I pulled the handcuffs from my belt and turned to the drug dealer, whom my partner held at gun point. The guy had somewhere in the area of twenty-seven arms and depending on what family he was from might have another—usually with a gun—hiding up one of his noses. I groaned.
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No one entered the Forest unless they were unwilling, arrogant, suicidal, or mad, but desperation would make a mother do many things.
At the edge of the moisture-net field, Ever crouched with her infant son, Spear, wrapped in her cloak.
Behind her lay the base where the Taa and Marzr warred.
“Now, Vanguards, go forth!”
That was the last human voice Vincent had heard. Well, other than his own; he’d been talking to himself for a few days. Or… weeks? He wasn’t sure. the twin suns of Vita Centauri muddled his sense of time.
“If only the others were here.” He shook his head
By Carlos Candela Terry I wake facedown on the cool titanium floor, my vision blurred and my mind shrouded in fog. My jaw cracks with stiffness. Iaclite’s fiery, blue light shines through the portside window and bathes dust particles in a teal hue; they hover like a swarm of lifeless fireflies. I struggle to my
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“It looks like Earth.” Captain Kilian maneuvered the pod through the atmosphere, eyes bouncing from the control panel to the green surface of the planet that had yet to be named.
Alice’s stomach churned with a combination of excitement and dread. “Except the forest is glowing.” For a moment, excitement won out,
“Galastar General, we have limited time to—”
“Yes, yes, I know.”
“General, you’re the only one who—”
“I know!”
“General—”
“Five damn minutes if you please!” General Jones swung into his cabin and slammed the door button. The white carbon fiber hatch hissed closed, shutting out the gray-clad soldiers and their white noise.
A sizzling screech reverberated through the Mud Runner as the laser gouged a line across my hull.
“I never expected to be grateful I didn’t repaint her.” Or so thrilled I hadn’t had the merits for it. I gritted my teeth. “Earl! Why are…”
My co-pilot was not in his seat. I muttered a curse against all androids and rolled the spaceship to one side, avoiding another blast.
“Idiots!” Admiral Paul Seward exploded as soon as the doors closed behind him, cutting off the hearing chamber with its three transparent sides showing a stunning starfield view and its dreary bureaucratic interior.
His navigator, who had waited outside, jumped straight. “Sir?”
“Turning down humans, the most promising Lightwarden candidates, just when we’re in dire need of recruits.”
Pete clung to the crawl handles on the skin of his spaceship and hoped he’d catch a breath before reaching the upper atmosphere. He’d looped his pilot’s harness straps hastily through a handle and clipped them together, taking most of the strain during acceleration, but he was already regretting his recklessness.
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Next up was the Aleuthian. It stood at the front, fidgeting with its hair and clothes with three of its rubbery appendages.
From the seat next to mine, Nimthron yelled, “Hurry it up already. Some of us don’t have three hundred years.”
Nimthron turned to me. “That’s only if it’s female, of course. Males have significantly shorter lives. But it’s nearly impossible to tell.”
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CAL! Get me out of here!” Walden screamed into his comlink.
The whine of blasters sent him scurrying around trees and jumping branches as he bounded through the woods where he’d landed that morning. At least CAL had the foresight to scan the local channels and had seen the proclamation. How the Lothean government knew he was here remained a mystery, unless his contact had snitched on him. After all, the bounty on Terrans was enough to make any poor sod give up his own grandmother.
“The citizens of New Earth must be expecting someone to appear from the ancient depths of space.” I didn’t know if I was trying to reassure myself or my assistant. “After all, the cradle of life is littered with functioning spaceships.”
The tractor beam continued to draw us in.
“They’ll welcome us, surely.”
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