《The Thorned Rose》4
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'This is it,' I thought to myself. I put on my sweetest smile, and stood talking to him for a bit. He took the bait just like I wanted him to, and asked if I wanted to go somewhere a bit quieter. I followed him up some stairs and through a corridor to a gorgeously decorated sitting room. 'Shame it will be covered in blood soon,' I thought. Erasmo turned around to pour himself a glass of whiskey, and when his back was turned, I grabbed the knife from my shoe, ran behind him and slit his throat. I brought his head up to look at me, and I watched the life drain from his eyes. Unfortunately, this type of murder was messy, and I had so much blood on me now, I definitely could not leave through the front door.
"Where did he go?" I heard a voice say.
"He definitely went upstairs," said another.
"Yeah he was going with that girl that rejected-" added a third, interrupted by the fourth who hissed, "find him."
I could hear them opening and searching each of the rooms, getting closer and closer to the one that contained me and a very dead Erasmo. Time to run. Even though I had trained to run in a long dress for times like this, it was still easier for me to just rip the bottom half of the skirt off. As it was such a thin material, it ripped easily. One last thing I had to do was pin a white rose badge, with one thorn, to the blazer of Erasmo. That was my signature move, it is what made me famous. I was known as the Thorned Rose, and over the world I was famous for my assassinations, but no one knew it was me. I went to open the window, but it was locked shut, fuck. I could pick the lock easily, but it would take a bit of time, and I wasn't sure how much I had before the men ran in and found me. No time to waste worrying though, I quickly took a hairpin from my hair and began unpicking it. Just as I unlocked the window, the door flew open, and there was four men. Right in the middle was 'Don Sandrino', as the girls had referred to him earlier.
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"You," he looked at me, fury raging in his eyes. One of the men lifted their gun up towards me, without hesitation, I grabbed a throwing star from my thigh and threw it, landing just in his shoulder, so he groaned with pain and put the gun down. They turned to help their injured man, and I used the distraction to pull open the window. I quickly hopped onto the window ledge, turned around and said "sorry boys, there was a hit out on this man." They all stared at me, with fury but bewilderment, and watched as I hopped out of the window and disappeared into the night.
I no longer had the luxury of time, so I quickly ran to where the car was parked, and took the keys that I had left on top of the wheel, unlocking the car and quickly drived off. I went to the bridge, where there was a blue pickup truck and a man waiting for me. He pulled back the tarpaulin that covered the back of his truck, I climbed inside and he sped off. All of my belongings had been gathered from the hotel, and were in my small rucksack next to me. I quickly changed into joggers, trainers and a zippy. I can basically run and drive as well in heels as I can in trainers, the only difference is the blisters and the grip of the shoes, so I always tried to change as soon as possible. Also, my outfit was very distinctive, thank god I wore a mask the whole night.
After an hour of driving, we reached a city where there was a car waiting for me. I thanked the man from the pickup truck, who handed me the car keys and then sped off. I quickly jumped in the car and continued driving. There were many other car changes, and finally, at 6am in the morning in Milan Airport, I flew home, back to London.
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Entangled Fates Book 1 - Quantum Beginnings
“By far, the greatest danger of Artificial Intelligence is that people conclude too early that they understand it.” —Eliezer Yudkowsky Hey all, we're moving over to book 2. This content is in a state of transition. The book is now availble on Amazon (includes extra chapters): https://www.royalroad.com/amazon/B07W1534R8 Artificial intelligence was nearly mankind’s last invention. AI took off like a rocket, then when it racked up an impressive death toll, it crashed before it could blossom and took most high-tech industries with it. Resistance and fears became deep-set. Two decades after the infamous Rev. 4.6 incidents, humanity hasn’t quit dreaming of the wealth and power that could be at their fingertips. A new generation of mega-corporations rose from the ashes. When one melds a quantum computer to a barely functional mental patient as a PR move, there are those who seek to profit, those who want to destroy it, and Alex. Alex Sage is a typical college student trying to keep up his grades and maybe find a meaningful connection with the fairer sex. Then, an automated semi crashes into his home, killing his family and turning his head into a pin cushion in the process. Alex awakens to find most of his memories gone and an illegal AI hidden in his brain implant. Now the pet project of a tech billionaire and heavily in debt, Alex struggles to stay valuable enough to be kept online. Still grappling with the repercussions of his injuries, and threats from a dangerous anti-augmentation political movement, there are no easy answers and threats loom around every corner. Alex must use whatever resources he can to escape from under the thumb of a ruthless corporation, while keeping those he comes to love safe. Chapters will stay up on RRL until Aug 10. It'll go up on Kindle Unlimited after that. How do you get those extra chapters I didn't have planned for RR? If you want them, they'll be in the published book. Book 2 will still make sense without them - I made sure of that. But... isn't $3 a lot for extra chapters? Think of it as tipping me for a good job and you'd also be getting my eternal thanks. If you enjoyed it so much that the idea of missing out a few chapters haunts you, I did my job as an author and made an engaging story. What's in those extra chapters? Resolving a few issues, set up for the cybernetic revolution, a rather intense sex scene with a new partner, revelations of who's really pulling strings, and a bit of set up for book 2. Complaints that people missed out on it when it was published here won't help (sorry!). I posted this for the folks who helped me shape the book, which is you all! (Again, yay!) But... Why! Why not keep it all on RR forever? My editor likes being paid for one. For two, I'd like the ability to get broader readership. If I break even on editor costs, I'll be incredibly happy. What about book 2? Drafts for Book 2 will go up around Sept 10. My draft of Book 2 is done, and it will be handed to the editor once Book 1 is published. Feedback has been even more positive. Beta readers devoured it and wanted more. I'll add a link to Book 2 once it's up on RR. I'm more or less, using you all for Beta Readers, so you get it before it's "canon" and edited. I invite active and meaningful feedback during this process. In return, you get early access to chapters. That does mean that the book content or plot might be adjusted before it gets published as I refine it. Sex Y/N? Yes. I heard the feedback, 90% wanted it explicit. You all will get the "full" experience. Will I dump all of book 2 here? Honestly, I'm not sure yet. At a minimum, it'll be up to the 75% mark as we collect feedback, much like what I did with book 1. It really depends on how good the feedback is and how nice people are. Lots of support + meaningful feedback to make it better = higher likelihood you get all the book. Will be it up here indefinitely? No, it'll probably go up on KU at some point, but I'll make sure there's enough time for a large readership to grab it here. Then we move to book 3 which already is around 60K words already. What about other adventures in the same universe/characters? Yep. Absolutely. Nothing ready to share yet though. I plan to keep those side chapters and more slice of life stories as RR exclusive. Since I'm carving this off in book-sized segments, I'll have to figure out where those disconnected story arcs belong. I'm open to suggestions.
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