To all of you who view my blog. Have a wonderful and safe holiday.

As a little tease, here is a sample of book 2 and a preview of a new character:

=======================================
She turned to face the ship hovering in the middle of the
river. Now, everyone was safe and more importantly, out of her
way. She didn’t know how long Jadie would be out of action, so
she needed to move fast. She jumped off the highway and onto the
pier, her objective was straight ahead.
Cindy dashed forward. The ship bounced up and down her HUD
as she picked up speed. She ran down the pier and the ship took
notice of her position. The turrets drew in her direction and
began to fire. Danger: Entering High-Risk Zone, turn around! The
HUD warned, but Cindy ignored it. An incredible barrage of
gunfire and bolts of plasma rained upon her. The ground exploded
around her causing fountains of dust and debris to shoot up into
the air. The little fragments ticked along Cindy’s armor.
A plasma bolt nicked Cindy’s arm and a burst of blood shot
out from it. She tripped and nearly lost her footing, but she
shook it off and continued to run forward. More bolts flew into
her line of sight, but she couldn’t afford to do any of her
fancy acrobatics, she needed speed. Her HUD goes crazy with
thousands of targeting reticules populating her line of sight.
They were all bullets and missiles heading her way and the suit
tried to calculate each of their individual trajectories. It was
like running through a bee swarm.
Another blast strikes her leg, the armor melts off
instantly and blood splatters over her silver shielding. But she
continued forward, her body is literally dying, but she doesn’t
stop, she won’t stop. Finally she could see the water edge in
the distance. Her suit is reporting system malfunctions
everywhere and the health status indicator is flashing red.
Water splashed up like waves from a tsunami, the ship, desperate
to obliterate Cindy before she could leap. Only a few feet left,
Cindy activates the built in speed boost and dares to do the
impossible. She leaps into the air, her arms and legs flailing,
all grace was lost, this was an act of desperation.

The remaining turrets turned, and now everything was locked
onto her little frame. She was an open target with nowhere to
go, but Cindy was ready for this.
“Cindy please don’t do this!” she heard in her comm-link,
it was Jonas. She shut off the comm-link and prepared for the
first volley. Cindy twisted her body and barely avoided the
metal storm of bullets chasing her. A blast from a plasma cannon
fired at her, Cindy rolled out of the way in mid-flight and
watched the bolt obliterate a section of highway behind her.
But now she was dropping, and she still wasn’t close enough
to reach the ship. Seeing all of these slugs, bolts, energy
blasts flying towards her was frightening. But she refused to
allow fear to stop her. A missile bay appeared from the hull of
the ship and red tipped rockets emerged from the holes. The
rockets fired in sequence, leaving a curled trail of smoke in
their wake. Cindy began to fall, she tried to use her grappling
hook but she was still out of range.

She did her best to dodge the initial salvo, but one caught
her by surprise and exploded in her stomach. “Unngh!” She cried.
The suit kept her alive, kept her going, but did nothing for the
pain. Her exposed stomach was bleeding, and more missiles were
still coming as she fell towards the river. Cindy ignored her
suffering and regained control of her descent. The next missile
volley came, and Cindy positioned herself so that she could leap
off the rocket itself. She had to be flawless with her timing,
one mistake and the rocket would explode under her feet.
Steady now… the first rocket was upon her. Cindy hit the
body with her foot and gained a small boost in altitude. It
spiraled out of control and crashed into the water. The next
missile came and Cindy leapt off that one as well. One by one
she used the rockets as an ascending staircase, and when the
last missile came, she leapt as far as she could go. The
targeting reticule from the grappling hook locked onto the belly
of the ship.