The New Prophet Sample

Rex Richards The New Prophet Book 1 in The Heat series his is a fast moving and adult thriller which may or may not have a supernatural twist. You decide. T I used to work in TV news. I met a lot of celebs and other TV people. Some were fabulous. But most of them were narcissistic, insecure and mean. All of them are the inspiration for this book! RRx © the author, all rights reserved 2 The New Prophet 1 10.56pm o you hear voices in your head? “Have you got your shit together, Jack?” DThere it goes again. “Rock and roll. Last few minutes now.” It wasn’t the sort of voice you’d want to confide in. It was a scraping voice, an annoyingly excitable buzz which dispensed not cosmic wisdom, but relentless instructions. “Nod, let me know you’re picking me up.” I sighed and dutifully complied. The voice always seemed to interrupt at the most inopportune moments - I had been thinking up anagrams. I’d come up with a couple of good ones based on last night’s news. One of the top stories, according to CNN, was that Donald Trump had been caught dying his hair. Never mind fake news, he was a fake blond! Had Putin hacked his hairdresser? I’d figured out that an anagram of ‘Donald Trump hair dyes’ was in fact; No, hairy muddled prat! Which wasn’t bad. Also, yesterday, September 11th, 2021, had been the twentieth anniversary of the Twin Towers attack in New York. And I had discovered that an anagram for ‘Mr. Osama bin Laden’ was in fact: Slam on main beard. “Two minutes Jack and Najida. Audio level check, c'mon, get your arse in gear.” Through my earpiece Max’s voice sounded like a cat slowly losing its battle to cling on to a blackboard. The worst thing was that I couldn't talk back. So, there was nothing left to do except sit in my chair and suck it up. “Najida, you look lovely as always. I hope you’re not feeling nervous? A big night for you, millions of people watching your first show as lead.” Max’s voice shifted into something resembling week-old oil from a Glasgow chip shop. “Don’t 3 Rex Richards worry, you’ve got our veteran Jack backing you up.” Veteran? I was pretty sure Max thought of veterans as people dribbling in wheelchairs and covered in medals who he could pat on the head once a year while they were wearing paper hats from cheap Christmas crackers. I sneaked a glance at Najida. Her immaculate long black hair poured down impossibly straight, framing her high cheekbones. She had wide, magnetic almond eyes, paintbrush eyebrows and thick, plumped out lips smeared in plum-coloured lipstick. She was sitting bolt upright, which made her stunning young bosom stick out like the prow of a ship. She looked terrified. Bearing in mind she was ruthlessly going after my job, I could’ve let her just fuck it up. But, well, I might be a ‘veteran’ but I still remembered what it was like doing your first show. I leaned over and whispered to her. “Hey, did you know your name translates into English as Brave Princess?” She stared straight ahead into the blackness. “You’ve done this show a hundred times as weather girl. You’ll be great. If Max annoys you, just imagine him on the loo.” “Stop fucking twittering, Jack. Thirty seconds.” But it had worked, I saw her smile. 4 The New Prophet 2 Midnight he church has a back door that is always open, just like a gay whore, The New Prophet tells himself. It is an T imposing gothic mass of sand coloured stone, corpse grey this late at night. He walks up the path, tapping His Victorian walking cane on the wind-lashed gravestones. He finds the unlocked door. He steps into the church. It feels cavernous inside, the stale air making it more like a forgotten entrance to hell than a house of God. There is a dankness to the warm air. In the belfry are four snake-like bell ropes, bat-black in the midnight light. Behind them is a ladder leading to a trapdoor in the ceiling, a maintenance hatch giving access to the beautiful and forgotten bells. Behind the bells, is a smaller ladder leading up to a platform at the top of the steeple. It offers spectacular views of the crushed streets of west London. He sits on the platform, aware of the caress of the autumn breeze. The rusty glow of shielded streetlights mingles with the flashes of prowling cabs. It is a clear night, the moon is full. He holds His walking cane by its black polished wooden shaft and grasps the silver handle. He twists it. The mechanism clicks, revealing the hidden blade within. He slides the swordstick free to catch the moonlight. An intricate carving of a dragon breathing fire twists down the wicked slender blade. He feels potent beyond measure. For a second, He thinks he sees a flash of light from behind the bushes which are slowly drowning the gravestones at the edge of the graveyard. A shadow retreats and is gone. The Heat, the all-powerful living fire that burns within Him, is whispering in His mind, telling Him of the glory ahead. The New Prophet opens His mouth and sees yellow and green flames lick out of it, bursting into the night sky. He looks at the flames as they cavort around Him. He marvels at the power and beauty of The Heat, and He feels humbled by it. 5 Rex Richards He remembers the time of His creation. All those years ago, when the Heat gave birth to Him in the darkest recesses of a young boy’s mind. The New Prophet watches as golden flames formed into shapes in the air as The Heat told the story once more. “When I was first created it was just to love and protect the child, who was my Vessel. He was so young. He needed a chance to be free of Her Tyranny, the Great Whore who ruined him. So, I made you. To be our soldier.” But as the Vessel had left the horrors of his childhood behind him and became a man, he forgot all about The Heat and his soldier The New Prophet. But The Heat and The New Prophet had not forgotten him. For years now, when the Vessel had been sleeping, The Heat had burned a little brighter and The New Prophet had slowly regained his strength, piece by piece. And now, at last, The New Prophet is so powerful He can take control of the Vessel’s body. It is a glorious feeling. To be physical, alive, in the body of a man. “Tonight is a special night.” The Heat tells him, its voice a crackle of sparks that floods his mind. “The road to Liberation is ahead of us. The first step is the death of the innocent.” 6 The New Prophet 3 Lenses and lights saw a pudgy outline hunched behind his camera. The man with that weighty responsibility was Derek. ‘Big D’ to his I pals. Although he took a few minutes to squeeze his water balloon body into the controls of his camera, once in, he had a touch as light as a fairy. Not that he was a fairy in the sexual sense. Far from it. He was a sexual rapier, if a morbidly obese one. I suppose you might call him a Love Blimp. It was impossible to see what was going on beyond the cameramen. Burning white lights blasted down from the pitch- black studio ceiling. All I could really see was a monitor placed in front of us, showing the current camera view. I looked at myself. At first glance I thought I looked pretty good: short, chemically enhanced dark hair, cheekbones that a young Richard Gere would have been proud of, a slightly thin face that seemed wider on camera, dark blue eyes that gave the lie of compassion. My dark grey suit, white shirt and grapefruit tie contrasted nicely with Najida’s tight cream-coloured dress and that epic coffee-coloured cleavage. She was wearing a silver brooch designed with what looked like an Arabic symbol. In its middle was a red ruby, and I wondered idly if it was a magical charm. I practiced smiling, and checked out how it looked in the monitor. Was it my imagination, or did I look a little pale? Najida looked immaculate, aside from the deer in headlights look she was still sporting a little. I was trying not to sniff too hard. About ten minutes ago I'd done a huge line of coke that had tasted a bit rough, and now a sparkle of snot was threatening to pop its head out of my nose and say howdy. My heart was bumping up a bit more than normal and I took a long slow breath to try and calm it down. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t have a drug problem. I can handle a shit load of the stuff, no problem. Aside from the fact that tonight’s little helper had come from a new dealer, drug-wise, it was business as normal. 7 Rex Richards I started going through the list of what was on the show tonight. Death by earthquake, Brexit economic gloom, more death, and other assorted events such as ‘post-life updates’ i.e.

Load more