C. C. Blake's Sweaty Space Operas, Issue 9

By C. C. Blake

The interstellar cargo transporter, Rick Cave, finds himself caught in a nightmare scenario when a gang of saboteurs, political dissidents, and assassins decide his medium-tonnage vessel is their best shot at getting off Piotrsworld and out of Slav Space. Can Rick get himself out of trouble before the satanic envoys bring their Dark Lord onto his ship to make him a deal he might not be able to refuse? Author C. C. Blake mashes together his beloved occult fiction with the pulpy worlds of tomorrow in a truly special adventure!

Then, Dutch finds himself trapped in a menagerie of horrors when he dares to stand against the lunatic calling himself the Star Sultan. He will have to brave ghuls, crazies, and even a dragon if he hopes to get out and rescue his beloved Reemalah from the Star Sultan's clutches!

Issue Nine of C. C. Blake's Sweaty Space Operas shows no slowing down of the action and adventure Blake's fans have come to know and love. New readers can jump on board today with these stand-alone stories while longtime fans will find plenty of connective tissue between these adventures with what has already happened as well as hints of what is to come.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Twice Told Tales II
• Release date: Feb 24, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463371398

C. C. Blake

C.C. Blake has lived across the United States, starting in the suburbs of Detroit, to Massachusetts’ second largest city (Worcester) to the country’s seventh largest city (San Antonio, Texas, that is). He’s has a variety of jobs, working as a substitute teacher, the graveyard shift dishwasher at a haunted Denny’s, lab research monkey and teaching assistant at a second tier college. Currently, he works as an automation consultant for a chemical company on the Northeast side of SAtown (which isn’t as Hellish as it sounds). Blake’s most popular character, irrepressible adventurer Chuck Cave, has appeared in over two dozen stories, including the 2005 Man’s Story 2 Story of the Year Award winner “Chuck Cave and the Vanishing Vixen.” The character’s supernatural thriller stories (which began with the seminal “Cave and the Vamp”) are all being released as a part of Vampires2.com’s initial foray into e-books. These new versions are presented in expanded and revised versions, all are the author’s preferred texts. Be sure to collect them all! In addition to his pulp stories for the 2-Empire (Man’s Story 2, Vampires 2, Androids 2 and Paranormal Romance 2), Blake’s fiction has appeared in several anthologies, including Unparalleled Journeys II (from Journey Books Publishing) and Fearology: Terrifying Tales of Phobias (from Library of Horror Press).

Book preview

C. C. Blake's Sweaty Space Operas

Issue 9

C. C. Blake

Table of Contents

Rick Cave and the Brimstone League

Trapped in the Star Sultan's Labyrinth of Doom

About the Author

Rick Cave and the Brimstone League

The woman in the blood red nun's habit leaned forward and peered into my eyes, offering not even a hint of a smile on her arterial scarlet lips, and said, I told you your services were required, and you give us lip. The Brimstone League has chosen to bestow a great honor upon you, Mr. Cave. The least you can do is show proper submission and respect. Her birth name might not have been Mary Blood, but she had been rechristened as such.

We were in the docking station of Piotrsburg, a hallway down from where my medium tonnage vessel the HotTicket was getting the last dregs of her fuel refill. She was far happier than me, let me tell you what. The so-called Brimstone League, a team of six assassins serving the whims of the Six Satanic Majesties from Lucifuge, had dragged me to one side to make their offer: passage off planet and away from whatever crimes they had committed in exchange for my miserable life. I had not fallen onto my knees and crossed myself upside down and declared my soul committed to Hades.

That's Captain Cave, I replied, or tried to reply. A copper-flavored cough stole the words' volume, leaving them an unintelligible mumble.

What was that? Mary Blood asked, cupping a hand in the general area of her ear. The wimple's hood hid the orifice of course, though the rest revealed far more flesh than one might expect. The dark lord is listening, Cave.

I don't serve your puking dark lord, I said, and at a nod from the Satanic nun a fellow who fancied himself the Brimstone League's defacto leader socked me in the stomach.

Mary Blood cut with words, while Bruiser McQueen's fists could break concrete. The blow was harder than a lean man like McQueen should have been capable of; he was a rangy looking fellow who looked damn near dried out from being staked under hot suns in some desert world like King's Beach. He did not have visible augmentations, but he sure hit like he was packing muscle mods.

I sucked wind and hoped his blow had not ruptured anything my ship's modest medical bay couldn't seal. McQueen's second blow rang my bell, a low tolling sound in my ears that called all the supplicants to mass. If I put up any more fight, McQueen or one of his cronies was going to go too far and kill me. Then, it would be a simple enough matter to steal my ship.

Afraid I still did not hear you, the satanic nun said. Her face was the mask of innocence, quiet unaware of the vicious treatment she had ordered.

I said welcome aboard the HotTicket, I said when I could force language through my mouth with anything approaching audible volume.

Good boy, she said. The dark lord smiles upon those who aid his agents in this unclean universe.

I was not sure how to answer that. Great. I always wanted to attract the attention of supreme powers.

You already have, Captain, Mary Blood said. At another of her nods, a different pair of Brimstone League heavy hitters lifted me