Here’s a fun twist: while Mercury’s main theme was how people don’t always get what they deserve, and how sometimes that means radical forgiveness, Sea of Lost Souls approaches forgiveness from a different perspective. Namely, how you can’t force it. What Jill did in the epilogue of Mercury was a choice she’d made when she was ready to make it. What if she had felt forced to make that choice?
Commander Hollander walked up to the generator and patted it appreciatively. “I never got to see the engine room on the Taft, being in the air wing and everything. We always wondered what you nerds got up to down there.”
“We were refining uranium,” I said, my hands on my hips.
Commander Hollander blinked. “Really?”
“No. We nerds were completing a series of highly-complicated procedures designed to ensure that the uranium within the two nuclear reactors was bombarded with the correct amount of neutrons, thereby making sure that we didn’t kill everyone within five hundred miles. When we weren’t doing that, we were studying how to do that better, so your butt had the power to fly planes. What were you doing?”
Ugh, aviators. Every single thing about them had always stuck in my craw, from the way that virtually all media about the Navy acted like they were the only people aboard a carrier, to the way they strutted around the ship like they owned it. And now here I was, dead and still somehow in an engine room, listening to the aviator who’d killed me call me a nerd. In my space. In my domain.
Commander Hollander sighed. “Remember to call me sir. I was providing air support for operations overseas, Petty Officer. Let’s not play this game. I came down to get to know you all a little better, since we’re spiritually connected.” He patted the generator again. “Like this. This engine has, what, eighty thousand horsepower?”
Sharp and fearsome superhero Heather and her San Diego team have struck a dark deal with a local gang: in exchange for helping the team escape a lethal foe by faking their deaths, the gang will take credit for “killing” the team, known locally as The Beasts. With the clock ticking down and few allies to help, their lives–and their deal–only becomes more complicated when Heather and her teammate Courtney begin to fall for two gang members.
Here’s a sneak peek of some new characters to fall in love with! I’ve been madly writing, getting ready for the NNWM sprint next month.
Working Title: The Sea of Lost Souls
The first was a Navy brat, just trying to make Dad proud. The second just wanted adventure. The third wanted to get away from it all, but can’t stop thinking about who he left behind. The fourth had two beautiful children and the world ahead of him.
As my female colleagues walked past, the crewmen would jump up and bid them appreciative hellos. Some even offered their hands, but Dot and Peggy would hiss at them to get back to work every time. I understood the appeal of pretty women as much as the next guy, but why were they acting like this? Some of them were so dumbstruck that they didn’t salute Lieutenant Hollander, nor make any sign they knew an officer was in their presence.
Wide Spread Interests 