The Assets (Chaos Witches Volume One)

By Tal Turing

In a dismal future where persistent, monstrous storms have scrubbed the Earth clean of mankind and his toys, a technological jump allows a privileged few to, once again, build and live on the surface, protected by strange, rotating, domes. The price to live in such a dometropolis is to contract with the corporations who built them.
These are the stories of extraordinary women whose lives are changed by these soulless companies and the cold, cruel game they play, one designed only for losing.

Cynnamon has studied their rules and is poised to exit their game a winner, until she crosses paths with a strange company whose employees share one collective mind.

Miriam trades an arranged, marital prison for a diamond studded corporate cage. Trapped with a conscienceless man who dreams only of his own glory at anyone's expense, her only chance to survive may lie with strange viral bugs which have a mind of their own and intend to control hers.

Annabelle, leader in a strange Sisterhood, knows better than to help those who are ensnared by the corporate web, but watching from the wings has never been her style. Can she save them or will she herself be caught?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tal Turing
• Release date: Jan 30, 2017

Book preview

The Assets

Chaos Witches : Book One

By Tal Turing

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

© Tal Turing 2015

Published at Smashwords

Smashwords Version 1.2

All rights reserved

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Cover Artwork

Cover artwork created by Marin Atanasoski and used with permission.

http://spirit815.deviantart.com/gallery/

Dedication

This work is dedicated to every woman whose story was told while their name was not. And to the original Girl from Guantanamo for the same reason.

Acknowledgments

I'd like to thank Nanowrimo.org for giving me a push and my wonderful beta readers: Jesse and Gloria.

Disclaimer

Warning: This work contains some adult themes including depictions of violence and sexual behavior and is suitable only for adults and those not easily offended. Any political or religious endorsements are unintentional.

Synopsis

The Witch is dead. Or did you simply not recognize her?

In a dismal future where persistent, monstrous storms have scrubbed the Earth of mankind and his toys, a technological jump allows a privileged few to, once again, build and live on the surface, protected by strange, rotating, domes. The price to live in such a dometropolis is to contract with the corporations who built them.

These are the stories of extraordinary women whose lives are changed by these soulless companies and the cold, cruel game they play, one designed only for losing.

Cynnamon has studied their rules and is poised to exit their game a winner, until she crosses paths with a strange company whose employees share one collective mind.

Miriam trades an arranged, marital prison for a diamond studded corporate cage. Trapped with a conscienceless man who dreams only of his own glory at anyone's expense, her only chance to survive may lie with strange viral bugs which have a mind of their own and intend to control hers.

Annabelle, leader in a strange Sisterhood, knows better than to help those who are ensnared by the corporate web, but watching from the wings has never been her style. Can she save them or will she herself be caught?

Contents

Prelude to the Series

Cynnamon

Miriam

Annabelle

Synopsis of Book 2: Ill Wind

Prelude to the Series: Chaos Witches

Now that I have the time and inclination to reflect back on my life, I am moved to leave words for the future as now I actually believe that it will exist. But I do not wish to tell a story which dwells on the terrible storms as they were just part of my life. And I do not wish to complain about the evil I have seen in men's hearts including my own, as there will always be plenty of that to go around. Instead I will speak of her because those are tales you might never hear and I am sure she will not tell them. Indulge an old man:

Chaos

Our world is an island of structure and order, floating in a vast ocean of chaos, the void. And the illusion is that we float when really we sink. The descent is slow, almost imperceptible and that too is an illusion because there is nothing to keep chaos from waking us up with a hard yank or just swallowing us whole, at any time.

How many times have you looked at the moon and then looked away without a further thought? She waxes to fullness then wanes away and returns again, coaxing the oceans onto the shore, inspiring the poets and bringing a gleam to your lover's eyes during a midnight stroll. The moon has always been there, seen or unseen, and even when you do not care to watch, it slides through its phases on schedule as any almanac will predict.

But we have been fooled; the moon is leaving us, and each time she comes into view is one less time; slowly, in tiny steps, the moon moves further and further away becoming less ours and more of the void.

Mankind relies on stability. The temperature of the planet varies by hundreds of degrees but our bodies are regulated within tenths. Our blood glucose, blood pressure and our pH must be just so if we are to live. Isn't it true that our success is measured not by how much of the Earth's surface we change, but how much is adapted to our very specific, very rigid needs? And we call ourselves 'adaptable', also an illusion.

At first, they thought the violent weather a fluke, an extreme swing of the pendulum, but as monstrous storms, flooding rains and ripping winds scoured the lands, they saw the pendulum twist and fly away into the void. Those who were not swept away were driven mad, left to kill each other before they too were taken.

Witch

Witch. It is not a word we survivors use, though it's still found in a dictionary, encountered in a story, labeled in a picture. That term is as old as 'abacus' and far less useful, of a creature as 'real' as a mermaid but much less comely and aesthetic; and when green-painted women wore large black hats and flourished their wands in the air to accentuate their ancient words of command...nothing ever happened.

Was it not a wand that they waved? Or was that some other myth? You may think me dull for not knowing, but the truth is that I know a great deal about things that matter, and witches simply don't and neither do the details of their legends. It would be more advantageous for me to study the old ways of applying leeches to wounds or predicting the future by scattering stones than to spend even an hour perusing their 'magic' books, the kind you might still find in a museum or a scavenger shop. It might provide some heat and light if you were to burn it but hardly enough to be worth the effort. Honestly, to us, the word 'ghost' is much more relevant and formidable. So many, many have died. Surely their ghosts roam somewhere; even I believe that. But witches? No.

Chaos Witch

But that word sprung to my mind one day as she arrived. The doors opened up and she stepped through, as she had many times before. I knew her and of her and previously never suspected a thing. And on this day her appearance matched the circumstances but given how things ended, my mind puzzled and churned and swirled and unable to resolve, it did as best it could and spit out that single word. Witch.

Thinking back, she never aspired to power or to wealth and, as far as I know, never achieved either. She aged as women do, she sneezed, she shed tears and blood. She spoke, acted and reacted as reasonably as any other woman I have known.

It was when I considered the big picture that she seemed too reasonable, too available and too happy to exit while others told the story and her name faded. Too often I caught her lingering in the storm while the rest scattered, kicking stones prior to an avalanche, puffing air in a storm's advance. Too many times did she 'accidentally' choose the path into the fire rather than the escape.

But, honestly, I still would not have known but for my dream: I sat on the shore while she swam circles in a large black pool, the void.

When I find swamp fruit on the ground, I look for the tree from which it came. When someone gives me credits, I consider how many more they must have. But when I think of her, I am sad, because there is nothing to explain from where she came. Or who can replace her once she is gone. She is like the moon.

Thus I believe she was a witch. But I am not certain.

Perhaps, if you would listen to the stories, you might make up your own mind; and inform me of your conclusion.

I am in the stories as well, one who suddenly realized her secret. And kept it of my own free will. Or so I believe.

Cynnamon

Simple songs still cause my toe to tap, my head to bob while the best wizards' spells never moved even a hair on my head.

-Unknown

It was especially difficult to convince villagers to send their daughters to school, especially those who lived far out in the valley, those they called guajira, I never knew from where that name originated. I had one little guajira, with olive skin and raven hair, but so shy, she would sit and listen but would not speak. Eventually, a young woman, with similar features, accompanied her to class and stood in back and would prompt her to answer, she'd whisper, Put up your hand Cinny! or something like that. Soon, we reached an unspoken agreement; whenever the woman would point, I would call on the little one who would then stand and deliver a thoughtful and often correct answer. Alas, as was often the case, one day the little guajira stopped attending and I never saw her again. I did come to learn that the woman was actually the mother and had passed away, unexpectedly.

-from the blog of Pol Gente, New Berlyn

Storms

When the Storms arrived, they became a transforming force, reworking in less than one hundred years what had taken thousands to build. Floods washed away roads, rainwater flushed clean basements and savage winds broke buildings into pieces that the wind used to scour the lands. They never left.

As for the people, they either perished on the surface or crawled into the earth to hide and wait for their time. But even in their despair, many still believed that this was not how it would end, that some would find a way.

And some of us did. But we knew better than to advertise that fact.

Valley

In one particularly deep North American valley, the effects of the storms seemed typical. Trees were ruined, snapped in half, limbs removed and leaves stripped away. Rain waters poured down the sides of the valley and powerful winds drove the thick clouds quickly overhead.

But there were some abnormalities here as well. The powerful west wind was baffled by the high ridge of the valley, greatly decreasing the severity of the air pressure near the valley floor. And although waters poured in, they were quickly diverted into ravines and then, unseen, into a network of underground tunnels and tubes which prevented flooding and pooling.

The most puzzling phenomena were a series of strange, dark, shapes lined along the bottom of the valley's western wall. At first glance they seemed like large black cones, kilometers across, that had been pressed into the valley floor, planted perhaps by a storm giant. But these objects were not distinct, their boundaries were fuzzy like smoke and shifted with time as if the whole entity was spinning slowly, churning itself deeper into the ground.

Each swirling black entity was actually a protective dome. And the collection of these domes together with the network of tunnels beneath the valley comprised the city of Techview. And as far as its residents knew, they were one of only a handful of such settlements in what was left of the world.

Urbanic Dome

The northern-most dome was larger than the rest; Urbanic Dome was named after the powerful corporation which had constructed these strange, wondrous, technological marvels. Beneath it lie a community like those once found on the surface of the planet, one with buildings, gardens and even farms, some of which belonged to the Urbanic Corporation but much of which was rented or sold to individuals or even rival companies.

While so much of what man had created had been lost, somehow the thing called the corporation had found a way to survive.

Evening Shift

A Techview bus emerged from a tunnel and entered the eerie realm of the dome at night. By rule, all was dark, save for dim, greenish, luminescent strips which marked landing zones and roof contours; that and an occasional flash from the navigational beacon of a random vehicle as it moved through the air.

The bus leveled out into a traffic zone ten meters above ground and moved decisively toward a plot of land overrun by weeds and tall grasses and littered by some ancient, rusting trailers. The vehicle slowed to a hover over a green outlined platform and descended onto it silently.

The doors of the bus slid open and she stepped out, a black pack slung to her back. The bus lifted off again as she left the platform, her face obscured in the darkness save for a brief flash of faint red LED light from the dark glasses on her face.

Even as her foot touched the ground, her AI spectacles had reached out into the facility, announcing her arrival and obtaining the information needed to guide her along a path to the entrance of the largest trailer, one which now was powering up inside. Its door opened and closed as the facility swallowed her.

Cynnamon squeezed into a cramped room, hung her bag on a nail, and slid onto a cold, metal chair which swiveled in response. An array of displays hummed into life at the pleading of her DT-3000 AI spectacles, an expensive piece of corporate equipment, her lifeline to everything and everyone within the domed city of Techview.

Even after a day of corporate training, she had still managed to draw the evening shift at yet another remote Transom facility. She had missed dinner and would not be able to leave and return to her Transom Dome home until 4 am, nearly eight hours later; so she would have to scrounge food within the neglected facility or wait and have an early breakfast.

She had never been in this facility before, rarely even visited this dome, and that added to her concern and sense of isolation. Working an evening shift was always problematic; off hours meant less support would be available; less support meant more improvisation would be needed and improvisation raised the probability of screwing up. Cynnamon had already received last month's I screwed the team pooch award as determined by her handler and boss, Lee Wethers – Senior Officer, Transom Industries, Operations Branch, Techview.

But Cyn didn't worry about losing her job, because she was not an officer nor an employee of Transom Industries; she was even lower on the totem pole. Cyn was a human corporate asset, business chattel, and corporate property could not be fired, but it could be fined and fines added to the debt which bound her to the company and so, for Cynnamon, there was no punishment worse than a fine as they steadily put off her emancipation date. That day would not be arriving anytime soon.

Alone within the trailer, Cyn removed an elastic band from around her wrist, swept back her long, black hair and secured it behind and out of her way. She slipped on an AI glove, it paired with the spectacles and she went to work.

The monitors flashed in response to subtle gestures of her gloved fingers and the darting of her dark, gold-speckled eyes beneath the frames. The glow of the display played with the natural golds and browns of her skin. In school, they said she had olive skin and that had confused her as she had only ever seen black or dark green olives. Her mother had explained that the rich sun colored olives of old were now as rare as a glimpse of the sun itself.

As she worked, Cyn expected to hear the door open at any moment, Lee would arrive and then they would have two members of the team available within Urbanic Dome while the remaining three were back at Transom.

But she heard no such noise as she worked. Strange, she had not seen her handler, virtually or otherwise, in days. Would they be without one again this evening? She sighed.

During the previous shift they had received a request to assist a rival company in performing a patent search. The team assets discussed for nearly an hour whether or not they could even accept such a request. In reality, as long as a request does not violate company policy and as long as the client can pay their price, it does not really matter who they are. After much delays and confusion they finally completed that assignment and received a reduced commission as a response penalty.

The night before was worse, by the time they had formed a strategy for dealing with the request, it had been snapped up by another ops team. They needed Lee back! Cyn looked up at the status of her team as displayed through her AI spectacles, no one was online, except Carla.

Hi Carla, thank god you are here. Where's James and Trent? Cynnamon sent the message off to their hospitality asset. Carla was the team's voice and face to the rest of the world, at least when they wanted to be nice. And she was always on time for her shifts, just like Cynnamon. If the other two didn't pop online soon, she would ask Carla to find them. It was bad enough their leader was AWOL but she would be damned if she would be caught without her coworkers. They should all boil together if it came to that.

Cyn had learned the dangers of acting without the approval of her boss and support of her team. She did not want to suffer a repeat of last month's debacle when her penchant for making decisions in a vacuum had earned them a sizable commission penalty.

Cyn was already on to a second set of procedures when Carla's greeting came back.

Trent's just arrived and I assume James is not far behind.

Cyn would leave James to Carla. Those three had worked together for a while while Cyn was the new girl on the block; besides it was the problem of the missing handler which concerned her.

Carla, Lee is not here. Could you have him fetched if he does not show within ten? Or find out about a stand-in, we have to have a handler right? It's been like this all week.

Cyn had been in Techview for seven years, but she had been on this team for barely six months. Teams were constantly formed, reformed and retired as the whims of profit dictated; some teams were large while theirs comprised of only five and except for Lee, they were all assets, and students at that.

Trent was the theorist of the group, with medium build, straight dark hair and Asian features, he was knowledgeable, detail oriented and driven toward perfection and optimization. Normally such people aspired toward the top technological companies like SkyTran or Urbanic; so Cyn felt that Trent was probably frustrated by the client driven culture of Transom. Clients were often neither logical nor perfect.

James was experienced but lacked Trent's perfectionist tendencies. James had a strong work ethic and a competitive nature which extended to all things. He had already challenged Cynnamon to play one-on-one Q-ball, a match they had yet to schedule. James had a boyish charm which complemented his tall and athletic physique.

While James, Trent and Cynnamon were trained as operations assets, Carla was a hospitality asset (or hospie) by training and experience.

Hospies were taught to handle the client or the customer or whoever it was you needed to appease. They could be bartenders, bank tellers, call center operators or even sex workers. It was said that the perfect hospie cared about people but not too much. Domers tended to stereotype hospies as eye candy or pretty faces but that was a gross oversimplification as Cyn well knew.

Thus it was Carla who worked directly with the paying client, whether it be an individual or a rival company or a division of Transom itself and she kept in contact with past clients, always looking for new commission opportunities.

But Carla was more than a good hospie, what made her different was her determined managing of team politics, using a mixture of sweetness, sarcasm and confrontation to keep everyone on track, she was a perfect second-in-command to Lee and although James and Trent had not admitted that fact, it was obvious to Cyn.

As the new member of the team, Cyn found that sometimes her requests for information or assistance might be ignored by the senior members of the team, but she had also noticed that whenever she mentioned the slight to Carla, the issue was resolved, perhaps not right away but sooner rather than later. Cyn respected Carla for that, especially as Carla was not overly friendly to her, preferring to work with James and Trent whom she knew well. Thus Cyn had volunteered to work the shift out in the dilapidated trailer while the three friends stayed behind in Transom Dome.

Urgent Request

Cynnamon, sweetie, I have SCR pinging me with an elevated priority request, would you speak with them? Carla's pleasant and easy-going voice reached Cynnamon as she was in the middle of another procedure. As Transom had such a low presence in this dome, the task lists were quite different and it was taking longer. Cyn automatically responded in the affirmative even as she realized there was no such thing as 'elevated priority', if Strategy and Corporate Relations (or SCR) were requesting anything above normal, then it must be urgent priority. Cyn sighed as Carla added SCR to the connection. Cyn's own mother used to call her 'sweetie' and Cyn had automatically responded favorably to Carla's expert use of the term when she really should have asked for more information. Was it just a coincidence or was Carla that good?

Carla's smooth voice returned, Cyn, I have Mr. Georges from SCR online. Mr. Georges, Cynnamon is acting team lead this evening, please provide her with the details of your request.

What? Cyn thought, what was this 'team lead' nonsense? Where was Lee?