Star Magi: A Space Opera Fantasy Adventure (Star Magi Saga Book 1)

by Andrew Dobell

  ‘Understood,’ Elden answered and said his goodbyes, leaving them in Yasha’s capable hands, who began to lead them into the building.

  ~Can we trust him?~ Amanda asked through their Link.

  ~Yes,~ Ylena answered. ~But not many others out here.~

  Life and Dress

  Red City, Axia, Proxima Centauri

  The hospitality provided to them by the Nexus was second to none. As Amanda sat up in her bed following a very relaxing night’s sleep, she looked out of the window to see a view that was breathtaking in its beauty.

  They were high up in the spire above the Union building, allowing Amanda to look out over the thin spires of the surrounding structures of the Red City platform. In the distance, the curve of the planet below with its enormous, kilometers tall buildings reaching up through the clouds was stunning. She watched lights from passing ships flashing against the sky that even now, during the day, darkened to black above her, they were so high up. Beyond the curve of the planet, one of the inner tilted rings rose above the horizon majestically, further adding to the alien feel.

  ‘Incredible,’ Amanda muttered to herself. This place was amazing, and yet, she was only in the next system over from Earth. She wondered what other marvels lay out there in the darkness of space.

  Climbing out of bed, Amanda walked out of the bedroom and into the main living area of her suite. It was big, with lots of open space and soft furnishings as well as almost all of one wall being floor to ceiling windows so she could continue to enjoy the view from here as well.

  ‘Good morning, Miss Page,’ said a voice in the room. It made her jump and look around to see who else was in here — not least because she wasn’t wearing much — before she remembered it was an AI of some kind that she’d spoken to the day before. ‘Shall I prepare breakfast?’

  Amanda smiled to herself, feeling a little silly for being scared. ‘Yes, please. Just some cereal and fruit, though, nothing cooked.’

  ‘As you wish,’ answered the AI.

  ‘Actually, I have another question for you,’ Amanda said.

  ‘Go ahead,’ the voice answered.

  ‘If I wanted to go shopping for a dress for tonight's gala, where could I go?’

  ‘There is an extensive shopping plaza lower down in this building, Miss Page. They should have something suitable for you,’ the AI answered. As it did, a holographic representation of the building appeared over a nearby table. A marker flashed, saying, “You are here,” in the upper third of the building, Then a whole floor was highlighted in the lower third, with the label, “Shopping Plaza,” marked on it.

  Amanda took in the visualisation for a moment. ‘Thanks,’ she said, and made her way back into the bedroom and headed for the bathroom where she turned the shower on.

  ~You up?~ Amanda sent through her Link to her companions.

  ~I am,~ Rane answered.

  ~Indeed,~ Valerya added.

  ~Yes,~ Aris said.

  ~I’m going to head out and go shopping for something to wear to the gala tonight. Anyone fancy coming with me?~ she asked as she climbed in the shower.

  ~I already have something with me. Besides, mother’s keeping me busy today meeting a few dignitaries, so I can’t join you until later,~ Rane answered.

  ~I’d rather not,~ Aris said, his tone deadpan. She wasn’t surprised by his answer.

  ~I ordered something last night,~ Valerya explained. ~Sorry.~

  ~No problem,~ Amanda answered as she soaped herself down.

  ~Did you sleep okay?~ Rane asked.

  ~Very well, yes, although, the AI in the room nearly scared me to death this morning.~

  ~Hah, you forgot it was there, didn’t you?~

  ~Of course. I wasn’t used to it. I only had my underwear on. I thought someone was getting an eyeful.~

  ~Since when were you bothered about someone seeing you naked?~ Rane asked.

  ~I wasn’t naked,~ Amanda protested.

  ~Alright, nearly naked. Better?~

  ~Much,~ Amanda smiled. ~

  ~You didn’t answer my question,~ Rane continued.

  ~I know, I’m getting to it. I wasn’t bothered, not really, it was just… Unexpected.~

  ~Are you guys always like this?~ Valerya asked.

  ~Sometimes,~ Rane answered.

  ~That’s a yes,~ Amanda added.

  ~I feel sorry for Aris, having to listen to Mandy’s dirty stories, poor guy,~ Rane commented.

  ~Hah!~ Amanda laughed. ~You know I’m in the shower right now, right?~

  ~Oh shit.~ Rane’s smirk could be heard through the Link. ~Now, he’ll have visions of you soaping down your tits.~

  ~Don’t you get excited, Rane,~ Amanda needled her.

  ~You wish.~

  ~What have I got myself involved in?’ Valerya said.

  ~I was thinking the same thing,~ Aris added.

  ~Was that all you were thinking?~ Rane asked him, her voice suggestive.

  ~You’re like a dog with a bone, Rane. Leave him alone,~ Amanda said, laughing. ~Okay guys, I’m going to get a move on and see what this place has to offer, I’ll catch you later,~ she said to a chorus of goodbyes before she pulled back from the Link and focused on getting washed.

  Finishing up, she finally got dressed and ate her breakfast out on the room’s modest balcony.

  She could just conjure a dress from thin air with her Magic if she wanted, it would be the work of seconds, but she wasn’t in a rush, and honestly, she was just curious to see more of the building and the community here. While she ate, she used her Magic to send a second set of senses down to the shopping plaza and had a cursory look around, taking in some of the shops to get an idea of what was around.

  She spotted several suitable places before she cancelled the Magic and finished her breakfast. In a similar fashion to just conjuring the dress, she could also just Port down to the plaza level, but again, she wanted to experience more of this place, so she settled on the idea of walking down instead.

  The building itself was massive. Even just a cross-section of the level she was currently on would be the size of a small town back on Earth. She noted on a map she asked the AI to bring up that there was a small shopping area on this level, too, but it was just for everyday food and sundries. The main shopping plaza was actually spread over five floors, and the stores were huge; you could buy pretty much anything down there.

  ‘So, remind me how money works on Axia, it’s been a while since I was here,’ Amanda asked the AI.

  ‘Axia’s economy is what you might refer to as a Post-Scarcity Society. There is no lack of the basics for life here. Everyone receives a small amount of money every thirty days, but all basic food, clothing, housing and more — the basics needed to live — are free. Luxury items are not, though, and money is used to pay for them.

  ‘The money a citizen gets is not much, but enough to buy small luxury items. Citizens can earn more by working — which many do — from manual labour as an employee, or they can set up businesses of their own.’

  ‘Or they can steal or extort it,’ Amanda added, knowing there was still a criminal element here.

  ‘Correct. The item of currency throughout the Nexus is the Mana Credit. Most money is virtual, but cash does still exist and is created from Mana.’

  Amanda nodded, remembering this now from her previous excursions into space. Mana was the physical manifestation of Essentia, found at Poolings where Leylines on a planet crossed. Mana’s appearance varied wildly depending on where the Pooling was located. It often looked like a natural part of the environment, like grass or rocks or metal, but a Magus could always see it for what it truly was. Another property of Mana is that it cannot be conjured by a Magus, only shaped, making it perfect as a currency as no Magi could conjure millions of Mana Credits and destabilise the market.

  The Nexus Bank, who controls and circulates the Credits, have an automatic right to any and every Pooling found on any planet within Nexus Space. Typically, the bank will protect and preserve the
Poolings while also harvesting the Mana, which they later change into Mana Credits.

  Since learning of Mana Credits centuries ago, and with help from Astrid and later Rane, Amanda remembered she’d made investments in Nexus businesses and started saving, giving her a nice pot of money should she ever return to the Nexus at some point. Today would be the first time she got to spend some of that money.

  Finishing her breakfast, Amanda left the guest suite and made her way through the building towards the nearest bank of elevators, of which she had noticed there were many. The corridors were huge, easily big enough to drive a few cars down side by side, maybe even a couple of semi-trucks, and although people were walking around, there weren’t that many of them.

  She got the feeling that living here on this floor was like living in a small community, a village of well-off families enjoying a privileged life. People greeted her as they passed and were generally friendly. She quite liked it here.

  Eventually, she found the bank of lifts closest to her room and rode one down to the shopping plaza. It stopped several times during the descent, letting people on and off, but again, the elevator car was maybe four times bigger than even the biggest ones she’d been in on Earth, giving everyone plenty of space.

  No one really paid her much attention, and she felt like she fitted in with the general fashions that people were wearing, with a couple of others wearing very similar fitted body suits to hers.

  Before too long, the lift announced it had reached the shopping plaza level, and Amanda left the elevator behind, walking out into this much busier area of the building.

  Leaving the elevator car, Amanda found herself on the uppermost floor of the shopping plaza. There were people everywhere, and it looked like the complex went on forever in every direction. Making her way through the crowd, she walked over towards the nearby balcony, getting a better view of her surroundings. It wasn’t too much different from a large, multi-level mall on Earth, with the Nexus version of escalators ferrying people between levels which were filled with shops of all kinds.

  One of the most fascinating things was looking at the incredible range and diversity of people that were all around her. While many of them looked basically human, most people looked like they had modifications of some kind, including the more human looking ones. The mods ranged from simple prosthetic limbs or eyes to extra appendages, tails, wings, through to modifications so extreme that she wasn’t even sure that they even qualified as human any more. She found she killed over fifteen minutes just people watching before she remembered she’d come down here to actually buy something. Pulling her gaze away from the crowds around her, she focused on the job at hand and looked around at the stores around her.

  The place was massive, and she had no idea how she was going to find what she wanted until she spotted an area off to her left with what looked like a map.

  Wandering over, Amanda found a large illuminated map of the five levels of the plaza, complete with a key that told her which shop was which. She noticed that while there were plenty of general areas with all kinds of shops next to one another, there also seemed to be some specialised areas as well. She scanned the map quickly, finding where she was on it and then figured out how to get to the nearest clothing section.

  The next few hours passed in a blur of walking through crowds, visiting shops, and trying on all kinds of dresses and outfits, and for the first time in what felt like forever, she actually kind of forgot about the mission and the responsibilities she had. She was having fun, and the whole thing reminded her of some of the days she spent with her friend Georgina back before she even knew about Magic and her whole world was a few streets of New York City.

  At one point, she even spotted a cake shop with some seriously delicious looking creations in the window. I wonder if they have their own version of baked vanilla cheesecake in here, she thought, remembering the smell and taste of Georgina’s speciality.

  With a pang of sadness and longing, she turned away and returned her focus to her quest for the perfect dress.

  As she wandered from shop to shop, however, she started to feel a small doubt that something was slightly off. She wasn’t sure what it was exactly, but it was there, hiding at the back of her mind that something wasn’t quite right.

  Spotting another shop, she walked over to it and was about to go in when she had a distinct and clear feeling that someone was behind her, or that she was being watched.

  She turned and scanned the crowd with her Aetheric Sight, but saw nothing. Frowning to herself, she shrugged and moved inside.

  She hadn’t been browsing the racks long when her eyes lit up as she spotted what could be the perfect dress. It was short and kind of metallic, with an iridescent pink colour to it that shimmered in the light. She strode over to it and picked it off the rack. It’s gorgeous, she thought as she held it against herself to see how it might look.

  ‘Amanda?’ said a voice from next to her. She turned and looked at the man who stood beside her. He looked a little out of place, standing here in the women’s section of the store. ‘Amanda-Jane Page? Of Earth?’

  ‘Eeerm, I guess…’ she spluttered, feeling a little shocked by this intrusion. She let her vision switch over to the Aetheric spectrum and immediately saw the intense glow of something Magical under the loose wrap he wore.

  ‘The Dynasties say hi…’ he said with a kind of fervent glee.

  ‘Oh, shi…’ Amanda cursed as she furiously worked her Magic.

  BOOM!

  The man exploded in a massive fireball of intense heat and shrapnel as the Essentia bomb blew up. Raw Essentia ripped at her Aegis, shredding her shield with a nightmarish intensity as her Magic snapped into place.

  The floor fell away, and she was suddenly weightless. For a moment, there was nothing but the orange light of flame and a void with no floor.

  She landed with a ribcage shaking thud and lost her breath for a second as it flew out of her. Looking up, debris and masonry fell down towards her. Instinctively, she raised her arms to shield herself and pumped Essentia into her personal Aegis. The debris bounced off her shield, which surrounded her like a bubble, and then came to rest all around her. Dust and smoke filled the air but faded quickly as it started to settle.

  ‘What the…’ she muttered to herself, looking up at the huge hole in the ceiling she’d fallen through.

  Two figures stood on the edge of that hole, indistinct in the dusty air, looking like little more than two shadows. One of them moved and then glowing white hot bolts of energy flew at her from whatever weapon the one on the right was holding. The one on the left glowed in her Aetheric Sight, though, indicating it was a Magus.

  The bolts slammed into her shield, but bounced off, smacking into the rubble all around her.

  Amanda jumped to her feet and leapt up, her enhanced strength propelling her up towards the figure that was shooting at her. Magic flared from the other person.

  Amanda slammed her knee into the shooter’s face. The shooter — a man, she now realised — fell backwards with a shout of pain and dropped to the floor, his Magical gun skittering sideways as he lost his grip on it.

  Landing where the shooter had been standing, she looked left, but the Magus who had been standing there was gone. He’d Ported out.

  ‘Damn,’ Amanda cursed. Movement in front of her attracted her attention. She looked back towards the shooter. He held a knife in his hand and wore a sneer on his face as he made threatening motions.

  Amanda smirked, raised her hand and beckoned him towards her.

  The man lunged with his knife. Amanda knocked his arm away and slammed her knee into his sternum, catching the edge of his ribcage and hearing the dull crack of breaking bone.

  ‘Ugh,’ the man grunted before he swung in at her again. She grabbed his wrist and used his own motion against him. Twisting and flicking her wrist. The man flew five meters and crunched into the far wall, hitting it upside down. He fell to the floor, landing head first before falling
flat.

  Stepping over to him, the man stirred and tried to push himself up. Amanda punched him hard and knocked him out cold. She kicked the knife away. With a thought, she summoned her Magic and reached into the man’s head, looking for any hint why she’d been attacked and who they were.

  Instead, she found a mind that had been torn apart. It was a mess, with little of anything left, including no real memories of who he was. He also didn’t know what he was doing or why he was doing it, only that he needed to kill her at any and all costs. She rifled through his short-term memories and found some images of the man he’d been standing here with moments ago, but the appearance of the Magus seemed fluid like it was shifting and changing all the time. She couldn’t tell if the Magus was male or female or anything.

  Amanda sighed. She suddenly realised that she was still holding the dress she’d found in her left hand, but it was torn, dirty, burnt, and in no state to be worn.

  ‘Great,’ she muttered.

  ‘Hey, you okay over there?’ said a voice. Amanda looked up to see one of the shop’s attendants climbing over the rubble. She smiled. The moment she’d realised it was a bomb and was about to blow, she’d thrown up an Aegis around the bomber and herself to try and contain it. The mess the explosion had made was quite well contained, she noticed with a feeling of satisfaction, and with a quick scan around, she confirmed that beyond the bomber, no one else had suffered any serious injuries.

  ‘Are you alright?’ the attendant asked again.

  ‘Yeah, um, I don’t suppose you have any more stock of this dress out back, do you?’ Amanda asked, holding the remains of it up to show him.

  The attendant blinked, stood in the ruin of their shop staring at the crazy woman in the middle of it holding up the bunt dress.

  The last remaining strap on the dress finally gave way, and it fell to the floor.

  Amanda smiled.

  The attendant stared at her for a second longer. ‘I’ll just check.’