Hello 3.5 readers.
NanoWriMo is upon us and we will soon find ourselves in 2016, the year I promised myself I would release a novel.
So I’ve decided to give it a go with National Novel Writing Month.
I’m about to share with you two chapters of a story set in a world that I’ve been writing and re-writing for quite some time now. Technically, the characters, in one form or another, have origins in ideas I had as a kid.
And needless to say, Alien Jones’ rantings on this blog helped them to take shape.
So here goes nothing:
UNDESIREDVERSE: WANTED
The year is 2999. Bookshelf Q. Battler is long dead, his bones merely dust mixed within the dirt of East Randomtown Cemetery.
Since time immemorial, the Vek, a species of super intelligent three foot green beings, have ruled over the Rakan Collective, a union of over a hundred billion peaceful planets. In fact, it turns out that the default desire for most species is to be peaceful, productive, educated, happy, and non-hostile. Under the leadership of the Mighty Potentate, the citizens of the collective live only to study science, philosophy, art, literature, and other subjects. They’ve built a mighty army to protect what they have, but amongst themselves, war is unheard of.
Then there’s the Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies. Together, they form a cesspool of depravity, chalk full of beings who never met war they didn’t like. Violence over religion, over corruption, or just for the hell of it, these “garbage planets” as the Mighty Potentate refers to them are undesired. They’ll never be welcome in the Rakan Collective, due to chaos they foster.
And what a scummy place the Undesiredverse is. The Cabal operates a vast organized crime syndicate, dipping its toes into every facet of life, from business to government. The Tarazni Clan, a group of renegade Tollusks who roam about stealing as much territory as they clan, have occupied Earth for forty years.
Oh, and don’t forget Sourcemind – the highly evolved Artificial Intelligence that conquered and enslaved a human world and can’t wait to expand his control further.
But every story needs a hero, doesn’t it? Ours are Roman Voss, a routinely down on his luck, debt addled human bounty hunter and his pilot, a disgraced Vek/former advisor to the Mighty Potentate, Jones, or as Voss refers to him, “Jonesy.”
Our tale begins with Roman and Jones on a simple mission to collect a bounty on a ne’er-do-well, only to find themselves in possession of a bald woman who has no idea who she is, why every dirtbag wants her, or why the fate of the Undesiredverse (and even beyond) rests in her hands.
Roman, Jones, and Our Mystery Woman are about to become the most wanted beings around.
Let me know what you think, 3.5 readers. If you like it, say so. If it’s crap and I should quit, say so too.
Bookshelf Battle 