Then he turned back to the group of us. “Nick might remember that when we talked about my people, I told him that I wouldn’t notice them, but that he would. That’s because I was assuming that they’d be hiding the same way I’m hiding. He’s not. He’s broadcasting his position so that anyone who can sense us can hear.”
I glanced over at him. “Would flipping into near space help? It wouldn’t with a starship, so I’m guessing it won’t…”
Lee shook his head. “It won’t help. Shifting into blink space might work, but depending on who it is, well, that still might not do it. Stay in normal space. Don’t speed up. Don’t slow down. Pretend you don’t feel anything.” Continue reading Space: Part 7→
Lee watched as we flew over a piece of what probably had been a planet. Maybe it had only been a moon, but it was round on the outside, jagged on the inside and big.
“They tried to hide there at the end of it,” he said. “They didn’t know it was the end yet, but I’d gotten my forces out of the area. Once they were safe, I used a new weapon we’d devised to fight them. It destroyed their shields, broke apart magical bindings and protections, and shattered the system’s planets. It damaged the star.”
I looked out toward where the computer said the white dwarf had to be. I’d wondered about that. Continue reading Space: Part 6→
“That’s not quite accurate. I doubt that very many ships can do this, but the main reason ships have near space drives is so they can hitchhike on larger spaceships. If you’ve got a near space drive, you can get close to a larger ship and get pulled into jump space with them.
“After that, you can stick with them or go off on your own. You can do the same thing with a jump gate—stick with the registered destination or choose one. So we won’t stick out that much. Continue reading Space: Part 5→
Whatever it was, it wasn’t doing anything immediately. If it turned out to be useful though, it wasn’t going to be easy to copy it for the team back home.
“That’s not all it is,” I told her. “I grabbed soundtracks from a few different science fiction movies—Star Wars, Alien, Star Trek, Iron Man—more than one from some series. Plus I downloaded TV show soundtracks too—Firefly is the obvious one, but a few other shows too. Plus, all my regular music.”
I felt like I could hear her eyebrow raise as she said, “So, SF movie soundtracks plus music that’s mostly appeared in Guitar Hero or Rockband, right?”
Some of you probably read Drew Hayes’ serial “Superpowereds.” Well, Drew’s on vacation this week and asked people to fill in. As it happens, I’m one of the people.
I wrote a new Legion of Nothing story to entertain people while he was gone and thought I’d pass it on to all of you that it exists.
In it Nick and Haley attempt to go on a date, but actually encounter that classic superhero scenario–the bank robbery.
We were in space and flying toward Lagrange point four, specifically to the Xiniti space station that guards the jump gate.
I was flying the jet—which wasn’t really a jet, but was actually a spaceship that we referred to as a jet and mostly used as a jet.
Imagine a dashboard full of glowing readouts and a window above it that showed glowing pinpricks of light that were mostly stars except that I knew some of them were galaxies. Off the top of my head, I couldn’t say which was which, but the spaceship’s AI could if I wanted.
Xiniti Space Station Batukti: Edge of Interdicted Space/The Human Quarantine
Nikataktuk of the Xiniti Jump Gate Command stood alone in his office. He’d rather be with the rest of his clan, but there were some things that were easier thought through alone—many things in his position.
He thought at the far wall and it changed. No longer a landscape of the jungles of his homeworld, it mirrored the stars outside the space station. He turned toward the wall to the right, calling up a map of known space complete with jump gates, military installations, and major trade routes. Continue reading Space: Part 1→
When the dust settled, a flash of blue light brought me back to the Heroes’ League’s headquarters. I appeared on their starplate, a small version of the ones I’d destroyed. Control looked up from the controls to smile at me. “It’s over. All their gateways are gone.”
Then she stopped smiling. “Could you maybe step off the starplate? I’ve got to turn it off and I don’t want to accidentally send you somewhere, or worse, send part of you somewhere.”
Something hit me from behind. I didn’t feel it, but I heard it sizzle as it hit my shield. It didn’t matter. I let the energy flow through me and build in my shield.
When I was in the military, scientists attempted to figure out where the energy that I use came from. They took genetic samples, poked and prodded me, fired different forms of radiation at my shield, and all they knew in the end was that I had the greatest capacity to draw power and hold it without using it that they’d ever seen.
