... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby UnmarkedBoxcar » Tue Jun 02, 2015 2:03 am

More more more!
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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Wed Jun 03, 2015 7:18 pm

Scientific research confirms: The Mobius crowd and not just friendlier and less psychotic, but they have better literary taste as well!


6.

‘I got a bad feeling about this.’

Teddybear flight had reached the fringes of the Perabyssos system. The light was dim even with enhancement, the sun hardly different from the far more distant stars. Flickering bars on the comms panel showed radio contact with base was weak, almost gone. Aside from the ringed planet in front of them, the navigation pane showed a six-figure distance to the nearest celestial body. Even by the standards of space flight, it was cold and empty.

‘Nerves, Booster?’ said Polo.

‘Maybe.’

‘He’s right,’ said Arjanna. ‘Our contact is between the planet and its rings, moving at high sublight speed without frame-shift. We’ll have to synchronise velocities with it. Waiting for it to for it to come out would take too long but if we go in, our escape vectors for coming out again will be limited.’

Dan fidgeted in his seat, making the inertail gel around him wobble. He peered at the scanner. ‘I can’t get much on it except that it’s very big. Looks like that miner was right.’

‘I don’t trust him,’ said Arjanna. ‘That weapons fire looked all wrong. I don’t like this situation either, but it is our job to take risks. Polo and Booster, you hang back here. Doc and Baby, we’re going in.’

Dan frowned in annoyance. Perhaps they were heading for a fight, in which case he wouldn’t be stuck with the handle much longer. Then the frown turned ito concentration. Racing towards a planet at the speeds of a modern spacecraft was always a tense time; inserting yourself by a moving target between a belt of rocks and a planet while trying to hold formation and not disappoint a hard-assed flight leader, even more so. He heaved a sigh as the disengage kicked in and the three ships dropped back into normal space.

The iron-grey mists of the gas giant dominated the right of his canopy, fading to shadow in the distance; to the left spread its ring system, visibly breaking up into the granules of its constituent rocks, glimmering very slightly. But his eyes snapped straight to what was ahead of them.

‘What is that?’

It was, indeed, huge. Scale was difficult without context, but it looked larger than a space station. It was roughly cylindrical, but tapered slightly in towards the front from where it flared out into a huge device like a skeletal funnel. At the rear was a ring of huge engines that looked different to modern thrusters, with great heavy, flaring nozzles. The body almost did not appear solid at first, being covered by a mass of pods and armoured casings. The most numerous of these were flat plates meeting in sharp angles, making the ship’s surface appear angular and bladed, almost as if it were covered in metallic thorns. It was also obviously old; there were pits and scars of asteroid damage, and zoom windows showed the slow abrasion of space-dust. At high velocities, space became far less empty. The whole thing rotated slowly about its axis.

‘That,’ said Doc, ‘is a generation ship.’

‘But it can’t be!’ gasped Dan. ‘They all arrived or were confirmed lost years ago!’

‘Seems they missed one,’ said Arjanna in a matter-of-fact tone.

‘How do you lose something that size?’ asked Dan.

‘Well if you know anything else that big which crosses interstellar space at sublight velocities using a ram-scoop, I’d like to know about it.’ Doc sounded like he was enjoying himself.

‘Scan it as well as you can from all angles,’ said Arjanna. ‘Then we report back. Split formation.’

‘Why would it attack a mining ship?’ Doc’s eagle did not move except to adjust its course away from the giant.

‘I’m not sure it did,’ said Arjanna. ‘You maintain safe range for weapons fire. I’m going in closer.’ Her Viper flared its engines and started forwards.

‘What does this mean for the system?’ asked Dan.

‘Trouble.’ Doc’s voice was clipped.

‘Four new contacts, behind the cap-class!’ called Arjanna. ‘Two sidewinders, cobra, eagle. Scanning... they’re deploying weapons!’

‘Think I can guess their legal status!’ said Doc. ‘Going weapons hot.’

Ahead, streaks of laser and dotted lines of shot came from the newcomers. Sparks and fluorescing clouds of vapourised metal flew from the impact points at the rear of the generation ship.

‘Frag!’ spat Arjanna. ‘Call the cavalry!’

Movement came from the giant form. All along its length, pods were opening. Muzzles raised themselves up and swung around. The comm lasers in Dan’s sensor array picked up the hull vibrations and put them through the speakers, filling the cockpit with a screeching and groaning of motors, the throb of gimbals and servos. Thermal signatures glowed from scores of barrels below Arjanna’s viper.

‘If it wasn’t hostile before, it is now,’ muttered Doc.

*

Note: It seems that italics do not survive the hyperjump to bulletin board. Apologeys!
Note2: I don't have access to the Elite Canon Writers' pack, so more apologeys for any lore violations. Hopefully they can be corrected later

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Flip » Wed Jun 03, 2015 11:33 pm

For what it's worth, Straylight, after I read Kate Russell's Mostly Harmless, I PM'ed her to ask if she planned to write a sequel, and she answered that it would depend on whether Frontier issued a new round of licenses at an affordable price.

So if you're planning to release your novel publicly at some point, you might want to find and check Frontier's fine prints about that. It might not be as easy as you'd like, legally speaking.

Not trying to discourage you, though. I want to read the rest! :)
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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Thu Jun 04, 2015 3:55 pm

Doing this for fun and as an experiment/practise... haven't written a multi-viewpoint before, and the last novel attempt was falling down a bit on pacing. I want to try and learn the thriller technique of short chapters/sections alternating questions or cliffhangers!

"Mostly Harmless" is next on the list. Enjoyed "Reclamation" and it gave some valuble world info, although I'm still not sure how ordinary people communicate over distances--is there still something like a mobile phone, or is it done with implants?

Have already had the official discouragement from Allen Stroud when I asked what the current novel-writing position was. Frontier has entered the mysterious waters where writers have to pay up front for a chance at publication...

Like I said, this is just for fun. But I do worry about the little voice at the back of my mind that says "This will be SO GOOD and SO MANY people will love it so much that entire forums will be hanging off my every word then Frontier will have to come and beg, yes BEG, to pay me loads of money to publish it properly and program me an ROU of my own to pilot in-game. Then all my other novels that have been turned down will get published even the crap I wrote at Uni and I'll replace Terry Pratchett and Iaim M Banks and outsell JK Rowling and in future generations scholars will even be pawing over the scraps of my unfinished stuff!!!"

Ahem.

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Fri Jun 05, 2015 6:55 pm

The pirate ships were within range. Dan pressed the trigger--

SERVERS DOWN FOR MAINTENENCE said the computer.

‘Damn it!’ he roared, punching and kicking the controls to no avail. More text appeared on the screen

UPDATE SCHEDULED AT PEAK PLAY TIME WITHOUT NOTICE FOR YOUR MAXIMUM CONVENIENCE

Dan beat his head off the canopy a few times. Out in space, the pirate craft were frozen, not even their drive trails drifting. Dan heaved a sigh and sat back on the chair.

‘Anyone want to play I-spy?’ asked Booster over the comms. ‘We only have six hours plus everyone downloading at once to kill...’
* * *
Just kidding everyone, here is your next exciting installment:



7.

Karlon did not exactly hate effort and exertion. Sometimes, it was necessary. He didn’t like to think he was one of the lazy slackers who were just content to learn agricultural machinery and a bit about horticulture, then spend the rest of their lives farming. Plenty of the children at school had been like that, and while Karlon enjoyed slacking off as much as the next person, he fancied more out of life than a plot of flat fields and weekends at the same naff clubs in what passed for a capital city. Not that there was anything wrong with that if you liked it, and he certainly didn’t enjoy the idea of dogfighting for his life or having to escape a neutron star, but space... that was interesting. Not to mention a great way to impress the girls.

Mining had turned out to be more boring than driving a tractor though, and getting locked away to die in an airless (and smelly) prison cell did not seem like much of a lark either. He could hardly describe it as exciting either; unless he thought of something, it was just a matter of waiting to die.

Which was all a roundabout way of saying that it was time to put a certain amount of thought and effort into finding a way to not die here. Would probably be worth a bit of exertion in the long run, too.

Karlon looked at the key where it was stuck to the wall. He stuck an arm through the bars; too far away. It was within the length of a leg, but when he tried, his knee was too big for the gaps. He grabbed the bars and tried bending them apart, pulling until it felt he was going to burst something, but they wouldn’t budge. Doing more exercise probably wouldn’t have made any difference there, he consoled himself.

He looked back at the vent. If he couldn’t get to the air, could he make the air come to him? If he unscrewed the vent, perhaps he could stick in an arm and unclog it.

The problem being, he had no screwdriver. The little multi-tools he normally carried had been all removed from his pockets, which was one bit of efficiency he really wished the pirates hadn’t managed. His buttons were plastic and their edges only broke when he tried them in the screw-heads, which were somewhat corroded anyway. Someone had seriously skimped on costs building this... whatever it was. Karlon had thought non-stainless screws were outlawed in spacecraft.

He tried just pulling on the vent in case it broke, but the slats cut viciously into his fingers. They would probably sever his tendons beffore he could shift it; not that he had the willpower to pull any harder, anyway.

Damn it!

Karlon scratched the back of his head. His fingers hit the chewing gum and he groaned. Even the little annoyances were still here...

The gum!

Wincing, he pulled at it, gently teasing it out from amongst the hair and scab. Then he popped it into his mouth and chewed, pulling faces as he did so. The faces were helped by having to pull a number of long hairs out of his scalp while he did that and twisting them together. He then put one end of the braid into his mouth and worked it into the gum.

Karlon moved up to the bars, took the gum out of his mouth, wrapped the other end of his improved cord around his finger, and took careful aim before flicking it at the key.

It hit just next to it and bounced off.

‘Oh come on, you were sticky enough earlier!’ begged Karlon. He pulled the gum back and did it again. This time, the gum hit the key and stuck.

Gently, he pulled on the braid. If the hair pulled out of the gum instead of pulling the key off the wall, it was back to square one.

The key moved. It slid a few centimtres along the wall and stuck. Karlon tugged a bit more; nothing. He though of praying, but couldn’t remember if there was any particular deity his ancestors had favoured, so he tugged again.

The key came off the wall, and the gum came off the key.

Karlon found he was holding his breath. The key was drifting in his direction. He kept holding his breath in case he disturbed the air currents.

Gently, the key drifted through the bars. With great care, Karlon caught it.

He reached out and fumbled with the padlock. ‘Don’t drop the key, don’t drop the key!’ he muttered to himself.

The padlock clicked open. Karlon disengaged it carefully, pushed open the cage door, and made for the main door. He yanked the handle and pulled it open.

Never had such dirty air tasted so good!

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Tue Jun 09, 2015 6:50 pm

8.

Space flamed with laser fire. The beams from the generation ship were redder and spread out more than modern weapons, but there were a great many gun batteries, and they looked powerful. Arjanna’s viper spun, twisted, dived, flipped and boosted upwards but great slashing rays scored several hits, making her shields flare and flicker.

At the great vessel’s stern, the attacking ships did less well. One of the sidewinders exploded into an expanding ball of debris; the eagle corkscrewed away trailing a glimmering cloud of escaping air, and the shield signature winked out from the cobra.

Streaks appeared on the radar behind Dan and turned into green dots. ‘We’re here!’ said Booster. ‘We couldn’t get word to base; something is jamming our long-range comms!’

Arjanna’s engines flared again, propelling her away from the giant. Her shields read as low, but intact. ‘Glad you’re here. Those clowns just woke this thing up. Thank Darwin its guns have limited range!’

‘I never even heard of one being deliberately armed!’ said Doc. ‘Still, we should be able to take those remaining ships now.’

‘Negative!’ snapped Polo. ‘We have a large offender group approaching around the planet. A python-class ship in the lead with two adders, at least six more small about five minutes behind them. Something’s stirred up the hornet’s nest!’

‘Yeah, I’d advise we make our exit in the opposite direction,’ suggested Booster.

‘We stay,’ ordered Arjanna. ‘The law says that generation ships have to be protected, I remember that much. The python could do it serious damage, and it will never believe we can be friendly after that. The gen ship needs to see us fighting its attackers.’

Dan diverted full power to his shields, hoping to charge them strongly for the upcoming fight. The sidewinder and eagle who had arrived at the stern of the huge ship were now flying towards them, but maintaining a cautious distance from its guns; the cobra seemed to be hanging back.

Sensors registered the dull boom of a spacetime disturbance, and three forms appeared near the bow. Two were the chunky forms of adders, larger than their security craft but slow and designed for civilian use. The other was the huge, wide form of a python; a huge multi-purpose craft, but well suited to combat. Normally, Dan would have been worried with all five of the fighting that on its own.

‘Baby and Doc bears, engage the ships at the sterm. Booster and Polo, keep those adders busy and help distract the python. Remember that eagles are fragile, people, and we need to be seen fighting more than we need to win. Fly for evasion not attack. I’m going to take out the python.’

‘Do as I say not as I do, much?’ said Booster. Obviously the second in command had some latitude.

‘Don’t worry. I’m me.’

Dan saw Polo increase her speed and pushed the throttle to full. The two pirate ships were heading straight at them. As they neared weapons range, he distributed power to engines and weapons.

>Here we go. My first fight.<

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Jace Faolan » Tue Jun 09, 2015 7:13 pm

This is great stuff Straylight! I just perused the first post, but it had me hooked! Can't wait to get home to start reading the rest.
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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Wed Jun 10, 2015 7:28 pm

Thank you! :)

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Sat Jun 13, 2015 11:01 am

9.

The rest of the... whatever it was, wasn’t much cleaner than the cell had been. Where was he? Karlon made his way through a passage, pulling himself along the wall with his hands. If it was a station, it wasn’t rotating to simulate gravity. If it was a ship, it was an astonishingly quiet one; even an idle craft generally had a multitude of hums, throbs and the occasional whir going on. He thought he could hear some wheezing, which could either be whatever life support was still working, or people exposed to the long-term effects of it working badly.

If this was a virtual reality game, Karlon was sure he would find a convenient weapon to hand very shortly, be able to use it, and in a few goes would be able to overpower the first guard. Not being a game, he could not even find a spanner, had not had a fight in real-g let alone zero-g for years, and there would certainly be no second chances at overpowering any guards. His plan was to surrender immediately on meeting anyone.

He rubbed at his forehead, which was still aching. The passage was short, and opened at another which was also short running crossways. There was something familiar about it... yes! He was on a spaceship. An ordinarily sized one as well, not the giant he fuzzily remembered from before. If only he was more eperienced, he’d be able to recognise the type immediately from the general size and layout. It didn’t help that the main corridor aft was sealed off with welded plates marked “VAKYOOM DONT TUCH” in red paint, and a couple of other doors were fixed shut as well.

He poked about a few rooms. The place was cluttered; there were hammocks hung in corridors and compartments that hadn’t been meant as crew quarters. The washroom should have been cordoned off as a biohazard; the galley needed the germ warfare squad to be called in. So far, everything was deserted. The upper comanionway...

Ooops.

Karlon had wandered onto the bridge. A ship this size didn’t have its cockpit in the nose but a bridge at the top instead, only it was a little late to back out now. The place was mostly dark, but some things still worked; his two captors were talking to the hologram of a tall man in a combination of security armour and leathers. He had a long face accentuated by the enormously long sideburns that extended down in front of his ears and flared out from his jaw; his chin, however, was clean-shaven.

The stubble-headed man and the spidery woman had their backs to him, but the holographic figure spotted him immediately. ‘Who is that?’ he demanded, pointed a bony finger.

The flesh-and-blood crew spun around.

‘That’s the prisoner the miner sold us,’ said the man. ‘He must have escaped!’

‘Well we can’t have break-outs!’ said the hologram. ‘Kill him.’

The man produced a wide-barreled gun from under his layers. ‘But... erm...’

‘He’s going to fix the air filters for us! Says he doesn’t need parts!’ put in the woman.

‘Really?’ The man’s expression relaxed. ‘In that case, getting out of his cell shows commendable initiative and ingenuity, I’d say. Welcome him to the crew and get him a beer. Now you’re sure the jammer is working alright?’

‘Perfectly, boss!’ said the woman.

‘Then how am I speaking to you now again?’

‘Special frequency it doesn’t affect only we know about.’


‘Well that’s good then. Carry on.’ The hologram flickered and vanished.


The man relaxed and put his gun away. ‘Nice one, mate. I’m Billhook and this is Lixxie.’

‘Two x’s, no living ex’s,’ said the woman.

‘Here.’ Billhook reached into a compartment and threw a bottle across the room. Karlon clumsily caught it; there was no label, but he knew this type of container. It was cheap import beer, marked as any one of a number of brands before sale irrespective of the contents.

‘Thanks, but my head is still aching like anything!’ he said. ‘Have you got any water?’

‘You don’t want to go there,’ said Lixxie. ‘Our recyclers don’t get rid of the taste. Or much else.’

Karlon gulped. ‘They’d better go on the list after the air. Any soft drinks?’

‘Eh?’ Billhook pulled a face. ‘We’re pirates, matey boyyo!’

‘Oh... yeah.’ Karlon boosted himself further onto the bridge, looking around himself. The smart-glass of the bridge seemed to be working, brightening the view enough for him to make out a number of large rocky shapes that were quite familiar. There were also a number of long metal booms radiating from the ship he was on, other objects tethered to the sides; there were cargo cannisters, pods of machinery, chunks of wreckage, several smaller ships. None of them looked to be in working order.

At least he could see the prow of the ship; its shape and size could only be one thing. ‘I’m on a python!’ he called.

‘What’s left of it.’ Lixxie jumped up and seized the ceiling next to him. ‘Hasn’t flown for years. Blackburns found it and made it our base of operations.’

Karlon managed to bite the top of the bottle (thin cheap metal) and took a swig. The alchohol content was barely worthy of notice, anyway. ‘Now I’m not a hostage, any chance you could tell me what’s going on? Who is Blackburns?’

‘The boss we were just talking to,’ said Billhook. He was helping himself to another beer. ‘Pirate lord of out-system. Not a bad guy to work for.’

‘The other facial hair was taken,’ said Lixxie. She grabbed Karlon’s arm and flipped herself back towards the floor, only spilling a little beer as she did so.

‘So what am I doing here? Did you say he... sold you to me?’

‘ ’Course. We don’t shoot up ships for nothing, you know!’ Billhook reached out to catch Lixxie, but she slapped his hand away and grabbed his forearm herself.

‘I’m payment for shooting someone? Who!?’

‘We shot his own ship up,’ said Lixie, fitting her magnetic shoes to the floor and standing still for a moment. ‘He wanted it to look good.’

‘So you know him?’

‘Thurden?’ Billhook took a swig. ‘He drops us supplies from time to time in return for us letting him mine out here.’

Karlon took a swig as well, feeling that he needed it. ‘I thought we were leaving emmergency drops for other miners!’

‘Not terribly bright, is he?’ sneered Lixxie. ‘Saves it for technical stuff I suppose.’

‘So... waters of Earth!’ Karlon slapped himself. ‘I remember now. The generation ship! But why would Thurden clunk me, dump me here and have you shoot his ship up?’

‘Does it matter?’ asked Billhook. ‘He told us it was a huge score as well. Humungous great ship he said, hardly any guns, collectors would pay top credit even for just a piece of hull. Enough for every pirate in this system and more besides, ’cording to him. Very keen Blackburns got the word out so that every freebooter in the system would get in on it.’

‘Except fragging us!’ said Lixxe. She was now folding herself into a space where it looked as if a console had been removed. ‘We got our rides shot up and spare parts borrowed, so we have to wait for the hunters getting home.’

‘It would be magnificent out there!’ said Billhook, waving his bottle. ‘We worked out a pincer movement with the others. Half in from the other front, us and the other half in from the back a minute later. The ship and any pigs that have shown up...’ He let the bottle float and smacked his hands together. ‘Bam!’

*

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Re: ... than to arrive (crack at a serial novella)

Postby Straylight0 » Fri Jun 19, 2015 5:32 pm

10.

Back on Perabyssos, the spaceport basked peacefully in the sun. From time to time, the howl of thrusters rang off concrete and faint waves of dust flew across the runways and pads.

At the side of the Federal Security compound, the woman Booster had been talking to sat on a step. A small camera drone hovered around her head with a faint whine of fans, and she drummed her fingers on her satchel. She heaved a sigh, stood up and walked over to where a guard waited by the door.

‘Please?’ she said.

‘Still can’t,’ said the guard, without looking around. Her uniform was crisp, and she stood away from the wall without slouching. ‘I shouldn’t let you through when Booster is around either, even if he does “pilot your asp” on Saturday nights. And Thursdays when he’s supposed to be on training leave.’

The first woman pulled a face. ‘Do you have to use phrases like that?’

‘Federation guard manual section 3.4.7 paragraph two, and I quote, “when not addressing a senior officer or in the presence of minors, personnel on guard duty must take every opportunity to employ euphemisms and colloquial language for the promotion of smut without explicit terminology.”’

‘Oh,’ said the woman. She walked back a couple of steps, then turned round again. ‘How did you know about the Thursdays?’

‘Section two: observational skills, gathering of intelligence and use of bush telegraph.’

The woman tapped the camera drone, making it wobble. ‘How do you know I’m not recording now?’

‘Recording lights are required by law and not on. You might have disabled them but you need to stay in my good books.’

The woman sighed and kicked at the ground, but it had been swept too clean to have any grit or pebbles on it. ‘Want a coffee Gillian?’

‘Wouldn’t mind a tea.’ The guard pulled her dark glasses down to the end of her nose and turned her head to look over the top of them. ‘What else you after, Debra?’

‘Oh come on!’ Debra jumped up and down. ‘A damaged ship lands, your best security flight scrambles with my boyfriend on it—who tells me nothing either--you feed me that line about the bush telegraph and still tell me nothing?’

‘It’s actually driving me bonkers as well, but I don’t know any more than you do. I want to be jumping up and down too.’ Gillian had returned to standing perfectly still.

‘Perhaps you should have your tea less than military strength?’

‘Section one top priority, beverages fit for duty personnel--’

‘Okay! Colour of old tights it is.’ Debra turned to go, but after a moment a cough made her turn back round.

Gillian had cocked her head and put a finger to hear ear, then she lowered it. ‘It would be dreadful if a journalist was away getting tea when the captain of the damaged ship came out of the building.’

‘Yes it would,’ nodded Debra. ‘Although there’s no reason to assume that would be happening now rather than in, say, five minutes.’ She checked the drone and stood facing the door.

‘None at all,’ agreed Gillian.

The door opened and Captain Thurden came out. His face was flushed and his throat and jaw were twitching furiously as he sub-vocalised on a communications implant. He was even making some hand-movements as well, as if he were face to face with the person he was speaking with.

‘Captain! Sir!’ Debra jumped in front of him. ‘Have you any comment about the attack on your ship? What has happened out there? Rumours of a--’

‘Get out of my way woman!’ Thurden pushed her roughly aside. ‘No, not you! I really do need to speak with Minister Straughn--’ His voice went back to the faint rumble of sub-vocal.

A taxi whizzed round the corner of the building, its six wheels skidding slightly as it jerked to a halt. Thurden had paid extra for one with a human driver.

‘Captain! If there’s something big and nasty out there, the public needs to know as soon as possible!’ called Debra, running after him.

Thurden stopped with his hand on the door and looked at her. ‘Tell everyone to prepare for the worst,’ he snapped, and climbed in. ‘Extra ten credits if you get to the assembly within five minutes,’ he told the driver. The taxi roared off as he finished slamming the door.

‘Bit of a drama queen I think. He’ll talk more later,’ said Gillian.

‘Assembly building, did he say?’ Debra checked the little camera drone.

‘It’s illegal to send them more than fifty feet away from you for surveillance, you know,’ said Gillian.

Debra pulled a face. ‘They keep telling us.’

‘You know I’ve heard there’s a kiosk in town does really good tea,’ added Gillian. ‘My hover-bike’s the red one if you want to go fetch some.’ She tossed Debra a key-tag. ‘Be careful, it’s extremely fast.’

*

Apols for reducing writing speed; I wasn’t well the past week and besides, all the bugs and some other things have notably reduced my enthusiasm for Elite. More should be coming, a number of scenes are already planned out in my head.


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