huge.
“Just rounding 70%.”
“Then we should already be reverse-Winkling.” Anything close to 70% of lightspeed and time effectively took half as long on the ship as off it. At about 95% of lighstpeed, the ratios reached for the sky and 1 year on the ship felt like ten to the rest of the universe and increased exponentially after.
“How long before we're in the Kennedy Window for the first few sensor pods?” I asked him.
The window was named for Andrew Kennedy, who invented the Wait Calculation. Basically, because of differing speeds, two bodies that leave the same point can reach their destination at radically different times. Kennedy was concerned with increases in technology, but the calculation had since been applied more broadly.
The Nexus was designed to fire sensor pods from tubes. Their initial speed was higher than the Nexus'. However, the Nexus continued to accelerate, and would eventually overtake the pods.
The purpose of the pods was to arrive at a planet flagged by earlier probes for closer inspection. The pods were designed to orbit a planet a couple of times, get enough info and slingshot back towards our trajectory to be picked up en route. Hitting Kennedy's Window meant getting the pod and its sensory data back early enough that we only stopped at planets that actually had someone to talk to on them.
“Ten minutes.” We were specifically targeting inhabitable planets. We didn't want mining rights to particular worlds; we wanted the rights for whole systems. So our mission was to seek worlds that might have competing claim, and break bread with them- if possible, make a deal. If not possible, at least make sure we marked off territory around them, to keep their expansion checked.
“There you are. You threatened to throw another engineer out an airlock?” I recognized the grating voice before I turned around. Pete Ferguson, HR rep and the company's man on the ship. He was the only unranked member of the crew, which was odd, because he was also number one in the ship's hierarchy- behind captain, of course. He was a stickler for the goddamn regs. He seemed to like me, but not respect me- an odd combination in practice.
“Is it somehow my fault you hired engineers who are 90% dick and only 10% brain?”
“I don't suppose you could tone down on the references to male genitalia,” he said. “I'm sure, at a minimum, that the female members of your crew aren't comfortable with it.”
Haley chimed in to defend me. “Actually, Mr. Ferguson, the term ‘dick' originated in the 1500s, meaning ‘fellow' or ‘lad.' It was not until the late nineteenth century that the phallic connotation of the word surfaces in the written record.”
“She's in rare form this morning, isn't she?” I asked him.
“She?”
“With that voice I think it's obvious. You don't want to give our ship gender identity issues this close to the start of our mission, do you? You aren't deliberately trying to create a hostile work environment for our computer, are you?”
“I'll, uh, be in my office,” he said, slightly ducking his head as he turned away.
“Thanks for that, Haley,” I said.
“Anytime, captain.”
Continued in Nexus, available Summer 2013.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Foreword
Shades of Cray: The story of the first transracial individual.
Leaving Lost Atlantis: A man writes his ex-wife, after discovering what happened to Atlantis.
An Iraqi Christmas Carol: A small group of soldiers and an Iraqi policeman mount a rescue for a kidnapped boy.
Quarter: A military team designed for assassinations loses control over one of its members in the middle of a mission.
Werehouse: A man trying to help his homeless cousin runs afoul of a society of murderers.
Atlas Dug Up: Two philosophical equals have a love affair that continues after death.
Blood Falls: An expedition to the Antarctic goes south, after a rock wall collapses.
Murder Your Darlings: A writer finds himself convinced one of his characters is trying to kill him, after his loved ones start getting hurt.
Mine: A doctor exacts revenge on a former-General.
Failure Cascade: A ride on a space elevator goes horribly wrong.
Euthanasia: A surgeon gets caught between his oath and his vengeful calling.
Shrink: An executive ponders the consequences of modern business.
Indian Gift: An ex-outlaw is drafted into convincing an Indian to sell his land.
Parallel: A professor familiar with inter-dimensional travel tries convincing one of his students to kill another.
New Corpse Smell: Observing decomposition.
Green Thumb: A Department of Agriculture employee has a chance run-in with a farmer covered in chemicals. This short story was eventually expanded into a novel, Dag, now available.
Dogs of War: Two Explosive Ordnance Disposal soldiers recover together, after nearly dying in an explosion. This story is part of a novella, Dogs of War, available for free to newsletter subscribers.
Nexus: The crew of an interstellar star ship try to screw the alien species they meet before their corporate backers can screw them. This is the opening chapter of Nexus, coming summer 2013.
Thanks From The Author
Other Works By Nic
Thanks From The Author
You have my sincerest thanks for helping me continue writing. Below is a list of my other work. Some is available for purchase now, others will be available soon. I also encourage you to check my website for other projects of mine, including RSS feeds of stories that are updating weekly and to sign up for my newsletter, so I can let you know when something new is coming out.
Nic feeds off your thoughts, attention and the odd crudely-drawn erotic fan-doodle. Feed Nic by leaving a review at your favorite e-tailer, or emailing him at
[email protected] Additional contact methods and stalking opportunities are available at NicolasWilson.com.
Other Works by Nic
Available Novels
Homeless
Humanity has been decimated by a violent new species that nests in enclosed spaces, and slaughters everything unfortunate enough to come indoors. Mitch is a 'Wall Banger', an explosives expert who 'cracks' buildings, exposing them to air and sunlight to kill the invasive organisms. When a friend of Mitch's asks for help tracking down a murderer, Mitch recruits Cori, a 'Shadow Runner' who races through infested spaces to gather supplies and saleable loot. But this terrifying contagion isn't the only danger, as their world descends into a harrowing marathon against oversupplied militias, murderous gangs, self-righteous survivors, and all-out starvation.
Banksters
It’s a profitable time to be a bastard, one of the most profitable in history. Mark Dane intends to take full advantage of that and be the bastard at the top- if he can make his way past his fellow predators, through a concrete jungle of murder, sex, greed, and revenge. Ride shotgun with a sociopathic social climber, as he lies, cheats, and manipulates his way through the ranks of the fourth largest financial firm in the country, and revel in the bastard on bastard violence that follows.
The Necromancer’s Gambit (The Gambit #1)
The sheriff of Portland, OR’s magical community is known as Knight. His bosses run the mage government, called "the Gambit." On a rainy night, he recovers a mutilated body, tainted with dark magic and dumped at a local haunt. When the corpse is identified as a close associate of the Gambit, it threatens the safety of the community he protects, and those he cares about most. As the fragile peace amongst the city's magic-wielding factions disintegrates, Knight must track down a cadre of murderers before his friends are picked off, one by one- with each death used to strengthen the spells cast against the Gambit.
Nexus (The Sontem Trilogy #1)
Captain Anderson Grant of the corporate starship Nexus boldly explores alien worlds (and occasionally the alien women, too). Grant and his crew struggle with the company’s version of manifest destiny, as well as its
attempt to coerce them through military force. They begin to question whether the largest threat to their mission and their safety will come from outside the Nexus or from the company that respects them more for their genetic possibilities than their individuality.
Dag
Dagney Morgan, a sarcastic Department of Agriculture employee with an affinity for paperwork, has a chance run-in with a farmer covered in toxic chemicals, and walks away with a genetically modified baby, along with the seeds of a conspiracy. Before she can learn how to change a diaper, Dagney and her makeshift family are thrown into an international web of corruption and intrigue, and hounded by murderous, artificial soldiers. Their only chance at survival is to expose a plot that stretches into the highest echelons, and could start both an international arms race, and a revolution.
Whores
In the near future, women's rights are eroding. Those who buck the system are hunted as gender criminals by the authorities when they're lucky, and rogue militias when they aren't. Alex Harmon, a newly minted gender crimes detective tasked with bringing recalcitrant 'feministas' to justice, pursues a woman cast into a resistance group by circumstance. The tactics of his peers and growing violence force him to question his goals and allegiances, as he finds himself dragged into a brutal guerrilla war for the minds and bodies of a generation of women.
Selected Short Stories Collections ebooks
Ghost Dust
Cinderella Shoes
New Corpse Smell
Cockfight
Analog Memory
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