Deep Sky Anchor

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter.

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Once again, the vacuum bomb sailed away from The Wanderlust, looking like nothing more than a thin streak of light on the viewscreen.  A shooting star.  But this time, Captain Carroway didn’t try to wish on it.  She wondered how many of the members of her crew did.

The bridge of The Wanderlust was much more crowded this time.  Everyone aboard had gathered together to watch.  And now, not only were there two crews melded together aboard The Wanderlust — Union and Anti-Ra — but also three newcomers, two guests from the Waykeeper’s back and the strange amalgamation of circuitry and mycelia who now insisted they were a doctor. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 30: The Voyage Begins”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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“You can move Lupinia?” Commander Chestnut asked, scurrying his way into the engine room and pressing his way between the much larger cat and canine blocking his view of the indecipherable equations Ensign Diaz had been writing.  His brushy reed of a tail flipped about wildly, expressing more excitement than seemed like should be able to fit into such a small mammal. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 29: A Better Use for a Black Hole”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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Meanwhile, in the engine room, Captain Carroway kept pressing Ensign Diaz, gently but firmly, to think harder.  They needed a way to help the Waykeeper, while also escaping from the incoming fleet of Zakonraptors themselves.

The wolf-like officer kept insisting it couldn’t be done.  The fur on her hackles had raised, and a growl crept into her voice as she countered every one of Captain Carroway’s proposals.  The Norwegian Forest cat’s suggestions barely deserved the word ‘proposals.’  It was more like she kept rattling off the basic specs of The Wanderlust — electron torpedoes, blazor canons, lumo-projectors.  None of it was useful or inspiring, and Ensign Diaz felt increasingly wild and angry listening to the cat pressure her. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 28: The Spark of Inspiration Ignites”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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Ensign Mike withdrew their mycelial filaments from the cracks in the prone caterpillar’s wrinkled skin.  The cracks healed and the wrinkles smoothed as the fungal strands pulled out of them, leaving Lys as young and healthy as she’d been before leaving the atmospheric bubble around the Waykeeper launched her into the throes of a premature metamorphosis.

The fungal officer had stopped her metamorphosis, staving off her chrysalis state. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 27: Metamorphosis Delayed”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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Lys could hear the commotion around her.  She heard the captain — the gruff cat with green eyes who she’d waited to meet for many years — get called away to consult on something in the engine room.  She heard the kind squirrel man chittering to her about trees, branches, and roots.  Something spiritual, something comforting.  She could hear the sound and meaning, but the actual words had become muffled as her body tried to withdraw deeper inside itself, shedding the outer skin that was supposed to still be her, still be her for many more years.  She could feel the filaments of the mushroom creature’s hands extending out, infiltrating the space under her skin, between the old self that was trying to die and the new self — crystalline and unfinished — getting ready to begin. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 26: The Many Branching Futures”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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“Captain?” Ensign Melbourne meowed from the pilot’s seat.  “We have company.”

“The Zakonraptors are back?”  Captain Carroway had barely been back in her captain’s seat long enough to get comfortably settled.  “Already?  We scared them away for less than a day?”

“I guess so,” the white tomcat meowed acerbically, the tip of his tail twitching in a way that betrayed the concern his dry tone tried to belie.  “We don’t have any better weapons than when they were here last time, but this time it looks like there’s a lot more of them.  Do you think Ensign Diaz has any more ideas or clever tricks hidden up her sleeves?” Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 25: Returning to Where It All Began”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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When the time came to say goodbye to their Ollallan hosts, the crew of The Wanderlust lined up in front of the ramp leading up to their open airlock.  A group of Ollallans lined up across from them, mimicking the crew’s orderly formation.  Captain Carroway felt a burst of pride that her crew was already working together so smoothly.  It helped that Commander Chestnut had clearly run a tight ship, so the Anti-Ra officers had been well prepared for blending into a Tri-Galactic Union crew. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 24: You Can’t Go Back, But You Can Go Forward”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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Korvax bustled about, arranging all of the visitors to his adopted world into seats at the long table, alternated with local Ollallans, so that everyone could talk together while they ate.

The feast proved to consist mostly of sugar-crusted leaves, stewed fruits, and nut casseroles.  Commander Chestnut, the two Morphicans, and Ensign Risqua seemed delighted by the fare, and to be fair, everything that Captain Carroway tasted was delicious.  Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 23: One Meal in Paradise”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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Under normal circumstances, Captain Carroway would never have stood for leaving her brand new ship totally empty on an alien world.  But there hadn’t been anything normal in her life since she’d stepped aboard The Wanderlust.  Everything had just been getting weirder and weirder, and she needed to roll with it or she’d break apart, shattering into a million pieces. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 22: The Living, Breathing Forest”

by Mary E. Lowd

An excerpt from Voyage of the Wanderlust.  If you’d prefer, you can start with Chapter 1, return to the previous chapter, or skip ahead.

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The electron torpedo flew away from The Wanderlust, shining like a tiny, shooting star on the main viewscreen.  From the outside, it looked like it emerged from the armaments of a much larger, much more dangerous ship.  In the blink of an eye, the torpedo collided with the closest Zakonraptor vessel, and the small ship erupted with fire that mirrored the fires it had been lighting below.  Though, of course, unlike the fires on the turtle’s back, this fire didn’t last long, fueled only by whatever air had been aboard the section of the ship that was breached by the electron torpedo’s explosion. Continue reading “Voyage of the Wanderlust – Chapter 21: A Strange, New Land”