Tag Archives: Science Fiction

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Cover Reveal! The 716

Olivia is destined to be the future leader of Meliora. She’s smart, rich, and innovative, and she has a pink Identifeye light.

Andy is destined to be a waiter and househusband. His blue Identifeye light prevents him from pursuing his dream of becoming an engineer. After all, who ever heard of a male engineer?

But when Andy’s life becomes entangled with Olivia’s and he gets the chance to prove himself on the female stage, everything starts to change.

In a society where men are second-class citizens and only binary gender norms are acceptable, Andy and Olivia must confront their own beliefs and decide what kind of world they want to live in.

Will they do what is expected or what is right? And will the wrong choice spell disaster?

 

sjpratt.com

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Sneak Peek Friday

Ten Lives

by Christian Terry

 

The morning was hot and bright. The six started marching as soon as they had packed their camp. It wasn’t long before the group had come across the three-fingered statue. The image they had seen on the map earlier did not do it justice. It stood majestically over them. At over ten feet tall, it loomed with clinging jungle vines draped around it. The group took a moment to gawk at the sight then, shortly afterwards, became aware of their surroundings. The missing men that had been sent this way before them, there were no signs of them having been this far. No footprints or any type of trails were left behind, leaving the six of them baffled. Suddenly something caught Mike’s eye: what the stone statue was pointing at. Hidden behind large hedges and vines in the distance was a gravelly road, and beyond it was a long stretch of silver, half the width of a football field but just as long. Large trees were lined up on both sides with outstretched limbs hovering over the shiny strip of land.

“What is that?” Mike asked as he delicately set his backpack near the base of the statue before he tiptoed toward the chrome ground. Mike crossed the grass and stood at the edge of the metal strip, staring down at his own reflection. He tentatively stepped out. Whatever metal this was, it didn’t make a sound as Mike’s size sixteen shoes walked across it. A small obelisk stood just on the outer right side of the silver strip. It was shaped like a pyramid with a small red jewel on its apex. It couldn’t be the fire emerald could it? Mike decided that it would probably be a good idea to leave it alone for the time being. No one leaves things as valuable as that out in the open, he thought to himself. After ignoring the obvious bait, he walked the entire length of the silver walkway. That’s when the trouble started. As he neared the end of the walkway, a chill ran through his body, and he could see his breath escape his mouth. He looked down at his arm. The “X” was glowing. Death? He looked around furiously for what could possibly kill him. What he saw was the rest of the group. As the group marched toward him, he noticed Louis fidgeting with the stone obelisk, struggling to take the jewel off of its top.

“Lou!” Mike barked, but before Louis could react, the obelisk shifted backward, and the ground began to tremble. The shaking left them all fighting for footing. There was a loud screech. The silver strip was disappearing underneath them! It resembled a mouth as it opened, swallowing Ariel, Piggy, Brackar, and Mercury into its murky abyss.

Adarha ran toward Mike as the ground beneath her feet yawned open. She jumped toward him, clutching what little of the path was left. “Help, please!” she cried.

Full of determination, Mike ran toward her and slid, barely grabbing her arm before she let go. “Gotcha!” Mike shouted.

He was hanging over the edge, but the ground kept retracting. He scrambled backward, but not fast enough. He fell.

————–

Find and Follow

⇓⇓⇓

Christian Terry

by

Sneak Peek Saturday Night

Chapter 1 of Hunted on Predator Planet…

Tracked on Predator Planet

by 

Vicky Holt

I roared at the white-furred pazathel-nax that snapped at my boots. For some kathe reason, the devil dog picked me out as the weakest in the pack. What a load of kathe. I could kill any of my brethren in a couple of tiks. Even Naraxthel. Ha. Especially Naraxthel, now that he was smitten with that useless soft female. It was better he had left us when he did, otherwise the devil dogs would be disemboweling the both of them.

“Run ahead!” I shouted to the three hunters. “Pull them away! I’ve got this mutt!”

I watched them draw the rest of the pack away, Raxkarax feigning a lame leg. I swung my raxtheza but missed the dog’s gray-white head. I parried its muzzle with my double blade, and soon its blood sprayed upon the groundcover. Two more swipes with my blades, and the dog lay dead, its entrails steaming in the rain-swept air. I double-checked my sight-capture was working. The Ikma Scabmal Kama loved to see death and mayhem.

A huge crack of lightning split the air, and I heard a sizzle in my earpiece. I watched in awe as a giant tree fell across the trail, shuddering the ground with its enormous weight.

I looked through sheets of rain, to the trail my brethren had followed, but they were gone. I heard distant shouting. Wary the devil dogs would sneak around and flank me, I cleaned my blades and jogged off the trail, finding a lesser used game path to head in their general direction.

A snarling log hit me in the shoulder and knocked against my helmet. I fell to the ground with a curse and felt the teeth of a lone devil dog worry my elbow joint. I growled and unsheathed my short sword, stabbing it in the belly. I silenced its high-pitched whine for good. I stood and aimed a disgusted kick at the huge blood-spattered corpse. More curses followed when I slipped in the mud of the trail, almost falling on my ass. I heaved great breaths from exertion, feeling heat from my anger flush my skin from my arm pits to my neck. I scowled and frowned, waiting for more pazathel-nax to lunge at me from the ikfal. Crouching in wait, I held my blades ready.

Rain poured over my armor, washing the blood and gore from its seams, as well as powering the cells. A fuzzy static pierced my earpiece. I cocked my head. “Hello? Raxkarax?” More static. “Natheka? Raxthezana?”

Kathe. That dog jostled my comm when he pounced on me. The sight-capture feed blew out as well. Once the rain stopped, I would remove my helmet and try to fix the delicate technology. For now, I was isolated.

Alone.

Out of communication range.

Last seen being attacked by the vicious pazathel-nax.

My breaths increased; my heart raced. The tendons in my neck tightened.

I could not have planned this any better if I had spent ten cycles arranging it. A gust of breath escaped my lungs. If I was dead to Theraxl, I was free. I only paused a second to leave my prized blade sunk into the body of the dog. No living Iktheka would leave his raxtheza.

I spun on the trail and tore off in a different direction. Careful to step on springy undergrowth instead of black mud, I chose to hide my trail sign.

I ran for several zatiks, sometimes leaping to grab hold of a low branch and swing myself forward a veltik. The farther I ran west, the freer I felt.

No more sight-captures for the Ikma. No more nights in the Ikma’s pungent lair, filling her baser needs while my promise of posterity withered and died. No more lengthy feasts in the dining halls, pretending to be humored by others’ stories or females’ batting eyes.

On Ikthe, I was Iktheka alone, beholden to no one save my goddesses.

Holy Goddesses, I thank you for the gift presented to me. May I use it to give you glory.

My armor felt lighter. I felt a sensation like cool air lift from my belly and burst forth out of my mouth. A laugh.

Shaking my head at my foolishness, I ran on, headed for the private glade I sometimes escaped to for precious moments of solitude. I liked it because it was defensible on three sides. Protected by a defile of rocks on one side, a gulch on the other, and flanked by a stream on the third, it was perfect. It had access to the bounty of the forest on the north side. I smiled. I would be there in three days’ time, and then I could scheme how I might live out my days as an exile on Certain Death.

I stopped for short meals of speared jokal over small fires. I built them under the heaviest canopy, that the smoke filtering through the leaves became invisible. I obscured my footprints, choosing rocks and treefalls to walk upon, or reversing my walk, in places where prints were inevitable. Leaping and jumping, climbing trees or crawling through bowers, my trail sign was untraceable. Once the heavy rains descended, I would be but a memory of a dream to my fellow hunters.

I slept in the vee of the red tower trees and killed the animals that threatened to kill me first. On the morning of the third day, I smiled at the Sister Suns. Soon I would settle a camp. I would dry meat and use my hands to build a semi-permanent shelter.

I lowered myself from the tree, pulling a jeweled talathel out and twisting its jaws until they popped. I threw it to the ground for the jokapazathel and loped the remaining veltik to my glade.

I slowed to a walk, unhurried for the first time since my adolescence. I reported to no one now, save the Holy Goddesses.

Using my gloved hands to part the foliage, I came upon my glade through the deep woods. Already I heard the babbling waters of the stream where large glisten-fish swam upstream. They made a delicious soup. My mouth watered at the thought.

My eyes caught a movement, and I stilled.

I switched to my heat-vision and cursed soundly.

Holy Goddesses, do you now play a joke on your servant Hivelt? Do mine eyes see another soft traveler in truth? Do you play with Hivelt?
I zoomed in on the figure. There, in front of a small ship, stood a person of Yasheza Mahavelt’s race. I watched in disbelief as they gathered sticks and twigs and placed them in a huge pile at the back of their ship. They had been collecting for days, it would seem.

My eyes widened as I scanned the site, switching back to my natural vision. A drying rack had strips of meat and pelts draped over it. The traveler built a cairn of rocks at four corners of the glade. Another large boulder sat against the rock outcropping, a concave center collecting rainwater.

My breaths came in short bursts. My heart seemed to slow with time. I blinked, willing the sight to change. It didn’t. The soft traveler’s industry belied Yasheza’s race. Perhaps this was another race? Naraxthel’s Yasheza ran from him and hid. She took baths. This one—this one worked.

I watched for several jotiks, checking my camouflage settings obsessively. When she left her site to approach the tree line, I faded further back into the ikfal. What was she approaching so carefully? Flailing movement at ground level caught my eye. Ah. This traveler set traps.
The mahavelt’s suit was identical to Esra’s. I retreated into the ikfal an extra step but waited to see the face. If it was a female, I would turn and run, if it was—

They turned to look at me, but I knew I made no sound, my armor at maximum stealth settings. My camouflage obscured me. But she—I could see her face.

Luminous silver eyes, like the scales of the glisten-fish, saw through me and pierced the empty place where my heart was not. They shone out of a darker skin tone than Yasheza Mahavelt’s. The contrast was striking.

Her brows turned down as if she could detect my presence, and her mouth frowned. Her eyes narrowed, and she dropped her wood, taking steps toward me.

Run, Hivelt. Run and hide.

My face grew hot and I clenched my fists. My heart hammered in its heart-home, and I took a great draught of air. The little industrious trespasser built a homestead in my glade.

I reached for my raxtheza, and my hand came away empty.

She took one more step, then cocked her head. I watched her lips move as if she spoke, but I heard nothing. She turned away and resumed checking her snare.

My heart returned to its usual pace, and I relaxed my hands at my side.

By all appearances, this female intended to stay. But I would observe for a few days until I decided if she deserved the raxfathe and death.

Naraxthel spoke of corruption in Theraxl ways, and the Ikma Scabmal Kama revealed it to be so, but that didn’t mean the raxfathe didn’t have its place in the order of things. Especially when an uninvited interloper took up residence in my place of solitude and serenity.

I snarled and snapped my teeth, remnants of the pazathel-nax fight hounding my thoughts. I watched her progress along the tree line, and my eyes tracked a path to a spot in front of me. There! A clever snare utilizing a sapling sat within a long stride from me. A dead jokapazathel hung limp. Seeing she was preoccupied with her load, I cut the rodent loose and kept it for myself. A tribute.

Death and fury would be my companions tonight. I retreated further into the ikfal and climbed a tree.

♦♦♦

The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for a good man to do nothing~Edmund Burke

Find and Follow Vicky Holt!

⇓⇓⇓

https://www.lovevickyholt.com/

Amazon Author Page

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Instagram @LoveVickyHolt

 

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Short Story Friday–Welcome 2020!

A Coastal Town in New England
is Full of Crazy Characters

by

Johi Jenkins

Words: lobsterman, bicycle, light bulb, yoga, fireworks, infantile, weave, leopard, balding, sunset

Aguaclara sat down on a wooden bench under the shade of a beautiful tree whose name she didn’t know. A man rode by in a weird-looking bicycle, but no one appeared to question his transport. Along the boardwalk people walked with careless abandon, looking for all the world like this coastal town in New England was totally normal. It totally wasn’t. What the sign on the road had advertised as a charming little town, had actually turned out to be a ridiculous parade full of crazy characters.

She tapped her forehead in frustration. “We should’ve gone to Hawaii instead,” she bemoaned.

“Agreed,” a voice said above her. She looked up to see Laster as he sat down next to her. “Although all twenty islands are just one giant tourist pit, I’ll take a Hawaii sunset over this weird town and that awful storm that came out of nowhere on the way here.”

They had flown in from California, but as they had descended over the Appalachian Mountains they’d barreled through a thunderstorm that no weather monitoring bot had predicted.

“That storm was awful, right?” Aguaclara agreed. “And this town … yeah. Everyone talks so funny and acts so strange. I think they’re going for quaint, but it’s remarkably archaic.”

“Yes! Oh my gosh, this place is nuts!” Laster held up his hands in frustration. “The people are crazy! Just now, I saw a balding man asking for money. He said he didn’t have anywhere to live.”

“What? Where does he sleep?”

“I don’t know! It doesn’t make sense, but I didn’t want to pry. Well, I tried to give him money, and he didn’t have a scanner. He even asked me, ‘why would I have a scanner?’ What! How does he expect people to help him? Can you believe that?”

Aguaclara nodded sadly. “Laster, I believe you, but only because I went into a little store where a woman was selling handwoven goods, and she also said she didn’t have a scanner. She did have a hand computer that looked like a scanner, but when I waved my wrist over it nothing happened. She took back the scarf I meant to buy and said she didn’t weave for free. I said I didn’t want it free; I meant to pay but her scanner didn’t work! And then she acted really confused and said her computer was a phone and not a scanner. Okay, crazy lady, bye. I left.”

Laster shook his head. “This whole town is crazy. While you were shopping I went by the beach. I stopped to watch a small group of people stretching in unison. I wondered out loud why they would do that. A woman next to me heard me and said they were doing yoga and that it was a great way to keep their bodies flexible.”

“Why would they need to exercise for that? That’s why we have metaxalone in the water. Ooh …” Aguaclara snapped her fingers. “Maybe these people drink untreated well water. So they’re all stiff. That’s crazy.”

“Right? But that’s not as crazy as the other thing she said.”

“What else did she say??”

“She said she was a better teacher than the guy teaching the class, and had more experience. But she quit when she found out that he made more money than she did.”

“What! How come? If she was better, she must have been getting paid more.”

“I asked the same question, and she just shook her head and mentioned the gender gap.”

“The gender gap in population? What has that got to do with salaries?”

“No clue. She was wearing tight pants printed to look like leopard spots, though, so I just assumed she wasn’t right in the head.”

Aguaclara shook her head. “These people are crazy.”

“Definitely,” Laster said. “Maybe we should just head back.”

“I’m hungry, though. Let’s find some food. Someone is bound to have a scanner.”

“Let’s hope. I’m hungry, too.”

They walked along the boardwalk until they reached a small shop with a sign that read: All forms of payment accepted. They walked up to the counter eagerly and read the menu. Attempted to, anyway.

“I have no idea what any of this means,” Aguaclara confessed after a minute.

“Me neither,” Laster said. “Bacon, ham? Drumsticks? What’s that?”

“And what about this chicken, fish, lobster? Why call food after an animal?”

At that moment a young man came out of a door in the back and smiled at them. “Hi, welcome to Ed’s Lobster House. What can I get you?”

“Um, we’re not sure yet,” Aguaclara answered.

“How ’bout our famous lobster? Ed just brought them in this morning and they’re super fresh.” Seeing their confused expressions, the young man added, “Ed’s the owner and also the lobsterman.”

Laster frowned, extra confused. “You mean like a superhero? Like Spider-Man?” He’d heard of Batman and Spider-Man, but not Lobsterman.

The boy looked confused. “No…? I meant like … a lobsterman? You know, a person who catches lobsters?”

“Why does he catch lobsters?”

“Uh, maybe to serve them—” he said in an infantile tone, as he pointed to the restaurant sign “—in his Lobster House??”

Aguaclara and Laster looked at each other in horror as the light bulb turned on in their heads. And they ran away. Out of the town and across the road, and into the clearing where their monojet was parked. Only when they were back inside their jet did they stop to catch their breath.

“These people eat animals, Laster.”

“What crazy town did we stumble into, Clara?”

But Aguaclara’s gaze had drifted to a banner that was hanging from a tree. The large, bright letters were printed over depictions of fireworks. She read the words, but they didn’t make sense.

Happy New Year! 2020

“Gosh in Heaven, Laster,” she finally whispered, horrified. “You know that crazy storm we went through on the way here?”

But Laster couldn’t answer, because he had too seen the sign, and had lost his voice.

“I think it warped us back through time,” she concluded miserably, “… to the 21st century.”

Dun Dun Dunnn

The End

Find & Follow

⇓⇓⇓

Johi Jenkins

by

Short Story Friday

Big Time Deals in the Big City

By Arbor Winter Barrow

 

Devina Gershwin knew every corner of the big city of Kestavan. It was a city the size of a small ocean and filled with just as many people as fish. Devi had been raised from birth in the slums on the outskirts near the deep, thick jungles of the rest of the planet. Kestavan was the only human habitable spot on the planet, everything else was ruled by the native species of wolflike packs that roamed the jungles. Large energy fields drew a line between the city and the jungle and neither mixed.

The spaceport at the center of the city was the heart of the tiny civilization in the middle of the galactic nowhere. The skyscrapers that had been raised around the spaceport turned the city center into a crown and the people who lived there were just denizens of a palace that churned around it.

The king of this place, the dealer of hands, of fate, and everything in between was named Gev Horrton. Gev Horrton was the oft-unseen king of this tiny patch of land, no one, especially as low class as Devi would ever get to meet him. Except under one condition. Every year on the summer solstice a city-wide card tournament took place and this year Devi was going all the way to the top. If she won every tournament from the lowest to the highest she would get the honor, if you could call it that, of playing against the king himself. That’s what she was going for, that was the challenge that was ahead of her. She was determined and driven to change her lot in life and she had the skills to do it now.

It had taken her nearly ten years to save up for the entry fee and the last bit came from the sale of all her worldly possessions. Her favorite speeder bike, her computer, her communicator, all of it was gone now. She had moved out of her apartment the day before the rent was due, and slept in the subway station that night. In the morning she had gotten up and taken the subway to the Central Office where entrants could apply for the tournament. In three short days she was going to the largest casino in Kestavan to crawl her way to the top.

Devi refused to be complacent anymore. This place was seen as a safe haven for every sort of crime and criminal and she had been raised as one of its pawns. Gev Horrton and his cronies had a tight grip on the city populace and anyone who dared try to change or question the tiny aspects of their society.

It wasn’t uncommon for feuds to end with one side ending up outside the energy field only to be eaten or killed by the native wildlife or just left to starve to death as little of the native plantlife was edible for humans. Her own family had gotten on the bad side of one of Horrton’s men and they had died out in the jungles. She had been left to fend for herself and if it weren’t for the kindness of a few strangers she would have died years ago.

She had a plan and that plan involved going all the way to the top and changing things from the top down. The populace was unhappy, but so few of them knew what to do about it. Devi had learned the hard way how to wheel and deal from the inside of the slums and the darkest corners of the city. She knew exactly the path she would have to take to get to the top, she had the play the game and had to make them believe that she was part of the game.

With her tournament entry fee placed Devi had only a handful of credits left.

Even with her skills and the amount she could make in one game it had still taken ten years to save up for the entry fee. It was a tournament for the super rich and a slumkid like her had a one in a billion chance at getting in.

This was the year, and in three days she was going to the top.

***

Devi spent her last credits on a nice, sleeveless suit and a nice meal. She was going to win in style and with a full belly. Nothing could crush her confidence. The day of the tournament she showed up to the entrance, flashed her entry chip and took her place among the other entrants.

Rithcards was the most popular and hardest card game in the galaxy. There were over a thousand cards in each deck and nearly as many ways to win the game. Each suit was four cards and the combinations you made from your hand over the course of the game determined the point values. Devi was good at it. She had been playing since her mother taught her as a child and she had learned to count cards before she had learned the names of the constellations in the sky.

She had supported herself for all of her 22 years by playing small games in the dark backrooms of the city. Even though gambling was far from illegal and most crime was given a pass, some of the games she had played were so high-risk Gev Horrton himself would have come down hard on the people playing. Devi had won just enough games to fill her pockets and keep a roof over her head but not enough to draw attention to herself. A master rithcard player would be easily noticed in this city and she wasn’t ready to make her name known until the day of the tournament.

The tournament bracket lit up the ceiling of the main room and Devi found her name easily at the bottom of the lists. She was an unknown and that was fine with her. A loud chime echoed across the room. “Places everyone!” A woman said over a loudspeaker and the room filled with the initial conversations and card shuffling.

Devi looked at her first opponents and breathed a sigh of relief. As much confidence as she had in her abilities as a rithcard player she could see the green gills on these people. They had the money to get themselves into the tournament, but not the skill. She would defeat them easily, but at the same time she didn’t want to draw too much attention to herself too quickly. There was a chance that if she displayed too much skill too early on that the tournament heads would find a way to eliminate her from the game permanently.

The tournament had five rounds, of seven games each, and for the first round the tournament room had over 1000 tables with 5 people each. In the fourth round, the winners with the highest skill points over the course of the tournament would be in the fifth and final round. The winner of the tournament would get to play one-on-one with Gev Horrton himself.

Here’s what you need to know about Devi’s skill, she was a thinker, she was a skilled card counter, and capable of figuring out the micro-expressions of the players around her.

The first round she didn’t wipe the floor with her opponents but let them think she was struggling along with the rest of them.

The second round she was in a whole other world of competition, these people actually had money and skill. But all the same, she hid her abilities. WIth the second round Gev Horrton’s men were watching her and every other player. One of these people, the best of the people, would be the one to go against Horrton. It was their job to look for possible opponents that might actually be a threat to Gev Horrton. She nearly lost as many times as she won, she let herself float in the middle of the pack, letting others take the limelight and yet others to crash and burn. As the fifth and final round began Devi didn’t let an ounce of fear mar her confidence.

In the fifth round, all her opponents were long time players, skilled, and probably nearly at the same level of criminal renown as Gev Horrton himself. It wasn’t uncommon for an unknown like herself to rise in the levels, but it happened rarely and with every round she won, she saw the attention wavering in her direction.

One of her opponents in the final round suddenly stood up and threw up all over the table. The woman was staring at her drink like it had betrayed her. Devi was suddenly aware of the fact that Horrton’s men had been the ones bringing the drinks. This woman had done little to hide her very significant skill and therefore was now being taken out of the game for it. She was eliminated from the game as she fell to the ground and started having a seizure.

Devi grasped her cards and breathed deeply.

And she triumphed. She won the tournament by what most would call the breadth of a hair. Devi had played the game. But she hadn’t won yet. They weren’t worried about her, they weren’t even concerned that some unknown player that had apparently lucked her way to the top. They all assumed that she would be defeated by Gev Horrton. That was their mistake, that was Horrton’s mistake.

They began the one-on-one, and Devi paid little attention to the crowd that milled around watching them. She knew some of their faces from having played against them, and others she didn’t. She put all her focus on Gev Horrton. He walked down the aisle of tables waving at everyone like the king he thought he was. She knew the moment before he sat down what his tells were, she knew the moment he was given his cards, what weaknesses he would have, she knew when they put down their first suit of cards just what she needed to do to win.

They played seven games. She won some, she lost others. And as he did, in the final game, in all his arrogance and hubris Gev Horrton pulled his gold plated owners chip out of his jacket and placed it on the table.

“If you win this round, you win it all,” he said. The move was supposed to make his opponents nervous, to make them make mistakes, and to push too hard. Devi had watched all the games on the GalaxNet in the past 15 years and knew this tactic so well.

“I have a philosophy, Mr. Horrton.” Devi said, looking at her cards. Her face betrayed none of the emotions she felt roiling in her gut. She would only have one chance at this.

“And what’s that, Miz Gershwin.”

“Devi, please,” Devi said amiably.

“Devi it is then.” Gev Horrton nodded his head.

“Power without compassion is the heart of a dying star.” Devi placed one card down face up and began the flip the next. “Eventually the equilibrium breaks and the star goes nova.”She didn’t break eye contact with Gev and saw his face begin to pale. She placed a finger on her last card and turned it over.

“A system that is so unbalanced cannot be sustained. And your system is now mine.”

The four cards on the table were one of the most unlikely combinations in the game, and also the most valuable. She had won by a landslide and the open-mouthed horror on Gev’s face was so sickly satisfying.

“Impossible! No! You’ve cheated!”

Devi raised her hands and wiggled her fingers. She had intentionally worn a sleeveless shirt that day so as to prevent any worry of cheating.

Gev looked at his secretary but the man was as ashen faced as Gev was. Gev had arrogantly walked himself into a corner and Devi had trapped him.

“Impossible!” Gev said and shot to his feet. He yanked at the gun on his secretary’s belt and pointed it at Devi. “You won’t get away with this!”

Devi slowly lifted herself to her feet and let a smile twist her mouth. It was not a kind smile. “I have won fair and square, Mr. Horrton. You agreed to this, and I think they are ready for a change.” Devi nodded at the men and women who made up Gev Horton’s cohort of bodyguards. She knew all their faces, all their names. They had all been children like her, torn from their families because of Gev’s tyranny, thrown to the literal and metaphorical wolves. It had taken ten years to save up for the tournament and ten years to recruit and maneuver over 300 men and women into the service of Gev Horrton. She had done more than won a card game and the city, she had won the hearts of its people. Two of the bodyguards were holding a vid camera and the feed was broadcasting across the city. Horrton had been in his castle and on his throne for so long he had lost touch with the elements that had gotten him there, and Devi had taken full advantage of that.

Gev’s hand shook and the gun trembled. His finger was dangerously close to the trigger. Devi just continued to smile at him and reached over the table where he had placed the city control chip. The gold glinted and the cool metal felt heavy in her hands.

“Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you’re taken care of for the rest of your life somewhere where you can’t hurt anyone else.”

***

“Devi of pack Gershwin,” the wolf-like creature said and stood on its hind legs. The Veskers towered around her but Devi wasn’t afraid. She had been friends with these people from a very young age when they had saved her from the treacherous jungle where her family had perished.

“I have done as I promised. The city is yours,” Devi said and held up the gold chip.

The Vesker leader was named Kissk. He had been no more than a pup when he had found her as a child and brought her to his people. She had befriended them all and grew to love them as her own family.

“No, Devi of pack Gershwin. It is yours. We are a simple people. Now that we know of the worlds beyond the stars we too would like to become part of this society. Some of us will return to the jungles to live out our lives, but others, like myself will integrate into this society and make it ours from the inside out.” Kissk waved a paw at the Veskers behind him and they howled in agreement.

In the years since Kestevan had been built one of Gev Horrton’s primary suppression tactics had been on the sentient species of the Veskers. If the United Planetary Society had found out that this man had built a city on planet belonging to a civilization of pre-spaceflight peoples they would have sent an army to stop him and liberate the planet. Anyone who found out about the sentience of the Veskers or tried to send information off-planet was killed before any information they had could reach the responsible people.

“You will be our liaison, you will be our teacher, and you will be the leader of this city until such time that one of us understands it enough to take over. This is your oath?”

“This is my oath,” Devi said and grinned up at Kissk.

Devi waved at them to follow her and the pack of Veskers trailed after her past the opening in the shield wall and into the city.

The End

 

Finder and Follow Arbor Winter Barrow

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