Tag: episodic fiction

  • Case File #5: A Permanent Tuesday

    an episodic Vivian Locke occult noir

    Image generated by Gemini, with direction by Michael Raven

    Sunny Day Parasol Co.

    Case File #5: A Permanent Tuesday

    This is a serialized story. Start with Case File #1 here.

    Kogan threw a heavy velvet cloth over the retort, a gesture that strangled the light and the visual connection. “Dredge wasn’t moving ordinary stolen goods for the Johnson who hired him, Locke. Not by a long shot.”

    He walked to the door and worked the locks with the practiced care of a man who didn’t want unexpected company. The deadbolt slid home with a weary sigh. The second lock clicked like a rat trap. Then the heavy iron bar dropped into place with a definitive, bone-jarring clank. He flipped the sign in the grime-stained, chickenwire-reinforced shop window to “Closed,” turning the world outside into a dull rumor, and dimmed the lights, making the room a cave of shadows and secrets.

    (more…)

  • Case File #4: The Ghost in the Glass

    an episodic Vivian Locke occult noir

    AI image based on this work & created with Gemini, with direction by Michael Raven.

    Sunny Day Parasol Co.

    Case File #4: The Ghost in the Glass

    This is a serialized story. Start with Case File #1 here.

    “Jesus, Viv. You don’t have to be some bitchy dame about it. Sure sure, I’ll help you out. Always have, haven’t I?” he grumbled, grinding his cigarette in a graveyard of butts in the overflowing ashtray. He muttered something low and ugly and, with a wave of his hand, coaxed the frost to slink back into the frost-encrusted case like a beaten dog.

    “First things first,” he added, his voice a low gravel. “Let’s get that little bit of nasty into containment.”

    (more…)

  • Case File #3: The Kiss of Verdigris

    an episodic Vivian Locke occult noir

    AI image based on this work & created with Gemini, with direction by Michael Raven.

    Sunny Day Parasol Co.

    Case File #3: The Kiss of Verdigris

    This is a serialized story. Start with Case File #1 here.

    The walk away from a fresh corpse is always longer than the walk toward one.

    The rain spat its static-kissed venom onto my trench coat, a thousand tiny drumbeats dancing off my shoulders before dissolving into the crackling cobalt-spark of the alley puddles at my feet. I slipped from the streetlight to shadow, leaving the spreading chalk outline of a problem for the boys in blue. That’s when it caught my eye — a sickly green stain creeping across my glove. The corrosion from the dead man’s identification coin had left its signature, thin, poisonous tendrils still foaming where they’d kissed the laminated identification papers. A dirty reminder of a dirtier business.

    (more…)