Read Online We Are Here by Michael Marshall - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Michael Marshall
Ads: Link
simply prefer to have that guy inside the tent pissing out, instead of the other way around. Get it?”
Golzen shrugged. Talk of Maj bored him. “Sure.”
“Good. Because we’re getting close, my friend.”
No longer remotely bored, Golzen looked up. “For real?”
“The time for change is upon us.”
Golzen felt his stomach flip. “How soon?”
Reinhart closed his eyes, as if listening to something beyond the hearing of normal men, perhaps simply the dark workings of his own mind. “I don’t know. But soon . Maybe even within the week.”
He opened his eyes. “Put out a broadcast to the chosen. Encourage readiness.”
“Saying … ?”
“I’ll leave that to you. Just hold the date. There is no date yet, but … hold it anyway.”
Golzen grinned. “You got it.”
“And bring me fresh blood. I’m going to lose some of my best stealers on this. We need replacements in training before I can open the door to Perfect and let us walk the road to our brave new world.”
“I’m on it.”
“Not while you’re standing here.”
Golzen walked quickly out through the bar and onto the street. He already had ideas for friends to turn, clueless wanderers to bring into the fold: people who could learn to do what he and the others had been doing for Reinhart, while the chosen left on a mission Golzen had been preparing (and advocating and prophesying) for years. He had no problem with performing this task for Reinhart. Relished the prospect, in fact. He’d tell his buddies to sniff harder around Maj, too, if that’s what Reinhart wanted. Why not? It wouldn’t be much longer that he had to work with the man.
Golzen was built to hold impulses in check, most of the time. He’d been very patient, working every opportunity to bind the other eleven of the chosen to him through the treats and advantages he’d gained for them. The relationship between him and Reinhart had been very useful in this, symbiotic.
But such relationships end.
Chapter 9
As he entered Roast Me, David confirmed—with a sinking feeling—that Talia was working the counter. He considered turning around, but not seriously.
“Hey, Norman,” she hollered, as she cranked through the orders of those ahead of him in line.
He sighed. Yesterday it had been “Ernest.” Couple days before that, “F. Scott.” The previous week they’d been more contemporary—Richard, Don, and Jonathan (two or three guys she could have been shooting for with that last, the handle of choice for today’s nascent Great American Novelist). She evidently believed she’d found a rich seam of comedy and was determined to mine it out.
And that was okay. He’d always liked Talia, a big, cheerful woman in her fifties who cussed freely and had been holding down the Gaggia in the town’s only coffee shop since it opened. Very occasionally they let Dylan have a turn for light relief, but basically if you wanted a latte in Rockbridge, Talia was the go-to gal. She was fiercely resistant to the term “barista” and happy to remain—as she was prone to tell their rare, easily intimidated tourists—just “the fat chick who makes the fucking coffee.”
When David had been working in an office up the street he’d often passed the time of day with Talia, content that in Rockbridge everyone knew everybody else along with a fair portion of their business. He was aware that Talia lived with nine cats in a trailer on the other side of town near the creek, was long-term single but had once been the lover of a man called Ed who’d died under tragic circumstances, and that she possessed a strong creative urge, manifest in prolific journaling and collage-making and a vast novel of epic fantasy upon which she’d been working for at least five years.
And therein lay the problem.
While he’d been holding down a day job David had been happy to shoot the breeze with Talia. They’d been hobbyists, engaged in the same struggle. Since he got his deal, things had changed.
Golzen shrugged. Talk of Maj bored him. “Sure.”
“Good. Because we’re getting close, my friend.”
No longer remotely bored, Golzen looked up. “For real?”
“The time for change is upon us.”
Golzen felt his stomach flip. “How soon?”
Reinhart closed his eyes, as if listening to something beyond the hearing of normal men, perhaps simply the dark workings of his own mind. “I don’t know. But soon . Maybe even within the week.”
He opened his eyes. “Put out a broadcast to the chosen. Encourage readiness.”
“Saying … ?”
“I’ll leave that to you. Just hold the date. There is no date yet, but … hold it anyway.”
Golzen grinned. “You got it.”
“And bring me fresh blood. I’m going to lose some of my best stealers on this. We need replacements in training before I can open the door to Perfect and let us walk the road to our brave new world.”
“I’m on it.”
“Not while you’re standing here.”
Golzen walked quickly out through the bar and onto the street. He already had ideas for friends to turn, clueless wanderers to bring into the fold: people who could learn to do what he and the others had been doing for Reinhart, while the chosen left on a mission Golzen had been preparing (and advocating and prophesying) for years. He had no problem with performing this task for Reinhart. Relished the prospect, in fact. He’d tell his buddies to sniff harder around Maj, too, if that’s what Reinhart wanted. Why not? It wouldn’t be much longer that he had to work with the man.
Golzen was built to hold impulses in check, most of the time. He’d been very patient, working every opportunity to bind the other eleven of the chosen to him through the treats and advantages he’d gained for them. The relationship between him and Reinhart had been very useful in this, symbiotic.
But such relationships end.
Chapter 9
As he entered Roast Me, David confirmed—with a sinking feeling—that Talia was working the counter. He considered turning around, but not seriously.
“Hey, Norman,” she hollered, as she cranked through the orders of those ahead of him in line.
He sighed. Yesterday it had been “Ernest.” Couple days before that, “F. Scott.” The previous week they’d been more contemporary—Richard, Don, and Jonathan (two or three guys she could have been shooting for with that last, the handle of choice for today’s nascent Great American Novelist). She evidently believed she’d found a rich seam of comedy and was determined to mine it out.
And that was okay. He’d always liked Talia, a big, cheerful woman in her fifties who cussed freely and had been holding down the Gaggia in the town’s only coffee shop since it opened. Very occasionally they let Dylan have a turn for light relief, but basically if you wanted a latte in Rockbridge, Talia was the go-to gal. She was fiercely resistant to the term “barista” and happy to remain—as she was prone to tell their rare, easily intimidated tourists—just “the fat chick who makes the fucking coffee.”
When David had been working in an office up the street he’d often passed the time of day with Talia, content that in Rockbridge everyone knew everybody else along with a fair portion of their business. He was aware that Talia lived with nine cats in a trailer on the other side of town near the creek, was long-term single but had once been the lover of a man called Ed who’d died under tragic circumstances, and that she possessed a strong creative urge, manifest in prolific journaling and collage-making and a vast novel of epic fantasy upon which she’d been working for at least five years.
And therein lay the problem.
While he’d been holding down a day job David had been happy to shoot the breeze with Talia. They’d been hobbyists, engaged in the same struggle. Since he got his deal, things had changed.
Similar Books
