So I haven’t been feeling well lately. I know, I know. What a surprise. I thought I might be coming down with some mutant version of the flu, one that caused all the secondary symptoms–achy joints, dizziness, fatigue–and none of the primaries, like a runny nose or cough, or you know, ANY visible proof that I was sick and not just lazy. Oh, and fun fact time: I never had my tonsils out as a kid. For the first half of my life, they never gave me trouble. Then we moved from Washington State to Oregon and I guess the move introduced my (secretly overworn) immune system to new bugs and presto! The next time I got a harmless cold, it felt like I was swallowing marbles. Over the years, it got better…and then we moved to the Midwest. For the last week, I’ve been choking from the inside-out, but no sore throat, no stuffy sinuses, not even a headache.

This morning, one of my surgery scars opened. Turns out I didn’t have the flu. I had a massive weirdly pain-free infection.

Okay, so that was gross and I apologize, but I turned on the computer for the first time this week and got slapped in the face by an outpouring of tremendously touching concern, and I just wanted to let everyone know (yet again) that I wasn’t ignoring you and I’m not dead, just medically fragile, which is a condition that is often as gross as it is inconvenient.

In the meantime, although I managed to do nothing except edit and am only falling further and further behind on Part IV of Everything Is All Right, my FNAF fanfiction, I have the next chapter of Part III: Children of Mammon uploaded and ready to read over at fanfiction.net or archiveofourown.org, whichever your preference. Also, for all my loyal readers who have been waiting more than a year for me to finish this behemoth and get back to work, I do feel bad for how long I’m making you wait, so I’m going to try and scrape together enough of my short stories to make a decent anthology. Don’t expect high romance. The content ranges from dark to pitch black, as I never intended any of it to be read by anyone and it probably shouldn’t be.

If nothing else, I will be soon be releasing a supplemental novella for The Lords of Arcadia series (a subplot cut for length, now reconstructed and fleshed out to some 50k words), concerning the lycan and some of the former captives from Gabriel’s camp. There were several other subplots culled from The Army of Mab, and it was always my intention to write them up and release them all together, but I may never get around to that, and this novella is already written. I’ve held on to it long enough. Look for it before the end of the year; working title as of this moment is Tooth and Claw. The anthology should show up sometime early next year. I haven’t thought of a title yet. I’ve been thinking about it all week, lying on my bed of pain, and the best I came up with was Love Bites and Butt Stuff. I’ll try again when I’m not running a fever, but I’m open to suggestions.

But right now, tonight, I can offer you only another chapter of the damn few remaining in Children of Mammon. Enjoy!

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It stopped raining sometime in the night, but Ana was not fooled. The storm was not over, merely catching its breath. She took advantage of it while she could however, making the run to Hurricane only through the combined powers of all-wheel drive and mulish determination. She saw no one at all on the flooded roads, which was not surprising, as it turned out, because they were all at the WalMart. A simple grocery-and-battery run took nearly four hours, but then she was back in the basement at Freddy’s, working on the condenser.

The next time she raised herself out of that other-world where everything was metal and wire and all the parts fit together only one way to make a working whole, it was almost two in the afternoon. For hours, she had been unaware of her body except as its limitations correlated to the work she wanted it to do. Now a litany of physical complaints registered all at once, each convinced it was the most pressing and needed all her attention. She was hot, sweaty, filthy, thirsty, had a headache, a backache, a buttache, sore knees, dry eyes, dry mouth, an empty stomach and a painfully full bladder, and also, she might be going a little crazy because she had brought only three lights down here and they were all three in front of her trained on the condenser and yet she could see her shadow.

Ana puzzled over this for way too long before arriving at the conclusion that this didn’t mean she was crazy. It meant she wasn’t alone.

“If you’ve come to kill me, do it now, before I have to stand up,” she said.

Freddy’s grunt was at least half-growl. “THAT. ISN’T. FUNNY.”

“I’m not completely sure I’m joking.” Ana shifted with effort from a sitting position to a kneeling one, and from there, groaning, onto her feet. “How long have you been watching me?”

“ABOUT. AN. HOUR. THIS. TIME.”

“This time? There were other times? Sheesh, I was good and out of it, wasn’t I? Any visitors while I was playing around down here with my fucking back to the door like a dumbass begging to be murdered?”

Freddy shook his head, watching her gather her tools. “ARE. YOU. DONE. FOR. THE. DAY.”

“With this, yeah. It’s fixed.”

Freddy’s reaction to this news was underwhelming to say the least. She’d seen this bear—well, okay, not this bear, but clearly a bear with most of his same programming—gush over some crayon scribbles like the kid had presented him with the frigging Mona Lisa, but single-handedly repair the only cosmic energy condenser on Earth and what did she get? A nod. Just one. With his eyes only half open and completely level. Look up callous disregard in the goddamn dictionary and that was the picture to accompany it.

“‘Holy shit, Ana, are you sure?’” she asked herself dryly. “‘That’s amazing. I am legit amazed. My bearish flabber is fucking gasted. If I had a gold star, I’d give you one. If I had two gold stars, I’d give me one for believing in you so hard.’”

“ARE. YOU. DONE.”

“Not yet, give me a second. ‘And am I happy about this? Why, I’m jubilant. Delighted. Positively adlubescent. I’m as happy as a clam in high tide and pleased as a pig in warm shit.’”

“COLORFUL.”

“‘I am so proud of you,’” said Ana, flipping some switches and giving the primer a few good cranks. “‘Of course, I knew you could do it all along, but it’s still damned impressive. I appreciate all the work you’ve done, but this? This is really above and beyond. Great job.’ Thank you, thank you, but seriously, bear, shut up. I need to listen.” Beneath her hand, the primer grip had begun to vibrate.