Three By Bunker: Three Short Works of Fiction

Acclaim and Raves for Michael Bunker’s WICK Series

"...The writing is excellent. We need more Indie writers like this ... Michael's writing changed my perception of this life quite a bit. I hope it does the same for you."

" ...The characters are richly constructed .... The prose is easy to read and the story develops smoothly. I can't wait to find out what happens but I don't want the story to end! "

...combines the best of Sinclair Lewis and James Howard Kunstler in a truly great read that will both engage you and challenge you to think- and choose wisely.

....Mr. Bunker has managed to write a carefully crafted and extremely, disturbingly believable piece of fiction about the modern human condition.

Exciting, riveting and compelling story... Highly recommended reading...

"...Good read - page turner – can’t wait for more!! Captivating - a storyline that flows. Character build up - exquisite! Very well done!!"

" ...So glad I took the plunge and got hooked on this thrilling series! Characters that are personable. Settings in vivid detail. Couldn't wait to move on to the second book!"

"...I was kept guessing at every turn of this book. I love how this story becomes rich and alive in my mind without being tedious or over-written. He tells you just enough to keep you engaged, but doesn't overwhelm with detail."

...It had me fully engaged from page one.

...Great fiction with a lot of realistic probabilities. Not your typical of the world doomsday thriller.

"...The book definitely leaves you thinking... and the ending makes you want to start the next book right away. If you plan on reading this book...beware; you won't get anything else done but reading!!! Enjoy!"

"I love Michael's way of writing and the subjects he writes about..."

"... packed with great characters, suspense, philosophy, and thought-provoking ideas."

"...will have you reading non-stop into the wee hours of the night and will leave you gasping for air."

"Ok, this book has me on the hook... I very rarely read non-fiction but this outing by Michael Bunker has been terrific. ... Buy it for yourself and your friends."

"This was the most intriguing book I have ever read. It started out to be a journey and ended up with nail biting, edge of your seat conclusion. ...What a rush this was."

" ... The writing is gorgeous, tactile, vivid, with a plot yarn that unfolds a landscape beautiful and terrifying."

"I was engaged in the story from the start - something I've missed from many other authors from this genre recently. Nice to see some real literary talent and wit in this genre."

...All I can say is read it. You won't be disappointed. Michael Bunker writes so well. ...

MORE Acclaim for Michael Bunker’s WICK Series

"A compelling story that is beautifully written. Each sentence simply melts into the next. Michael Bunker has a gift for awakening the imagination. ..."

"You can't go wrong when you have fiction with excitement for the brain AND heart. Combine that with the lurking knowledge that many elements of this story could be off the fiction backburner and onto full heat reality very soon, and, well, it all adds up to one I could not put down."

"Characters that engage you and that you'll care about... Check. Believable dialog ... Check. Story that will have you guessing ... Check. Romance... Check. Agents... Check. Double-agents ... Check. Triple-agents ... Check. Great stuff ... thank you, Mr. Bunker."

"I found it to be a captivating use of the English language. Packed with well written, thought provoking mental imagery."

"...I could hardly put it down. Read in two sittings. Like eating a beautifully prepared, delicious meal when you are really hungry, eating so fast, scraping every speck and morsel from the plate..."

"This series is shaping up to be a blockbuster. It is exciting and well written. You won't be disappointed. Can't wait for the next installment."

... Michael Bunker draws you in with his beautiful imagery and storytelling. I have a feeling I'll be following this author for some time!

"...Michael Bunker weaves a wonderful story, building the characters and plot along the way in a way that will make you stop and think. This book will leave you breathlessly wanting more. ... what are you waiting for? Get reading."

" ... Entertaining and thought-provoking. Can't wait to get my hard copy because you never know if the power will go out."

"...I literally read it in one sitting because I could NOT PUT IT DOWN. I wish I could give it more than 5 stars. I simply cannot WAIT for the next volume in the series. Each one gets better - but if they can top this I may never sleep again. It is that good - honestly.

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THREE BY BUNKER

3 Short Stories

by

Michael Bunker

Fiction Disclaimer:

This book is a work of fiction.  Names, characters, places, and events either are the products of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously.  Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

© Copyright 2013 by Michael Bunker

All rights reserved

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FIRST PRINTING

All rights reserved.  No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in reviews, without the written permission of the author.

Cover Design:

Katija Živković

http://joyindesign.net

For information on Michael Bunker or to read his blog, visit:

http://www.michaelbunker.com

To contact Michael Bunker, please write to:

M. Bunker

1251 CR 132

Santa Anna, Texas 76878

For David and Stewart

Thanks

Table of Contents

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Book 1: #NANOWRI War Z

Book 2: Pennslyvania

Book 3: Futurity

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Introduction to 3XB

I’ve had many friends and fans ask me for #NaNoWri War Z and Pennsylvania in print, but I’ve been reluctant to offer these stories as stand-alone, printed paperbacks because of the expense to the reader for such short works of fiction.  So, in answer to the conundrum I’ve been motivated to bring out this little short story collection—even if PENNSYLVANIA is the only real short story in this book.  Futurity is very close to a full-length novel, and #NNWWZ is definitely a novelette at over 28,000 words, but all three are short works of fiction.  So, in this volume, whether you buy it in the e-book format or the paperback format, you will receive the equivalent of a long novel worth of stories, for a much lower price than would have been available otherwise.  I hope this method works out better for your pocketbook!

Michael Bunker

Santa Anna, Texas

March 2013

BOOK 1:#NANOWRI War Z

No romance writers were injured or eaten during the writing of this book.

Neither was the author.

Acknowledgements

I want to thank my family for giving up the weekend with me that I spent writing this book for #nanowriwee.  If you don’t know what #nanowriwee is yet, you’ll learn about it in the book.  Thank you to Kate for creating an awesome book cover at the last moment, while I was editing the very last chapter, while she was sick with pneumonia.

Special thanks to Hugh Howey for allowing me to use his story, and name, fictional likeness, and non-fictional awesomeness.  Your books are fantastic Hugh, and your story is a great motivation to those of us who pour words out and try to form them into stories.  May the Zombies never eat you.

Introduction to #NaNoWri War Z

This will have to be short and sweet because I’m running out of time.  No, the zombies are not about to get me, but the clock is.  This novelette was written in under thirty hours during #nanowriwee (National Novel Writer’s Weekend).  It was, for me, an experiment and exercise in writing that has been very valuable.  I am typing these words with less than hour left in those thirty hours.

No novel written in such a short amount of time... at least no novel that I could write... could have any real literary merit.  I told my daughter while writing this book that I now valued the days and weeks and months that I usually had to ponder and consider a story.  But #nanowriwee was valuable nonetheless.  It made me write this story, which I would never have written under any other circumstances.

I am a stranger to writing comedy, and even a greater stranger to writing anything at all about zombies.  I wrote #NaNoWri War Z as a satire, and I hope you receive it as such.  It’s meant to be humorous and fun and I hope that it is.

My mind is frazzled, and I hope that you get that this work was designed to take the reality—the actual feelings of physical and mental exhaustion that I now feel—and communicate them through the book.  As you go through it, think of me, because as I wrote it, I thought of you.

Again, I want to thank Hugh Howey for playing along.  I appreciate his spirit and love of books and words.  He is an inspiration.

As for me... now... I’m going to sleep.  If Zombies have not eaten me yet, and I suppose they never will.

****

Afterthoughts

It is now a short few days after #Nanowriwee and I’ve slept a little, and had some time to reflect on the project, this story, and what it all means.  I cannot tell you in words how difficult this challenge was to complete.  The rules were (for those of us living outside of the UK) to write a novel in under thirty hours and get it turned in by midnight GMT in England.  The work had to be a lengthy work of fiction (no actual word expectation though most people considered 15k to 20k a reasonable accomplishment.)  You could not just repeat 1 word 20,000 times.  You could not turn in a work full of prose you’d previously written.  It needed to be a new work.  Other than that, there were no real rules.  I shot for 30,000 words and fell a little short.

For me, the whole issue was problematic.  First, the challenge was taking place in England, and I was in Texas.  That meant that the challenge started at 2 A.M. for me.  There were other, greater challenges, not the least of which was the fact that I fell asleep on Saturday night (I expected to wake up at midnight to get back to work) and didn’t wake up until 6:30 a.m. on Sunday Morning.  Meaning that in the midst of the competition, I decided to take about 8 hours off.  In the end, I wrote for about 20 total hours out of the thirty that were allotted.  And for most of those 20 hours I was either so hopped up on Cappuccino and Espresso, or so goggle-eyed and mind numbed that the words flowed from my mind like cinder blocks falling out of the back of my pickup truck.  In short, I wasn’t prepared.  I had not pulled an all-nighter in a few decades, and was used to being in bed by midnight and up by 5:30 or 6:00 a.m. every day.

Now, I’ve decided to basically give you the story as I wrote it.  There have been no major rewrites.  In the last few days I’ve scanned the story a few times for major errors, and I’ve put in a few commas.  I haven’t had it read by an editor, and I haven’t done my usual work in polishing and shaping the story.  That’s because part of the metaphor of the whole story is that it is taking place during #nanowriwee, and the exhaustion and the numbed mind are all part of the story.  It is what it is.

After sending the story to Hugh Howey, I told him that #NaNoWri War Z is not the story I want to be remembered for.  In fact, if someone told me that I could pick out any of my works and have Hugh Howey read it, this little short story wouldn’t even be in the pile I would consider for such an honor.  I’d send him W1CK or Futurity.  Probably W1CK.  But circumstances played a dirty trick on me, and #NaNoWri War Z is my entry into the challenge.  This is what I wrote in about 20 hours of typing over two days, warts and all.  I hope, if it accomplishes nothing else, that it makes you laugh... at least once.

Chapter 1

#nanowriwee

I hope no one submits a stupid zombie novel.

You know someone will, Carol, Mark Waggoner said as his eyes scanned his Tweetdeck page.  Tweets and retweets, hot, angry, and dripping with vituperation rang up on his screen like fireworks exploding in a black night’s sky.  That’s one of the things about indie publishing; it’s a perfect reflection of the free market.  As long as zombie novels are selling big, and as long as The Walking Dead continues to be a hit series on American television, then writers are going to follow the dollars.  I hate to say it, but zombies are capitalism and we should embrace that.

Well, as long as I don’t have to read any of them, Carol replied, casually rubbing a finger along Mark’s arm as he fired off a tweet, I find them to be vulgar and rude and the last bastion of lazy writers, she added.

Carol had a thing for Mark, but what she didn’t know is that her thing was never going to be reciprocated.  Mark ignored her like he ignored Myspace, and that wasn’t going to change.  Carol was a fair writer, a dynamite dresser, and a valuable member of the Colonel Magazine staff, but Mark was a gay, Roman Catholic, Jewish man, and Carol was never going to be his type.  Besides, he had an e-magazine to run, and that was a tough enough job without bringing romance into the mix.  That and... he was irrecoverably gay.

The Colonel Magazine was on the very verge of a breakout, and Mark was hoping that #nanowriwee, his own brain-child, was going to be that breakout. 

#NaNoWriWee—National Novel Writers Week—started as a joke around the office.  A few of the writers were poking fun at #nanowrimo, the National Novel Writers Month, a peculiarly American novelty where over 100,000 fledgling writers sit down and encourage one another to write a 50,000 word novel in a single month.

What good can come from a gaggle of under-talented and culturally challenged hacks vomiting out 50,000 words in thirty days? one of The Colonel staff writers had asked, are they a hundred thousand monkeys trying to accidently pen a Shakespearean sonnet?

Actually, Cyrus, Mark said, correcting the young and self-impressed junior editor, some damn good novels have come out of #nanowrimo.  Maybe it’s happened accidentally, like with the monkeys and Shakespeare, but there was some silver in there with all the dross.

Well, maybe I’ll stay up some weekend drinking Red Bull and eating teaspoons of sugar and I’ll write a novel that’ll make me rich! Cyrus sniped back, arrogantly.

It would never work for you, Mark shot back, "because you’d have to have some drive, initiative, and a willingness to look at the monolithic Publishing industry dead in the face and say, ‘Whatever, MAN!’  I don’t think you have it in you... but maybe... just maybe, there are some people out there that do have it in them.  What we should do is sponsor a #nanowriWEE.  WEE will stand for weekend.  We can do it over a weekend, maybe twenty-eight to thirty hours of actual writing.  We’ll hold it here in the office and we’ll offer pizza, coffee, and maybe beer, and wine when it’s over."

A novel?  In a weekend? Carol had asked.  You’ve lost your mind.  You might as well just download a random word generator app for your iPad and program it to spill out 50,000 words.  What a glorious waste of time!

It wouldn’t need to be a full-length novel, Mark said, It could be a long short story or a novelette.

"Nanowriwee? Cyrus said, sneering again, because sneering is what he did best.  That won’t be a writing exposition; it’ll be a typing contest!"

Good, Mark said, so we’re all agreed.  This is exactly what we’ve been needing around here—a shot in the arm and some good publicity.  Maybe we can get one of the publishing houses to publish the winner.  Perhaps in an e-book.  They might go for that.  No real investment for them and if it sucks then at least they get some good will in the publishing world for throwing a bone to the indie writers out there.  It’s a win/win.  Carol, you get on this, ok?  I want to do it in January.

And that’s how #nanowriwee got started.  Or something like that.

Now it was late January and the weather was brisk and cold and wet because it was England, and the #nanowriwee concept had grown and gone international.  It looked like The Colonel was going to lose a few thousand bucks on this (mainly in beer and pizza for his staff and the fifty or so contestant/writers who would be writing their novels live at The Colonel’s offices) so Mark hoped the advertising and publicity was going to make it all worth it.  Carol stopped flirting and, disappointed at another failed attempt to seduce her gay boss, went to make sure the pizza orders were going to be ready for the competition.

****

Across London in a super-secret but non-descript run of warehouse flats off of St. James Street, a young RAF officer named Clarence handed a coffee (black) and a file to his boss (not at all black.)  "We’ve had some serious problems, sir.  I’d hate to say that the whole operation has gone bad, so I won’t... because the whole operation has gone horribly, terribly, demonstrably bad."

Paul Hill took the coffee from the officer, smelled it, and then poured it out into his waste can.  What’s gone wrong now?

Probably no one has cleaned the filter for a while, the young officer answered.

"No, not with the coffee... with the... wait.  So no one has cleaned the coffee filter?  Do you know a dangerous, world-ending super virus could be incubated in one of those coffee machines?  Seriously!  What the hell is wrong with you people?  But, no.  What I meant was, what has gone wrong with the project?"

Oh, well.  How should I put this?  Hmmm... Let’s pretend that London is a huge coffee machine, and the basement of this building is a filter that hasn’t been cleaned in some time...

What are you saying, man?

As you know, sir, Clarence said, we’ve been trying for a decade to produce super-soldiers for our military using genetic modification.  We’ve learned that splicing genes and all that whatnot isn’t especially hard.  It’s all the rage, you know, and we’ve also learned that introducing the modified genes into the body using a very virulent... well... virus, for lack of a better word, is the easiest way to get quick results.

Paul searched around his desk for a pen he knew he’d lost, and, not finding it he pulled off his glasses and used one of the pointy edges in an attempt to scratch the middle, unreachable, portion of his back.  So, tell me again why we’re trying to breed super-soldiers.  Was I in on that project?

It was your idea, sir, the young officer said, and as he did so, he reached over and began to scratch the middle of Paul Hill’s back.  Paul arched his back like a spoiled feline and leaned into the scratch.  We want to create super-soldiers, Clarence continued, so that when America decides to play beat cop around the world and demands our participation, we will have very effective and efficient killing machines ready to turn loose on unarmed third world villages.  Clarence smiled, those were your words, sir.

The scratching continued.  And this kind of thing works, does it? Paul asked, and as he did he began to lower and raise himself in his attempt to emphasize the proper location necessary for the scratching of the back.

Well, we’ve had our notable failures.  There was the chap who went nuts and tried to stab everyone on the train with a ballpoint pen.  And then there was Stephen Fry.

Oh, yes... check.  What a fiasco that was.

Anyway, this time is worse than that.  Apparently we’ve created a horrible mutant virus and it looks like things could get ugly right quickly.  Perhaps we ought to notify someone higher up.

What’s it look like now? Paul asked.

Well, in a microscope it looks like a little swimmy, dodgy, microbial kind of thing.

I mean, what does it DO?

Oh, well, our test subject was an unemployed independent writer from Leeds.  As he said this, Clarence finished scratching Paul’s back because it was starting to look a little weird to passersby.  He stepped backwards and adopted a more formal stance.  I can’t tell you what exactly happened, sir, but somehow between the cutting up and the scrambling and the choppity-chopping of the ol’ DNA something went awry and well, we kind of made a zombie out of the bloke.

A zombie you say?  Like the traditional kind?  As Paul said this, he halfway closed one eye, drew his face into a zombie-like scowl and twisted up his arms and hands in front of him.  He began to shuffle walk, dragging one leg slightly behind him.  Like this kind of zombie?  Or are we talking one of these tech geeks that walk around all day staring at a smartphone and typing in text shorthand, because if we made an unemployed writer from Leeds into one of those... he shuddered at the thought.

"Well, sir, more of the traditional kind.  Not all traditional, mind you, but mostly so.  It definitely eats people, we got that sorted out right away... definitely eats people, for sure.

"Also, you can’t kill it easily.  I mean, that’s kind of a rule with all zombies, so we expected that.  It certainly takes a shot into the brain and not a glancing blow to the skull with something sissified like a cricket bat or anything like that.  You have to really hit them good with something that actually, you know, perforates the brainal matter."

Ah, yeah, right, Paul said, nodding his head.  He loved being briefed.

"And, you know, if you hit it with something completely inappropriate—and I’m speaking hypothetically, sir—but if you were to hit them like so with a cricket bat that might have been stowed behind the copier down in 2A and you knock an eye out or something; or if you... say... rip an arm off of it while it’s trying to get into your 2012 Vauxhall Insignia, well, it just kind of keeps going.  So, really kind of zombieish in that way.  Also, they walk terribly slowly and moan a lot, and they have these grayish eyes and they slobber horribly.  But other than these things I’ve mentioned... totally different than a traditional zombie.  Remarkably different."

Well, that sounds very zombielike to me, Paul said, glad to be briefed about these sorts of things.  Tell me again how all of this got started.  I’m a little unclear about the gent from Leeds and his becoming a zombie.  The rest of that I kept up with."

"Yes sir.  The experimental virus was supposed to take two to four weeks to seek out and adhere itself in a way that allowed it to make structural genetic changes.  The writer chap answered an advert over the weekend and our plan was to inject him with the virus, then have him back every week or so for testing.  We chose his type... young, less than active, and kind of soft around the edges because frankly we didn’t want to create a real super-soldier quite yet.  We wanted to bring him back in and test his reflexes, eye-hand coordination, strength, agility, etc. just to get an idea if we were on the right track.  We hoped to see some minor increases in these factors and to show that the improvements were traceable to the virus we’d developed.  Well, anyway that’s the way it was supposed to work. 

But the virus was designed to be delivered in really tiny doses.  Unhappily there was a mix-up, and a young intern injected him with roughly twenty times the suggested dosage for this test.  Twenty-times the dosage!  What a mess!  Anyway, the virus indeed melded with his little pudgy writer’s DNA and...

And now we have a zombie outbreak on our hands, Paul Hill said.  Extraordinary.  You said that these zombies were not quite the normal kind.  In what ways does our experimental creature differ from a traditional zombie?

The young officer smiled, feeling happy to get to the good news.  Well, sir, when I said that the zombie definitely eats people, that part was not hypothetical at all.

No?

No, sir.  Not at all.  It got out of the basement and it proceeded immediately, although quite slowly, to the house of Howard Jacobson the writer.  And after some time wherein the beast struggled to get into his place and scratched on the doors and basically moaned a lot, Jacobson finally came out to see what all the fuss was about, and the zombie ate him.

It ate Howard Jacobson?  The older guy? Funny writer that writes for the Independent?

Well, he used to write novels too, sir.  And it didn’t eat all of him.  Just some of the meaty bits.  Jacobson’s a zombie now too.

The zombie ate Howard Jacobson?  Isn’t that extraordinary!  I wonder why?

That’s the other thing, sir.  We’re discussing how these zombies are different from traditional zombies.  We found out that these zombies only eat writers.

Writers you say?  Well that is rather extraordinary.

"And only good writers, sir.  That we’ve confirmed."

"Well, now, I think I have you there young man.  Whether writing is good or not is purely a subjective thing.  I think good writing is really in the eyes of the reader, don’t you?  We can’t rightly know that these beasts are targeting good writers."

Well, that’s yet another thing, sir.  We do know it because these zombies can talk... at least the first one did, and maybe Jacobson too.  I interviewed it myself.  We captured it and I thoroughly debriefed it before we smashed its brains in with a 7-iron, which, by the way, seems to work much better than a cricket bat.

I still think you are speculating about the ‘good writers’ thing, Clarence.  I mean, I’ve read Jacobson, and he’s humorous, but he’s no Tom Clancy... anyway, you talked to it?

I have the report here, sir.  The whole interview transcribed and ready with some... ancillary information for your consideration.

Well, give it to me.  I’ll study it later, Paul said.

Just quickly sir, Clarence continued.  "We also tested the theory, just to make sure, because I was skeptical too after the interview.  Really skeptical.  We asked a few local writers to come in for questioning.  We told them it was all about national security, blah, blah, blah, and that maybe we needed them to hide some secret spy clues into their next novels or something along those lines.  They love stuff like that.  It makes them feel important.  Well, most of the writers turned us down flat because of issues of artistic integrity, but three showed up and we ran our test with them."

Ah!  Interesting.  Go on, Paul said.

The three that agreed to come in were J.K. Rowling, you know who that is, and then this E.L. James, she’s the lady who wrote the soft porn novels that are so popular right now.  Fifty Shades of some such nonsense."

And who was the third?

John Lanchester.  Don’t know him, but he has a book on the top of the Amazon charts, so we just rang up his agent and Lanchester agreed to come right over.

Fascinating.

"Yes, sir, it is.  So we had the three writers in the conference room down in 3B, and as