Today's Spacemage
By Timothy Ellis
The Spacemage Chronicle, Book Two.
Copyright © 2018 by Timothy Ellis
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and events are fictional and have no relationship to any real person, place or event. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is purely co-incidental.
The author is Australian. In Australia, we colour things slightly differently, so you may notice some of the spelling is different. Please don't be alarmed.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without the written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Contents
Contents
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty One
Twenty Two
Twenty Three
Twenty Four
Twenty Five
Twenty Six
Twenty Seven
Twenty Eight
Twenty Nine
Thirty
Thirty One
Thirty Two
Thirty Three
Thirty Four
Thirty Five
Thirty Six
Thirty Seven
Thirty Eight
Thirty Nine
Forty
Forty One
Forty Two
Forty Three
Forty Four
Forty Five
Forty Six
Forty Seven
Forty Eight
Forty Nine
Fifty
Fifty One
Fifty Two
Fifty Three
Fifty four
Fifty Five
Fifty Six
Fifty Seven
Fifty Eight
Fifty Nine
Sixty
Sixty One
Sixty Two
Sixty Three
Acknowledgements
A Message to my Readers
Also by Timothy Ellis
One
The ward chimed at the back of my mind.
For a moment I wondered what it was, before memory supplied the answer. It'd been a while after all, and I'd forgotten quite a lot I did when I first arrived back here.
I shifted my magic sight from the coral reef I'd been watching, while lying on a beach lounge, sipping a cold drink.
Half a world away was the monument to a lost civilization I'd erected in my first month here. There were people around it. Three of them to be exact, and I knew all three. A little way away, was a shuttle. I'd long since stopped waiting for one, so there wasn’t a ward in place to alert me to one coming down.
I frowned. Jess and Lea were in a military uniform, and Tasha was back in her Marine uniform. Something had changed.
I added hearing to remote viewing, something I'd only succeeded in doing recently. I could not only see the whales out in the ocean now, I could hear their songs as well.
The glass case containing my first pad, shattered as Jess hit it with her gun butt. I'd left it there in case I died before anyone came back to this backwater planet, in the middle of nowhere. On the pad was my recollection of my journey to the stars, and why I came back. The monument contained a power source to keep the pad charged, able to magically keep going almost indefinitely.
Jess removed it from its little pedestal, and turned it on. There was only a single file on it, and she pressed the icon to bring it up. She started flipping madly.
"What is it?" asked Lea.
"Thorn's story of his time with us."
"Flip to the last page," suggested Tasha.
Jess did.
"What the fuck?" she exclaimed.
"What?" asked the other two together.
"He's said he expects to be dead before this is found."
"I hope he didn’t do something stupid," said Tasha, looking worried.
"What kind of stupid?" asked Lea.
Jess and Tasha exchanged looks.
"What would you do, if you were the only person on the planet, with no-one else on it, and no hope of rescue?"
"Finally get some peace and quiet?" laughed Lea.
The other two looked at each other again, obviously debating spelling it out or not. I was laughing. She'd been spot on, and the other two didn’t know it. The planet wasn’t without noise, but it was peaceful and quiet without other people. Especially on your own private island, with its own private beach, and no predators to bother you.
I sighed. I guess I’d have to put them out of their misery. But first, I needed clothes. By the time I’d padded up the hot white sand, hunted out the clothes I'd previously worn on the ship, and was ready to move, they were arguing about what to do next.
I shifted myself to stand behind them.
"Hi."
The three of them jumped, and turned to face me.
"Don't do that!" yelled Jess.
"Hi," said Lea.
Tasha said nothing, but enveloped me in a hug which left me gasping for breath. Eventually she let go, and stepped back, smiling coyly.
We stood there for a full minute.
"So not dead," said Lea.
"Apparently not," said Jess.
Tasha was grinning. The other two were not, their frowns getting bigger as they tried to work something out. I waited for it.
"What the hell have you done to yourself Thorn?" asked Lea. "You look older."
"I am older. It's been a long time."
"It's been two months," exclaimed Jess. "You look years older."
"Five. It's been five years."
"It has not," said Lea.
"Has for me."
"You didn't?" asked Tasha.
"Didn’t what?" asked Lea.
I nodded to Tasha.
"I assume it didn’t go well?"
"Not really. But it could have been worse."
"What didn’t go well?" yelled Lea.
I paused, trying to figure how to put it.
"I figured the civilization here vanished because of something I did while I was on the ship."
"So?" asked Jess.
"So the only thing I could think of, was vanishing missiles in space, and where they went. And perhaps when they went."
"You're not making sense Thorn," said Lea.
Tasha winced. She'd worked it out.
"One of the things we were supposed to learn after the day of choosing, was where things we made vanish, went to. It was different for everyone, and it was part of learning magic properly to find your stash of things."
"Did you find yours?" asked Tasha.
"Yes, and no."
"Pick one," said Jess.
"No, as in I didn’t find anything to be sure. But yes, in so far as the only thing different about this planet, is a rather large crater up in the hills behind us."
"The missiles?" asked Tasha.
"I assume so. After I vanished them, they came here, and exploded."
Tasha winced again.
"And you think you wiped out the civilization here with the missiles?" asked Jess.
"Presumably they went back in time, as well as crossing space."
"So what did you do?" asked Lea.
"You didn’t?" asked Tasha
again.
I nodded. She winced again.
"What?" demanded Jess.
"I tried going back in time."
Jess and Lea were shocked. Tasha nodded.
"But you only managed five years back?" she suggested.
"Yes. And I wasn’t able to come forward again. Or figure out what was wrong with my intent going back. All I knew was, I'd not gone very far back, since the stars hadn't changed at all. Five years wasn’t much of a time jump. I figure the problem was at least a thousand years ago. So I lived it the long way, which is how I know it was five years. Hence looking older, because I am."
"How did you avoid meeting yourself?" asked Tasha, grinning. "Or didn’t you?"
I smiled at her.
"No, I didn’t. As soon as I realized I was stuck back then, I went looking at those parts of the planet I hadn't looked at with my sight. There's this nice tropical island I didn’t know about, so I made a home there."
"Hence your tan," laughed Tasha.
"I guess so. Anyway, I wasn’t here, or anywhere I’d see myself, and to make sure, I put an invisible shroud over the island to be sure."
"So, you're what, twenty three now?"
"About that, yes."
"Good."
Tasha looked happy about something, but I turned to Jess instead.
"What made you come back?"
I really hadn't expected to ever see them again.
"You remember that pretend war the military were spouting at us?"
"Vaguely. The aliens beyond the frontier?"
"Yes."
"What of it?"
"It happened a month ago."
Two
"Seriously?"
"Yes Thorn," said Lea.
"What happened?"
"The aliens hit our fleet unexpectedly," explained Jess. "They took the military station there, and what remained of our fleet fell back to the next jump point. We’ve been managing to hold there, but they take out one of our ships for every one of theirs we take out. The attrition rate was too high. Is too high."
"And?"
"They drafted every ship with a gun or launcher on it, including us."
"I wondered why the uniforms. What made you go back?"
"You remember the Major?"
"Yes. Vaguely."
"He survived the courier being wrecked, and was later placed in charge of recruiting draftees. This time when he caught up with us, he had an offer we couldn’t refuse. Or at least, Jen couldn’t refuse."
The mind boggled, and for a moment, my eyelids fluttered with surprise.
"What?"
"They put her in charge of the civilian fleet. She's still under the admiral in charge, but more or less independent."
I couldn't picture it.
"I'll take your word for that."
Lea laughed.
"So what are you doing here?"
"We need you Thorn," blurted Lea. "It's really bad, and we're running out of ships."
"We need something they won't be able to counter," added Jess.
"I missed you," added Tasha.
I laughed. Mainly at Tasha being so out of step with the other two. But as what they were asking sank in, I stopped laughing, and started frowning.
"No."
Tasha nodded, as if she'd expected it.
"Why not?" demanded Jess.
I thought for a moment, not about her question, and four lounge chairs materialized next to us, in a circle. The pad shifted back to the monument, and the glass fragments vanished, replaced by new glass panels.
Tasha smiled, and sat immediately. I sat next to her. She opened her mouth, and an occasional table appeared next to each chair, with a drink on it.
"How?" said Lea, and stopped.
Jess sighed, and both of them sat.
"You're a lot more powerful now than when we last saw you, aren’t you Thorn?"
Jess sounded resigned now.
"Yes. I've had a lot of time to practice."
Grass grew up around our feet, changing dirt into a lush green meadow.
"Is there anything you can't do now?" asked Tasha.
"Sure. I'm not even a master yet. With no teacher, it's taking me much longer to learn things."
"Is Jen your reason for not coming back with us?" asked Jess.
"Partly."
"She's changed," said Lea.
"She no longer has the stick up her arse," added Tasha.
I winced. It was a mental image I didn’t need, and they had no idea just how dangerous it was suggesting it to me. Things happened just because I thought of them. Five years hadn't been enough time to master my thoughts enough, to be safe around other people.
"Sorry. I remember the last time you had an odd thought pop in."
"That's part of it. I'm dangerous to be around."
"We'll risk it," said Lea.
I shook my head, but said nothing.
"Jen's changed," repeated Jess. "She's had a taste of real command now, and what we've seen over the last month would change anyone."
"I will not be a weapon for her to wield."
"It won't be like that."
"Even if it's not her, someone will want to wield me as a weapon, once they see what I can do."
"They already know part of what you can do," said Tasha.
I looked at her, nodding for her to continue.
"The Major put the basics together, and went looking for answers. He heard enough off beat stories from everywhere we went, to understand you were different enough to be useful. He doesn’t understand what you are, but he knows you're powerful enough to jump ships across systems, and to destroy ships without using technology."
"So?"
"He reported to his superiors, and Jen was told to come get you."
"So why isn’t she here?"
"You left because of her," said Jess. "She figured we had the best chance of getting you back without her."
"I left for several reasons, and she was the lesser of them. Had I stayed, there would have been a point where I refused an order, and she'd react badly to it. We came very close to it, as it was. She was beginning to see me as a threat to her command of the ship."
"We made her admit that," said Lea. "She's past it now."
"She freely admits she screwed up," added Jess.
"Not much point telling me that. It has to come from her."
"You'll talk to her then?"
I thought about it.
"Yes."
"We'll go get her then."
"You can't send her a message to say come down?"
"We only have one shuttle left, so it has to go back to the ship, before she can come down. Unless you want to come up to the ship with us?"
She looked at my face, and hers fell.
"We'll be back as fast as we can."
She and Lea rose, and walked off to the shuttle. Tasha made no move to get up, and made a point of sipping her drink. We watched the shuttle take off, and head upwards. Tasha turned back to look at me.
"I really missed you!"
Three
There was something in the way she looked at me I found faintly disturbing. Or was it unexpected? I rose, and offered her my hand.
"Let's go somewhere more comfortable."
She took my hand, and we shifted to my island. On the sand next to my lounge, another appeared. I waved her towards it, and renewed our drinks. Before she sat, she looked at the house behind us.
"Nice. Your second life home?"
"No. But something similar from the same place. Smaller."
"What did you do when you first got here?"
I filled her in on the last few pages of the testament on the pad.
"So you rebuilt your first life house, and dug out the village? Where was it?"
"Over near the monument. I put the monument where I landed, which was in the middle of where I thought the city should be. But my first life home was further down the hills, near the sea, but not where the city's port was. So it isn’t
visible from the monument."
"And you didn’t go back after you jumped back in time?"
"No. I built everything I need just here. The old house was too primitive."
She gave me a look.
"Didn’t you get lonely?"
"Sometimes."
"Me too."
"Isn't a war enough to keep you too busy to get lonely?"
"Not really. Being close to death brings home what's important in life."
I shot her a glance.
"You…"
"No, I wasn’t," she laughed. "Well not more than minor wounds. But the ship was substantially damaged in the last attack, and for a moment there, I thought we weren’t going to make it. You don’t need to be badly injured, to start thinking about mortality, and what's missing in your life."
I looked up, and threw my sight up to the ship. The shuttle hadn't docked yet, and I looked at it properly. I could see the shuttle had seen better days.
I was shocked to see the ship. There were gaping holes in a dozen places, although the inner hull hadn't been breached. The ship's unique design had worked in its favour. The hull was dented just about everywhere. I looked all around it, seeing more than half the turrets and launchers either destroyed, or badly damaged. Inside the ship, there was evidence of burnt out junction boxes, and jury rigged cables. The magazines were empty.
I looked at Tasha. She nodded.
"Most of our remaining ships look like ours. We took a beating Thorn. I'm not sure why we're still here."
She seemed to be thinking for a moment, I saw her reach a decision, and she rose.
"Show me your house Thorn."
She held out her hand, I took it, and led her across the sand to the front door. It didn’t take long to show her around. The last stop was the bedroom.
She looked in, nodded to herself, and pulled me in after her. She turned me around, and pushed me down on the bed.
"I'm glad you grew up," she said. "We're the same age now. Makes things different."
I was still trying to figure out how, when she started unzipping her uniform.
Four
The shuttle touched down further along the beach.
Tasha and I were in the water, and watched it come down. I'd created a bikini for her to wear, and a pair of light shorts for myself. We waded out as Jen walked up the beach towards us. Lea and Jess followed on behind her.
I was shocked at how Jen looked. I beat her to the first word.
Today's Spacemage Page 1
