Copyright © 2020 Brandon McCoy
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2020
www.realmccoybooks.com
There are so many people to thank that have helped me along this journey….
you all can thank Leanna for demanding a longer thank you page.
To Aubree
For all the bedtime story inspiration, I gift to you an entire world.
To Shayne
Thank you for your encouragement, your laugh,
and your constant reminder that I had a book to finish.
To my guides, Carrie and Celia
Thank you for making an amateur feel like they
had something to share with the world.
And finally, to Leanna
You who have always seen the worth of my salt.
Without you this would be but empty pages.
Prologue
There was a knock at the door: rap, rap, rap.
“Enter,” a voice called from behind a desk cluttered with stacks of time-worn paper.
The metal door slid open with a whoosh. A tall man dressed in uniform gray stepped in from the corridor. His hands were full, and though he was not labored with his cargo, he did not seem eager to linger with it in his arms.
The man looked over the desk and the stacks of paper that surrounded the woman like a palisade. Such a scene might have been common a century ago when trees were plentiful, and the sky was still clear and blue. Now it was as much a symbol of failure as it was excess. Her hands moved delicately, conscious of fragility as she dismantled one pile, only to form two others.
“Here’s fine, Daniel,” the voice said as she carefully made space on the opposite end of her desk. She wore a smile, the eager smile that accompanies a long-anticipated gift.
Daniel placed the container down carefully as if the contents of the box were as delicate as the paper surrounding it. He pulled a bundle wrapped in black plastic out from under his arm and extended it towards her.
“What’s this?” she asked as she took the plastic bundle from him.
“Your mail,” he replied with a slight grin.
“Mail?” she said. “Must be Father’s idea of a joke. How did he even…” She trailed off as she opened the contents to reveal a heavy stack of letters bound in twine. With a weary sigh, she set the letters down on her desk.
“It was stowed away on a supply drone,” Daniel offered. “It had your name spelled out on the bottom with reflective tape.”
She sighed again. “I suppose the whole ship saw?”
“It was hard to miss, ma’am,” Daniel said.
“He couldn’t have contacted me like a normal person?” she asked, lifting a translucent piece of glass that flashed with the day’s breaking stories. Her image appeared under an unflattering headline. She saw it, frowned, and turned the device over. “No, he had to embarrass me with his nonsense. As if it wasn’t enough to be his daughter? As if I needed to be reminded of...”
She stopped and closed heavy eyelids around tired blue eyes. Taking in a deep breath, she let it out slowly as she tucked a strand of brown hair behind her ear. “Thank you, Daniel. Is there anything else?”
“No ma’am,” he replied though he made no motion towards the door. His back straightened even more.
She raised an eyebrow in invitation. “Is there something else, Daniel?”
“The captain has invited you to dine with him tomorrow evening.” He lingered as his statement slowly formed into a question. “Privately?”
She leveled a tired look at the stacks of paper on her desk, then to the parcel of unread letters. She frowned.
“Splendid,” she replied with a performer’s sincerity. “What time?”
“1900 hours.” He turned his attention to the well-worn lab coat that hung loosely on her slender frame. He shifted in his boots uncomfortably.
She followed his stare, self-consciously smoothing the wrinkled front of her coat with her palm.
Daniel opened his mouth to say something, then closed it, gave a salute, and exited back through the door.
She draped her hands over her face and grimaced. “Dinner,” she scoffed. “I’m sure that’s what he wants.”
She spun back and forth in her chair idly until the sight of the metal container caught her eyes. “Hello, handsome, did you miss me?”
She sprang from the chair and flipped open the latches on the lid of the container. There was a hiss as the hermetic seal was breached. The lid opened slowly—too slowly for her taste. She pressed against it until the hydraulic hinges strained in protest. She reached inside and pulled free a thick tome wrapped in worn leather. As she lifted it out of the container, a single scrap of synth-paper tumbled free. She ignored the note and set the book down on the desk in front of her.
The book said nothing in reply. It sat as silently as it always had, its dark leather cover holding tightly to its secrets.
She stared at the book for a moment then bent down to inspect the note from the floor. It was slick to the touch and carried the faint smell of algae. She unfolded it and read:
Good luck.
-L
“Bastard,” she cursed as she crumpled the note and tossed it to the side of her cabin where a bin sat overflowing.
She turned her attention back to the book, opening the cover before leafing through several pages hurriedly. Though she was concerned for the frailty of these pages once, she was no longer. She was tired of tiptoeing around; she was through being polite. She had to discover its secrets. She was growing impatient, impatient with its silence. She needed answers, and that bastard Leeland wasn’t going to help. She was running out of time.
There were mountains of research material at her disposal, thousands of years of academia. She had correspondence with over a dozen noted linguists, volumes of histories, and possibly the most comprehensive collection of myths and legends curated upon her embedded drive. None of that made a damn bit
