The Good Doctor's Tales Folio Four Read Online Free PDF

Transforms, enough so she had a waiting list of
Transforms willing to join her household.  Several in Tonya’s own household,
much to her chagrin.  Nearly any of the Transforms in her household would welcome
the chance to help with Focus Rizzari’s visit.  Johnny considered the job an
insult.  Tonya wanted to smack him.
    He would learn to be a proper household member if she
had to beat it into him.  She suspected this would be a very long lesson.
    She turned to Shot.  “Shot, you’ll do bodyguard duty.” 
Even in her home, a Focus always had a bodyguard.  Often, several.
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    “And why don’t you take Johnny with you and get him a
little exercise?  It’ll be good for him.”
    “Yes, ma’am.”  This time Shot smiled.
    Johnny glanced at Shot and his ferret face fell.
    Shot led Johnny to the front door of the house then took
off at a slow jog along the broken sidewalk in front of their old converted townhomes. 
Tonya followed, expecting the worst.  Johnny followed Shot slowly, feet
dragging.  Fifty feet from the front door he slowing to a walk.
    Tonya frowned at Johnny’s display.  She pulled his juice
out of him, a lot of it, more than eighty percent of his supplemental juice and
way over the line into pain.  Her stripping hit him like a sledgehammer and he
stumbled to his knees.
    “No,” he said, a whimper.  He turned and looked back to
where she stood, watching at the window, but Tonya kept her face like stone.  After
a moment, Johnny pulled himself painfully to his feet.  He hugged himself tight
and tears leaked from his eyes.  He glanced at her resentfully, his wounded
eyes protesting the unfairness of her actions.  She was mean to him.  It wasn’t
fair.  He didn’t deserve this.  She could see him thinking ‘bitch’, but he
didn’t have enough nerve to speak.
    Tonya had seen it all before.  She ignored it.  Unmoved,
she kept his juice torturously low.
    Finally, the lesson sunk in.  He turned and moved
forward toward Shot, one slow step at a time.
    She kept the juice down.
    Miserable, he went faster, lifting his feet up into a
real jog.  When he finally began the run, Tonya let the juice flow back into
him.
    Shot had stopped when Johnny fell and watched the
tableau in silence, his face pale.  Tonya realized she had slipped.  In her
anger at Johnny, she clipped Shot when she drew Johnny’s juice down.  She
clipped Shot by four points, a little less than forty percent, enough to
seriously hurt when the drop came that fast.  She pushed the juice back into
him, and then a little bit more in apology.  He glanced at her, startled.  She
smiled back at him and nodded.
    She would have to watch herself when Focus Rizzari
showed.  Such novice sloppiness was unconscionable.
    “Pick up your feet, asshole.  I’ve seen little girls go
faster than you.  Move it!” Shot said, as the pair moved away.  Johnny would be
in for a rough run.
     

Carol Out Hunting
[Carol Hancock POV]
    The Midwest Regional Warehouse of Sears & Roebuck
was a busy place at 3 PM in the middle of November.  Appliances, furniture, and
clothes lived there, along with toys, tools, dishes and bed linens.  Trucks
came and left the loading docks in a never-ending stream, and an army of men
worked to keep the goods moving – unloading, transferring, sorting, loading
again, as the crates and boxes came in from the manufacturers and left again
for the stores.
    I had hunted all night, curled up in an abandoned
tenement for an hour of sleep just after dawn, and continued hunting into the new
day.  I found my target while I patrolled in my car.  Now, on foot, I checked
him out. 
    The world would not miss Danny Clegg.
    Danny nudged the prongs of the forklift forward under
the palette holding the Kenmore washing machine.  He worked as a loading dock
man, competent save for his low juice problems.  I sympathized.  This time, he
ran the forklift in too fast and slightly off angle.  The forklift hit