Astra Norte - Space Cadet: Log entry 1
by David Elvar
Hi, I’m Astra Norte and I’m a Space Cadet. Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard all the jokes. Anyway, this is the first of my space logs, and I have to tell you, it’s been a pretty scary voyage so far. I mean…Uh? What do you mean, let ’em read it for themselves?…Oh, oka-a-a-ay. Sorry, people, but I have to go. Just read and enjoy. Okay?Hearing voices in your head in any world, even Feregana, isn’t considered normal. But hearing the voices of ferrets? Definitely cause for concern. So when Stefi discovers the voices she’s heard her whole life aren’t spirits or her own crazy mind but ferrets of all things, it’s no surprise her life becomes a whole lot stranger.The timid Gemmie and gruff-yet-sensitive Maya soon tell her of a disturbance descending on their world, a disturbance only an utterly unprepared Stefi may be able to prevent. Armed with only a kitchen knife and the seemingly useless gift of communicating with ferrets, what’s a girl to do? Run away from home to seek help and answers from misfit members of Feregana’s divided races, of course.The problem is, her eventual companions, outcasts like her, could hardly be considered normal. There’s Ifaut, an immature and obsessive princess from the Furosan race, along with her latest “pet”, Sansonis of the Kalkic minority; Rhaka of the dog-like Otsukuné; and Cédes, a ghostly blind Furosan prophetess with a (very literal) fiery temper.Yet in their journey to find who or what wants to end Feregana, Stefi and her new friends soon discover that few things are certain in a world heading inexorably towards war and perpetual twilight. But what is certain is that Stefi’s gift is capable of overturning the humans' Church of Kardin, which will do anything to stop her and her friends. And that, as Cédes has seen, their journey can end only in Stefi’s untimely death.