They were doing repairs... ----- Chapter 8. Xander watched the installation of the precious coil in his VRD, one of the gloved hands gripping the coil and the other tightening part of a not-quite visible fixture. "There, that's got it!" the Sergeant said. "Check the connectivity, would you?" "Connection shows good, sir!" Tavana answered from the pilot's seat. "We just had the Trapdoor status light go green!" "Well, now, that's a relief and a half." A tiny glint in [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 7
June 6, 2016 By 1 Comment
They had repairs to do... ----- Chapter 7. Campbell activated the shaped pad inside his suit; the sweat on his forehead and eyebrows was quickly wiped away. "All right, Tavana. I'm out." He stood on the dimly-visible hull of LS-88, the innumerable stars of the galaxy sprinkled across the utter darkness like frozen sparks embedded in obsidian. Low down and towards the rear of the landing shuttle, he could see the enigmatic nearby star – one he was pretty sure was less than a light-year off – gleaming [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 6
June 3, 2016 By Leave a Comment
Well, they had power, but they were still stranded in the vast dark... ------ Chapter 6. Xander blinked himself awake and stretched, letting the tensing of his muscles start the blood pumping. The interior of LS-88 was quiet except for the faint hum of various pieces of equipment and the murmur of the environmental systems. It should also have been pretty dark, but there was a glow from the pilot's seat. Probably what woke me up. He glanced around. To his surprise, not only were Francisco and Maddox asleep, but the [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 5
June 1, 2016 By Leave a Comment
The biggest problem they faced right now was power... ----- Chapter 5. "You sure it's safe there, Sergeant?" "Sure I'm sure," he answered, focusing again at the indicator in his retinal display. "The 300M's got real good shielding. Barely above background levels outside the shell, even when operating. Right now she's down, so the only way it'd be dangerous is if I cracked the shell open and she was still hot inside. I only see about twenty-five service hours indicated on the system, so the lining's [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 4
May 30, 2016 By Leave a Comment
Well, it was time for our heroes to start fixing things... ------- Chapter 4. "What next, Sergeant?" Xander asked as they put the wrappers from the ration packs into the disposal. "Yeah, that's the question, isn't it?" Sergeant Campbell glanced around the shuttle's cabin. "What do you think, son?" "I think you're probably better qualified to answer –" "Damned right I am, son, but in this situation we all need to learn to be qualified. We're in an [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 3
May 27, 2016 By Leave a Comment
The castaways had been forced to a very difficult decision... ------ Chapter 3. Tavana stared at the screen, where Lieutenant Haley and the severed boarding tube from Outward Initiative were dwindling out of sight, and felt cold horror spreading through him. He'd seen the readouts, known how bad LS-88 was damaged, but this – a living person, now cast away into the endless void so that they could get some systems back online – hammered home the terrible situation in a way that no words could have. He found himself shaking [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 2
May 25, 2016 By 1 Comment
Our new cast was in a sticky situation... Chapter 2. "Sergeant!" came a half-panicked call from above, and Samuel Campbell turned from the mostly-unresponsive board. "You see something, Xander?" "It's… It's Pearce Haley, Sergeant!" "What?" Of all the answers he'd expected, that hadn't been one. Given the timing, a part of him had thought that Pearce might have been killed at the interface, but the idea that she was just outside… "Is she alive? Her suit intact?" "Yes, sir." Alive? And outside? [ Continue reading... ]
Castaway Odyssey: Chapter 1
May 23, 2016 By 3 Comments
Here we begin snippeting Castaway Odyssey; expect release of the eARC in July! CASTAWAY ODYSSEY By Eric Flint and Ryk E. Spoor PART I: ADRIFT Chapter 1 "Franky, get strapped in now!" Xander Bird said. "You're not my mama!" the red-haired little boy snapped back in a frightened tone. "You can't tell me what to do! And I'm not Franky! I'm Francisco Alejandro Coronel!" Xander closed his eyes for a moment, ignoring the lifeboat drill alerts, and took a deep breath, running his fingers through his slightly-too-long curly [ Continue reading... ]
Just For Fun: My Favorite Moments Part 1
April 14, 2016 By 1 Comment
I have often been asked what my favorite events, lines, or moments in my own books are. These favorites tend to shift some depending on my mood, and it's certainly hard in many cases to choose just ONE such for any given work. So I thought it might be interesting to describe and talk about up to three from any given work. Paradigms Lost: The first, and probably still my favorite of all, comes at the climax of the section titled "Lawyers, Ghouls, and Mummies", that ends with the simple line: Verne Domingo had come [ Continue reading... ]
Just For Fun: Superheroes Who Should Not Be Dark
April 5, 2016 By Leave a Comment
The recent release of Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice has created a huge amount of controversy, a large amount of it centering on the almost unrelentingly grim imagery of the movie, and most specifically on the depiction of Superman. Throughout my life, there have been several times in which people dealing with the superheroic have decided – in various media – that a superhero can't be done for a modern audience and retain the four-color brightness of their origins. The arguments vary but tend to boil down to a perceived, [ Continue reading... ]
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