Today, I'm going to tease you with a little bit of an old WIP of mine called Forbidden. At one time, it was running once a month, as a series. Now it waits for my return.
Forbidden takes place in the future, to a time when the birth rate is alarmingly low, and infant mortality too high, and children are too precious to risk. The church has finally relented their stance against priests marrying and having families, although homosexuality is still a crime. The United States is now the Alliance of States, and includes Canada. The country is working to rebuild itself, after a devastating war, and prisons are scary places to be. Jerico James is the spoiled son of a wealthy man who's pushed his luck and must be punished. He'd being sent to Sanctum, one of the government help centers, located in the Midwest. In this snippet, he's arrived at a bus station, waiting for his ride to Sanctum. Enjoy!
The bus ride had been
long, boring, and utterly without merit. Part of the reason for the longevity
of the ride was the condition of the roads. Some arterial highways were little
traveled and had yet to be repaired; sometimes detours were tricky and time
consuming. Although Jerico had spent a little time with the two young admiring
females who sat across from him, their company had quickly grown tepid, and he
had retired to the solitude of his own thoughts, instead. The future seemed
bleak and dismal, at least from his perspective, filled with toil, labor and
hard work. That was no way for a man to
live.
The town where he’d
been finally dropped off, along with his luggage, was nothing in comparison to
the one he’d left the day before, but it wasn’t like he’d a say-so in the
matter, and he knew Sanctum would be even smaller than this. To his surprise,
there was no one there waiting to meet him. He was given instructions by the
officer who met the bus: where to sit, and what would happen if he didn’t do
so. He shrugged and did as he was told, taking a seat on a bench in the bus
terminal. The man had let him know in no uncertain terms that he was being
watched, what else could he do?
This terminal was not
as busy as the other. It wasn’t like he could slip into the crowd and make good
his escape; he’d be too obvious. So he tapped his foot and waited. Suddenly,
his attention was drawn by the tittering and giggling of a group of passing young
ladies, by their sighs of deep admiration and adulation—sounds which were not
aimed at him. He turned his head and saw the most gorgeous man he’d ever seen
in his life, coming toward him.
He could see why the
sighs for this beauty— he was ready to release one himself over this veritable
god. To his surprise, the man stopped in front of him, looking directly at him.
“Jerico James?” he
asked, “I’m here to take you to Sanctum.”
Jerico smiled. Maybe
this was his lucky day after all. Maybe
Sanctum would be more interesting than he’d imagined it would.
One could hope.
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