Goon Squad #1

By Jonathan L. Howard

THE THREAT: There are villainous monsters, mutants, freaks, and warped masterminds in the world, beyond the ability of conventional police forces to deal with.
THE SOLUTION: Recruit your own monsters, mutants, freaks, and warped masterminds, and give them warrant cards.
Every large urban centre has its own Special Talents Response Team, a small cadre of... unusual personalities with unusual abilities.
Manchester’s is the infamous GOON SQUAD, a team that has been operating continuously since the 1940s. Based in the heart of the city, their brief is to deal with threats ranging from the slightly odd to the very strange indeed.
Join the GOON SQUAD as they bring law and a degree of order to a city under siege from the forces of weirdness.

GOON SQUAD Issue #1: "The New Girl." Nadiya Kysla has made mistakes in her past; large-scale, very public mistakes that ended with her losing her liberty. She's not like that now, though. Now she just wants a quiet life. When trouble comes to her, however, it starts a chain of events that mean she will once more adopt a persona she thought she would never again assume -- the infamous Puppet Girl. But can the notorious art terrorist ever leave her past behind to become a hero of today?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jonathan L. Howard
• Release date: Jan 27, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311211934

Jonathan L. Howard

JONATHAN L. HOWARD is a game designer, scriptwriter, and a veteran of the computer-games industry since the early nineties, with titles such as the Broken Sword series to his credit. He is author of Johannes Cabal the Necromancer, Johannes Cabal the Detective, and Johannes Cabal: The Fear Institute, as well as the YA novels Katya’s World and Katya’s War. He lives in the United Kingdom with his wife and daughter.

Book preview

GOON SQUAD #1

The New Girl

by

Jonathan L. Howard

Copyright

Goon Squad #1 The New Girl

by

Jonathan L. Howard

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright holder.

Copyright © 2014 Jonathan L. Howard

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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http://www.jonathanlhoward.com/

Cover Illustration by Laura Hollingsworth

http://lostie815.deviantart.com/art/Lostie815-s-Commissions-OPEN-383080527

Goon Squad Issue #1

The New Girl

Nadiya Kysla's life was to change out of all recognition because she had to buy rice.

She thought she'd have enough for the chicken curry she was throwing together, but a glance and a shake of the jar proved she had been hopelessly optimistic in that belief. So she put on a beret to top off her ensemble of a black and white top striped horizontally, the black slacks and shoes, the dark red gloves she always wore out of the house, and – confident that she was positively the reincarnation of Audrey Hepburn – she walked the two hundred metres to the Willets convenience store. Admittedly, Audrey Hepburn's skin was never quite such a pure shade of snow white, nor did she feel it necessary to wear gloves and sunglasses to avoid upsetting passers-by, but Nadiya looked terribly chic whatever the specific reasons for the gloves and glasses, and she'd long since learned to value effect where function was the true cause.

She wandered the aisles of the store, picking up a bag of Basmati rice, half a dozen eggs, and a small chocolate bar. It wasn't a bad area, but the Willets was certainly beginning to look a little tired, and she navigated the worn patches in the flooring without thinking or even really noticing them. She made her way past a teenager stacking the shelves with the same offhand complacency. It wasn't the cheapest place to shop, but at least it lived up to its claims of convenience. It also contained a small Post Office in the