While one John prowled the park looking for signs of the beast, Ivan returned to tribe’s mobile command center — though nobody within tribe referred to it as such except for himself, and that privately — to share some of his thoughts with Mama.
She had another driver now, one of Ivan’s men, with another in the front passenger seat. In the wake of the attacks, his business was taking him all over the east side, and he didn’t want to leave her stranded and unprotected.
“Afternoon,” she said as he climbed inside and shut the door behind him. “What’s the word?”
“The word is bad,” he said. The van pulled away from the curb as he settled down on the rugs in the middle of the van. “People know we were hit, even if they do not know how or why. They understand that something has happened, that something has changed. The streets have a new mood.”
“The streets’ mood?” Mama said. “Next you’ll be talking about their energy. You don’t normally concern yourself with those kind of intangibles.”
“There is nothing intangible about the difference between respect and disrespect,” Ivan said. “The gangs are moving in. Our boundaries are being tested. Our people are being snubbed. Our operations, disrupted. Nothing too overt, but nothing we can afford to ignore.”
“And nothing we can afford to spend time on, not when we have bigger fish to fry,” Mama said. “Did you talk to John?”
“I talked to both of them,” Ivan said. “One of them is working for us. The other may be tempted to investigate out of curiosity. If he finds anything, he may deal with it on his own, or pass the information on to us. It is hard to predict.”
“I can guess which one is which,” Mama said. “And I could have guessed that would be the outcome. I know you didn’t come back here to give me a bunch of status reports. Come on, let’s hear it.”
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Alright, here’s the deal. I will update this story every day this week, from now until Friday. You want me to keep going after that? You can help me keep my enthusiasm for writing by showing your enthusiasm for reading by spreading the word.
Easiest way to do that is to slap some links up. Forums (assuming they’ve got a place for links, I don’t want anybody to spam for me), blogs, livejournals, whatever. I’m not picky. I know there’s a dedicated core of people who read this story but it needs to be bigger if this thing’s going to keep going.
Tales of MU got huge, despite having some material with limited appeal in it, because people were willing to spread the word about it. Tell your friends, tell the world, Tel Aviv. Throw me a bone here, and I’ll keep dishing this up.
Or something.
(And yes, anybody would certainly be justified to wait and make sure I actually deliver on the story this week before they spread the word, if only so they don’t get lynched for getting people hooked on a dead story.)
Both of my favorites stories updated on the same day?! I knew I liked Memorial Day.
In the interests of finding out more about Wow and Woe, I’m slapping links up on all of my networking pages, including the kink sites. They’ll probably be more attracted to MU, but I do what I can.
Just one thing, by the way… Ivan says “The gangs are moving in. Are boundaries are being tested.” Our?
Would it be odd for a stranger to say “I love you,” Miss Erin?
Thanks! Every little bit helps. I’m not looking for a miracle turnaround here. Just some fresh links, some fresh hits, a little growth to build on.
Your wish is my command:
http://misslynx.livejournal.com/335990.html
If a few links and a few referrals can get daily updates back for tribe, i’m telling all my friends about it!
Just keep updating!!
‘…as he climbed inside and shut the door behind him. “What’s the word?”
“The word is bad,” he said, shutting the door.’
is there a set of double doors i missed somewhere?
Well. I hink Ive already rambled to everyone I know who reads. But Ill certainly wave some links in their face if itll create updates. I love this story and Id rather not see it go the way of Star Harbour Nights. Love that story…
Keep up the good work.
If I post a bunch of links to Void Dogs will you update that every day for a week too? : )
Posted links on my LJ, MySpace, and facebook so far – will be branching out as soon as I come up with some good ideas as to where, as well as putting the bug in all my friends’ ears by word-of-mouth. =)
I’d hate to see Tribe go!
White-Noise: I’ll be getting Void Dogs back on track soon, too, but I sure wouldn’t mind if people started sharing links now.
Ta-da!
http://phantomcranefly.livejournal.com/3094.html
You guys did a great job and I’d like you to keep up the good work. I will keep Tribe going this week, but I’m gonna miss today… a lot of unexpected site maintenance stuff over at ToMU.
But it’s given me some ideas for improving Tribe’s site and expanding its reach. See you all tomorrow.
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