JAKE AND THE DYNAMO

CHAPTER 21: PLAYERS

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The cluster of twenty girls, like some kind of giant amoeba with T.B. as its nucleus, oozed through the front door of the arcade. Leaning on his counter, Tim blanched. The girls hadn’t bothered him when they had remained out under the awning, but now he apparently didn’t know what to do once they’d invaded the male-dominated space of the arcade’s interior.

There was an unspoken rule at the arcade: girls, if they came in significant numbers, were to remain near the front end where the merchandisers and ice cream were. Girls were not to enter the arcade’s inner sanctum except singularly, and preferably in male company. Cavalierly violating this unspoken rule, T.B.’s band of jabbering females now threatened the purity of this haven for luckless and socially awkward boys. Continue reading “JAKE AND THE DYNAMO Chapter 21”

JAKE AND THE DYNAMO

CHAPTER 20: PLAYED

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Five blocks north of Jake’s house, the residences of Juban gave way to shops and strip malls. The shopping district was a tidy, modern section of town with wide sidewalks and glassed-in storefronts, and it even boasted several parking lots, since an unusually large number of Juban’s residents owned cars. At nine forty-five on Saturday morning, Jake walked up the street and, with his hands in the pockets of a blue windbreaker, loitered on a corner. He had a few loose coins in his pocket, the only money left after the night before.

He knew he was in trouble. Continue reading “JAKE AND THE DYNAMO Chapter 20”

JAKE AND THE DYNAMO

CHAPTER 19: DEMONS AND DELINQUENTS

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The giant bat flapped his wings as he circled overhead. Lightning cracked, so for a moment he appeared as an ominous silhouette against a sky full of white fire. “We have you right where we want you, Barfing Boy,” he cried in a squeaky voice, “and your magical girlfriend can’t save you!” He laughed. “Where is your Princess now?”

The bystanders in the street cowered. An elderly lady lifted her umbrella cane and pointed it at Jake with a shaky hand. “Look! It is him! It’s Barfing Boy!”

Next to the old woman stood a young man with a big potbelly hanging over his sweatpants. Under his chin, his upper neck was hairy, as if he’d forgotten to shave that part. His T-shirt was too small to cover the last few inches of his enormous stomach, and in pink letters it proclaimed, “Magical girls do it in fancy outfits on live TV.”

“And look!” he cried as he pointed at Dana. “Barfing Boy is two-timing Pretty Dynamo! Woo-hoo!”

The onlookers gasped. Jake slapped a hand to his forehead. Continue reading “JAKE AND THE DYNAMO Chapter 19”

JAKE AND THE DYNAMO

CHAPTER 18: SINKING DEEPER

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Jake squirmed in his bus seat and struggled to control his breathing. His face felt hot, as if he had a fever, and his clothes stuck to him in uncomfortable places. Marionette’s intense kisses kept replaying in his head.

Other bus passengers glanced his way uneasily or stared at him openly. He probably looked like a freak.

He swallowed hard and ran a hand through his hair. His fingers came away moist with perspiration. He desperately wanted to hit the court and shoot some hoops. Or go back to Marionette’s apartment. Or grab another girl—any other girl.

You’re not choosy, she’d said.

And he remembered Natasha’s words, too: Boys his age need sports to release their excess energy, or they commit sex crimes. He had thought she was joking.

Darn it, maybe they were both right. Continue reading “JAKE AND THE DYNAMO Chapter 18”

JAKE AND THE DYNAMO

CHAPTER 17: FLASH IN THE PAN

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Magical Girl Grease Pencil Marionette remembered.

She lay, as she often did, with her head in the lap of the Moon Princess. She stared at the ceiling, face expressionless, saying nothing, as the Princess ran delicate fingers through her silver hair.

“My pet,” the Princess cooed in a gentle singsong. “My pet, my pet, my darling Marionette.”

They were in the Moon Base, the Princess’s secret lair hidden beneath an antiquities museum in the heart of the city. The Princess sat on a divan between two marble pillars, and Marionette sprawled on the divan like a carelessly dropped toy.

Across the room, Sentinel, the Princess’s supercomputer, quietly thrummed as it communicated with its satellite network, which scanned the Earth, near space, and proximal alternate dimensions for significant threats. Around the room, screens showed satellite images of the world, or shots of stars or the moon. Other screens displayed scrolling text. Continue reading “JAKE AND THE DYNAMO Chapter 17”

JAKE AND THE DYNAMO

CHAPTER 15: A NEW PRIMA DONNA

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Chirops trembled as he slipped out of the stream. In a flash of dissipating magical energy, he entered Urbanopolis. The jagged rubble gouged his feet, and the cool air made his fur stand on end. It had been many ages since he’d been here.

All things considered, not much had changed.

The demoniac wasn’t hard to find. Near a collapsed building, he stood, perfectly balanced on the tips of his toes, on the top of a broken wall that now leaned at a forty-five degree angle. Blood and dust streaked his cheap suit. He gazed at the full moon, his back to Chirops. But soon after the bat appeared, the demoniac, with the sound of popping vertebrae, twisted his head around backwards. His mouth spread into an impossibly wide grin, revealing sixty or seventy sharp, crooked teeth. He flexed long, bony fingers, which at their tips had six-inch, razor-sharp claws. Continue reading “JAKE AND THE DYNAMO Chapter 15”