Operation: Red Revival

By K Higgins

• Language: English
• Publisher: Huginn Press
• Release date: Apr 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9781734841114

K Higgins

I grew up in a small town in Northern Connecticut, my head swarming with stories. It wasn't until I was sixteen that I finished my first full length novel. The feeling of typing that final word was enough of a high to keep me coming back for more! Between work (with wonderfully frustrating sixth graders I wouldn't trade for the world!) and continuing my graduate schooling in Philosophy, I oftentimes pull all-nighters to get these incessant ideas out of my head! While I absolutely salivate over a thick and juicy story ready to be served, I also admit that there is something sexy about novellas that pulls me in, so I create a bit of both!

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K Higgins

Operation:Red Revival

First published by Huginn Press 2020

Copyright © 2020 by K Higgins

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

K Higgins asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

First edition

ISBN: 978-1-7348411-1-4

This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy

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Contents

1. Chapter 1

2. Chapter 2

3. Chapter 3

4. Chapter 4

5. Chapter 5

6. Chapter 6

7. Chapter 7

8. Chapter 8

9. Chapter 9

Afterword

1

Chapter 1

Isat in my quarters, watching the show that was playing on my entertainment screen. I had attempted to open up a book a good hour ago – read more was my New Year’s resolution – but it was already June back on Earth and I managed about a chapter in some mystery novel. Turns out mystery novels were the absolute worst. I groaned and rubbed my eyes before peering out my window. Beyond were green cabbage fields. I was in charge of those cabbage fields. Well, they were a part of what I was in charge of in the south quadrant. The north quadrant was the place that had the good stuff – potatoes – but Martins was in charge of that area. She rubbed it in my face every day.

I checked the time and tapped my wrist-pad, shutting down the screen across the room. Standing, I stretched and crossed for my uniform. It wasn’t anything fancy, but enough to let the people around here know I was a captain. It consisted of grey slacks and a matching grey jacket with gold embroidered cuffs. And of course, my name stitched into the breast. It made me feel like I was some military lieutenant. And frankly, that made me feel badass. Probably wasn’t good for my inflated ego, but, eh, who was counting?

I laced up my black leather dress boots, a material that was reserved for those in power – or at least those stupid enough to believe they were – and reached for my hat before thinking, fuck it, and leaving the room without it. It was a beret, could you blame me? Honestly, it was the worst part of the job. Not the politics or the grueling hours or the possibility of a slow, excruciating suffocation should our compound ever shut down. No. It was the fucking berets.

The automated door to my quarters shut behind me and I heard the heavy click of the locking mechanism. The designers down at the International Space Administration felt it necessary to safeguard the lives of the captains of Mission Revive, but honestly, all I had kept in there was my clothes and my mystery novels, and frankly, I’d welcome someone stealing the latter. And anyway, it wasn’t like we were conducting strange scientific studies up here. We were terraforming. Colonizing. It wasn’t anything to make enemies over. No one was out for the cabbage captain’s life.

My wrist-pad buzzed as I passed the rec room of the southern farmers. A hearty group. Not technically farmers either – or at least they weren’t on Earth. Some were botanical experts, some were agriculture professors, et cetera, et cetera. You get the gist. They were honestly the only reason we were up here on the red snowball of a planet, considering a very vital part of terraforming was the food supply.

The buzzing persisted, and I tapped the wrist-pad, answering with a slightly sing songy,

Yes?

"Don’t ‘yes’ me Poe. Where the hell are you?"

I smirked. Martins was always a sound for sore ears. Also a sound that made ears sore in the first place. Really, it depended on her mood.

South quadrant. I replied. Why?

"Why? She demanded. Her voice was only a bit static-y. The comm device in the watch on Earth worked perfectly. When we tested it here and heard the slight malformation of the words, our first thought was that it was affected by the radiation on Mars. After the construction of the tempered glass dome surrounding the quadrants was completed and painted with the antirad polymer – the polymer whose sole purpose was to block ninety nine percent of the Sun’s harmful radiation – and the crackle and static didn’t desist, we tried other hypotheses. All of which fell through. Eventually we decided to agree that it would be the first mystery that Mars gave us. The first of many, we figured. It was nothing to be wary of. We’d either figure it out, or we wouldn’t, and if we didn’t it probably wouldn’t kill us. How about because the Quadrant Meeting started, you absolute buffoon."

Hey, I countered sharply. That’s an insult to all buffoons around the Solar System.

"Lord have mercy." Martins grumbled. Lord. It was a term for a god that once ran rampant on Earth. The only traces left of him were in this massive library in Sector Five back on Earth. Apparently it was called the Vatican Library or something vaguely similar. Couldn’t quite