[UA] Collaborative Novel

[Gregory Paul Stolze]

The idea I'm kicking around starts with a character.  Don't know her name
yet, but she's an old lady Duke, probably in St. Louis, probably a
Cliomancer.  She finds lost children.  Unfortunately for her, she's caught
the eye of the Sleepers, who make the tough decision: Even though she's
doing good things on the individual scale, she's being too blatant and
threatening everyone on the big scale.  So they dispatch one of their
Executioners.  

The duke gets tipped wise that the Executioner is on the way.  She has a
chance to bail out, but she's just started the search for a new lost child.
 She continues her search, even though she knows it puts her in danger.

The Executioner finds her.

"Look," she says.  "I'm not going to fight you.  You'll just win.  And I'm
not going to run from you, because I'm too damned old.  But I'd like a last
request.  Let me find this one last child."

The Executioner thinks this is ludicrous, even though he finds this job
particularly distasteful.

"Okay," says the lady duke.  "I'll sweeten the pot.  Help me find the
child, I'll let you kill me AND I'll let you blame me for kidnapping her.
I'll SET IT UP.  All the lost kids I've found -- I'll take the fall for all
of it.  Isn't that what your bosses want?  You won't have just cut off the
problem, you'll have erased it.  All my previous 'magickal' successes will
be revealed as the mechanations of a deluded, sick old woman."

He checks with his superiors, and they agree.  Of course, she's looking for
a chance to dust him.  He's on the alert for it.  And there's more going on
than either one of them suspect.

-G.
If disaster strikes, it's God's wrath--quote the Old Testament.  If nothing
happens, God is merciful--quote the New Testament.
	-From "The Onion's Y2K Survival Tips"

http://www.thehungersite.com/index.html


_______________________________________________
UA mailing list
UA at lists.uchicago.edu
http://lists.uchicago.edu/mailman/listinfo/ua