Then, pausing at the door, Patrick asked suddenly, “So what’s stopping you?”
The question caught Alek off-guard. He felt something rise to the top of his mind, shoving aside all the rationales and all the other excuses he might have mustered. He knew it immediately for what it was.
The truth? It seemed to be the day for it.
Alek stared up at the Striker, not knowing—no longer caring—if he were alone or if Patrick still stood at the doorway. “This whole thing.” He looked around the empty ‘Mech bay. “All of it,” he said. Then his voice dropped to a simple whisper. The way in which most basic truths were spoken.
“It scares the hell out of me.”
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Ilsa J. Bick is a writer as well as a recovering psychiatrist. She is the author of prize-winning stories and novellas, and has written such Classic BattleTech tales as Break-Away and The Gauntlet, Books I and II, as well as the MWDA novels Daughter of the Dragon, Dragon Rising, and Blood Avatar.
Other work has appeared in SCIFICTION, Talebones, Beyond the Last Star, Star Trek: New Frontier: No Limits, and Star Trek: Voyager: Distant Shores, among many others. She has several Star Trek: Starfleet Corps of Engineers e-books to her credit, and her next SCE e-book, Ghost, is forthcoming. Her first published novel, Star Trek: The Lost Era: Well of Souls, cracked the 2003 Barnes and Noble Bestseller List.
She lives in Wisconsin with her husband, two children, and other assorted vermin.
Randall N. Bills has served as the Classic BattleTech line developer, continuity editor, art director, and a primary author/novelist for almost a decade, where he’s led the publication of over fifty products for that universe.
He also served as the MechWarrior: Dark Age continuity editor, working for WizKids to help in the creation of that original universe—including its thirty full-length novels—and was the driving force behind the coffee-table art/universe book MechWarrior: Technology of Destruction. In addition he’s published fiction and game design in the Shadowrun, Earthdawn, Crimson Skies and Vor: The Maelstrom universes.
As well as publishing eight novels set in the Classic BattleTech/MechWarrior universe, he’s one of the lead writers kicking off the Adventure Boys series of Young Adult fiction as published by the Adventure Boys Company.
Randall lives in the Pacific Northwest with his beautiful wife Tara, and three busy children: Bryn Kevin, Ryana Nikol and Kenyon Aleksandr…oh, and Jak O’ the Shadows, a red-tailed boa.
Loren L. Coleman has been a novelist, game designer, and all-around literary hatchet man for over fourteen years. Regularly published since 1995, his first BattleTech novel, Double-Blind, hit the bookstores in 1997. In the last ten years he’s published over twenty novels, including nine for BattleTech and a trilogy to help re-launch the world of Conan. Counting up all short stories and game-related sourcebooks, he has well over two million words in print—most of them involving a media tie-in project of one type or another. Most recently Loren has edited two DAW anthologies as well as a six-series set of Young Adult works for Adventure Boys, Inc.
When he isn’t writing or launching new ventures, Loren plays Xbox games, collects far too many DVDs, and holds a black belt in traditional Tae Kwon Do. Currently he resides in Washington State with his wife Heather Joy, two sons Talon LaRon and Conner Rhys Monroe, and daughter Alexia Joy.
Jason M. Hardy is a beloved storyteller, international peacemaker, and revered philosopher who always enjoys the opportunity to write his own bio. He is the author of the MechWarrior: Dark Age novels The Scorpion Jar, Principles of Desolation (with Randall N. Bills) and the forthcoming The Last Charge, along with the Shadowrun novel Drops of Corruption. He’s contributed a number of stories to the BattleCorps website and, with the editor’s indulgence, will continue to do so. He lives in Chicago with his wife and son.
Kevin Killiany has been the husband of Valerie for over a quarter of a century and for various shorter periods of time the father of Alethea, Anson, and Daya. Since the late nineteen-sixties, Kevin has been an actor, a drill rig operator, a photographer, a warehouse grunt, a community college instructor, a drywall hanger, a teacher of exceptional children, a community services case manager, a high-risk intervention counselor, and a paper boy. He is currently a writer, with stories published in a variety of universes—including Star Trek, Doctor Who, MechWarrior, and of course Classic BattleTech. He is also an associate pastor of the Soul Saving Station in Wilmington, NC.
After experimenting with numerous occupations, Louisa Swann, a native Californian (ack! She admits it!) settled on writing as her long-term mental aberration. During her excessively loud oral dissertations (proven integral to her writing process as evidenced by numerous short story sales to DAW, Pocketbook, and BattleCorps), husband and son shake their heads and mutter something about “the muse.” In the interests of survival, husband Jim acquired an 80-acre compound complete with coyotes, frogs, and screech owls to serve as nightly backup band for a raving writer’s rants. Interdimensional traveling provides fodder for the muse, allowing Louisa to discover wonderful new places like the Classic BattleTech world and put them on her list of favorite places.
Steven Mohan, Jr. lives in Pueblo, Colorado with his wife and three children and—shockingly—no cats. When he is not writing he works as a manufacturing engineer.
He has sold more than twenty stories to BattleCorps, including the Jihad serial Isle of the Blessed. He appeared twice in Total Warfare, and has done work for several upcoming Classic BattleTech sourcebooks.
His original fiction has appeared in Interzone, On Spec, Polyphony, Paradox, and several DAW original anthologies, among other places. His stories have won honorable mention in The Year’s Best Science Fiction and The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror and he was nominated for the Pushcart Prize for his alternate history tale, A Monument More Lasting Than Brass.
Blaine Pardoe is an author of science fiction
