Felis ex Machina

By Kevin L. O'Brien

January Ian Mariposa, Jaim to his friends, and his feline familiar Bastet, have acquired a device that allows them to travel back in time. One scholarly subject that has always fascinated him is the influence that the Cthulhu Mythos had on Victorian society of Great Britain in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. As such, he spends a great deal of time in London of the 1880s.

However, he needs a way to support his pretense of being a dilettante aristocrat, and what better way than to pose as a consulting detective in the manner of Sherlock Holmes? He expected most of his cases to be fairly mundane, if occasionally macabre or grotesque, but some turn out to be more eldritch than he anticipated.

Such as, the time Scotland Yard called on him to examine a body....

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kevin L. O'Brien
• Release date: Jan 5, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311116673

Kevin L. O'Brien

Kevin L. O'Brien was born with a pen in his hand.Well, not quite, but he has been writing for as long as he can remember, at least since First Grade. Writing has always been his first, true love, but it hasn't always been his career. He worked for 15 years as a biomedical researcher, then for 3 years as a web designer. However, after 30 years of trying to be published in print with little success, he has decided to try his hand at self-publishing.He writes primarily speculative fiction -- fantasy, science fiction, horror, and their sub-genres -- but he also likes to try his hand at thrillers, suspense, mystery, and even westerns. However, his stories tend to have a fantasy element, no matter how subtle.Most of his stories involve the following three main characters:Medb hErenn (http://www.medbherenn.com/) -- One-time queen of Ireland, she is over 3500 years old. A warrior and a sorceress, she cannot be harmed by any weapon made by the hand of man.Eile and Sunny, Team Girl (http://www.teamgirlforever.com/) -- They are two adorable, vivacious, fun-loving young women whose motto is ONWARD TO ADVENTURE!!! Yet trouble follows them like a love-sick puppy wherever they go.Sir Differel Van Helsing (http://www.sir-differel.com/) -- The descendent of Abraham Van Helsing and King Arthur, she heads the Caerleon Order, the premier monster-hunting organization of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth. She commands Dracula, the most powerful vampire extant, and the greatsword Caliburn, better known as Excalibur.He also writes a series of sword & sorcery stories set in an alternative universe known as the Lands of the Dreams of Men.Kevin lives in Denver with his family and 4 cats.For more information, see his website: http://www.kevinlobrien.com/

Book preview

Felis ex Machina

Kevin L. O'Brien

Smashwords Edition

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Text Copyright 2013 by Kevin L. O'Brien

Cover artwork copyright 2014 by Ariel Roberts

Cover design and typography copyright 2014 by Kevin L. O'Brien

Victoriana font distributed under a free-use license by Gophmann A.L.

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License Notes

Thank you for downloading this ebook. It is licensed for your personal enjoyment and remains the copyrighted property of the author. This ebook may not be sold, reproduced, or copied, whether for commercial or non-commercial purposes, but it may be given away if no changes are made. If you enjoyed this book and would like to share it, please encourage your friends to download their own copy from Smashwords or their favorite online retailer, where they can also discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support, and for respecting the hard work of this author.

Please consider writing a review for this book on the retailer's website.

If you see any misspellings or typographical errors, please notify Kevin L. O'Brien using one of his online social networks. Thank you.

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents, including those based on the real world, are either products of the imagination of Kevin L. O'Brien or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Because some ebook platforms do not support special characters, certain words may appear misspelled, but this was done deliberately to avoid the problem of the platforms deleting the characters. Also, the LRF platform used by older models of the Sony Reader does not permit the use of links to external URLs, whereas the PDB platform used by Palm reading devices does not support any form of linking whatsoever. Finally, certain words use British instead of American spelling, to simulate the characters' English accents.

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Table of Contents

Preface

Felis ex Machina

About the Author

Other Books by Kevin L. O'Brien

Connect with Kevin L. O'Brien

Sample Excerpts

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Preface

My favorite Cthulhu Mythos character hands down is Titus Crow, the occult investigator created by Brian Lumley. In many ways he reminded me of Dr. Benton Quest from Jonny Quest, except he wasn't a scientist. By that time, however, I had become a scientist myself, and I knew that scientists like Quest were very rare, and not looked upon with much respect in the greater scientific community. As such, Crow seemed an acceptable substitute as an intelligent, educated man who used his knowledge to perform quasi-scientific investigations of paranormal phenomena, though more from the aspect of a private detective investigating a criminal case. In my early days, when I wrote Mythos fan fiction, I had taken certain hints Lumley dropped in his stories to enlarge upon Crow's backstory, making him a protege of one of my early characters. However, I found out that Lumley was very protective of his creations, even those he didn't write about anymore, and I realized that it would be nearly impossible for me to get permission to write stories using or mentioning Crow, at least not until I had proven myself to be a successful writer on my own.

As disappointing as that revelation was then, and still is now, in hindsight it was probably a good thing, because it forced me to create my own characters and venues. Arthur Templeton, Prof. Jeremiah Arkenton, Cairnsford Colorado; all had their origins in that period of forced creativity.

January Ian Jaim Mariposa and his little black cat Bastet also originated during that time. Along with Templeton, Mariposa was meant to be my Titus Crow, with a twist: as revealed in No Torrent Like Greed, he is the consort of the cat goddess Bast, and as such is blessed with long life and the aid and protection of one of her familiars. He possesses one further aspect with Crow not shared by Templeton: he is a time traveler. Except that instead of using an alien clock as a conveyance, he has a pocket watch.

Though I intended him to visit other times, he primarily uses it to journey back to Victorian London, to better study the effect the Cthulhu Mythos had on that society. While there he supports himself by playing Sherlock Holmes; that is, he acts as a private consulting detective and solves crimes for clients. I had planned about a dozen stories describing his various cases, but so far this is the only one I have finished. I may finish the others, if there seems any interest in seeing more.

By the way, the title is a play on the term deus ex machine, which in literature refers to a miraculous rescue of characters from danger they cannot deal with themselves.

Back to TOC

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One of the problems with being a time traveler is finding a way to support yourself in the past, since rarely can you take sufficient funds with you. This is especially the case if you intend to pass yourself off as a well-heeled gentleman of leisure. I am a scholar of the mythology of the Outre Beings, and I had returned to England of the Victorian Age to do research on the pervasiveness of that mythology in British society. As such, I needed to adopt a persona that would allow me to freely conduct my investigations. That of a dilettante aristocrat seemed the most useful, but that in turn required having a fair amount of wealth to perpetuate the lifestyle, and despite my ingenuity in establishing a nest egg, I was soon forced to find a source of income. Considering my profession, the most obvious choice was that of a consulting detective. Of course, the irony of the situation was not lost on me. As a child I had devoured the stories of Sherlock Holmes, and now I had a chance to emulate him in Victorian London. How could I resist?

Naturally, I have my equivalents of John Watson, Irene Adler, Mrs. Hudson, and Giles Lestrade, but I also have additional assets that Holmes could never dream of. Despite the limitations of the device I use to travel through time, I am able to bring with me any item I can carry. As such, I have a number of accoutrements that make investigation easier, especially since I have neither Holmes's talent for observation nor his powers of deductive reasoning. And I have Bastet, my familiar and companion. Though she is invaluable in too many ways to briefly list, she is especially useful as a mnemonic device: people tend to remember the consulting detective with