Stardreamer: Shades Space Opera, #2

By Rock Forsberg

'It's a portal to our universe. We have to warn the others.'

 

To save life as they know it, Tredd Bounty and his superhuman crew seek to reunite the five Shade gods. The only problem is that they are impossible to find, and time is running out.

 

Doctor Belinda Killock has a different approach: she is creating a new superweapon for the navy. To make it work, she needs a source of deep energy. That's when Tredd and his fellow FIST operatives start to look less like allies and more like a resource to be exploited.

 

When the aliens attack, it's evident that the portal to hell is made of good intentions. 

 

Nobody is ready. Everyone is fighting. But who's the real enemy?

 

Stardreamer is the second book in the exhilarating Shades Space Opera series. If you like gritty heroes, alien encounters, and paranormal powers, then you'll love Rock Forsberg's action-packed novel.

 

Buy Stardreamer now to ride beyond the universe!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rock Forsberg
• Release date: Mar 23, 2021
• ISBN: 9789526895925

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Kuleema—an Andronese word, which in common language translated roughly to ‘the moment when things turned bad’—floated through Eddie’s consciousness.

Shaking it aside as a typical glitch of his mind’s relocation, he opened his eyes. He was lying on the floor of a small room, a perfect cube with four black walls—doors on two of them, a window on one, and a clock opposite the window. Black floor and black ceiling sucked the white light that was bleeding in from the corners.

The room had become a familiar place: it was where he spent the time he blacked out in the real world. He could bring nothing with him, and as such, he had first treated it as nothing but a dream, his mind’s creation. For years, he had visited the room, unable to open the doors, until, with Warrigal’s help, he had learned the true nature of this strange place. And when he had first opened the doors, he had seen the vast plane of Remola.

Beside him, Warrigal got up. He was one of the Shades, and as Eddie’s master he guided him in controlled travel between the realms.

‘I’ve a bad feeling about this.’

‘What is it?’ Eddie said.

‘I will take us down and show you.’ Warrigal sat on the chair in the middle of the small room. Sitting upright, his back straight, he closed his eyes and entered a state where he controlled the space.

The room jerked, and the view from the window changed. Massive black shapes whizzed past their otherworldly cabin as Warrigal flew them over the plane of Remola, a vast cityscape. Under the dark sky stood countless towers which, unlike the boxy buildings of Spit City, were like massive, black, glistening treetrunks, with boughs like muscles. Soon, the tall arboreal structure of the buildings gave way to lower ground, full of moving creatures that resembled ants.

The movement outside the window subsided, and with a slight bump, the cabin stopped.

Eddie hadn’t been to this place in Remola before, but novelty had become the norm, as the plane seemed to be infinite. Also, he had never been so close to the moving things on the ground. They were no ants; they were huge.

He put his hand on the door handle, but before turning it, he glanced at Warrigal. ‘Is it safe?’

‘They are still unable to discern our presence,’ Warrigal said, rising from the chair. ‘Perhaps their senses are unconditioned for the likes of us.’

Warrigal was a Shade and Eddie was a human, but here they were both outsiders exploring a strange land. Eddie took a deep breath and pushed the door open. He gasped at the sight.

In front of him spread a seemingly endless flat space, unlike anything he had seen in Remola before, filled with massive, elongated black structures, which rested horizontally and didn’t seem to have any roots into the ground.

‘What are those things? Ships?’

Warrigal nodded by his side. ‘I was hoping this wouldn’t happen so soon. They have moved faster than I ever expected.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘They’re building a fleet,’ Warrigal said, with an unwavering expression. ‘Let’s move.’

Warrigal returned to the chair in the middle of the room and closed his eyes. Eddie pulled the door shut and the cabin jerked again as Warrigal flew them up and over the infinite alien shipyard. Far in the horizon something glimmered.

‘Did you see that?’ Eddie asked.

‘Felt it,’ Warrigal grunted, and heaved a sigh. ‘This can mean only one thing…’

As they approached, the form of the glimmer became clearer. From the middle of a gigantic convex plate rose a stream of what looked like white energy. It was difficult to estimate the height, and from afar it looked like it reached relatively low in the sky. Where it ended, the crimson sky was black.

All around the structure from which the energy beam originated, the colossal Remola ships were lit with green lights and slowly took off from the ground.

At the end of the energy beam, the blackness revealed stars.

‘It’s a hole in the sky,’ Eddie said.

‘It’s a portal.’

‘To where?’

Warrigal opened his eyes. ‘To our universe.’

‘How is that possible?’

Warrigal stood up and stepped beside him. ‘I can only guess, but the more I think about it, the more I get a sense that their whole existence is about attaching to our universe and coming through.’

‘Why now?’

Warrigal shrugged. ‘We always thought that entropy would rip the universe apart and kill the heat, but that was far, far in the future. I thought we’d have more time, but we don’t. Yesterday’s future is now, and Remola is the ripper.’

‘We have to warn the others,’ Eddie said.

Like the first wind of a storm, the once vague notion of another plane bleeding in had just become real. Kuleema indeed.

CHAPTER TWO

Evie tried to stand still on the bridge of the League’s Fegora cruiser, staggering as the ship shook. Their shields were blasted out and the hull was littered with breaches. The controls screamed in red. A Kohonro frigate loomed in front of them, its commander calling out to them via video link.

‘What do you want?’ she asked.

‘Your death will make me a hero among my own,’ he said, hissing through his faceplate. ‘My swarm surrounds your ship and will pierce you on my command. I only want to capture your face in defeat.’

She turned around and peered at her crew. They stared at the big screen in terror.

Of course.

She hit the control board, removing the Kohonro commander from the screen. ‘Fire the fairies!’

The weapons officer turned to her with a question in his Andron eyes. The photon air scatter—or fairy, as it was called—was their last line of defence. It would drain their energy reserves until they could barely move and hold life support.

‘You heard me,’ Evie said, portraying confidence, though inside she knew it was a gamble. ‘Let them fly!’

‘Captain,’ the officer replied, and tapped the launch sequence. ‘The fairies are go.’

If someone were looking at the two ships from afar, they would have seen a dazzling show of fireworks lighting up the black vacuum. The fairies shot forth, sizzling around the Fegora cruiser’s nose and expanding out into a net of white light that headed towards the Kohonro frigate. At the same time, thousands of Stygian flyers that had hovered in dark silence lit up with the power of their burners as they charged full blast towards the Fegora. The cast net of fairies engulfed the frigate, which for a moment became a bright ball, like a star. The flyers pierced the unprotected hull of the League’s cruiser, into the command centre, into the engines, and into the reactor. Both ships went up in flaming white light.

For a moment, Evie felt like she was floating alone in emptiness.

She had lost a battle with the Kohonro, but at least she had brought them down and made zero of their plans. It was worth the sacrifice.

The game over, her surroundings changed to the virtual gaming hub of Momentum 6, a multitude of listings and scoreboards around her. She peered at the result of her last gambit.

‘The Kohonro survived? Impossible!’

A dark and handsome man had appeared in the virtual hub—‘Santa5k’, his username, hovering above. It was Gus, her mentor and guide to hacking the network. Seeing his avatar made Evie giggle every time — it was just so different from his real-world appearance.

‘The Kohonro frigate’s shields absorbed the fairies,’ he explained.

‘I gave them full power,’ Evie said. ‘I was one hundred per cent sure I took them down.’

Gus grinned. ‘The Kohonro are like Spit City cockroaches. You think you’ve smacked one down and it scuttles away and bites you in the butt.’

Evie smirked. She enjoyed his humour, even if it did little to improve her mood. The same went for Momentum 6, which to Evie had become devoid of joy. It had been half a standard term since she’d joined FIST, and while the others were on their escapades, she remained stuck in the Pentafol building. And to top it all, even Berossus had started acting weird too.

But it hadn’t been a complete waste of time. Looking back to when she first met Gus, she had changed from someone who thought she ruled the network to someone who actually did.

‘How are you going with Hush10m?’ Gus asked.

It was the codename of a project she was working on for him in exchange for him teaching her.

‘You can check it tonight.’

‘That’s fast,’ he said with a squint. ‘It must be hackproof.’

‘Should be, I’ve had plenty of time to run sandbox tests.’ On the topic of time, Evie realised it was already late. ‘Oh, gosh! I should get ready for the ball.’

‘See you there,’ Gus said, with no hurry at all.

Evie stood beside Berossus like a deer beside an elephant and marvelled at the crowd around them. The ballroom in the top floor of the Pentafol building had a high ceiling, supported by heavy beams and covered with one-way transparent slabs through which the nearby gas giant Heeg glowed red against the black of space—red and black, the colours of FIST. The room was lit by balls of light that floated slowly above them. The stage was dark except for the corner, where a band of Jindalar men in black played soft vaporwave tunes.

The event was to celebrate FIST’s half-centennial and had attracted people not only from Spit City but from around the galaxy. The Dawn Alliance were represented by a number of significant politicians and officials, including Dawn Alliance Chief of Military Mr Bunlier and Member of Dawn Parliament Ms Roce, as well as a navy group under Admiral Atamian’s leadership.

Evie revelled in the idea that most of the people in the crowd were oblivious to what FIST stood for. Not long ago, Freedom in Spit Today had been a borderline-legal rebellious organisation fighting for dominance over Spit City. With Dawn Alliance Navy collaboration, the name was dropped, and people forgot fast.

Even Berossus wore a FIST celebratory uniform. Compared to the normal one, this had a more angled jacket with red highlights, and it looked great on his broad figure. Even after his appointment to FIST, he routinely wore plain T-shirts and hung around with the techies like one of the guys.

Evie spotted a familiar figure walking towards them and tugged on Berossus’s shoulder. ‘It’s Inanna.’

It had been a long time since Evie had last seen Berossus’s mother. Then, she had been bedridden with phalaxymy, cured by Dr Killock just before Yedda and Moola collided. Evie could not hide her surprise as she saw her now.

‘She’s radiant!’

Berossus smiled. Inanna’s skin was smoother and her whole being was warm and full of life. It was a huge transformation from the shadow of a woman Evie had last seen.

‘Mother,’ Berossus said as she came up to them, and then he hugged her. ‘Great you could make it here. And you look so good too.’

‘I am delighted to be here! It’s just marvellous, this gala, it reminds me of the old days, the ball at Christonia—the air of it, the lights, the sounds, and the people… I was so young then. This makes me feel like I’m young again.’

‘You look like you are,’ said Evie.

Inanna gave a warm smile in response to Evie’s hesitant look. ‘Yes, I remember you, Evie. Delighted to see you again. I trust you’ve been well?’

‘I have, thank you, ma’am.’

She placed a hand on Evie’s arm. ‘Inanna, it’s Inanna.’

Evie smiled. Inanna wore a long gown in orange and red that sparkled under the spotlights. It was festive, but at the same time graceful.

‘Your recovery is astonishing,’ she said.

‘The doctor truly was a miracle worker. I would like to thank her, but Berossus tells me he can’t reach her.’

Evie swallowed. She was still perplexed by the whole situation. Dr Belinda Killock had cured Berossus’s mother when they visited her at the Five Ways space station. Soon thereafter she had turned out to be a Dawn Alliance Navy Special Forces agent, betrayed the whole crew and captured Aino, the girl who could move stars. But in the end, Evie and the FIST posse had recovered Aino. Last time she saw Bells was when they had left her with the rest of the navy crew unconscious on a ship on the planet Laine, where the Shade Aalto resided. Later she had heard that the navy had salvaged the ship soon after they had returned to Spit City. But the fact remained: Bells had indeed cured Inanna. It was obvious Berossus hadn’t told the whole story to his mother, and Evie would be sure to keep it that way.

‘It’s a shame. We dropped her off but can’t seem to find her again.’

‘I hope she’s all right,’ Inanna said.

‘I’m sure she is,’ Evie said. ‘Saving other people in need somewhere.’ She had probably failed at hiding what she knew, but Inanna said nothing about it.

Instead, Inanna placed her hand on her son’s arm, as if about to say something, but then stopped. ‘Oh, your arm…’

‘Yeah,’ Berossus said, and peeled back his sleeve. The jacket was tighter than the shirt, so he could only pull the clothing halfway up his forearm, but it was enough to reveal a prosthetic arm, which had no skin imitation, just a metal sheet cover. He grunted, and Evie thought he blushed. ‘It’s better than I expected. I wanted it unskinned, so I would remember. Nowadays I don’t even feel the difference.’

Inanna looked at him with a tinge of sadness in her face. She said, ‘I’m happy it turned out well in the end.’

While captured on a navy ship landing on Eura, Berossus had become a raging monster and lost his arm in a fight with Vice Admiral Vorlar Block. Evie expected Inanna knew what happened to him when he went down on a planet, and that they had probably talked things through, but Berossus had likely changed some of the details.

As Berossus and his mother chatted, Evie looked around for familiar faces. A robot waiter whizzed past and offered some fatty-looking balls. Evie was just saying no to them as Berossus leaned over.

‘Awesome, they’ve got shrocks!’ he said, grabbing a handful.

Evie shook her head. Shrocks were slimy, fatty balls of meat. She hoped they had real food too. The executive life with FIST was luxurious—she had everything, and if she didn’t, she had people to provide for her every whim. The only problem was that it had become boring. Sure, there was a lot to do, but nothing was real. Things were too good. Good and boring. Out in space, running in the Rutger cargo ship with Tredd and Berossus and Eddie, she had felt alive. Now she was living in a fancy cage—just like she had at home.

She had run away from home when she was just sixteen. Her father, wearing the disguise of a diplomat, was a monster beneath. She loved her mother, but because of him, she had cut all ties to them. FIST was her only family now.

Does family always become a prison? At least Momentum 6 has just received a new expansion.

Eyeing the crowd, she found two familiar grey men: Sarthon Exxoc, the taller, a tough-looking warrior, was talking with short and chubby Gus. Evie excused herself and drifted towards them.

‘Show me the stuff and I will,’ Gus said to Sarthon, furrowing his brow.

‘I see. Well, we have to give it a while then,’ Sarthon said, and chuckled. ‘Regardless, it’s great to have you on the team.’

‘I’m not—’ Gus said, but failed to finish his sentence as he spotted Evie approaching. ‘Look how gorgeous you are.’

Sarthon nodded in agreement.

Evie blushed. ‘It’s nothing,’ she said, even though she appreciated the compliment.

‘Besides beautiful, how are you?’ Sarthon asked. Standing tall, with short grey hair and heavy lines on his edgy face, he exuded authority. He had been a FIST leader for a long time, and had introduced Tredd and his crew to the organisation.

‘Good, thanks.’

Gus gave her a look.

‘Well…’ She cleared her throat. ‘I could do with a bit more action.’

Sarthon raised his brows. ‘You already have so much going on with your studies, training, and FIST administration.’

Evie shook her head. ‘It’s not that there’s nothing to do, but I believe I’m not the best person to run an office.’

‘OK,’ Sarthon said. ‘What do you propose?’

‘I want to go out on a mission. Like Tredd and Jill went to Ronagon with Berossus, and Eddie visits the world of Remola with Warrigal. I want to help find the remaining Shades. I want to do something other than sitting on my butt all day.’

Sarthon chuckled. ‘You don’t have military training. I don’t want you to be blown to pieces.’

Evie snorted at the comment.

Gus eyed Sarthon with a serious expression. ‘You should’ve seen her fight the Kohonro in Momentum 6. She is in her element when things heat up. Unlike most, she’s calm under pressure.’

Evie nodded, knowing that she perhaps looked calm even though she was about to crack, and stared up into Sarthon’s evaluating eyes.

‘Perhaps you should talk with Tredd when he’s back.’

‘I will,’ Evie said.

‘Make no mistake,’ Sarthon said, ‘FIST leadership think you’re doing a good job, and we will support your decision. Also, your commendation from Aalto is indisputable.’

She delighted in hearing Sarthon affirm the quality of her work, but the problem was that she didn’t care about the work at all. She planned to speak with Tredd as soon as possible, whether he wanted her to or not. Over the past months, Tredd had given her a list of excuses as to why she couldn’t participate in his missions. No more.

The band stopped playing and the lights above the hall dimmed. As the stage grew brighter, people started quieting down and turned towards it. Henning Dal—the public face of FIST leadership, and Aino’s father—stepped into the spotlight, wearing a black and red FIST celebratory robe.

He took a step forward and said, ‘Honourable ministers of the Dawn Alliance, representatives of the five races, leaders of Spit City, dear guests, it is my pleasure to welcome you to the FIST half-centennial ball.’ Henning nodded, smiling at the crowd’s applause. As it faded, he continued, ‘As the newly appointed head, I’m thrilled to steer an organisation that is as bold as it is generous…’

He went on to describe FIST’s origins and the current role it held as a conglomerate service provider to every Spit City inhabitant and beyond. He had written his speech carefully to please the interests of various stakeholders in the crowd, and as Evie expected, never even hinted at the true nature of the organisation.

‘As a token of our expanding collaboration, I would like to invite Admiral Atamian of the Dawn Alliance Navy to say a few words.’

The crowd cheered as the admiral climbed onto the stage. A stocky Andron, Henning stood tall over him, but something in his appearance commanded respect. They shook hands, and as the applause faded, the admiral spoke.

‘I was but a fresh captain when I first heard of FIST, and it wasn’t good.’

Amused laughter broke out in the crowd.

‘You know, a shadowy outfit, treading by the boundaries of the Dawn Alliance law. I never thought I’d be here as an admiral, announcing a new collaboration between FIST and the navy.’

The crowd cheered. Not too far from her, to the right, Evie saw Eddie.

‘Just last night in the Dawn Central, the Navy leadership signed a treaty with FIST to deepen our collaboration by sharing data and cooperating in…’

Evie lost interest as the admiral continued his barrage of jargon and elaborate words about the benefits of the treaty not only to Spit City, but also to the Dawn Alliance as a whole.

Around her, people listened patiently, some whispering, some looking down at their handheld devices. When the admiral and Henning shook hands, the crowd burst into applause.

As the crowd scattered, Evie headed towards Eddie, who was talking with a cyborg of sorts. Evie picked up a flute of bubbly drink from a robot server and glided over.

‘Katamokaru?’ the cyborg said with an incredulous expression.

‘That’s where the lead from the depths of Ronagon points.’

‘Hey,’ Evie cut in. ‘What are you talking about?’

Eddie leaned closer and lowered his voice. ‘Shinzaburo. Sources say he’s residing deep in the forests of Katamokaru.’

‘Really?’ Evie asked. She found it odd that a Shade god would be hiding in Katamokaru, an ancient Jindalar home which had been abandoned thousands of years ago. Now it was preserved in its natural state so as to respect the order of nature. Perhaps that was what had drawn the Shade there.

‘Yeah,’ the cyborg said with a wonky smile. A tall and slender man, both of his arms were artificial, and he didn’t wear sleeves to try to hide it like Berossus. The only real human feature was his face, where he had thick, wrinkled skin that formed heavy lines around his eyes and on his cheeks and forehead. His stupid grin made him look like he’d put all of his money towards body mods and had nothing left to upgrade his mind.

As Evie stared at him, the cyborg became flustered. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t believe we’ve met. I’m Rixon, a FIST operative.’ He offered a hand.

‘I’m Evie. I’ve been down with these folks a lot, too.’

Rixon grinned as they shook hands.

‘What do you plan to do?’ Evie asked.

‘We will go down to Katamokaru,’ Rixon said.

‘It’s a jungle. How are you going to find Shinzaburo?’

‘Hush,’ Eddie said, glancing about for unwanted ears. He leaned in. ‘We have a strong lead of his whereabouts.’

‘I want to join you.’

‘I see no reason why not,’ Eddie said, ‘but it’s Tredd’s expedition. You should talk to him.’

‘So, when are we going?’

‘As soon as possible. The mission has become the priority. My last visit confirmed the Remolans are moving faster than we thought. We have warned the navy and prepared our fleet for mobilisation, but I believe the only way for humanity to succeed is to gather the support of all five Shades.’

Of course, that was proving to be difficult. The Shades had fallen apart through a disagreement aeons ago. Aalto wanted to unite them again against the threat of Remola, whereas Nenetl was said to want to restart the universe. Warrigal had stayed in contact with Aalto, and was now exploring the realm of Remola with Eddie. There had been nothing about Efia or Shinzaburo—until now.

‘So, when?’ Evie asked eagerly.

Eddie shrugged.

‘What about Daler Tait?’ Evie said.

Eddie squinted. ‘Indeed, what about him?’

Evie said, ‘I understand it was because of him that FIST learned about the Starcrasher.’

‘In a way, but actually it was through Tommy Huckey, who back then was after Aino already. Daler had a clue about the whereabouts of the superweapon— Oh, Aino’s there, by the way.’ Eddie pointed at a girl in a white and red dress. She was holding hands with her father, Henning Dal.

‘But she’s not the superweapon,’ said Evie.

‘Well, not alone, but that’s semantics,’ Eddie said. Lowering his voice, he continued, ‘It won’t be long until Admiral Atamian’s people figure it out. It might be that Dr Killock is involved again. They’ll realise that the two hundred and fifty-five copies of Aino they captured from Avalon—all except one—had been connected to a powerful grid, and that they can do without the original Aino. Then it’ll only be a matter of time before they—’

‘Can move stars!’ Evie said, shocked by the realisation. People around turned to look, and she pressed her hand to her lips, feeling awkward.

‘There’s nothing we can do about it,’ Eddie said, ‘and neither should we. Instead, we need to prepare for Remola, and make sure the navy is prepped too. Them having the ability to move stars might just be the thing to help us win.’

‘But only,’ Rixon said, ‘if they take it seriously. So far, it seems Admiral Atamian thinks the whole Remola threat is a hoax.’

Eddie sighed. ‘It’s real. I’ve seen the Remolans preparing. The invasion will happen, and now I doubt if we have enough time…’

‘Why, what did you see?’

‘They’re ugly, they’re big, they have humongous ships on a perplexing scale, and they’re burning a hole into the sky with some kind of energy beam.’

‘What does that mean?’ Rixon said.

‘I don’t know, but if you want my guess, they’re preparing a gateway to our world. I will go back with Warrigal to confirm this and see if we can find anything to help us.’

Evie gasped. So it might already be happening.

CHAPTER THREE

Tredd leaned against the bar and sipped a straight-up Kikuchian. He wore a fancy shirt with the top buttons open, and a suit that made him look like he was ten years fitter. The lights were down low, and under the red spotlight, a singer with white curls and hot red lips squirmed in a tight dress.

Baby it’s my destination,

Every time we touch.

I’ll be your passion’s creation,

Cos you love me much.

The mood fumes mixed with the song in the air and with the longing in Tredd’s mind. The hall was filled with loaded outlaw gentlemen and shady ladies, all enjoying the evening in Bumblebee, perhaps the best speakeasy in Spit City.

A tall blonde lady in a sky-blue dress approached him. At the last second, she turned to the bar beside him. She looked around for the bartender, but seemed at a loss. The bartender, a stocky Andron man, stood with his back to her. All the while, Tredd’s gaze was firmly fixed on the path between her delicate chin, white neck and décolletage—the loveliness he had first fallen for as a teenager.

‘Excuse me?’ She tried to get the bartender’s attention, but to no avail. She turned to Tredd, biting her lip in frustration.

‘Yeah, I know,’ Tredd said. ‘Let me?’

She shrugged.

Tredd hit his glass against a metal pillar and said, ‘Hraa tlo, he paalv skian.’

The Andron turned around and pushed his handheld terminal aside in shame. ‘Yessir,’ he said with a heavy accent, ‘what can I get for you?’

Tredd turned to the lady beside him.

Her blue eyes, which matched the dress, met Tredd’s with a suggestive gaze. ‘A white flame, please.’

‘A white flame coming up,’ the bartender said.

She turned back to Tredd and smiled. ‘Thank you, Mr…’

‘Bosch,’ he said. ‘Troy Bosch. Pleased to meet you, Ms…’

She sighed, her lips just slightly parted. ‘Fae Delight.’

‘Pleased to meet you, Ms Delight.’

The bartender placed the drink in front of Fae.

‘It’s on me,’ Tredd said.

She brought it to her lips and took a shy sip. Tredd took a swig from his tumbler.

‘So, Ms Delight—’

‘Call me Fae.’

‘What brings a lady like you to a place like this?’

She licked her upper lip. ‘It’s… You see… I’m new to Spit City.’

‘Oh, you are?’ Tredd said, and leaned forward. ‘I’d love to show you around, if you like.’

She took a sip and stared at the screens and bottles behind the bar. On stage, the singer curtsied to the rhythm of the applause. As she began another song, Fae turned back to Tredd.

‘Where would you take a lady like me, Mr Bosch?’ she said, and touched the lapel of his jacket.

Tredd rubbed his chin as if he were thinking, but he knew already what he was going to say. He had planned it all. ‘Red Tower Showroom.’

She smiled. ‘I’ve heard of the Red Tower, but isn’t it on the other side of the moon?’

‘It is indeed.’

She raised an eyebrow.

‘We’ll take the Thrulift.’

‘Through-what?’

‘Through this moon, Fae. Through the core.’

She took the drink in her hand and, shyness gone, emptied it with one gulp. She didn’t even flinch. ‘Take me there, Mr Bosch.’

‘With pleasure, Ms Delight.’ He stood up and offered her his arm, and together they sailed through the crowd. She was like a beacon of light in the dark.

‘What is it you do, Mr Bosch?’

‘Call me Troy,’ he said. ‘I’m a lawyer.’

‘Oh,’ she said.

‘Surprised?’

‘Yes, in fact, I am.’

He chuckled. ‘Is that a problem?’

‘I just wasn’t expecting it…’

They walked out along the red carpet. Tredd thanked the Dresnean doorman and they took an elevator down to the fiftieth floor.

‘The opposite building,’ he said, as they stepped out of the elevator. From the fiftieth-floor lobby extended a skybridge that connected the two obsidian buildings. He led Fae down the skybridge and stopped in the middle. He took her to the side, touched the railing, and looked past the buildings.

Their city was a dark ball of spikes that covered the whole of Heeg’s small moon—so small that from their vantage point the curvature of the moon was visible. Now, with her in his life, Tredd saw light between the obsidian towers and a beauty in the richness of existence, where before he had seen nothing but smut, betrayal, and decay.

‘This is Spit City,’ he said. ‘See that building beside the Skeletech ad?’

She nodded and held on tight.

‘The lowest red light?’

‘Uh huh.’

‘That’s where I used to live.’

‘For real?’

‘For real, but now… Turn around. Up there, where the big bus is floating, where the building with the protruding pipes becomes thinner—that’s where I live now.’

‘I’d love to see your place.’

‘Perhaps later,’ he said, a glint in his eye. ‘Today you have other plans.’

When he had met her as Commodore Conrad of the Dawn Alliance Navy, after years of separation, he had never thought they would be spending time together like this in Spit City.

They entered the building, which continued through the moon, under a pointy Thruneedle logo, and he led Fae down a spiralling staircase to the Thrulift lobby.

‘OK, you’ll love this,’ he said. ‘It’s gonna be just three minutes to the other side.’

She gripped his arm tighter and stared at the advertising screens, which were showing ticket information along with various details about the trip.

She gave a shy smile. ‘As in, the other side of the moon?’

Tredd chuckled and noticed her staring at the short queue underneath the screens.

‘Don’t worry, the queue’s for those without tickets,’ he said, and pulled up his terminal. ‘I’ve got us covered.’

She grinned. ‘Are you sure about this?’

‘Of course. It’s going to be awesome.’

He led her through to the terminal, which was a round room with eight wide vertical pipes. On each pipe there was a door through which they could enter a pod. Tredd nodded at the young assistant beside the closest pod. The assistant, a young Baar man with a sharp haircut, beckoned them over.

‘That one’s ours, let’s go.’

Just then, someone tapped on his shoulder, and Tredd turned around. It took a second or two to recognise the face, it had been so long, but his royale goatee—a thick moustache anchored by a chin strip—was unmistakable.

‘Tredd Bounty? What are the chances?’

Tredd sighed. It kind of ruined the spell of him being a lawyer and Jill being the newcomer Fae. Really, what were the chances? Regardless, Tredd put on a smile.

‘Rene Goodman,’ he said, with his captain’s voice. ‘It’s been a long