There’s just one problem: the cities are mysteriously empty. He can’t find even one survivor, which means the planet is off-limits to commercial exploitation and cannot be used to achieve financial profits in any way.
Soon Temple discovers an even greater problem, one that is strange and ominous and threatens his crew’s very survival.
Not only that, it is an incredible cosmic mind-stretcher that strains sanity to the breaking point, not just the characters' sanity but the readers' as well.
Read an excerpt!
After Temple reported the discovery to the ship by comlink, they entered the entrance in the wall to find a tall column rimmed by spiral stairs. Drawing his pulser, he took the lead.
He descended into a stupendous oval chamber whose floor looked at least a hundred meters beneath them. Above, Temple saw a great translucent dome admitting pale light. It pierced the interior in great, shimmering shafts, though there seemed little to see. As far as he could tell, a meters deep gray, featureless ash covered the floor. When they reached the bottom, he found a walled path across it. In places, the ash spilled over the tops in acrid piles, making them cough. Like the others, Temple pressed a handkerchief to his face to relieve the smell.
The path turned and turned again. Then it disappeared. They found themselves in an open area. Before them stood a platform.
“Wait!” Temple shouted. He saw Harper and McBride lower their pistols. Assured no one would fire, he turned back. Like them, he stared at the object before them.
An alien.
There seemed to be no question it was dead, also ugly and repellant. Lizard-like, twice the size of a man, it stood in an arched alcove, frozen into the unnatural rigidity of death. Or was it unnatural, Temple thought. Wasn't death as natural as life, even far more so, given the brevity of the latter? For that matter, how could they be sure the alien was dead, no threat to them? He studied the massive, green, scaly legs, the glittering claws on the poised arms, and the lethal jaws of the head whose long razor teeth would accomplish what the two sharp horns on its forehead did not. Trembling, he felt himself shiver.
“Oh, Baby,” Diana almost crooned. “I'd sure hate to meet him in a dark alley some night.”
Temple glanced at them. Diana's and Caldwell's eyes glistened with excitement. Harper and McBride, older and more experienced, regarded the creature with suspicion, as if half expecting it to spring.
AVAILABLE AT MUSEITUPPUBLISHING.COM!
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He has also posted three dozen blogs on writing at http://storytellersunplugged.com/
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One of his interviews can be found at http://www.milscifi.com/files/inter-JBR-BS.htm
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