Joseph Nassise

Tax day and deadline week all at the same time, means I’m quite literally swamped, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have something for our readers today.  As I was adding up the fees paid to my literary agent for his work this year, I thought it might be interesting to talk about just why I’m willing to give up this money and what I think an agent does for my career.

This will be a two part essay, so today we’ll look at the first five reasons to use an agent.   While having a literary agent is not a necessity, my personal experience has shown it to be a very beneficial relationship and I would recommend it wherever possible.

Reason #1 – An agent knows the marketplace better than you do

Given that it is an agent’s job to be aware of who is buying what from whom for how much, the vast majority of literary agents know the inner workings of the market better than most authors and it is their job to use that knowledge to your benefit.

Reason #2 – An agent has a personal relationship with multiple editors

An agent is, to some extent, a professional networker and has built up personal relationships with many editors over time. They know what certain editors like and don’t like when it comes to literary properties and they know what those editors have recently purchased, so they can help target your proposal to the individuals most likely to receive it in a positive manner.

Reason #3 – An agent understands contracts

The typical publishing contract is fifteen to twenty legal size pages of the most convoluted legalese I’ve ever seen and it is ripe with clauses that benefit the publisher rather than the writer. It is an agent’s job to understand what these clauses mean and to fight to remove or alter those that do not help your career. While you could educate yourself on the basics, an agent sees several of these a day and you would be hard pressed to meet their level of knowledge on your own without considerable time and effort.

Reason #4 – An agent is an experience negotiator

In the end it the agent’s job to get you’re the best offer and contract terms possible. This is what they do, day after day for client after client. They know just how much they can push a particular editor or publishing house, they know what is an acceptable counter offer and what is not, and they can advise you on what tact to take when the publisher offers terms that just aren’t acceptable.

Reason #5 – An agent protects your relationship with the editor

For one reason or another there often comes a time when the publisher had done something that you are unhappy with and that you would like to work to change. At the same time, you don’t want to alienate your editor or allow your anger/frustration over the issue to strain your working relationship. In times like these you agent can step in and play the “bad cop” for you, allowing you to work toward the result you want without damage to your editorial partnership.

Next time around we’ll cover the final five reasons to use a literary agent and I’ll answer any questions that might have come up out of part one.

The first time it happened, Memphis Stone was standing over the rapidly cooling body of a young girl.

It was just after 9:00 pm, mid-summer, the streets of Boston still reflecting the heat they had soaked up during the day under the combination of the 90 degree temperature and the even higher percentage humidity. It had been a long, grueling month with heat-frayed tempers and the corresponding hike in violent crime that always accompanied such a stretch.

Stone had been fostering a mild headache for most of the afternoon. The pain made him tense, irritable, and the fact that he was still standing there two hours after he was supposed to have gone off shift did nothing to assuage that. Just the opposite, in fact, as it sent his headache rocketing up several levels higher on the pain scale.

He stared down at the body, wondering. Who was she? Why did she have to come along right when she did? Couldn’t she have taken a different way home?

She was the fourth victim this month. All of them young, all of them seemingly innocent, at least to this world-weary detective. Apparently he wasn’t the only one who thought so, for the press had taken to calling it the work of the Saintkiller.

He rubbed at his forehead, his hand over his eyes as he tried to ease the rapidly tightening band of tension churning there. When he took his hand away, the scene before him wavered and then changed…
Read more…

Last month I began a short series on Beginnings. We identified the six key things a good novel beginning should accomplish and covered the first, hooking the reader, in a bit more depth. This month I want to tackle two more of the six – establishing a bond between the lead and the reader and presenting the story world.

Establishing a bond between the Lead and the Reader

The second thing a beginning should do is establish a bond between the Lead character and the reader. This can be done in a variety of ways, the most common being identification, sympathy, likeability, and inner conflict.

Identification, or empathy, is when we can relate to the character because of who they are or the experience they find themselves in. The more the reader can identify with the lead, the more real the experience feels and the greater the intensity of the story. A story about a man who has lost his job would generate identification and empathy in anyone who has ever been in the same position.

Sympathy goes beyond empathy and focuses on the emotional bond the reader has with the character. Awful things have happened and the reader genuinely feels sorry for the character. You can establish sympathy by putting the character in jeopardy, by having them face some grand hardship, by making them the underdog, or by giving them some sense of vulnerability. Take Rocky, for instance. We cheer for him and want him to win the big fight against Apollo Creed because we see him as the underdog, the guy who can’t possibly win. I use the issue of facing some grand hardship to introduce my character Knight Commander Cade Williams in HERETIC, book one of the Templar Chronicles. Cade has lost his wife to a supernatural event and has to deal with his loss and his burning need for revenge daily.

Likeable characters are those that we might like to be around, whose company we might enjoy. A witty character. An amusing character. A character who cares for others. Frodo in the Lord of the Rings. John Maclean from the Die Hard films. Even the serial killer Dexter, from Jeff Lindsay’s excellent series, might fall into this category.

Characters who are absolutely sure about themselves, who plunge ahead without any doubts or fears are boring. No one goes through life that way. Give a character a sense of inner conflict, of doubts and emotions, and you’re almost sure to engage the reader.

Presenting the Story World

This aspect of a good beginning goes beyond just establishing the time and place of the novel. Yes, it should tell the reader those things, but it should also focus on showing the reader what life is like for the lead character.

Showing the reality of the character’s situation not only helps present the story world, but also provides support for the establishing that bond we just talked about, as well as presenting certain elements that might assist in hooking the reader.

John Ridley’s excellent pair of novels, THOSE WHO WALK IN DARKNESS and WHAT FIRE CANNOT BURN feature a future LA where super powered humans are listed as illegals and hunted by special tactical squads from the LAPD. In the very first chapter, Ridley has the hero, Soledad “Bullet” O’Roark, face off with her team against a pyrokinetic who can toss fire around like a beach ball. The action immediately sets the stage and lets the reader know just what kind of world O’Roark is forced to deal with day by day. We see that reality for the lead character is harsh, unforgiving, and very deadly.

I do something similar with the opening of HERETIC, letting the reader know very quickly that the Templar Order still exists operating in secret as a combat arm of the Vatican, charged with defending mankind from supernatural threats and enemies. Without establishing that right up front, the reader would be lost by the events that quickly follow.

Next month we’ll continue our look at beginnings by examining how to introduce the opposition and some common mistakes writers make with their beginnings.

I wanted to talk this month about Middles and offer some advice on how to keep yours from sagging.

No, I’m not talking about belly fat. That’s a different blog. I’m talking about the middle of your book, the place where you have the greatest chance of screwing up and losing your reader.

Nine times out of ten, if you are going to lose a reader, it will be in the middle of the book, in that long, seemingly endless stretch that ties your terrific beginning to your fabulous ending. Think about it – how often do you put down a book in the first ten pages? How about with only ten pages to go? Not often, I’d wager. But think about all those books that you got a third, or even halfway, through, only to lose interest. You put it down and move on to something else. Why is that? And how do you keep it from happening with one of your own works?

The middle of the book is essentially a series of scenes that ties the set-up you created in the beginning with the result you’ve devised for the ending. It must be designed specifically to keep the reader moving forward inexorably toward that ending. If it bogs down, loses cohesiveness, or otherwise fails to achieve its objective, you run the risk of losing the reader. And that’s a cardinal sin.

What keeps a reader reading, what keeps them invested in your story, is their desire to see the Lead outwit/outfight/outthink the opposition and reach their goal What gives them the emotional experience they crave is the conflict between the opposition and the lead in pursuit of that goal.

The Opposition

The opposition does not have to be a person. It can be an organization, a group, a force of nature, whatever. Nor does it have to be evil. It simply needs a compelling reason to stop the Lead. The more compelling the reason, the harder the opposition will work. The harder the opposition works, the more difficult it gets for the Lead to succeed, which in turn produces more drama.

The Glue

Along with the opposition, the other crucial ingredient is the reason the Lead sticks around, the glue so to speak. If the Lead can simply walk away from the conflict, the reader will wonder why he doesn’t do so. And at that point you’ve already lost the battle. You have to figure out why the Lead (and the opposition for that matter) can’t simply withdraw from the conflict. And you have to make that reason believable.

Writing the middle of your novel will then simply be an exercise in writing various scenes of confrontation, most of which will end up with some kind of setback for the Lead, forcing them to analyze the situation anew and try something else.

But Joe, I hear you ask, how do I keep that from getting boring?

That’s easy. You can stretch the tension, raise the stakes, or do both at the same time.

Stretching the Tension

Simply put, this means to never let a thrilling moment escape with just a whisper. Play it for all its worth. This is one skill Alfred Hitchcock had in spades and is what makes him a master of suspense even now, so many years after this death.

When it comes to stretching the tension, I first ask myself one question – What problem has the potential to lay some serious hurt on my Lead? That forms the raw material of the scene as it gives us something to be tense about. Once I’ve determined that, I can go about stretching it.

James Bell suggests two ways to stretch the tension in his book Plot & Structure – stretch the physical or stretch the emotional.

Physical peril or uncertainty is always a sure fire way to hold a reader’s interest and you can make that bond even stronger by slowing down. Go through the scene beat by beat in your head, as if you are watching a movie. Then write it down, alternating between action, thoughts, dialogue, and description. Milk it for all its worth.

Bell suggests three key questions to ask yourself as you do this:

1. What is the worst thing from the outside that can happen to my character?
2. What is the worst trouble my character can get into in this scene?
3. Have I sufficiently set up the danger for the reader before the scene?

Of course trouble doesn’t always have to be physical. It can be emotional as well. When your character is in the throws of some emotional turmoil, don’t let them down easy! Ratchet things up as much as possible.

To stretch inner tension, ask yourself these questions:

1. What is the worst thing from the inside that can happen to my character?

2. What is the worst information my character can receive?

3. Have I sufficiently set up the depth of emotion for the reader before the scene?

Raising the Stakes

One question any good novelist should constantly be asking themselves is Who cares? In other words – Is this scene I’m writing going to make the reader care about what happens? Is there enough going on to capture the reader’s interest? What does the lead stand to lose if they don’t solve the central problem of the novel? Is that enough? If not, what can I do to change it?

There are three common ways to raise the stakes in your novel. You can raise the physical stakes, raise the inner stakes, or raise the societal stakes.

Raising the physical stakes is probably the easiest. What physical harm can come to my lead? What new threat can be raised against him? What other character can I introduce to make things more difficult? How will this person operate? What will they do to make things difficult for my lead?

Raising the character stakes involves looking at the inner conflict of the lead. This has the added effect of adding more dimension to your novel as well, deepening the story while at the same time raising the intensity. Ask yourself how things can get more emotionally wrenching for my lead? Is there someone the lead cares about that can be brought in and tied into the trouble? What dark secrets from the lead’s past can be revealed here?

The third way of raising the stakes is to examine the social aspects at play. Is there some major issue my lead is involved in? How can I bring that to the forefront? What complications does that issue add to the mix?

Easy Fixes

If you find that your middle is lagging, here are some suggested ways to help you re-energize it:

1. Analyze the stakes – what can I do to ratchet up the tension?

2. Strengthen the glue – what can make the conflict more compelling?

3. Add another layer of complication – how do I make things more difficult?

4. Add another character – who else might have a role to play here?

5. Add another subplot – what other plot thread might shore things up?

6. Push through it – is it the writing or just me?

While suggestions 1-5 are self-explanatory, I did want to say something about #6. There is often a point in writing the novel when you think everything you’ve done to date is just utter crap. For me, that usually happens around page 200 (or 2/3 of the way through the work.) Suddenly the characters suck, the writing sucks, everything sucks. At that point it is time to step away from things and get some perspective – before changing anything!

I’ll usually take 24 to 48 hours off from writing. I won’t work on the book. I won’t look at the book. I’ll even try not to think about the book. I’ll go do something I really enjoy, doing all I can to relax and take it easy. Then, and only then, will I come back and give it another look. Usually by then I’ve gained some perspective. If I still think it sucks, I’ll try to find ways to fix it and at that point my subconscious usually has had enough time to figure out just what needs to be done.

So there you have it, some tips and techniques for helping you deal with a sagging middle.

Good luck and keep writing!

I was involved in a message board discussion the other day about how I set up a series bible. For those who aren’t familiar with the term, a series bible is a summary of all the information you need to write multiple books (or television shows or films or what-have-you) in the same setting/story world. Since I do the same thing for my stand alone novels as I do for series work, I thought I’d share that process with you all.

The first thing I do is assemble all of my organizational materials into a three ring binder. I use tabbed dividers so that I can find things easily once the project has begun. I usually use the same set of tags on every project – Characters, Setting, Plot, Timeline, Research, Unanswered Questions, and Reminders.

– The Characters section contains all of my character summaries, my back-story notes, and a physical description sheet that allows me to easily reference things like eye color, height, weight, etc. I also make a habit of cutting pictures out of magazines or off the web to remind me of what certain characters might look like and I keep these with my notes for visual cues when it comes time to develop descriptive passages.

– The Setting section contains all of my setting sketches (one page summaries of everything I know about a particular place or setting) as well as any miscellaneous notes I might have lying around discussing how those setting relate to each other. As with my characters, if I have any images that I’ve saved, I put these in the binder as well.

– The Plot section contains my one paragraph, my four paragraph, and my four page plot summaries, as well as my individual scene breakdowns. I think I’ll talk more about these in my next essay.

– The Timeline section contains my spreadsheet mapping out exactly when things happen in the storyline. If I need to keep track of more detailed events (such as the exact timing of some of the events during the murders in my forthcoming novel THE WITCHES’ HAMMER,) I’ll also draw up one page sheets that outline these as well.

– The Research section contains not only my original list of research topics, but also the research itself. When writing my Templar Chronicles trilogy, I wanted my modern extrapolation of the Templar order to be as close to the original as possible, so this section actually grew so large as to necessitate its own binder. Do whatever feels right to you but remember, you shouldn’t be spending so much time researching that you never get around to actually writing!

– The Unanswered Questions is, appropriately enough, full of unanswered questions. These can be specific research issues (also filed in the Research section) or they can be character and/or plot issues that I haven’t yet worked out. Putting them in their own section and making a point to review it every few days keeps me from forgetting to answer them in the manuscript.

– The Reminders section is particularly important. The last thing I want to do is stifle my creativity and forward momentum by constantly going back and fixing things in my first draft. Instead, I keep notes of anything I need to fix, add, delete or otherwise adjust on a legal pad while I write each day and then transfer those pages into my binder when I’m finished each session. That way I know I won’t forget to come back and do them, which in turn allows my creative side to just get on with finishing the rough draft.

Once I’ve got my binder in order, I’m ready to get to work.

Since I write my chapters entirely out of order, this level of detail ahead of time is necessary for me to achieve my goals. I map out each and every book this way, taking one or two months to get it all squared away. The benefit, however, is that the actual writing time is greatly reduced as I’m not trying to figure out where I’m going while in the process of getting there.

So, how do you organize your books?

(It is an odd fact of my writing career that it takes me longer to write a short story than it does to write a novel. Possibly even two novels. So in order for me to have written something original for our October story month, I probably would have needed to get started on it before the idea for this blog ever came to me. Sadly, I’m not that prescient. So instead I offer you something appropriately Halloweenish from 2002, a story that first appeared in SPECTRES AND DARKNESS, my joint collection with Drew Williams. Without further ado, here is “The Urge.”)

***************

Detective Simon Jackson awoke that morning with The Urge whispering darkly in his ears. It had been two months since the last time, five since the time before that, but in the last few days the voice had been getting stronger, more insistent, and he knew he couldn’t hold out much longer.

It would have to be today, maybe tomorrow, at the latest.

He made a quick breakfast and dressed in his usual jacket and tie. Traffic was light; Jackson made it to the stationhouse a few moments before his tour of duty started and spent the extra time talking with some of the uniforms in the locker room before going upstairs to see what was on the day’s agenda.

The Captain’s briefing was short and sweet, which was a relief to all concerned. Jackson ended up with a stack of paperwork and a two day old mugging to investigate. Gino and Arthur got two grand larcenies and a suicide. Scofield still had the murder of the high school girl from last week. Marcy was out on vacation. Another typical day on the 8-4 shift in the 61^st Precinct.

Jackson quickly grabbed a cup of coffee and returned to his desk. The paperwork was pure drudgery. It wasn’t long before The Urge reared its ugly head.

It’s time, you know.

Time to do another one.

You know you want to.

You’ll like it, I promise.

He did his best to ignore it, knowing he couldn’t escape it, but trying to keep it under control.

When he couldn’t stand listening to it anymore, he went out on the street and started hustling his contacts; doing what he could to track down anyone who might have seen the mugging. The trail was over 48 hours cold and in his business that meant it was as good as dead, but at least it gave him something to do and kept the voice in his head quiet for a couple of hours.

By lunch, however, The Urge was back, doing its best to force its way into his thoughts. He was sitting at a table in Mike’s Diner, chewing resolutely on one of his famous rock-hard hamburgers, when he found himself staring at a couple of high school girls sitting a few tables away, the Urge whispering feverishly in the back of his mind.

The blonde one.

Yeah.

Her.

She’s the one.

Remember how much fun we had last time?

You know you want to.

It’s time, after all.

He must have been staring at them for a while, because he was getting funny looks not just from the girls but also from some of the other patrons. Even Mike was giving him a quizzical look from behind the bar.

He shook his head to clear it, paid hastily, and got the hell out of there before The Urge forced him to do something he didn’t want to do.

He hadn’t learned anything of any use while on the street and decided to head back over to the stationhouse to try and tackle the paperwork again. For the next few hours it became a battle of wills. The Urge would whisper in his ears, so he would slam it back down into the pit at the base of his skull. It would screech at him in a voice like nails on a chalkboard, so he would hum to himself to drown out its voice. But as the day wore on, he found himself listening to it for longer and longer each time it would make an attempt, until at last he couldn’t stand it anymore.

“Okay, okay…” he said to it in a tired whisper. “You win. Tonight. We’ll do another one tonight.”

The yammering in the back of his skull quieted down as he gave in. That dark side of his subconscious, the one he called his Shadow, knew that he would keep his word; he always had. Once he’d given in, his Shadow settled back down into the dark corner of his psyche and let him get on with the details.

He glanced around and found the squad room empty. It wasn’t something that happened very often, so if he were going to do it, it would have to be now or never.

The filing cabinets were on the other side of the room, less than fifteen feet away from his desk. They were never kept locked, despite the Captain’s repeat orders, which made things easier.

Five minutes later Jackson was on his way out the door, the files he’d stolen tucked securely in his briefcase.

The rest of the afternoon seemed to limp past, now that he had made up his mind to make another retrieval. The last four had taught him how to go about doing things, so he didn’t have many preparations to make. A simple check of his materials let him know that everything was ready. The stun gun was fully charged. The gag and the plastic restraints were in their usual places in the glove box. The hammer and butcher’s knife were in the paper sack in the trunk. Jackson just needed to remember to add the fake ID and the badge. Now all that was left was to choose a target.

He moved into the living room and took a seat at his desk. Opening his briefcase, Jackson pulled out the files and began to leaf through them. The subjects of all of them were girls, between the ages of fifteen and twenty-one. Mostly brunettes, but there were a few blondes too.

Equal opportunity and all that, he thought to himself idly, remembering the girls in the restaurant earlier in the day.

A handful caught his eye right off the bat and he set the rest aside to choose from these frontrunners.

It took over an hour, but he finally had a target. Megan Jones. Blonde, as it turned out. Blue eyes. Small and petite, so there shouldn’t be too much of a problem. She was from Riverside, about fifteen minutes outside the city, which was good because it could be reached easily yet was still reasonably secluded. Regular patrols would be at a minimum and he should be able to get in and out again without too much of a fuss.

Cleaning up the dinner dishes took another fifteen minutes, but after that he couldn’t put things off any longer. The Urge was back now, raring to go, like a tiger suddenly faced with an open cage door and a big fat goat staked down before it. The Urge was getting out tonight, and it was gonna have some fun before the sun came up, that was for sure. He was just going along for the ride, like he always did.

Jackson went into the bedroom and dressed in the dark suit he had laid out for the occasion. His shoulder holster went on under the suit coat, and the badge went into the outside pocket for easy accessibility. A pair of well-shined shoes completed the disguise.

He grabbed the pilfered file off the table and headed out to the garage. Jackson had brought the Caprice home from work earlier and would be using it tonight just in case he was stopped. He might be able to talk his way out of trouble by pretending to be on official business and the car simply helped add to the disguise.

Picking up the skell was the part that he always worried about. If he was going to get caught, it would most likely be then. It was a question of choosing the right location, copping the right attitude, and getting out quickly enough before people started asking too many detailed questions.

For tonight’s job he decided to head south, toward Lewiston. Jackson had been north for the last two and didn’t want to show his face around there too soon. It was unlikely that anyone would remember him, but there was no sense in taking the chance. There was a county lockup halfway to Lewiston and he chose that as his destination.

The ride was quiet and uneventful. He used the time to try to plan his speech to the girl. Not that what he said mattered all the much; the shock of what they were going through was usually enough to keep anything he said from sinking in, but he always made the effort. He guessed it was just his way of trying to feel like he was doing the right thing.

Maybe it was just to steady his nerves.

In any event, it helped to pass the time.

He reached his destination about an hour after he set out. He drove around back and parked by the rear security doors. He knew there were no windows back there and this would keep the chance of someone seeing something they shouldn’t down to as bare a minimum as possible. Unless one of the officers inside decided to follow him out, Jackson knew he should be free and clear. He checked his credentials to be certain he had the right set, placed the stun gun in the right-hand pocket of his suit, picked up his clipboard, and got out of the car. Knowing the back door would be locked he walked around to the front and went inside.

This facility was just like the hundred others he’d been in, which was something Jackson was counting on. A reception desk and a waiting room greeted him as he entered and behind the desk was the duty sergeant. As Jackson approached, the sergeant put down the magazine he’d been reading and cleared his throat, doing his best to look official. Jackson walked up and laid the federal badge he was carrying on the desktop in front of the sergeant.

“Michael Williams, FBI,” he said. “I’m here to pick up,” a quick glance at the clipboard and the official-looking paperwork it carried…“Reggie Saunders.” Before the other could say anything, Jackson passed him the clipboard.

Jackson knew that most government employees were cut from the same cloth. When faced with someone higher in authority, they’ll do what is asked of them with little or no resistance. Jackson was betting that because he looked official, carried official-looking paperwork, and acted like he belonged, then the duty sergeant wouldn’t be inclined to dig too deeply into the situation. As long as Jackson signed all the right papers, the sergeant wouldn’t bother calling his own superiors to verify Jackson’s credentials or wonder why he hadn’t heard of the transfer earlier in the day at the briefing. It had worked the last two times Jackson had made retrieval and he was hoping it would work for him again tonight.

He wasn’t disappointed. The duty sergeant looked over the paperwork, pulled some of his own out of a drawer, asked Jackson to sign here, here, and here, and then called down to lock-up to get the prisoner ready for transfer. Not a question asked. It couldn’t have gone more perfectly if Jackson had scripted it.

He stood in front of the desk talking sports with the sergeant until another officer came out with the prisoner in tow. Saunders was a typical low-life; all attitude and little intelligence. His rap sheet was as long as his arm and full of violence. He’d done time for armed robbery, rape, and was currently in for the murder of an elderly woman. He was at the county lockdown awaiting transportation in the morning to the new maximum-security facility in Sholton.

Unfortunately for him, he would never see the inside of another cell.

Saunders was dressed in the standard prison jumpsuit and the guard had him in cuffs but no shackles. That was fine with Jackson. Saunders was a skinny little runt and Jackson outweighed him by a good 75 pounds so he didn’t think the leg shackles would be necessary. Saunders made a number of rude comments as they turned him over, but Jackson just ignored them. Taking him by the arm, Jackson led Saunders out the front door and around the back to the car.

“Where we goin’?” Saunders asked, as Jackson opened the rear door and bent Saunders’ head to help him inside. Jackson didn’t answer him, just shut the door and opened his own. As he climbed behind the wheel Saunders started in again. “I said, Where we goin’? You deaf or somethin’, cop?”

Again, the detective didn’t answer.

At least not with words.

Instead, he calmly turned around and punched Saunders straight in the mouth with a short, sharp backfist. Saunders’ head snapped back and his nose gushed blood.

“Son-of-a-bitch!” he yelled, shaking his head to try and keep the blood out of his mouth. “You stupid f’in’ son of a…”

He never got any further. Jackson gave him his nicest, biggest smile, drew his stun gun, and shocked the scumbag into unconsciousness. Nothing like sending 75,000 volts through a skell to make your evening a nicer one, he thought with a grin.

All it took was that little bit of violence to cause The Urge to wake up and start jabbering again. This time Jackson didn’t mind. From here on out The Urge would be riding shotgun, if not wholly in the driver’s seat. And what it was saying sounded like a whole lot of fun.

He giggled.

He couldn’t help it.

Saunders twitched spasmodically for a moment or two even after Jackson removed the stun gun. He waited until Saunders had stopped, pulled on a pair of black leather gloves, and then smacked him a few more times at The Urge’s insistence. By the time Jackson turned back around and started the car, the rest of Saunders’ face was a bloody mess to match his nose.

Heading back the way he had come, Jackson made it onto the highway and a few exits closer to Riverside before the scumbag woke up. He wasn’t awake for more than a few minutes before he opened his mouth to speak.

Jackson caught his gaze in the rear view mirror before the man could say anything, raised a finger, and shook it slowly back and forth.

“Uhhn uhhn uhn,” he said.

The sight of his blood still drying on Jackson’s gloves made Saunders’ eyes widen in fear.

He stayed quiet for the rest of the ride.

It took a little over an hour to reach the Riverside city limits. Jackson cut west on Highway 202 and skirted the edge of town until he entered the warehouse district over by the train yards. This was a rough and tumble neighborhood, with more crack houses and street dealers per square city block than you’d care to count. Life was cheap down here and it was often measured in hours instead of years.

His car was noticed within seconds of entering the area. The Caprice screamed cop, an effect he had counted on, and the street vermin disappeared into the darkness like quicksilver flowing downhill. Even the toughest street hood knows better than to call attention to himself by hanging around when the cops are on the prowl, which meant the chances of someone witnessing what Jackson was about to do next were slim to none.

It wasn’t long before he reached his destination, a squat two-story warehouse set back from the road and surrounded by a chain-length fence. On either side similar buildings stretched, each abandoned and allowed to fall into a state of neglect years before. Jackson didn’t need to check the address in the file on the seat beside him; a faded and torn yellow ribbon with the words “Police Line – Do Not Cross” emblazoned on it in thick black letters hung from either side of the open gate.

He pulled up against the gate and used the front of the car to nose it open far enough to drive on through, leaving it open behind him. Crossing the empty lot, he parked the car so it sat facing the gate, ready for a quick getaway should things go badly.

In the back seat, the skell’s head was whipping back and forth as he frantically peered about at the surroundings. Jackson could guess what Saunders was thinking just from the expression on the man’s face: psycho cop beats me up and drags me out to some deserted location. This is NOT good.

Unluckily for Saunders, it was going to be a lot worse than he was currently imagining.

Jackson unlocked and opened the trunk. He opened the duffle bag and removed the cattle prod, making certain to keep it hidden below the level of the trunk and behind one leg so his passenger wouldn’t see it. He left the trunk open, walked around to the back door, and unlocked it with his free hand.

Inside the car, Saunders squirmed in the seat, moving as far away from the door as he could get.

Jackson smiled at him.

Opening the door, he stuck the cattle prod against Saunders’ body and set it off.

About ten times.

One after another.

Jackson was pretty sure his prisoner was unconscious by the third shock, but it never hurt to be certain.

The smell of burnt flesh wafted out of the car.

It was time to get to work.

It’s all about balance, Jackson thought to himself. Call it what you want: Ying and Yang, good and evil, the dark and the light. It’s Nature’s way to try to find a balance in all things. Usually there’s not much we can do about it. People are born, people die, and that’s all there is to life. But sometimes, when the conditions are right, we can change that balance. With a little nudge, we can tip it slightly to one side or the other. The opportunity only lasts for a few moments, and only a select few can make it work at all, but it can happen.

When the conditions are right.

He left the skell lying unconscious in the back seat while he grabbed his equipment and carried it to the second floor.

The large open room was all but empty. When the body had been found three years ago, the police had followed standard procedure and removed everything that hadn’t been bolted to the floor. In some cases, even things that had been bolted to the floor were removed, like the old boiler that had contained the corpse.

The near emptiness didn’t bother Jackson. He had brought along everything he needed.

The first thing he did was to set up the small battery powered lantern he’d brought along. It cast a circle of light some ten feet in diameter, leaving most of the room shrouded in darkness. He slowly began to make an inspection of the floor, concentrating on the areas that were close to the vertical supports that honeycombed the warehouse floor.

It took some searching, but eventually he found the right location. No matter how hard they had tried the building’s cleaning crew had been unable to completely eradicate the dark stains on the floor next to one of the vertical columns.

Jackson placed the lantern on the floor beside the column. Next, he took the chains out of the bag and slung them over the rafter high overhead, then adjusted their height so that the meat hook on one end swung above the floor at chin level. He wrapped the other end around the column and secured the chain in place with a large padlock. He took out the electric drill, the hammer, and the combat knife. He put them in plain view close to the chain.

Trooping back down the stairs, he dragged the skell out of the back seat and dumped him on the ground beside the Caprice. Taking the leather straps out of the trunk, he used them to tightly secure Saunders’ hands, feet, and knees before removing the handcuffs. Since Saunders was still unconscious, Jackson hauled him up and over one shoulder, then carried him up the stairs, where he slipped the meat hook through the straps securing Saunders’ hands and left him dangling there with his feet scraping the floor. He took an extra moment to remove the man’s shoes and socks.

Returning to the car, Jackson took the file off the front seat and locked everything up. Then he climbed back up the stairs.

The detective spent the time while waiting for Saunders to wake up going through the file. He paid particular attention to the crime scene photos and the autopsy report. He knew the suffering and pain had to be just right, the fear escalated to precisely the same level, or it would not work. He had learned things the hard way with the second retrieval he’d done and he still regretted the waste of a good subject with nothing in return. He was determined to do it right this time.

The Urge began whispering in the semi-darkness.

Use the hammer.

You know you want to.

Come on, it’ll be fun.

“Not just yet,” Jackson answered back firmly, knowing that the hammer was out of sequence. Using it when it wasn’t called for would prevent any possibility of retrieval.

Which was, of course, just what the Urge wanted.

Jackson knew that he had reached the most critical juncture of the entire operation and he would have to be careful moving forward. He needed to guard against the Urge’s excesses while at the same time use its power to generate the pain and suffering required for what he needed to do.

He just hoped the coroner had been correct in his findings.

Memories of the time the coroner had been wrong stirred sluggishly in the depths of his mind, but the Urge’s eager voice quickly dismissed them.

The knife.

Start with the knife.

Okay, Jackson thought.

Turning back to his captive, he found Saunders watching him. The sweat was already pouring off his face and the stink of urine in the air told the detective all he needed to know about the man’s mental state.

“Hi,” Jackson said, brightly.

Saunders watched him warily, but still didn’t say anything.

“Any idea why you’re here?” Jackson asked.

Ignoring Jackson’s question, Saunders said, “You can’t do this. I got rights. This is police brutality.” He jerked his arms and legs, sending his body bouncing about on the chains as he struggled to get free.

While Saunders struggled Jackson picked up the knife, stepped closer, and then very casually slashed him across the chest through his prison uniform. It was a shallow cut, designed simply to get the man’s attention.

It did.

“Jesus Christ!” Saunders swore. “You can’t do this!”

Jackson laughed. “Yes I can. And I will,” he said. “We’re not even close to being done yet. Now you have five seconds to answer my question or I’ll cut you again.”

“What question?”

Cut.

“Oww! Stop that!”

“I’m going to repeat myself, just this once. Do you know why you are here?”

“No,” Saunders replied, warily.

“Then let me explain. Three years ago, a young girl was murdered in this room.” Jackson kept his voice pitched low, forcing his prisoner to listen closely to what was being said. “She was raped, tortured, and killed. And, as far as the coroner could make out, not necessarily in that order.”

Saunders had stopped watching Jackson’s face; his entire being seemed focused on the blade of the knife.

“The girl, Megan Jones, was only fifteen. A young, innocent victim. Judging from the police file, the pain and fear she felt before dying must have been tremendous.”

Saunders’ gaze never left the blade as it turned over and over again in the palm of Jackson’s hand, the light glinting off it in rhythmic cadences.

“The perpetrator, whomever it was, started with the girl’s feet.”

Here it comesssssssssssss, whispered the Urge in anticipation.

Without another word, Jackson stepped forward, trapped the other man’s bound legs securely under one arm, and used the knife to savagely slash the underside of Saunders’ right foot.

Just as quickly, he did the left.

It took a moment for the pain to hit, but when it did, Saunders began screaming.

The cuts were not deep, intended more to illicit a reaction than to cause any real damage. Jackson waited until the shock of the initial pain had passed and for Saunders to calm down.

Again, cut him again.

Jackson held off. There would be time enough for cutting very soon. Right now, he had to make Saunders understand just what was happening to him. And more importantly, why it was happening.

Jackson moved behind his prisoner and grabbed the man’s left hand in his own. Saunders tried to squeeze his hand up into a fist, intent on protecting his fingers, but Jackson used the tip of the knife to keep the pinkie finger extended.

“You see Saunders, the world works in its own balanced way. Entire ecosystems are built around the concept of balance. Remove the wolf and the rabbit and deer overpopulate. Remove the rabbit and deer and you end up killing the wolf. Everything has a duty to fulfill. Everything has its own place in the chain.”

Saunders whimpered beneath the tape as Jackson place the sharp edge of the knife at the base of Saunders’ pinkie so that its long edge rose between that finger and the next.

“Only Man breaks this chain. Men like you, Saunders, who decide that it is okay to prey upon the young and the weak without giving anything in return. In your pride and your self-centered search for pleasure you use pain and death like servants instead of the masters of entropy that they truly are. When an innocent victim dies at the hands of a monster like you, that balance is disrupted, the cycle thrown off.

“Sometimes though, things can be set to right. Errors can be corrected. The cycle can be restored. Things can be put back into balance.”

He tightened his grip on his knife.

“But there is a price. There’s always a price. In order to balance the scales, you have to offer up something of equal value in return. Right now, you’re all I’ve got to trade.”

That said, Jackson began to saw off Saunders’ left pinkie.

Saunders began screaming and didn’t stop for a long time.

For the next three hours, Jackson worked his prisoner over. Slowly and carefully, he tortured the man in the same fashion that Megan Jones had been tortured in this exact same spot three years before.

First he used the knife.

Then he used the hammer.

Then he switched to the electric drill.

He used his hands intermittently throughout the process, until his knuckles were raw from the blows. His blood and his prisoner’s mingled freely across their damaged surface.

Throughout it all, The Urge whispered fervently in the back of his mind.

Finally, as Saunders hung limp and bloody in the harness; his fear pushed to a fever pitch, Jackson stopped and rested.

As he worked to catch his breath, Jackson realized they were no longer alone.

The room around them was filled with a greasy black mist. Out of the corner of his eye, Jackson could see things moving in that mist; a cheekbone gleamed wetly here, a clawed hand covered in a gray, decomposing flesh reached out toward them there, white eyes with no pupil flashed into view and were gone just as quickly on the far side of the room. Like will-o-wisps in the night, each vision was there and gone before Jackson could focus on them, a situation he did not object to.

He knew that Saunders had also seen them when he heard a high-pitched keening noise floating across the room.

The mist seemed to twist and curl with greater frequency as the man’s fear spread like a wildfire through the room.

Jackson sighed in relief.

He had done his job.

They had arrived.

The first time Jackson had encountered them had been entirely by accident. He’d lost control after catching a fleeing suspect, beating the man to within an inch of his life in anger over the senseless killing of an elderly man in a mini-mart. When he regained his senses, he’d found the alley in which he stood filled with the same greasy black smoke. Voices had spoken from the depths of the mist, asking him what he’d wanted.

Unthinkingly, he’d answered the first thing that had come to mind.

To his amazement they’d given it to him.

It wasn’t until the Urge had started whispering to him that he’d figured out how to summon them on his own.

This time, he did not wait for their question.

“I’ve come to trade again.”

A sibilant whispering filled the room, causing the hairs on the back of Jackson’s arms and neck to stand at attention.

“I want the girl. Megan Jones, in return for this one,” Jackson told the mist, indicating Saunders with one bloody hand.

The mist stood still for a moment, as if in indecision. Then with a banshee’s shriek it swept forward, crashing around the two men like a wave breaking at its crest.

Jackson stood stock still, his eyes closed and his arms wrapped tightly about himself to guard against the chill he knew was about to envelope him. He felt phantom hands caress him and heard voices whisper in his ears. The hot fetid breath of something foul splashed across his face, inviting a reaction, but Jackson refused to give them one. He kept himself rigidly in control, somehow knowing instinctively that to do anything else would give them free reign to do what they would with him as well.

Saunders’ terrified cries mixed with those coming from inside the mist, rising in volume until Jackson ached to cover his ears to drown them both out, but he held still and did not move.

Then, as abruptly as it had begun, it was over.

Silence descended.

Jackson remained where he was for a long moment, being certain, then cautiously opened his eyes.

The mist, and Saunders with it, was gone.

At his feet lay the sleeping form of a young, blonde teenager dressed in a private school uniform.

Her name, Jackson knew, was Megan Jones.

Only a fading purple bruise remained, marring the left side of her face, testimony to what she had once endured at the hands of another animal much like Saunders. Even that would fade with time.

They were just getting off the highway when the girl regained consciousness in the front seat of the Caprice. She awoke confused, lacking memory of anything that she had experienced since the morning of the day she’d disappeared.

In his gentlest tone, Jackson informed her that he was a police officer and that he was taking her home. She’d been struck by a car, he told her, and had suffered a mild concussion but was otherwise okay.

She was still dazed by her experience and accepted the explanation, never even bothering to ask his name. When he pulled up in front of her house, she thanked him and got out of the car. He watched as she walked up to the front door and rang the bell. A face appeared at the window and a light went on over Megan’s head, illuminating her where she stood on the front steps.

Jackson sped off just as the front door opened, disappearing into the darkness before he or the car he drove could be recognized. From past experience he knew Megan would have no memory of the brutality to which she been subjected, but he knew that her parents would remember every heartbreaking moment from the second she had disappeared until now. They would want to know what had happened to her. They would want to know how she had come back.

Those were not questions Jackson wanted to answer.

Not now.

Perhaps not ever.

With the rising sun Jackson headed for home, content with the night’s events.

As he drove, a small voice began whispering in the back of his mind.

It’s time, you know.

Time to do another one.

You’ll like it.

I promise.