I have no details; that's just what my wife and daughters told me to explain why I have a house full of high-school students in costumes tonight. The puppy (Now 100 pounds) loves everyone and wants to be friendly. The wife informed me I was packing his cage to the third floor. I sighed and started up the stairs. Four stairs from the top, there was a loud popping noise in my left knee. So now I'm typing with one leg up and on ice, the dog is in a crate...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 261 and Writathon Begins!

Writathon has started. Expect to see a lot more chapters for Tunnel Rat. 55,555 words in 5 weeks.

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Milo woke from where he had collapsed in a chair by his workbench. After the talk with Wally about buying Section E, his anxiety had pushed him further and further into a state of hyper-focus, and other problems had vied for his attention. He was worried about Belinda, and that pushed him to begin working on contingency plans for several possib...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 355

Rory Brindleberry had worked all night packing the carts, and as the sun came over the horizon, he looked over at his tired relatives sleeping on a bed that hadn't been dismantled and stowed yet. The lads and lasses had worked hard all through the night, and he smiled at the thought of what came next. Taking a pot of lukewarm coffee from near the hearth, he stood over them, and then dumped the contents onto the sleepers. They awoke with various complaints.

"What da' hel?" "Who be play'...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 260

The forced relocation for the Alphabet was not going well. They had abandoned too many locations in too short of a time. The adrenaline rush was gone. Fleeing through the sewers was fun and hectic. But after traveling through three countries to throw off any possible pursuit, they started to relax. Now, they were back to rebuilding and creating a new base of operations. The set of rooms they occupied were in the top three floors of a building in London's East End. They owned the building, kep...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 259

It was eight o'clock in the morning when the pounding started. At first, Eric ignored the pounding on his door because it was keeping time with the pounding of his head. Then the screaming started. That was always ignored because, in Eric's injured state of mind, he was having a bad day, and if you had a bad day, then John was surely screaming at you. It all made sense. But at some point in time, the pounding in his head and the pounding on the door separated and became twice as annoying, for...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 354

Near the ancient city of Gadobhra, just outside its walls, was a small cave that hid a newly created passage to the lands ruled by the Fae. To a human, it was well hidden. The ancient druidic magic that caused the rapid growth of the forests was still strong, and the woods here were a dense tangle of trees and heavy underbrush. The lumberjacks who harvested the trees could make no headway against the forest, and only the well-built road leading to the city was kept clear. Assuming you knew it...

Butcher of Gadobhra Preview and Roadmap

The road to this point in the story has been over two years long. To be honest, I didn't have a plan when I started, just a story to tell. Much like one of my Dungeons and Dragons campaigns, I knew the broad strokes, but a lot changed in the telling. You'd think an author would have more control over the characters than a dungeon master, but that isn't always the case.

Some things were surprises, like Rolly and Squirmie. The Very Hungry Caterpillar was going to be a recurring villain,...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 353

Sedgewick was used to odd things happening. One day, it might be an invading army of squirrels, and the next could be a drinking contest between six goblins and a guild of human adventurers. Today was calmer, simply a wagon train carrying barrels of gold guarded by Fae Warriors, Gnomish Strike groups, and a Sphynx. Banker Coppertwist led the way, opening the doors of his bank for business. His first customer was Prince Ragothorn, who brought with him forty-nine barrels of gold coins represent...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 258

Wally pondered the new information he had gained, taking his time and searching for ties to other data. He didn't need the time but wanted to talk to Steven, and it was Sunday. Samantha had declared Sunday morning off-limits, promising to 'unplug' Wally if he stole her husband from her before noon. Wally was smart enough not to test that statement and didn't contact either of them until noon on Sundays. Breakfast had just finished when Steven's phone turned on, showing a door on the screen an...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 257

It had taken him weeks, but Bork was sure that tonight he would finally get past the last layer of security and finally find out what Claw Master was hiding. Everyone else had given up after multiple failures and recognized that their brother was obsessing over hacking into the company they had just paid five billion dollars. Not to steal but to see what else Claw Master was working on and what the link was between this new corporation and their long-lost sibling. Like all of his siblings, Bo...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 256

Milo was annoyed. No, he was highly annoyed, and it was pushing him into a dangerous place where his emotions rarely hit. He furiously typed in commands to search through all of the information he had found in Manpower's email and stored data; six screens were showing surveillance video at high speed while his system searched for certain topics of conversation. He had one eye on the screens while he mostly concentrated on following John and Eric's email for the past few weeks, and then diggin...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 352

Suzette crossed her arms and glared at Oberon. "This isn't my home. Sedgewick is home, and that's where I'm going." Then she looked around at rolling hills and meadows filled with thorn bushes, poisonous flowers, and tall, dark oaks. "And explain what you mean by My Realm."

Rolly laughed and petted Squirmie. "Wizard of Oz logic, girl. You killed the wicked witch, you get the Ruby Slippers. Only in this case, it's a fixer-upper of discrete fractal dimension subdivided from the rest of t...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 351

Whew, rewrote this three times. I think I got all the kings out.
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Ozzy looked at Suzette and winked. "Ladies first."

"Fine, but I warn you, there might not leave them much." She looked at the Goblin but pitched her voice louder.
"I want to go home and not have to worry about some tricky Fae law or upset cousin showing up some night to complicate my life. I want this to be over. Really over. Whatever happened here is done. Anything between myself and the frie...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 350

Ben watched with interest as the gnomes and the fae negotiated across the fence. First came a Fae herald and a hound, matched by the Prince and the Lawyer. These four took an hour to agree on the wording for a cease-fire and pre-agreement. Once copies of these were signed and sealed by both sides, the fence was removed and replaced with a large table that filled the gateway. The important people on both sides sat down, introduced themselves again, and began talking. At that point, the real ba...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 349

Helga picked up Tiberius, set him atop the fence, and whispered, "Give 'em hell!"

Tiberius balanced on top of the picket fence, a difficult task when wearing your 'before breakfast' slippers. The older bankers on his side of the fence were angry because of his interference and trampling over protocol. The Fae were in an uproar, although what they were threatening to do was always the question. But he was a Banker from a strong family and had been raised well. He knew his customer was i...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 255

The elevator picked up speed, and Milo grabbed a handhold with his tail to steady himself. The acceleration was followed by a period of slowing, and then a light above the door indicated they had reached their destination. The elevator doors opened, and three Roomba left to scout and report. Milo was on the car's roof, fearing the possibility of armed opponents pointing guns at him when they caught someone using their secret elevator. While his brave scouts explored, he decided to head to the...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 254

The cheese was very good. Taking a break was also very good. Milo woke from his nap, stretched, and then froze. There were two creatures next to him, staring up with large eyes. They were small, with floppy ears and big teeth. He had no idea what to do. The brown bunny scampered away, but the white one took one more bite of his cheese before escaping. He looked down to find the ground around him covered in small tracks, and half of his cheese was missing. He knew what rabbits were, but he had...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 253

The sun and sky stared down at Milo, and he stared back. Someone had done an excellent job on the holographic projection on the ceiling. If he had his helmet off, it would have looked real. His helmet had better vision than normal, and the infrared of the projection was right, and he could see small imperfections in the movement of the fluffy white cumulus clouds. The grass, bushes, and trees, however, were very real. The small park in the center of the room had probably been well cared for o...

Tunnel Rat Chapter 252

Black-17 was fully charged when the alert came in. The sleek black security Roomba slid from its charging station and joined six others to investigate the disturbance. Sound had been picked up in the outer offices that didn't match the normal profiles of permitted sounds. This had happened more and more over the years, adding new sounds to the list. Just last month, moisture from the hydroponics section had leaked through the ceiling, and a tile had fallen after decaying slowly for years. Bef...

Upcoming Schedule

The decision to work on one story for several chapters is paying off, and more is getting written. It's just easier to write and think on one story for a few days, then switch gears for another few. Butcher is 9 chapters ahead, and the next two chapters are plotted and many outlined. 249 is about half written.

Milo is 6 chapters ahead and gets the next 2-3 chapters, then back to Butcher and we finish off the Fae arc except for a half dozen dangling threads.

The short-term goal i...

Butcher of Gadobhra Chapter 348

With the Fae King deep in thought, Elgebert pulled his clients and the strike teams back from the fence by thirty feet. In hushed tones, they began discussing the facts of the case and the problems of getting their clients to safety unharmed and with their goods intact. It was a perilous situation, and no one wanted a war.


Fifty feet away and on the other side of the fence, Oberon considered the gnomish Lawyer's words. The straightforward recitation of facts was so brief that it wa...