I’m happily at work on Gunslinger to the Galaxy right now, just coming up on the halfway mark. With my new writing process, I make all the revisions as I go along, which means that the first chapter is more or less in a presentable state.
(As a side note, someday, I should do a blog post on my new writing process, because it’s radically different from the way I used to do it. Still got to work out some kinks, which I’m doing right now with Gunslinger to the Galaxy, but once I’ve got it down I should be able to produce publishable books on the first draft, in only a few weeks, as opposed to taking multiple drafts over the course of several years. Exciting stuff.)
In any case, here’s an excerpt from the first chapter. Enjoy!
In Which My Dear Husband and I Return to Earth
My name is Jane Kletchka, and I’m here to set the record straight.
By now, you’ve already heard my dear husband’s account of the Gorinal incident: how we were stranded in the armpit of the galaxy when the Gorinal jumpgate went down, how we both got caught up in an outcast Immortal’s million-year vendetta, and how together we thwarted it and stopped the galaxy from falling into a civilization-ending war. If only we’d known what we’d unleashed by doing so.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. As I’ve already said, my name is Jane Kletchka. I graduated summa cum laude from Earthfleet Academy with a double major in xenolinguistics and history. My parents urged me to pursue a graduate degree planetside, but I took the path less traveled and became a freelance xenologist. After gazing down on Earth from Luna for so long, it just didn’t make sense to clip my wings for another four years. I figured I’d spend a few years traveling the galaxy, do my part for intergalactic peace, then come back, find a nice Mormon boy, and settle down to raise a family.
Instead, I found my dear husband on the far side of the galaxy. If you’d told me only a year before that I’d marry a gunslinging mercenary, I would have laughed in your face. But so it was. Needless to say, settling down wasn’t in the cards anytime soon.
Still, as an old-fashioned Earth girl, I insisted on introducing him to my parents. So once our work at Gorinal Prime was complete, we set the Star Runner on a course for Sol.
* * * * *
“Sixteen days,” said Sam, shaking his head in disbelief. “Can you believe it? Sixteen f—”
“Ah ah,” I said, stopping him before he could swear. I love my dear husband, but he has a tongue as wild as the colony of New Texas where he was born.
“Sorry, honey,” he said, putting an arm around my waist. I tousled his dirty blond hair and glanced out the cockpit window at the starry warp-bubble that surrounded our ship.
“How long did it take when you first left Earth space?” I asked.
“Ten freaking months,” he said, catching himself. “Took a third-class berth on a Hyadian star crawler headed straight for Aldebaran, and by the end I was so bored I half-considered shooting myself for the diversion.”
“I’m glad you didn’t,” I said, stroking his back with my fingertips.
Down by my legs, a calico cat meowed. The Star Runner is a cozy little ship, designed for a crew of two with room for only one passenger. That was why Imutab had taken her cat form. A shapeshifter empath from the Silver Diadem, she’d signed on with us shortly after the Gorinal incident. As newlyweds, we didn’t mind her, so long as she was discreet.
“Uh, Jane,” said Tarak from the copilot’s chair. “Sam’s thinking about—”
“Thanks, but I’ve got a pretty good idea.”
Unfortunately, “discreet” does not accurately describe Sam’s copilot and first mate. Tarak is a Myadian, a race from the Scutum-Crux arm of the galaxy. They look a bit like hairless satyrs. Being telepaths, others tend to distrust them, so they mostly keep to their own kind. Tarak fell out with his clan, making him doubly the misfit. He’s a good person, though. It took a while for Sam to come around to him, but even he had to admit that it can be useful to have a telepath as your first mate, no matter how awkward or annoying he can be.
I leaned over and gave my dear husband a rather lengthy kiss. Imutab purred contentedly, while Tarak thankfully refrained from any more unwanted commentary. A cozy ship like the Star Runner makes everyone feel close.
“Let’s come out of warp before we’re inside Luna’s orbit,” I said. “I want to let my parents know we’re coming.”
“Sure thing, honey. We’re in no rush.”
“Also, I’m sure that Earthfleet will want to debrief us.”
“Debrief?” he said, frowning, “Honey, we’re private citizens.”
“Private citizens with a warship and a letter of marque and reprisal that goes straight to the top of Earthfleet itself. Or have you already forgotten all the upgrades we got from the EFS Auriga?”
“Don’t tell me you never dreamed about marrying a pirate.”
“Actually,” Tarak interjected, “Jane never—”
“That’s enough, Tarak,” I said, leaning over to give my dear husband another kiss. Imutab’s purring grew louder.
* * * * *
Returning to Sol was the easy part. Getting to Earth was much harder.
First, we had to get permission from Earthfleet to approach the planet itself. The Star Runner was originally a Setarni ship, which meant that the authorities didn’t recognize us as human at first. Even after we showed them the letter of marque and reprisal, they still insisted on an escort—for our “convenience.”
At least the debriefing was relatively painless. Since we fell in a category somewhere between mercenaries and pirates, they moved us along as quickly as possible. The same can’t be said of the authorities at Earth.
I won’t bore you with all the catch-22s of the bureaucratic nightmare we had to endure just to set foot on our beloved homeworld. Since since Sam had lost his passport and Earthfleet didn’t officially recognize us, we spent almost thirty-six hours waiting on a temproary ID from the colonial consulate. When the customs agents found out about Sam’s numerous firearms, they tried to force him to register them all, which threw him into a fit. I can’t remember how I managed to smooth that one out.
Eventually, we worked out an arrangement that left the Star Runner in high orbit, technically still in Earthfleet’s jurisdiction, and agreed to teleport onto the main spaceport for a shuttle to the surface.
“I don’t see why we need a shuttle when we’ve got line of sight to the surface,” Sam muttered as we made the final preparations for our departure.
“Because the only place we can register is on the spaceport,” I told him. “If the authorities pull us over when we’re planetside, and we haven’t—”
“I know, I know.”
I gave him a quick kiss, which seemed to help. Tarak keyed the teleporter, and the next we knew, we were surrounded in a conduit of shimmering blue light.
Teleporting is never a pleasant experience, but I take to it better than Sam does. As the light dissipated to reveal the spaceport concourse’s teleport pad, he made a face like he’d swallowed his own vomit. Thankfully, that was the worst of it.
The first thing about the spaceport that stood out to me was the sheer number of humans that filled the place. There were very few aliens in the crowd, and most of those were Hyadians. After spending so much time on the far side of the galaxy, it felt weird to be surrounded by people who look just like me. The second thing that stood out was just how crowded the spaceport was. Between the teleport receiving pads and the security checkpoint, people were packed almost shoulder to shoulder.
A haggard security officer with a permanent frown and bags under her eyes ushered us off of the platform. “This way down, this way down,” she said with practiced monotony. “The checkpoint is directly ahead, on the right.”
I’ve never seen Sam so tense outside of a combat situation. I took his hand.
We passed through the security scanners without incident. There was some confusion on the other side when the officer failed to locate his ID implants, but the documents from the consulate checked out and we proceeded to customs and registration.
Here, we were not so lucky. The customs officer refused to recognize Sam’s documents and called up his supervisor, who detained us for questioning. I rubbed my dear husband’s back and ignored his muttered cursing as we waited in the windowless interrogation room.
At length, the door swung open. “Greetings,” said a short man with brown skin and slanted eyes. His navy-blue uniform was wrinkled but clean.
Sam said nothing, so I smiled and offered my hand.
“Hi.”
He pointedly ignored my gesture and took a seat across from us.
“Your documents show that you are Sam and Jane Kletchka, from New Texas.”
“From Earth,” I corrected. “Sam is from New Texas, I’m from Earth.”
“Yes,” the officer muttered, checking his tablet. “Your ID checks out, miss Jane Elizabeth Carter. However, we have no record of marriage to a Mister Sam Kletchka.”
“Our marriage was performed at Gorinal Prime by Captain Isiatuk of the Silver Diadem,” Sam told him calmly.
The officer frowned. “Gorinal Prime? That doesn’t sound familiar.”
“It’s in the Scutum-Crux Arm,” I explained. When that failed to register a response, I added: “Of the galaxy.”
“Ah,” he said, raising an eyebrow. “I take it that isn’t in Earthspace?”
My dear husband frowned so deeply that his mouth disappeared into his beard. Things didn’t get any better from there.
I’ll spare you a blow-by-blow. Once again, the colonial consulate had to smooth things over, and we very nearly spent a night on those hard plastic seats in the interrogation room.
Eventually, though, we boarded a planetside ferry shuttle. Exhausted from the ordeal, we did so without a word, joining the mass of other zombie-like travelers who crowded the aging shuttlecraft like so many human sardines.
