For years the hero known as the Artifact has protected Evergreen City and the Earth with the power of the Consanguineous Assay — an alien device capable of rebuilding itself into any machine its wielder can imagine.
Then the Artifact’s fiancée Julia Kelly was brutally murdered, purely to strike at the Artifact.
Now Julia Kelly’s sister Emily Smith, alongside Landon Moore — aka the Artifact — have to wrap up the loose ends of Julia’s life, even as the rest of the world only seems to care about what the Artifact will do in response. Can they celebrate Julia’s life? Or will Julia Kelly’s death just end up as the Artifact’s motivation?
“So. You’re Artifact.”
Landon paused, then snorted. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m Artifact.”
“Seemed dumb to dance around the subject. It’s pretty obvious. I mean, Jesus. You call the Lieutenant ‘Jayce.’”
“Everyone calls the Lieutenant Jayce.”
“No one calls the Lieutenant Jayce, Donny. Jesus Christ.”
“Jesus Christ, Art. The oven? Pallid Jan cooked her?”
Emily felt a lurch down in her stomach. “Hey!” she snapped. “That’s my sister you’re talking about. I’d appreciate it—”
“Yeah, well – she’d have appreciated more than three calls a year and your snide-ass judgment from high school straight through until the day before she got – what, par-broiled? Was the oven set to bake or what? But we don’t always get what we want, do we?”
Landon rubbed his eyes. “So how about you?”
Emily looked nonplussed. “How about me what?””
“Do you think I should quit? Or stay the course?”
Paora laughed. “Quit? We don’t quit. We die. Oh, he might give the Artifact up. I hope he does. And then somewhere down the line he’ll be dragged back into the game under another name, or he’ll get it back, or he won’t have it and he’ll get killed. That’s how this works. I don’t know why everyone doesn’t know that, but it’s true.”
“Julie taught me to sew,” Daniels said, suddenly. “Excuse me?” Emily asked, blinking. “Julie.” The assistant was blushing, now. “She... I tore my coat down in the canteen and she saw, and said that it was just a seam rip, and told me to wait a sec. And she ran up to her office and… Continue reading ⎇001JW Halcyon Days: Motivation #5
CONCLUSION
“I came out there for my sister’s funeral, and to help wrap up her final affairs. And you know what I found out?”
“What did you find out?” Bryce asked, quietly.
“I found out that Julie was... the smartest person ever. And she was nice and kind and never forgot how to sew. She liked to cross stitch and she looked good in peasant dresses and I watched a Chief Technology Officer break down and cry over her, and... and the thing of it is, no one cares. To everyone else? She was just... an appendage. Something strapped to the Artifact to give him depth or some kind of... Jesus. Backstory.”
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