safehouse books

IO

Lizi turns and moves a couple steps towards the shimmer.
This thing is going to take off. And green beam all of us. I have no choice.

The craft emits a low rumble as the green vapor billows around it.

Sideways, backwards or forwards, Lizi stares at the shimmer,
I don't care where that craft is going. I need to stop it.
Now. Disarm the threat.

"Chiara Elizabeth Buttegieg you stop right now!"
Despite her mother using her horrendous first name, Lizi doesn't take her eyes off the craft.
Hagstrom barks. "Call IO! Call someone! Call them!"

Lizi stops and looks at their anxious faces on Nelson's EO com.
She smiles, "To stand between the people and danger. Isn't that the oath, Hagstrom?"
"But Lizi, you're not an agent."
"I'm the only one here. And if I don't do something, then a lot of people are going to get hurt. So, today..."

She turns the blood stained IO patch on the sleeve of Nelson's jacket towards the com. "Today, my name is Lizi Hagstromsdaw."

Lizi clips the com on the front of the jacket and slings the scanner over her neck and arm.
She pulls the blue beam out of the holster, ignites it, and walks towards the green vapour.

"This is for you, Nelson. For all of us!"
IO

The year is 2075
Lizi is bored with college and annoyed by adults.
Only her best friend Kai and her Haplo pals keep her sane.

She lives with her mother Katija, a geneticist who works for the Gene Base division of the First Union Firewall.
Katija recently married Hagstrom Vik, an IO (Internal Office) agent.

The Firewalls keep the populations stable.
But a highly disciplined outfit called The Mechanism operates in the shadows.

It's been forty years since the last empire fell.
A time of peace and rebuilding.
Most countries have formed together into smaller sustainable units called Unions or Alliances,
upgrading their operating systems to OS2020 standards.

A new threat is emerging.
One that will test them all.
As IO, EO and The Mechanism scramble across the world to stop it,
Lizi will be caught at the center of the fight.

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Tin Town

The Trail's End Mobile Ranch in Apache Junction, Arizona.
Once, a gleaming mobile home park, full of happy winter visitors.
Now it decays under the relentless desert sun.
The bleached out bones of a tin dinosaur.
Tin Town.

Disabled house painter Winston Smith, is waiting to receive disability benefits.
And watching his bank account dwindle down to nothing.
But his Mulligan's stew of neighbors provide ample distraction and comic relief.

Tongues wag and opinions fly around Tin Town.
Mostly over politics or someone else's medical condition.
And opinions are more popular than facts.

Winston, and a handful of his neighbors, look for the truth behind the opinions.
But telling the truth is not popular.
And it just might get someone killed.

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Cavemen With Cellphones

We are animals.
And, our behavior is more similar to the behavior of other animals, than it is different.
We have invented several ways to try to explain our behavior. We use psychology, biology, religion, and astrology.

But there may be another explanation: Instinct.
- Do you go out to eat fast food when you have healthy food rotting in the refrigerator?
- Do you believe that there is a right way and a wrong way to do most things, and you always know the right way?
- Do you constantly put other people's needs before your own?

Birds fly south for the winter. Fish swim upstream to spawn.
These are instinctive behaviors.

Our behaviors, even though they can take different forms, might still be motivated out of the same basic Primitive Instincts that motivated our ancestors.

How we do things changes.
But why we do things hasn't changed in thousands of years.

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yelling at bees

black cannot exist
without white

good
has no definition
without evil

a one sided coin
cannot exist

all things happen
in balance

unless
i embrace both
without judgement
i will wander
in the delusions
of my primitive Instincts

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Spiritual awareness
spiritual awareness
does not mean ~
i become aware
of how other people
should
be living their lives

spiritual awareness
means ~
i become aware
that there are
no shoulds

IO
But Kai, you're so young. You have your whole life in front of you..."

"No Lizi. None of us have our lives in front of us.
We only have the lives we leave behind us.
That, is what defines us."

eleven truths
1 i am more like the other animals ~ than i am different from them
2 i am more like other human beings ~ than i am different from them
3 we all have the same instincts
4 we all have the same needs
5 we all have different wants
6 ego is the root of all evil
7 i am the architect of my own misery
8 there is no universal right and wrong
9 there is no universal good and bad
10 all things are normal
11 the earth is a living organism ~ it doesn't make mistakes

the spectrum
love is not the opposite of hate
joy is not the opposite of sadness

the opposite of joy
is indifference to joy
the opposite of sadness
is indifference to sadness

all feelings have
their own spectrum

joy -------------------------------- indifference to joy
sadness ------------------------ indifference to sadness

this is why i can feel conflicting feelings
at the same time

love for my partner ------ | --------------- indifference
anger at my partner --------------- | ------ indifference

only my position
on the individual spectrums changes

acceptance
~ acceptance ~
is the middle path

but
~ acceptance ~
is difficult

which is why
so few humans
attempt to do it

it's so much easier
to judge and avoid
we are humans
we like easy

acceptance is the only path to serenity

All things happen in balance
life itself
cannot exist
without the balance
of positive and negative energy

we cling
to our positive beliefs
the way neutrons
cling to protons

but neutrons
do not praise protons
for their positive charge
and shame electrons
for their negativity

the stability
of the atom depends
on the balance of both

every building block
in our universe
from atoms
to solar systems
teaches us
the importance
of the balance
of positive and negative

our entire existance
is based on this balance

this is a great truth

this is the middle way

IO

IO

Tin Town

Cavemen With Cellphones

yelling at bees

Spiritual awareness

IO

eleven truths

the spectrum

acceptance

All things happen in balance