Darkspace Calamity (N/A) - Softcover

Bodan, Christopher

 
9781944452902: Darkspace Calamity (N/A)
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1944452907 ISBN 13: 9781944452902
Verlag: Future House Publishing, 2018

Inhaltsangabe

The Calamity is coming. Darkspace spreads across the sky as esper—powerful magic that gives everything form and life—is consumed. One by one, the galaxies have vanished. Only a single galaxy remains, and its inhabitants know the Calamity could strike at any moment. Princess Malya never wanted much to do with the fate of the galaxy. She’d be happy just to travel around the galaxy participating in the most risky and exhilarating sport in existence. But then a pirate captain tells her that she’s key to his plan that just might stop the Calamity.It’s a vague plan, and honestly a complete long shot. Even if Malya believes the cryptic prophecy of an insane space witch, the plan requires noble paladins and bloodthirsty corsairs to actually cooperate. With such impossible odds, Malya almost wants to keep running and leave the “saving the universe” to anyone else. But even Malya cannot outrun the Calamity. To protect the people she loves and maybe even the galaxy itself, she must pull off her craziest stunt yet.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Christopher Bodan is a freelance writer, editor, and full-time dog caretaker. He lives in Seattle with his wife, their aforementioned dog, and more electronics than he honestly knows what to do with. They don’t have enough games, though; they can always use more of those.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter 1

Tranquil Wind starliner, outbound from Daeveron
The stars are going out.
Malya blinked and refocused her eyes. She found herself staring up through the transparent roof of the United Stars boarding gallery. The thought had risen unbidden in her mind and pulled her from the pleasant enjoyment of the swirl and rumble of the busy spaceport all around her. Hundreds of people from dozens of species clustered in small knots or formed loose, hopeful lines at passenger gates and boarding ramps. The milling traffic was directed by brisk and efficient staff in the uniforms of various starlines. Her friend Betty stood just behind her, checking ID and itinerary documents. Malya soaked in the wonderful, banal normality of it all.
Their light has gone. The esper that gave them form and motion is gone.
She frowned. Someone had said that to her, once, and she couldn’t remember who or understand why she remembered it now. She glanced around at the crowd, as if a stranger might volunteer the answer, and saw only Betty and the boarding queue for the Tranquil Wind forming swiftly in front of her. She looked back up through the transparent roof at the gathering clouds and the rose-tinted blue sky. Out there, somewhere beyond her sight and Daeveron’s double rings, she thought, the stars still shone.
Except they didn’t, not all of them. Not anymore.
Mr. Tomn had pointed out the wide, brilliant carpet of shining stars from the view ports of dozens of starships. Her cypher always pointed to the vast, black swaths of sky next. “They used to be full of stars, of galaxies, of so many people,” he had said more than once. She shook her head. Not now. Not on her vacation.
But she couldn’t stop. Her mind flashed to the esper crystals growing so thickly that they choked the life from whole worlds, of Darkspace creeping closer and eating the stars one by one. She closed her eyes and pushed the thoughts down, but she knew that she could not forget, not really, not for long.
She ground her teeth and fought back to the present. She smiled humorlessly and scrubbed her face with firm fingers. “I definitely need this time off,” she muttered. “I’m tripping over my own mind.” She adjusted her cape so that its hood fell a bit further down over her face. The whole point was to avoid getting recognized.
She nearly jumped to the roof when Betty tapped her on the shoulder. “Whoa. Easy there,” the small mechanic said. “You okay? You looked like you wandered off for a minute.”
“Yeah. Yeah,” Malya said. “I’m good. Just—tired.”
“Well, pay attention.” Betty smiled and pointed past Malya’s shoulder.
Malya turned and saw that the line had firmed up in front of them, and she trotted to close the gap. She glanced around a bit sheepishly and then looked down. Just ahead of her stood a tonnerian family. The large matriarch’s feline features twisted in annoyed concentration as she tried to juggle luggage and boarding passes and identity papers and four children. They seemed almost completely focused on each other, except for one young girl at the back. She had turned to watch Malya hurry toward them.
The girl had adorable dark stripes running down the fur around her eyes and over her muzzle. Her perked ears twitched around curiously, waving their red-dusted tufts. She had huge brown eyes—tonnerians often did at that age—and they opened as wide as they could to stare at Malya.
Malya stared back for a moment and then smiled and winked. The girl blinked and her mouth dropped open. Malya’s smile widened. The girl glanced over her shoulder at the distracted woman.
When the girl turned back to Malya, she shuffled closer. “Are you Princess Malya?” she asked in a low voice. Her tail twined and loosened unconsciously at the small of her back.
Malya almost couldn’t hear the girl over the chatter of the crowd and crew. She leaned down. “Maybe.”
The girl sniffed. “I saw you race once, on holovid. You didn’t win.”
Malya heard a muffled snort. She glanced back to see Betty covering her smirk and tactfully looking away.
Malya shrugged at the little girl. “Sometimes you don’t win, sometimes you do. That’s why you run the race, to find out.”
The girl scratched at the fur around her right ear. “My dad says you almost always win. I like that.”
Malya chuckled. “So do I, but it doesn’t mean as much if you don’t lose sometimes. What’s really important is that you come out ahead in the end and have a good time doing it.” She tapped the girl’s shoulder. “Are you going all the way to Catermane?”
“No,” the girl said, looking around. “We’re going to Fornor to see my aunt.” She looked back before Malya could answer. “Are you going to Catermane?”
“Yes.”
“Mom says that Catermane is full of witches and troublemakers.”
Malya laughed softly. “Well, then, it sounds like I’ll like it there. We’re going for a festival.”
“Are you—” The girl stopped as her mother turned around and noticed her.
“Kollia, what are you doing? I’m so sorry, miss. She’s sometimes a, little, um, too, ah, friendly . . .” The woman’s voice stumbled and broke off.
Malya stood and saw recognition dawn on the other woman. Malya smiled, put her finger over her lips, and winked. Then she pulled her hood back up so that it fell over her face and covered her distinctive sky-blue and blonde hair. “No problem,” she said as warmly as she could. The line had started to move when the woman turned for her daughter, and Malya pointed at the gap opening up. “We better get going.”
“I—um, yes.” She fumbled a bit, and Malya picked up the handle of some of the family’s loose luggage and started forward. “Um, thank you. I—I hope she wasn’t bothering you.”
“Not a bit,” Malya said brightly. “Have fun on Fornor.”
“We will. I—How did . . . ?” The crew whisked her aboard before she could finish.
Malya smiled and waved.
Betty stepped up to hand off her own luggage. “Well that was uncommonly kind of you.” She swatted Malya’s shoulder.
“You know me. Always happy to meet a fan.”
Betty eyed her. “Especially if they’re not demanding that you sign everything they shove in your face. Still, you’re in a funny mood.”
“Am I?” Malya asked, trying to sound amused but not quite getting there.
Betty nodded, less amused than the princess had hoped for.
Malya sighed and tried to ignore the knot forming gently in her stomach. “Well, maybe. I just want to get this whole thing started.” Her smile turned wry. “Which seems strange, I guess. Hurry up and relax.” She strode up the ramp and handed her boarding pass to the attendant at the top. “Where’s Rin?”
Betty shrugged. “Last I saw, she was arguing with the cargo crew about something.”
“Of course she is.” Malya sighed and looked up. She saw a small, fur-covered face glancing over a rail down at her. Malya waved and smiled. “I didn’t think I’d be recognized quite so soon.”
“You’re hopeless,” Betty replied, turning over her own papers. “You’re one of the most famous racers in a generation on the most famous racing circuit in the galaxy. Nobody else has her...

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Verlag
Future House Publishing
Erscheinungsdatum
2018
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
1944452907
ISBN 13 
9781944452902
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
294
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