Author: jackdolinar

Her skin was dark, black as coal, and her eyes were an intoxicating violet. They shone when she laughed. She laughed often. It was a full sound, alive, and I couldn’t get enough of it. She laughed when she met me, so out of place. What was someone like you doing in a place like…

Erin bit her lip, considering. “We can always go back to Plan A,” I said, pain making me snappish. “Where I kill you, toss your body, and check the coordinates myself.” She sighed and shot me a withering look. “Kubos 3E3. A moon closer to the Center. There’s a place where we can lay low…

To be fair, there were always at least a dozen contracts worth more than ten million credits. Probably more if you counted backroom deals and unofficial hunts that never made it to the boards of any legitimate bounty hunting team. Link Grave, the legendary pirate captain, had a bounty of fifty million credits on his…

I scrambled to my feet, scooping up the Kheerzu sniper rifle in my left hand and the Colt revolver in my right, and sprinted for the exit. Behind me, her laspistols went pheew, pheew, covering my retreat. The barking orders of the camo-clad hunters and the ponderous whir of the Threezens’ miniguns echoed over the…

I dove sideways, my white robes billowing around me as Watcher whipped his hand out of the bag. In his grip was a Thundercrown F8, its long, laser-scoped barrel spitting bolts of blue-white energy that blasted across Chester’s kiosk. Rounding the corner, I lost my grip on Lilith as I caught myself with both hands,…

I swung the ship’s nose around, circling the station. Up close, Clarion was enormous—larger than any orbital station in this region had a right to be. My ship, Umbra, looked like an ant next to a bloodthirsty tarantula. The truth was, Clarion wasn’t supposed to exist. It wasn’t on any official holomaps, and its data…

I stepped out of the shower, cold droplets beading on my skin, and grabbed a towel from the bar. Scrubbing my face vigorously, I crossed the white-tiled floor to the mirror. Draping the towel around my neck, I stared at my reflection. Silver eyes stared back, framed by a week’s worth of stubble on my…

The mantis god screamed. Rage began to pour off him, shining through the chinks in his chitinous armor and spreading out around him in a dark red halo the color of blood. “What are you, mortal?” he demanded, voice scraping across my eardrums. Not a mortal. But I didn’t answer, eyes narrowing as I concentrated….

Preface “In this strange, twisted universe, there are many worlds. Most are lonely, desolate rocks. Some are husks, stripped of resources and left like the bones of a carcass picked clean by carrion crows. A few are inhabited, peopled by races grotesque and fantastical, and crystallizing from the collective consciousness of these people are their…