{"id":12185,"date":"2019-01-28T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-01-28T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/?p=12185"},"modified":"2019-01-24T16:56:48","modified_gmt":"2019-01-24T22:56:48","slug":"wip-excerpt-gunslinger-to-earth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wip-excerpt-gunslinger-to-earth\/","title":{"rendered":"WIP excerpt: Gunslinger to Earth"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Chapter One: Back to the Academy<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\nMy name is Rex Carter, and\nI am\u2014or rather, was\u2014from Earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI don\u2019t blame you for not\nbelieving me. If I hadn\u2019t experienced firsthand the events of my\nown life, I would be skeptical as well. But I assure you, my story is\ntrue. The legends of humanity\u2019s lost homeworld are, for the most\npart, based in fact. Sol was indeed the cradle of the human race, not\nSirius or Aldebaran or any of the nearby stars. The xenologists\u2019\nmain criticism of Sol, that it lacks a habitable-zone planet, are\nmoot because the world they are looking for\u2014Earth\u2014no longer\nexists in our plane of reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I\u2019m getting ahead of myself. My name is Rex Carter, and I was born on Earth only a few years after humanity made contact with the galactics. As a young man, I played a key role in\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[SPOILERS REDACTED]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026so I enrolled at Earthfleet Academy a year earlier than most of my peers. If I had to attend school, I was determined to get it over with as quickly as possible so as to get back to the business of having adventures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nLittle did I know,\nadventure would soon find me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nEarth had a single large\nmoon, which we called Luna. It was gray and rocky, with one-sixth the\ngravity of Earth, and no atmosphere. It was also the location of\nEarthfleet Academy. After a week-long break to celebrate the\nThanksgiving holiday with my parents down on Earth, I grudgingly\nreturned to my studies at the Academy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cHey, Rex,\u201d my roommate\nFrank greeted me as I entered our dorm room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI dropped my duffel bag at\nthe foot of my bed and flung myself onto the mattress. Earthfleet\nAcademy had its own artificial gravity to compensate for Luna\u2019s, so\nit felt very much as if I\u2019d never left Earth. The fact that I\u2019d\ntaken a teleporter back contributed greatly to the illusion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nNone of which improved my\nmood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe dorm room was clean and\nSpartanly decorated, as you would expect from a military academy.\nFrank lay back against his pillow with his laptop on his chest,\nplaying some game or chatting online with some friends back on Earth.\nQuite possibly both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cDid you miss me?\u201d he\nasked, giving me a lopsided grin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI rolled my eyes. \u201cMore\nthan I missed this place, that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cOh come on. The\nacademy\u2019s not so bad. Besides,\u201d he said, giving me a knowing\nlook, \u201cyou-know-who is back from Antarctica.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nBlood rushed to my cheeks.\nHe was talking about Charlotte Bujold, the girl I\u2019d been crushing\non since my first semester. I regretted having ever confided that to\nhim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cShe is?\u201d I asked in\nspite of myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cYeah,\u201d said Frank.\n\u201cCame back just yesterdayshift. I was going to tell her that you\nwere coming back early too, but\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cDammit, Frank. Please\ntell me you didn\u2019t say that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nHe laughed. \u201cDon\u2019t\nworry, my friend. I\u2019m just teasing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI groaned and rolled over,\nburying my face in my pillow. I\u2019d navigated my brother-in-law\u2019s\nstarship through space battles and war zones, and traveled far beyond\nthe Gliese colonies of Earthspace, but girls like Charlotte still\nmade my knees go weak and my tongue stammer. What can I say? I was\nstill young.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cTo be honest,\u201d Frank\ncontinued, \u201cI think Antarctica may have actually thawed the cockles\nof her cold little heart. She gave me a smile as we passed in the\nhall this morning. Didn\u2019t say anything, but she smiled. I don\u2019t\nthink she has anything planned before classes start on Monday. If\nyou\u2019re going to ask her out\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cShut up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cNo, I\u2019m serious. Now\u2019s\nas good a time as any. What are you afraid of?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cNothing,\u201d I said\nsullenly, burying my face even deeper. Of course, that was a lie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cDude,\u201d said Frank. He\nset his laptop aside and turned to face me. \u201cIf you like this girl,\nman up and ask her out. Nothing\u2019s going to happen unless you take\nthe first step.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI said nothing. This\ndissuaded him not at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cSeriously. You\u2019re not\ngoing to get a better chance than now. Once classes start up again,\nwe\u2019ll all be swamped from now until Christmas. She\u2019s sure to\nleave Sol for the holidays, and\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cI get the picture,\u201d I\nsaid, cutting him off. \u201cWhat do you suggest?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Frank sat up, his grin as lopsided as ever, and rubbed his hands together as if he were starting a project. My heart both sank and skipped a beat at the same time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

\nAbout half an hour later,\nnot quite sure how I got there, I found myself on a tram to the\nEarthfleet Academy library. Charlotte\u2019s roommates had told me she\nwas probably there when I\u2019d checked at her dorm. They\u2019d asked if\nI wanted to leave a message, but I\u2019d blushed, mumbled something\nincomprehensible, and gotten out of there as fast as if one of them\nhad thrown a live grenade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe main campus of\nEarthfleet Academy sprawled out leisurely across the mare,<\/em>\nor lunar plain. Since it was cheaper to maintain a lot of small but\ninterconnected artificial gravity fields than to put everything under\none giant dome, all of the various buildings were connected by trams.\nThe library was on the other side of campus from the dorms, not far\nfrom the spaceport and Earthfleet headquarters itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt was currently night on\nthe moon, and the Earth hung like a brilliant blue-green marble in an\notherwise dark sky. Swirls and streaks of bright white clouds covered\nits surface. The tram was mostly empty, so I had the view almost\nentirely to myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cPhoenix Tanner from\nEarthfleet News,\u201d the announcer on the radio stated, briefly\ninterrupting my nervous thoughts. \u201cTensions remain high at New\nAustralia as the Earthfleet task force headed by Field Admiral Cox\nrefused to lift the military quarantine of the system. The two\ncivilian ships detained by the task force remain under Earthfleet\ncontrol, and repeated requests by the colonial authorities to release\nthe crew have been denied. For the last several months, the president\nof New Australia has defied the Grand Council of Earth\u2019s ban on the\nimmortality serum to treat children suffering from chronic illnesses,\nwhile medical authorities on Earth insist that there are safe, legal\nways to address the colony\u2019s medical needs. In other news\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nMy mind drifted as the news\ndroned on. The only reason I\u2019d picked up that first story was\nbecause Charlotte was from New Australia. A little less than half of\nthe students at the academy were from the colonies. Sam Kletchka, my\nbrother-in-law, had attended for a year before dropping out. If he\nhadn\u2019t insisted that I finish my studies first, I would have\nalready dropped out and joined his crew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWell, that\u2019s not entirely\ntrue. I probably would have stayed on a couple more months, just to\nsee how things worked out with Charlotte. But the moment she rejected\nme, as I inwardly dreaded she would, I would have been out of there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThe tram came to a stop,\nand the doors slid open. I walked out on watery legs. The library was\na big place, even for Luna\u2019s standards, but I had a pretty good\nidea where to find her. Sure enough, she was studying at a cubby on\nthe library\u2019s top floor. I\u2019d seen her in the same general\nvicinity several times in the previous semester\u2014not that I was\nstalking her, of course. Her attention was focused on her tablet,\nwith headphones in her ears in a way that said \u201cdo not disturb.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAllow me to take a moment\nto describe just how gorgeous Charlotte is. Thin and petite, with\nhourglass proportions and a narrow waist, her eyes are a piercing\nblue and her hair is as black as midnight. It was cut just above her\nshoulders, so it bobbed and swung with every move of her head. Her\nface was long, her lips red and moist, her nose small and slightly\nupturned. It was the fire in her eyes, though, that really got to me.\nShe may have been small, but she was full of energy and passion, and\na hell of a lot stronger than she looked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWith all that said, you can\nunderstand why I was intimidated. The moment I saw her, I ducked\nbehind a nearby bookshelf and spent the next few minutes working up\nthe nerve to talk to her. Heart pounding and legs weak, I eventually\ndecided to hell with it and walked over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cH-hi Charlotte.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nShe glanced up at me with a\nlook of contempt normally reserved for strangers. Seeing that I\nwanted to talk, she reluctantly pulled the headphones out of her\nears.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cWhat do you want, Rex?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cI, uh, I heard you just\ncame back from b-break,\u201d I stammered. \u201cYour roommates said I\nmight find you here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nShe stared at me evenly,\nbetraying no reaction. I inwardly flagellated myself. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cSo, uh, we have a few\ndays before classes start, and I was wondering, uh, if maybe, uh, you\nwanted to get lunch or something?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nShe blinked. \u201cLunch?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cYeah,\u201d I said quickly.\n\u201cFood court, student center, tomorrow at noon. What do you say?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFrom the expression on her\nface, it looked like my attempt at asking her out had just crashed\nand burned. My heart sank. If falling through the floor was an\noption, I probably would have taken it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cI\u2019ll let you know,\u201d\nshe said, slipping her headphones back over her ears as she turned\nback to her tablet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\u201cUh, thanks,\u201d I\nstammered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nShe glanced up one last\ntime, as if to ask why I was still there. I beat a hasty retreat,\ntail tucked firmly between my legs, and silently cursed myself with\nevery bad word in my vocabulary. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI felt six inches shorter.\nI felt like I\u2019d forgotten to put on pants this morning. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI felt like a fool. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nOur encounter had lasted\nmere seconds, and yet as I walked in a daze back to the tram, I\ncouldn\u2019t help but dissect and analyze every moment of it.\nCharlotte\u2019s icy gaze. My own nervous stammering. Her utterly\nunreadable face. The longer I thought about it, the more convinced I\nbecame that I\u2019d made an utter fool of myself. Frank was wrong:\nasking her out in person had been a collossal mistake. Any hope I had\nof dating her was over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs the empty tram took off\nagain, I stared up at Earth, wondering what the hell I was doing with\nmy life. I didn\u2019t care about Earthfleet. I didn\u2019t care about my\nstudies. I did care about Charlotte, but that was all in the toilet\nnow, thanks to the fool I\u2019d made of myself. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nThat was when my phone\nbuzzed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nI frowned and pulled it out\nof my pocket. It was a text\u2014from Charlotte. My heart skipped a\nbeat, and for a very brief moment I hesitated, fearing to read it.\nBut curiosity soon got the better of me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nFood\ncourt<\/em>\ntomorrow at noon. I\u2019ll be there.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nA boyish grin spread across\nmy face as I pocketed my phone, and with no one else on the tram I\npumped my fist and shouted \u201cyes!\u201d \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nMaybe it hadn\u2019t gone as\nbadly as I\u2019d thought back in the library. Maybe she didn\u2019t think\nI was a fool. Maybe, just maybe, there was a chance things could work\nout with Charlotte and me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAs I was soon about to\nlearn, I had no idea what I was in for.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter One: Back to the Academy My name is Rex Carter, and I am\u2014or rather, was\u2014from Earth. I don\u2019t blame you for not believing me. If I hadn\u2019t experienced firsthand the events of my own life, I would be skeptical as well. But I assure you, my story is true. The legends of humanity\u2019s lost… Continue reading WIP excerpt: Gunslinger to Earth<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1135,1080],"tags":[474,985],"class_list":["post-12185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gunslinger-to-earth","category-gunslinger-trilogy","tag-excerpts","tag-wips","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iXK-3ax","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12185"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12185\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12200,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12185\/revisions\/12200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}