Starchild exile, p.1
Starchild- Exile, page 1
STARCHILD
Episode I: EXILE
Books by J Washburn
SONG OF LOCKE
A Young Elfe Battles Darkness
on a Quest to Rescue a Goddess
ECKSDOT
A Grade-school Hero Fights the
Nightmares Bleeding into His Reality
INKLINGS
Plunge Headlong into an Author’s Mind
J WASHBURN
Text, illustrations, and cover copyright © 2019 by J Washburn. All rights reserved. Published 4 May 2019.
ILLE CAELUM FREMITUS
Back Cover
1.
Thousand of lifetimes ago, an alien civilization mysteriously vanished.
They left behind surge gates—portals that let ships travel from one star to another. These gates are now controlled by a tyrannical government. Their Witch Hunters keep the populace oppressed, and all interstellar traffic is carefully scrutinized.
When a young rebel gets captured, her friends plan a prison break. To accomplish their illegal mission, they need a Bloody Wing, a priceless alien artifact with the power to travel outside the surge gates, off the grid.
So they hire a man who stole one of these Bloody Wings—
A renegade pilot named Starchild.
2.
Radiances are outlaws.
That includes people with powers in the Song—
People who feel the magic so powerfully that it flows out as light through their eyes.
People like Kalhette.
And the pangalactic government will stop at nothing till she is imprisoned, tortured, and experimented upon. They have kidnapped innocent radiances before. Tyranny keeps the population oppressed. The Witch Hunters make sure no one else gains abilities like hers. They will not relent.
But neither will she.
As one lone outlaw, she must find a way to unite people against this rising evil.
She can keep running, keep hiding, keep surviving.
Or she can risk her life to go on the offensive.
To strike back.
3.
Tyranny rules the galaxy.
President Taiberos regulates the media to supposedly protect against hate. He controls the interstellar gates to ostensibly prevent war. He monitors civilians to officially make sure no one gains power.
And the power he hates most of all is the magic of the Song—a force so strong it flows out as light from the eyes.
His Witch Hunters kidnap anyone with such abilities, criminal or not, and people are afraid to fight back.
Afraid to stand together.
Afraid to rise up.
But one person may have the power to counter these fears. One person could call the citizens to arms. Except that she too has been kidnapped—and is being held prisoner in the infamous Building 13.
Only the most daring rescue might reach her, and the consequence of failure is death.
And yet a small team of rebels dare to try.
The mission requires them to use a Bloody Wing, a priceless alien artifact with the power to travel outside the interstellar gates, off the grid, beyond the grip of President Taiberos.
So the rebels enlist the help of a man who stole one of these Bloody Wings—
A renegade pilot named Starchild.
4.
Tyranny rules the galaxy.
President Taiberos controls the interstellar gates. He regulates the media. He monitors civilians. And the power he fears most is the magic of the Song—a force so strong it flows out as light from the eyes. His Witch Hunters kidnap anyone with such abilities, imprisoning these radiances in the infamous Building 13.
So people are afraid to fight back. Afraid to stand together.
Afraid to rise up.
One person may have the power to counter these fears. She’s a radiance named Kalhette. She survives as a fugitive, on the run from the Witch Hunters, in constant fear of being kidnapped and mutilated.
But at least it keeps her safe.
Until a band of rebels asks for her help, explaining how she alone could call the citizens to arms.
So she has to decide.
Is it worth staking her life in an outright offensive—
Leaving the shadows to strike openly at tyranny—
Even at the risk of torture and death?
* * *
Starchild is fast paced. It dives deep into loveable characters. The world (galaxy) is exquisite.
Reviews
It’s a story for people who grew up with Star Wars but who wanted Star Wars to grow up too.
“It’s like Christopher Nolan rebooted Star Wars!” — Nathan Tucker, Numinous
“Gripping from the first page.” — Patti S.
“It’s got all the best parts: action, romance, humor. If Star Wars and Guardians of the Galaxy had a baby this would be it.” — Melodee
“Great world building.” — McKay Christensen
“It’s Star Wars meets Plato. Deeper than most space operas.” — Ash
“If you like spaceships, daring missions, secret facilities, or damsels who can kick butt on their own, this is a book you’ll enjoy.” — Zach
“What George Lucas did for Flash Gordon, J Washburn does for Star Wars.” — Connor Riley
Legal
STARCHILD: EXILE is copyrighted (2019) by J Washburn. It may not be reproduced in any way without express permission from the author. The cover design and interior illustrations are by J Washburn; the cover illustration is by XXX. This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places, and incidents are fictional. Any resemblance of characters to real people, alive or dead, is just coincidence. To readers who suggest changes and other ideas—by offering feedback on this book, you waive all rights to those ideas. You also waive the right of compensation for your help. In other words, the author appreciates your suggestions and is deeply indebted to you for them—your feedback is invaluable—but for now the best he can promise in return is a better story. Keywords: space opera, relationships, military fantasy, star wars, galactic empire, role-playing games, space marine.
Contact
If you find an error in the text, notify the copyeditor at typos@jwashburn.com (and make sure to mention this book’s title)—you’ll go down in history as the hero of the next edition. Subscribe to J’s monthly fan letter here: theinformant.jwashburn.com. Contact the author directly at me@jwashburn.com. And check out jwashburn.com.
Ver. 1.06
WC 110571
To Jax
last brother, first reader
best friend
All comes from light
and all returns to it.
— Victor Hugo, Les Miserables, 1862 A.D.
EXILE
For full-size and full-color versions
of the images in this book as well
as a pronunciation guide, visit
jwashburn.com/books/starchild
Once upon a time in a faraway galaxy…
1. The Uncrowned Queen
Kalh sensed the Witch Hunters coming to get her.
The feeling reached out and tapped on her heart with a cold finger.
When she felt it, she gasped and put her hand over the vial hanging from her necklace. It was a tiny piece of glass, filled with white sand from the shores of Solace. Her home. When they began hunting her, that was what they took away—home.
Because a fugitive had no home.
“What?” asked little Tanie.
She sat with the children in a circle on the floor. They looked at her questioningly, wanting to know what startled her. Young minds were the most valuable asset in the galaxy—beings learning how to choose. She’d been teaching them musical theory, though she’d refrained from sharing her forbidden melody for fear of exposing herself. Still, that song remained in her heart as she considered her escape plan.
Outside, subsolars floated gently by in distant traffic lanes. The sky itself was blue with white clouds strewn across, and two gentle moons sat quietly in the background. Everything out there seemed so peaceful, so calm.
All except for the menacing silence.
Kalh often had these supernatural premonitions, but lately they tended toward paranoia rather than an uncanny gift, and that made her second guess the feeling. She feared being wrong. Maybe it was something else. Maybe everything was okay.
Benton had sent her to his home planet, Sream, where she’d stayed long enough to get a regular job and start a regular life. She’d had a couple close calls, but since they didn’t actually catch her it was hard to know how close. Maybe she’d just been paranoid. Maybe this would turn out the same. She didn’t need to get so uptight—she knew that logically. Getting her emotions to follow along was another thing.
“What’s wrong?” asked Daryan.
She forced a smile and looked at the children, hoping she could peacefully finish the lesson. “Nothing is wrong.”
A deep boom echoed down the hallway. The sound smacked against the windows of the classroom.
The children twisted toward the doorway and then looked at Kalh again, waiting for her to explain. The worry showed clear enough on the little faces, but Kalh also felt it through ptolis—to her keen senses, the collective emotions in the room hovered like an identifiable presence. Did her premonition have something to do with the children getting hurt?
The door was flung open firmly, and it banged against the wall. Troops poured in. They wore body armor tinted a bloody red with white and black accents—the redhelms. Those masked faces, behind cavernous
If she ran right now, she might have a chance. Only, a conflict would put the children in danger. She didn’t want to risk that. Especially if she wasn’t sure they were after her specifically. Besides, her heart had already sped up. It had to beat slowly to surge. She leaned forward and gracefully stood without her hands touching the ground. A calm exterior at least. “You’ve frightened the children.”
The lead redhelm marched straight for her and gripped her bicep with the hand that wasn’t carrying a rifle. “Come with us, ma’am.” His voice through the mask was tinny and robotic, surely scary to the children. Her long, wavy hair, which she’d spent extra time on the night before, had been caught beneath his grip, and as he pulled on her, he pulled on it.
She tilted her scalp ungracefully to relieve the pain. She reached behind her head and tried to pull her hair free.
The children watched the brutality in silence.
As he led her, his fingers pressed into her muscle and pinched nerve against bone.
She wanted to jerk her arm loose and show them what a radiance could do. But not with children in the room. Besides, they’d entered too casually, as if they didn’t know who she was. If that was true, retaliating would only convict herself. She’d been overlooked many times before. Though this might be her last chance to escape before their net closed.
If only her heart weren’t beating so quickly.
She made eye contact with Tanie, a cute little guy she tried not to think of as her favorite. “You can’t just leave the children untended.”
The redhelm turned back and raised his weapon as if in salutation, but it came across more like a threat. “Don’t worry, kids. We’re the good guys.” He pulled Kalh’s arm and hair again as he marched out. “They’ll be fine.”
They herded her with the other teachers down the hallway of the school. She nervously pulled her hair around to one side and gripped it, till she became conscious of this; then she confidently oscillated her head, shaking the hair back into place. She locked eyes with Annekel, who did not look okay, like she too were a panicked child. Kalh imagined that her own face must look impassive—the calm exterior people expected from her, one that didn’t match her heart rate, the same lie she lived beneath constantly.
The redhelms pushed them into a conference room with a massive wooden table. “Have a seat,” came the metallic voice of another soldier. The room was full of her fellow teachers and staff. She took a chair next to Carth, but she avoided his eyes. She wanted to communicate a plea for help, but that would reveal her guilt to the redhelms. Besides, what could Carth do?
If only she could contact Benton.
She traced the layout of the school in her mind. Her shoes were stable enough for running but not for pivoting. The closest stairway was just two turns away. Could she reach them before getting crippled? Not likely. She wanted to peer through the walls and see if the way was clear, but that would give her away too: She wasn’t adept enough to mask starsight. Surging downward to a floor below might just put her amid more redhelms with her cover blown. Still, she couldn’t do it now anyway, not without calming down first.
The wide windows overlooked the city. She was too high up to surge through. Or to just break them and leap. She needed an ally to catch her, and she didn’t have an ally. She was alone. She could always jump to her death, as many on her homeworld had done. She dreaded that possibility, but she couldn’t erase it from her mind either. Why couldn’t the galaxy just leave her alone? That was what she really wanted. A little piece of solitude. She closed her eyes in a long blink and breathed deeply.
It was too quiet. No one said a word. No one dared.
She hoped the children were okay. They would be okay, and she would be okay. She just needed to calm down, get her breathing and heart rate under control.
Maybe contacting Benton had gotten her into this. Maybe one of their relays over the handnet had been intercepted, and now they’d come for her specifically, to stop the revolution from happening. But if they were after her, they would’ve just grabbed her. Just her. Yet all these people had been taken. That meant they didn’t know who it was. She just had to stay calm and no one would know. She could still escape this.
She looked up as a man entered, one she recognized immediately:
President Malkorn Taiberos, the most powerful man in the galaxy. His gloved cybernetic hand gave him away. As did his fat face. His bodyweight pushed outward on his suit of armor, a physical symptom of his decadence. His skin was pink, his hair pale. Overall he was the tone of raw meat, a walking, dignified, open wound.
Behind him followed a retinue of Witch Hunters.
They wore navy jumpsuits with white, mechanical plating over the top, suits that enhanced their abilities far beyond normal human capability, an advantage that echoed the treachery of heavy taxation. Around their waists they strapped batteries and grenades. A variety of mechanical contraptions hung from their shoulders, chests, and arms, making their shapes look more alien than human.
Taiberos wore the same outfit, only his armor plates were a slate gray, and his armor seemed custom fitted for his unhealthy size, his girth being greater than the sleek soldiers who followed him. He’d turned his military career into a successful political run, but his armor suggested he’d come for the former, not the latter. He carried his helmet under his arm so people would recognize him and give the deference he believed he deserved. The hand hanging over the mask was covered in a black glove, his famous black glove. Beneath it was a cybernetic hand, never once seen by the public. A source of shame, it seemed. But that didn’t stop him from famously pounding his gloved hand on pulpits as he campaigned to the ignorant masses.
The hand of Taiberos.
Kalh’s heart raced, equal parts terror and hatred. She didn’t know whether they’d already identified her, and she didn’t know how to flee if they did. In her mind, she saw a reporter speaking into a microphone and heard the echo of four words: Never heard from again. Never heard from again. Never heard from again. It had happened to Rothlesfer just a millo ago. And now it was happening to her.
Taiberos began circling the table.
One of the white-clad Witch Hunters dropped a long box on the table. It gouged the wood as one corner hit first.
Curiosity ticked the tip of Kalh’s tongue, and she wanted to look through its sides to see what was inside. Some kind of weapon? Or something that would convict her. But if she looked, she’d convict herself. She glanced at the surveillance camera peering down at them. It would’ve offered some protection—no one liked to do evil on camera. Only, Taiberos and his kind controlled them.
Next a miin entered the room.
Short, dark fur covered his body, and six appendages came from his torso. Many miina on Sream walked upright to blend in better with their human counterparts, but this one did not. He crawled like a predator on all sixes, disregarding the way it made him stand out. He looked around the room till he found her, and then the two of them locked eyes.
Her first reaction was disgust.
Miina were from her homeworld. They were traitors.
Of course, Benton didn’t think so. In fact, he trusted them deeply. Or some of them at least. And it was possible Benton had sent this one to help her out. She’d seen this creature in the marketplace too, skulking in the background, acting perfectly like a guardian. Or a spy.
The miin looked at Kalh with his animal eyes, and then he winked, like he knew her secret, like she could relax because they were on the same side.
She looked away. If they knew it was her, they wouldn’t have called everyone in. If they didn’t know, why would he have given that wink to her specifically? It only made sense coming from an ally. She decided to take a risk and gave the slightest nod. Maybe he could help her get out of here. If so, Benton had pulled through once again.
