"Let's just cool off and talk in a few days, right? I lo—...well, goodbye." That slimy son of a bitch almost said I love you. Martin had spoken that lie so many times it was habitual. If he was in front of her right now she might kill him. He wasn't, of course, but he would… Continue reading Coming in Hot
Tag: Luna
New Moon
Wikus stared up at the Moon, and half a billion refugees stared back. He couldn't help but think of his grandfather, Papa. He would have been proud. The atmosphere within the domed city atop Olympus Mons was thin; not for being on Mars or even for its elevation, but for the allocations underway. Olympus Prime… Continue reading New Moon
End of an Era
The sun was only a few degrees above the horizon, but that's as high as it ever got. And though the unfiltered sunlight was intense, it always felt like nighttime at the moon's southern pole. With no atmosphere to diffuse the incoming light the contrast between daylight and shadow was stark. It always looked like… Continue reading End of an Era
The Solovyova Object
The Second Cold War was colder than the first, the stakes higher, the players more numerous. But it picked up in the most memorable arena of the First: the Moon. NASA and JAXA maintained a joint science outpost in the Avogadro crater on the far side, and it was from there that Comet Calvillo-Ōtsuka-Folts was… Continue reading The Solovyova Object
The Price of a Scholarship
Irina floated to the catwalk where her governess waited. Instead of taking the water pouch offered to her, she swatted it away and banged her side fist repeatedly against the bulkhead. Her governess swam over and scooped Irina loosely into her arms. "What has gotten into you, child?" Irina shrugged the woman off. "I don't… Continue reading The Price of a Scholarship
Meeting Your Maker
What would have been a simple excavation on Earth took more than nine years at Sinus Iridum. Still, it was worth the extra effort to be the first xenoarchaeologist. He'd sold all his worldly possessions, alienated his family, and watched his coworkers turn into tentative friends and then into casualties as Luna did its very… Continue reading Meeting Your Maker
Third Time’s a Charm
Terrance waited at the communication console at Central Command in lunar orbit. The survey teams were operating just within the orbit of Uranus and the signal delay was over two and a half hours. Whatever was going to happen had happened already. The first ship had been closer, nearly within Jupiter's sweep, albeit on the… Continue reading Third Time’s a Charm
Zyz’s Syzygy
Zyz awoke staring straight into the sun through a shattered skylight. Full charge. Elapsed down-cycle: 14:11:55.25. She remembered now wandering the tunnels for days in the dark and then scrambling to find a place to recharge before a forced shut down. In the end she'd had to tap into the aux capacitors to stay conscious;… Continue reading Zyz’s Syzygy
A Moon Now Fuller
The ancient texts tell us the moon was a symbol of beauty—with its many phases and their various attributions, its single face, its mythology, its mystical threat of eclipse—and there was great opposition to its dismantling. But to look upon its remains, that glinting ribbon in permanent embrace with Earth, I am overcome by the… Continue reading A Moon Now Fuller
Welcome to the Peregrine
Antonio's fine jacket and leather shoes were already soaked and dripping, but he shielded himself from the freezing rain beneath the bulk of the space freighter on dock seven. He set down a bulging duffle bag to shield his eyes from the spotlights on the ship's ramp, a briefcase hanging heavy in his other hand.… Continue reading Welcome to the Peregrine
Warmup Pages 