Content warning:
This is a mean story. It involves slavery, torture, cage fighting to the death, murder, and some other violence. And then some violence, just for good measure. Also violence. And kidnapping.
I also stole some twins’ names from Heinlein. These are not Heinlein’s twins.
~*~ Continue reading
Previous: Searching for Answers
They spent hours looking at the papers before they had to go back to their childhoods, back to chores and schoolwork and things that, some days, seemed downright constraining.
Barbara’s mother, happy she was “taking some initiative” helped her put together a flyer for babysitting, and helped her post it at the Library – the proper downtown one, which had never been abandoned because, bright and shiny and brand-new, it didn’t tend to lose kids in its recesses. It had no portals to other worlds. Barbara had looked.
With three others posted – grocery store, post office, and their church – Barbara returned home to some math homework that was only exciting if she thought about it in terms of national economies and some literature homework that was so stultifying she added in a 2-page book review of The Wealth of Nations. Surely that counted as literature, didn’t it? Continue reading
Written to R.Coots’ prompt. Some bodily injury, but no serious violence and no real loss of consent.
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Ravi wasn’t exactly running, but he was hurrying. He had someplace to be. He really had to get there soon, or he was going to lose yet another blind date to his own stupidi-
The crack in the sidewalk grabbed his foot and sent him sprawling. Last pair of nice pants – ruined. Palms of his hands – ruined. Face – banged. Chances at this date – gone.
“Oh, shit. Look at you.”
He didn’t recognize the voice, but there were hands on him, lifting him up. “Come on. You’re an absolute mess.”
“Nuala?” He did recognize the voice. Blind date #2. He’d spilled sauce on both of them. Continue reading
The good news is: we landed on a sunny day, in an area the radar had shown to be calm.
The bad news is: It started raining the day after we landed. It rained for ten days straight.
It’s day 11 now, and we’re beginning to dry out and make plans for this place. Water won’t be a problem, that’s for sure.
Not sure about growing things, though; this area appears to grow mainly grains that don’t mind being flooded.
As far as we have been able to tell, the weather here seems to come in cycles of 10:1. That is, 10 rain to 1 day of sun.
The sun days are blessed and pleasant and even comfortable; we’ve been spending most of them developing a series of connected roofed shelters with walls to the windward side.
With these, we can move between the paddies that we’ve created, the two habitats, and our science bays.
Anywhere else, we’re going to need to develop some sort of mobile rain shelter.
We are past the “bear’s” reach for sure now, and we are out of the garden, too.
This planet looked, on first glance, to be almost entirely lava.
Looking at it more carefully, maybe 1/3 of the land surface is covered in active vulcanism, with an equal amount of the water looking like it will be very hot land soon.
One high area shaped like a horseshoe boasts lush greenery, fantastic elephant-sized birds, and a reservoir of water 100s of feet above sea level.
We are still debating sending down a team.
I think we found a lost colony.
Nobody expected us to find one way out here, and I suppose it could be a case of parallel evolution, but everything – the bilateral symmetry, bipedalism, range of melanin – is too similar to the humanoid base to be a coincidence
They appear to be at the late Industrial Age and have no space travel, but fragments of a much higher technology level can be seen.
The planet itself is idyllic, 85% water, most land masses in tolerable climates. But we found settlements on the one polar land mass, as well as on the top of mountains.
We sent several greeting probes, guessing at political divisions. This one will bear watching.
We came on this planet in the middle of a massive storm system in its northern hemisphere – eastern side. It looked like it was devastating the coast – but it also looked like there was nothing on that coast except rock which had, presumably, been hit by hurricanes in the past.
The Western hemisphere was rather calm, although the southern/western quadrasphere appeared to be in the midst of a blizzard on its largest landmass.
Inclement weather aside, this place has large land masses connected by small strings of islands and narrow land bridges. We went down a team to the north/western quadrasphere.
First: Purchased: Negotiation
Previous: Rocks and Bitches
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His magical muscles were atrophied. They hadn’t been put to any use at all in longer than he cared to think about.
He treated it like any other muscle he needed to work. He stretched it more than was comfortable, but not enough that he couldn’t move the next day. He glanced over at Sylviane, who looked, more than anything, curious.
“Good set of Words,” she murmured. For a moment, forgetting that he was not being Kept by her, he braced for the praise – and, in a part of his brain that wasn’t really listening to reason, to the insult that would come right afterwards, with the downswing of his mood without his consent or control.
None of that came. Continue reading
First – Previous – Landing Page – Next
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He stayed exactly where he was. The hand on his neck felt like it was protecting him. Encompassing him. Holding him, but not restraining him.
“You’re very good. I want you to know that. I am very happy with you.”
He felt like he might float away, if it weren’t for the strength of the hand on his neck. He pressed his forehead a little closer to the carpet and said nothing.
“Ctirad. Okay, come on, my darling. Sit up and let me cuddle you a little bit. I’m sorry. I’ve been pushing you too far. Come here, Ctirad.” Warm arms enveloped him as he sat up like he was on strings. A forehead pressed to the top of his head. “I’m sorry.”
“You said. You said you liked me.” That hadn’t been what he said, Ctirad corrected himself. He’d said he valued him. He’d said he valued him more than Ermenrich did. “You called me… no. You likened me to the Hope Diamond.” Continue reading
Her lungs were burning. Her ears were popping. Her face felt like it was going to explode. Her throat felt like it was on fire. She couldn’t take it any longer.
Audrey held on to the weight and counted to twenty. She could do twenty more, maybe fifteen more, eleven-twelve-thirteen oh god. Four… teen, Fif-teen.
She popped up out of the water, trying not to scream.
It wasn’t working. Continue reading
First: A New World
Previous: Dinner, and Things to Chew On
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She ate her food slowly, but with gusto. It may have been only one long night to her, but it still seemed like a long time since she’d had a taste of home.
Dennor Hightower was staring at her. She looked up from her food and waited, patiently.
“Kael,” he repeated slowly, “is not a Lerienoijen name. You said Lerienoijen. How many scholars know that word?”
“I don’t know. How many?”
“I know three. One of them is me. And I’ve never heard of you.” Continue reading