G.R. Nanda

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2200 Blues: Major Update for the New Year

Hello! Here we are, five years and 104 blog posts later! Last week, I finally reached the end of the first draft of 2200 Blues. The whole draft is 161,988 words, typical for an epic length novel in the science fiction/fantasy genres. I’ve handwritten the last chapters, which are far ahead of what is published on my blog. I’ve published the first part of Chapter 58, while I ended at around Chapter 78 (I’ve lost track of the exact order since I omitted a previous Chapter 58 from publication).

This has been a major milestone and marks the first completion of a draft of 2200 Blues. This is officially the first novel I have written. I’ve had this story in my system for years (since the fall of 2019), and I’ve finally reached the end. From the age of 15 to 21, even with a nearly two-year break from this project, 2200 Blues has carried me through a formative writing journey.

I will be pausing the regular weekly publication of 2200 Blues chapters for some time, as I need to take a break from this story before typing up my final handwritten chapters.

However, I would love to thank all of you in my small but loyal audience who have braved the bogged-down, murky, and rambling canyons and far reaches of my early draft. What you’ve seen in my published chapters has been edited mainly for grammar and clarity, without any substantial streamlining. It’s been a long and significant investment for those of you who have committed to reading every single chapter I’ve published.

Firstly, I want to thank Jennifer Boorman, who has been my biggest writing mentor. She took great interest in 2200 Blues back when it had just begun and has provided immense encouragement and constructive feedback from the start. Your mentorship during COVID was an amazing source of meaningful social connection and growth. Most of what I have learned about the mechanics of writing a scene, action, and character interactions has come from our one-on-one feedback loop with each chapter I wrote. I am incredibly lucky to have had a reader and mentor like you in my life, especially at such a young age for me. Your compassion, sharp attention to detail, encouragement, and engagement in my story have been an illuminating and wonderful part of my life.

Secondly, I want to thank the WordPress blogger who goes by the name DirtySciFiBuddha. You’ve been pressing “like” on every single one of my chapter posts all the way back to COVID, when I first started the blog at the age of 16. I appreciate your investment in my story. I encourage everyone to check out his writings on his blog—he has his own novels available for purchase on Amazon. Also, Kent, I’d love it if you left a comment on this post! I’d love to finally hear from my longest and most loyal reader!

The tiny group of regular readers has expanded since I began engaging with the arts scene in Gloucester, Massachusetts, this past year. I want to thank Bing McGilvray for reading all the chapters I’ve posted since resuming publication at the start of this year and for putting me on the radar of other interested Gloucester creatives who’ve joined the readership. Your comments and feedback have been an invaluable source of motivation for me. Check out Bing’s works in the Cape Ann Cosmos, a publication he helps run. Here’s a Cosmos piece about Bing as an artist and a fascinating and witty Cosmos piece he wrote about AI. From our lengthy conversations, I can tell you he has a wonderfully creative and perceptive mind.

Fourthly, I want to send a big thank-you to ANYONE who has read my work on my blog and/or offered me feedback and encouragement. Anyone who has perused my blog has given me motivation. I want to thank Eve Kerrigan and Maryann Ullman, my first creative writing teachers in high school, who provided immense inspiration and practice that got my wheels turning fast enough to roar into the accidental beginnings of 2200 Blues with full confidence. You both gave useful feedback on my early writings and were the first test audience for the name 2200 Blues. I greatly appreciate your contributions to my process and for facilitating spaces at school for me to work on this novel, including Maryann letting me focus on 2200 Blues for an entire trimester-length class. To anyone who has chosen to participate in the readership of what is a very intimidatingly long and winding first draft, thank you.

Lastly, I want to give a big thank-you to Reverend Richard Emmanuel of the experimental church in Gloucester, Massachusetts, for his spiritual musings and the conversations we’ve shared this past year as I got to know him. Your investment in me as a fellow human being on the “walkabout of life,” as you would say, and as a creative, has been invaluable to my relationship with art and the human experience. Together, we’ve explored science fiction, the narrative act, consciousness and the human condition—an exploration that seeped into 2200 Blues as I resumed work on it this past year. I am so grateful to have known you and to call you a friend. May you rest in peace.

What an incredible journey and a final wrap to the year 2024! 2200 Blues has seen me through thick and thin—navigating life and high school during the pandemic, readjusting from post-COVID maladjustment—it has been the lifeline I clung to in order to find purpose, stay on track, or get off the wrong track and onto the right one. Being able to share my work online has been tremendously valuable to me as a writer. It’s gotten me comfortable with sharing my work and exposed me to the vulnerabilities of showcasing incomplete and flawed work. Thus, I’ve become very comfortable seeing through and finishing incomplete and flawed work—the only way to bring creativity to fruition.

Phew! That was a lot, and the list of people to thank could go on endlessly. No creation manifests from a vacuum. The truly hard work for 2200 Blues will commence when I return to the project, with many more drafts to come—surely much harder and more arduous than the first. However, a primary project of this blog was to support the completion of my first novel draft. It’s surreal and indescribably fulfilling to have accomplished that.

A second primary project has been fulfilled by all of you reading this blog post and many more: the sharing and engagement of a story. Storytelling is a cycle, moving from the outside world through the creative act, back into the outside world, and right back into the creative act. Life itself is a creative act, influenced by and influencing many more. The storytelling process and phenomenon is never truly brought to fruition until the story has been shared, only for it to begin again, in countless individuals.

During this weird science fiction story we call the 2020s, you have all helped me to tell my own.

Writing this blog post has been incredibly humbling, enabling me to reflect on just how fortunate I’ve been to engage with and receive support from so many people in so many meaningful ways. You have all made this writer.

The last chapters of 2200 Blues will eventually go up here on the blog, but until then, you can expect different works.

Here’s to 2025! Happy New Year! 🎉 🚀 ✨

Early concept art for the lower level of Nickel’s American Eagle hovercraft that I doodled when I was 16

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Short Story – Woodland’s Heart

Please leave a comment for feedback! What you liked or didn’t like is greatly appreciated.

Out of the whole campsite, it was the log cabin that I hated the most. It reminded me of the reason I was at the campsite in the first place, to do the terrible work my dad wanted me to do. He’d got me like a fish on a hook with promises of— doing just that, fishing and also hiking up the Adirondack. But the dripping carcasses of freshly killed animals inside that cabin was really why I was here. I’d rather do anything than skin those animals, but my old man always said it was what I was meant to do in life.

I dragged my feet around the trees surrounding the campsite, procrastinating on the work I didn’t want to do. The trees were giants then, protecting me from being seen, creatures I could trust in their stillness as they stood tall and silent out of the endless carpet of dried foliage, frozen snow, twigs and sticks, creating little walls I could hide behind. I wanted to find one big enough to hide me as I ran away, only to return when the sun began to dip as my dad finished the day’s work. After some slow and quiet wandering, I found one, stopping behind a tall oak with a wide waist of bark, tracing the endless ridges in the wood with my eyes as they raced to the sky.

“Patrick!”

The boom of his voice made me quiver. It boomed whenever he was irritated with me. I could still hear the fireplace flames licking the air in fluttering motions. There were animals hanging over those flames, and I wasn’t ready to skin them. My chest tightened with anxiety, freezing me. Ever since my mom started chemo, the animals he skinned were his favorite pastime. He was so sure it would make the money he said it would—as long as I helped him, of course. It was his way of guilting me, of punishing me. He hadn’t mentioned it before we came, but I knew he’d bring it up by the end, to twist the knife either way. I didn’t like doing it, he knew I didn’t like doing it— he wanted me to like it, but he’d criticize me regardless.

Before I could move, something else did, crunching the leaves next to me. Breaking through a clump of drying, dying leaves hanging from the branches of a bush near the oak tree, was a small furry paw. My head buzzed, and I leapt backwards, my feet jostling more leaves than it. As its legs reached out, and dug into the earth, he turned his head around the bush. Peering at me with small beady eyes, he almost looked cute, except for the sharp claws that tore holes in the leaves as his paws sank through the foliage.

“Patrick!” roared my father. “Don’t make me come there and drag you! You’re old enough to know when you have to work.” The wolf slowly creeped around what was left of the bush. It opened its mouth as if to yawn but bared its sharp fangs at me— like a snake. I wanted to run and run like I was trying to impress the girl I liked in my gym class. But I couldn’t. I was frozen. As long as I stayed still, I could imagine the wolf walking about, a part of the world, like in a game of Pokémon Go, instead of my mind. I heard my dad’s footsteps behind me, a constant thunder, pounding on the earth, breaking the foliage, trampling the snow. His trampling was when I knew for sure I would get hit. Usually, it was down the staircase back in the shack we called home. There weren’t so many trees back there. Hiding in the trees here, I felt like an animal. At school and home, there were so many expectations— how to sit still, who to talk to, who not to talk to, how to play on the baseball field, how to be a good boy. With the trees— and the wolf, I felt like more than just a boy, but free— wild like an animal.

As I waited for the lightning strike of my dad’s body, I wanted nothing more than the wolf to bite me. I see that a lot clearer now. In the moment, I just wanted to stop slaving away for my dad. I wanted the wolf to jump on me and tear through my skin with its fangs. To hurt so bad that my dad would finally see me. Care for my wounds. Care for me. That as my dad’s footsteps grew louder and his ragged breath more imminent, I’d gasp and collapse to the ground, unable to stand up, a fetal animal in the throes of death or worse, lamentation.

“You’re still standing there!” my dad grunted. “Turn around and face me! I’ve called you six times now—” The wolf skidded its feet at the sound of my dad, turning around and looking me dead in the eye. “—but you have the nerve to stand with your back to me!” It took a long step forward. It’s happening. The outstretched claws stabbed the leaves, sinking its paw. Dad’s breath was like a snowblower, a spitting exhaust, behind me. I could hear it against the roof of his mouth and the insides of his nostrils. “What in God’s name is into you-”

The wolf opened its mouth wider, showing me its pale pink gums, the length of its long gray teeth, and snarled a hissing snarl. I remember thinking I’d rather feel them cut into me than whatever it was my dad was going to make me feel, in my body or my mind.

“Patrick! You lost all your chances!” my dad roared. The wolf’s paw almost disappeared in the leaves. My dad’s footsteps crushed the leaves and sticks behind me, snapping, crunching with no thought. With none of the quiet and gentle of the wolf. The wolf stepped forth with its hind leg, this time wobbling it. The wolf was stuck. It was taking too long to turn around, its hind and front legs stuck together. “Just when I thought you were good for something,” breathed my father.

The wolf collapsed, shivering on the way down. Instead of jumping on me, it limped around the bush before it fell on a pile of snow. Blood dripped out of its stomach, a pool of red bigger than I’ve ever seen before. Its head crashed, its eyes staring into mine as life escaped them. It went completely still. Its limbs curled up, eyes still staring into mine.

A painful blow struck the side of my head, burning across my ear and the side of my face. The sound of crashing skin came first. Then my exploding cry. Then the ringing in my ear, louder than everything. The burning grew over the side of my head. My blood rushed to the side and then it rushed up. Cold hard leaves and dirt met the other side of my face, prickling my skin, burning as hot as my dad. I grunted, tasting bits of dirt in my mouth, feeling hot tears grow in my eyes. I blinked them away in a hurry, seeing the top of the dead wolf, me curled over him.

To this day, I wonder how different a man I’d be if the wolf had bitten me.

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What is 2200 Blues?

In a future earth plagued by technological escapism and excess, a young man named Nickel is torn from a false digital Eden and thrust into a post-nuclear wasteland. Surviving becomes a journey into unexpected cultures, strange magic and dangerous visions.

This blog post was written before I completed the first draft of 2200 Blues. For the most recent update on 2200 Blues, click here!

As an additional note, I will be splitting my completed manuscript into three novels for future rewrites and revisions. I will soon divide the available chapters on this website by their designated book in the 2200 Blues trilogy.

2200 Blues is a science fiction novel in the works. For those jumping in for the first time, Chapter 47 is a good place to start.

I’m sharing my progress on the early drafts by posting chapters online. My chapters are basically the bare ideas and language for my novel. I expect to update and change aspects of the plot, characters and prose as I am working in the early idea incubation process.

I was deep in a world-building phase which is reflected by chapters 24-46. They are of a creation myth belonging to a fictional culture that I have created for my novel. Chapter 23 begins in the setting of my novel where the myth is narrated, before becoming the narrative of the prose itself. Then, in chapter 47, we return to the setting of the novel, where the myth’s narration is finished at the beginning. Chapters 24-46 will most certainty not be in the final version of my book. They are too much of a tangent from my main story. If I am to include the creation myth in the final draft, it will be in a much shorter abridged form.

I anticipate more worldbuilding content, for worldbuilding’s sake, which might not make it into my final draft. This all goes to show that what I am sharing on this website for 2200 Blues is a work in process. I am still discovering the story.

2200 Blues is a large scale science fiction fantasy epic and a coming of age story. Its biggest influences come from the science fiction novels Dune, Ready Player One, The Lord of the Rings, the Blade Runner films and The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe. These are among many sci-fi/fantasy stories mixed into my influences.

Here’s a concept sketch of a setting in the story.

Concept sketch of *Eagle’s* “basement” by G.R. Nanda

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What to Expect

By G.R. Nanda

This blog is a creative outlet. Readers can expect mostly fiction on this website, along with commentaries on fiction of different mediums.

As I’m a part of the sci-fi/fantasy reading audience, that’s the audience I’m writing for. Expect a lot of talk on speculative fiction as well as my own science-fiction and fantasy. As I’ve said on my About page, I love the large scale in fiction and have a great admiration and fascination for world-builders such as Frank Herbert and J.R.R Tolkien and their works. I attribute Star Wars and Harry Potter to infatuating me with the fantastical and futuristic. In my later adolescent years, I fell in love with indie and art house science fiction films such as Blade Runner (1982) and Ex Machina (2014). One of my favorite contemporary film directors is Denis Villenueve who’s responsible for Arrival and Blade Runner 2049, two of the best science fiction films I’ve seen from this century. I think the latter was a fantastic display of creative vision and originality that lives up to the stature and beauty of the original Blade Runner. It’s a sequel that doesn’t pander to nostalgic imagery or retread a film we’ve already seen (*cough, *cough – Star Wars: The Force Awakens).

Given Villenueve’s impressive feat in creating a visually striking and expansive futuristic world in 2049, I am incredibly excited to see how he adapts one of my all time favorites, the sci-fi book Dune by Frank Herbert. My fingers are crossed for a mind-blowing theatrical experience come this December. I really hope this film is not postponed because of the coronavirus! I plan on seeing the movie on its release date if I can and will post a review here.

Expect much to arrive here.

2200 Blues Serialization Update.

I will be splitting my completed 2200 Blues manuscript into three novels for future rewrites and revisions. I will soon divide the available chapters on this website by their designated book in the 2200 Blues trilogy.

2200 Blues Chapter One – Excerpt

The following is the most polished version of the first chapter in 2200 Blues, revised after the completion of my full manuscript:

A blanket of orange emerged from the atmosphere. The purple sky, its red clouds, and setting evening sun began to disappear from Nickel’s view. Orange gas flowed over the window through which he was looking, in floating particles and coalescing clumps. Where the sun was, a ball of red could be seen against the screen of gas, still burning into sight. But slowly, the frenzied gas took over, thickening around Nickel’s descending American Eagle hovercraft, and the fiery halo of light dimmed, decreased, and eventually went out.

All was orange. Nickel could still see clumps and particles floating around like snowflakes. The white outline of the spatial calibration map glowed from the navigational monitor situated on the dashboard in front of Nickel. On the right side, two vertical lines illustrated the scaled depths of the atmosphere. In between them a triangular pin prick was lowering, its tip pointing downwards. Once it reached the base it stopped. But Nickel knew that the Eagle was still descending. He could hear the engine rumbling under his feet, and the triangle was still pointing downwards from its tip. Nickel realized that the map had reached its limit. Wherever the ship was going, it was a place outside of the map’s knowledge.

He frantically swiveled around in his chair, surveying the circular control room of the Eagle. The monitor in front of his chair stretched around the walls of the hovercraft. He could see that screens were flickering. The lights embedded in the domed ceiling turned on and off. There were leisure-decks in the middle of the room. Chairs behind them shuddered. The monitors hanging from the wall shook.

The force of the descent pounded against the walls, and roared. All the screens and lights turned off. Nickel turned around, grabbed the nylon seat belt from under his seat and strapped it across his lap. The orange light of the gas outside cast itself into the room in a murky swath.

Nickel waited. He sat solemnly and tense, waiting for the verdict. For his fate. For the longest time in forever, he’d felt in control of his life; the Eagle was his life. As long as he could pilot and maneuver the Eagle; as long as it was functioning, Nickel was on top of the world because he and his hovercraft actually were on top of the world.

Nickel squeezed his eyes shut. A buzz of panic swarmed his head. The insides of his eyelids changed colors, responding to the shifting brightness of the gasses outside. A feeling of utter despair sank into his chest. He felt water collect at his eyes. He couldn’t cry. He was an adult; a 16 year old man; a whole grown man. A drop of tear escaped his eyelids and streamed down his cheek. It was joined by another from the next eye. He opened his eyes, letting the water flow. The dam of artificial security had fallen apart, letting a river of pampered adolescent anguish flow. Born into the Third Ether Realm, Nickel had been plugged into its virtual infographics of the world since the age of twelve. Disconnected from the Ether Realms, Nickel could only imagine what ghoulish technologies and unknowns awaited him outside. A screen to Nickel’s far left suddenly glowed and displayed a blinking warning sign. But in seconds it went black. Nickel pulled his head with his arms and stayed as still as he could. His eyelids were now dark.

The bottom of the ship grated against a surface. The floor rumbled. From below came a long piercing sound that hurt his eardrums. Nickel remained crouched. The grating ceased, but it reverberated in his mind. The Eagle gave a few more sporadic clanks as it settled itself on a seemingly precipitous terrain, moving around and thudding. Nickel opened his eyes and looked up at the world beyond his glass window. Still nothing but orange gas. A groaning came out of the back of the ship. Nickel shut his eyes, pressed his body against his chair and clenched its handles, bracing for the next series of impacts. There was no series of impacts. The groaning died, and all Nickel could hear was the eerie howling of the windy, gaseous atmosphere. He was breathing heavily. He opened his eyes again seeing nothing but a mellow orange outside; an atmosphere moving past the Eagle faster than Nickel was used to. Usually, it was him zooming past the world in his shell of a hovercraft. Not the other way around. The screens and monitors flickered to life, casting the green aura that signified no contact with the Ether Realms. The green shorted out to primary navigational systems. The technical functions were back, but the hovercraft was no longer online. Nickel felt too numb and helpless to take any course of action. He inhaled deeply. Do something. You can’t be still. Use the Eagle! You have a glibbing hovercraft! You stupid glibb! Just use it! With a tap and a flick of his hand, he summoned up a live fuel analysis on the piloting screen in front of him. The ship had so far used up over half of its ionized fuel resisting the forceful descent through this atmosphere. Nickel closed his eyes in frustration. Jesus glibbing CHRIST! Keep MOVING! Nickel opened his eyes and chose a power savings option. The entire ship was now expending 15% less fuel and electricity than usual.

Paperback Sci-Fi

A sweat-stained coolness clings to the velvety paperback expanse,

covered by a somber, questing night-sky,

years of perspiring excitement smudged over a humid cover,

peeling with curled-over edges,

whipped by riptides of passion,

the lone figure

depicted amidst waves of dunes

harkening back

to the clacking keys of a typewriter

stained by perspiration

in the raging summer of the 60s’,

unraveling in a boy

sunk deep into a beanbag,

keeping warm in the wintry chill of 2019,

as a promise teased over the cover—

“soon to be a major motion picture”

—unleashes a fire that keeps him warm

in the darkest depths of a pandemic winter

and the harshest storms of adolescence,

a mythology unleashed

amidst flickers of the news,

wars,

and environmental collapse

crystallized in the pages of a genius futurist,

the self and body transcended through space and time

by a young man stranded, both on the page and in front of it,

the sunset of the future made clear

through the thickets of time and space,

transmuting across years,

to artificial humans

in existential terror

aglow on the silver screen

lit by the flames of a beacon

burning divination

in a boy,

swimming in the currents of genre,

illuminated by those before him,

he finds a new footing,

with pen and paper,

creating his own world,

scribbling away

the heart of a sixteen-year-old,

found in the cracked spine,

worn with creased lines,

and split down the middle

by adolescent thrill.

to Frank Herbert who lit the embers

and Denis Villeneuve who lit the beacon,

Thank You Very Much,

I offer my gratitude, forever,

G.R. Nanda

2200 Blues Epilogue

TWO MONTHS LATER

______________________________

____________________

_______

“This cave dwelling will protect us from the phantoms for some time,” Venkar intoned.

A lone candle separated the two of them, illuminating the dark interior of the cave. A slow dripping echoed from the far recesses, but all was so silent that Nickel felt he could hear the very flickering of the thin candle. Or perhaps it was just his mind supplanting noise onto the silence.

Nickel scoffed in exasperation. “I’m too distracted!” he complained.

“You attach yourself to your thoughts,” Venkar said.

“What do you mean?” Nickel shouted in frustration. “I want to focus, but I—”

“That’s where you must stop,” Venkar interrupted.

“Stop focusing?”

“Stop wanting to focus,” Venkar said. “Just let it be.”

Nickel opened his eyes and sighed. “When I was in my hovercraft, I felt my focus was being pulled every which way by all the screens I was surrounded with.”

“Then how will you be ready for Hedonim?” Venkar asked.

Nickel started to respond but closed his mouth, sighing. He wanted to ask, How will I be?

“Your spiritual training begins with your attention. The Thraíha have given you a strong foundation in will. Now you must recognize that it is not the screens identifying with your mind, but your mind identifying with them.”

“But the Ether is designed to—”

“Of course it is,” Venkar said. “But all phenomena begin as subtle vibrations that manifest as gross thoughts of the mind. Let go of the desire. Become the background space against which all things flow, mere waves in the ocean of consciousness.”

“Focus on the breath and let all pass as ephemeral,” Venkar continued. “Go outside.”

“What?”

“Go outside the cave,” he said. “Go to the other end.”

“Why?”

“Practice,” Venkar said.

“Venkar,” Nickel said, “I can only spend so much time practicing. We have to get to Hedonim!”

“If only we observe the present, appreciate all that is there, we see we have all the tools within us. I may tell you of them, but you must recognize them in yourself.”

Nickel stared at him.

“Go,” Venkar said.

Nickel suppressed a sigh. “Okay,” he said, standing up and walking past Venkar.

He made his way through the narrow passages of jagged rock, struggling to fit between them. The deeper he went, cramping his shoulders and bowing his head to pass, the brighter the cavern became. Inlets of blue light flickered through the cavern walls, illuminating droplets of water beading and falling from the ceiling.

A strange clacking noise echoed, growing louder, merging with a distant roaring sound—like a waterfall, but something else entirely.

What did Venkar want me to see? Nickel winced as he hit his head against a protruding boulder wedged into the roof. A phantom? Nickel staggered to a halt. The moment he froze, vertigo swept through him, pulling him forward through the cavern. His vision blurred, and he stumbled through the rest of the passage.

The blue light outside grew brighter, coating the rock walls in a glowing luminescence, seeping into their crevices like liquid. The roaring sound became deafening.

Nickel smacked into the cave wall, his entire body jolting from the impact. The vertigo was unstoppable, yanking every fiber of his being toward the cave’s exit. His feet scrambled beneath him, unable to resist the force, until he stumbled out of the cave entrance, crashing to his knees before the gargantuan, glowing skyscrapers of Hedonim.

Nickel wailed in horror, his hands trembling, wanting to cover his eyes but finding himself unable to. He was back in the hovercraft, but worse. Instead of falling out of the Ether into the canyons, he felt like he was falling out of the canyons into the Ether—like never before.

Nickel gasped, his body frozen in place. The city rose before him, a glowing dam of artifice, a wall of towering constructions shaped in oblong, curving, spiraling, and rectangular forms. They emerged from massive block-like structures where ghostly phantoms of human beings—avatars of the unseen, undying emblems of digital entertainment, of hedonism—frolicked endlessly, uniform and spawning without end, like a hive of ants creeping from the ground.

Holograms and holograms galore. The physical merged with the digital. The digital became physical. All in one. An endless digital sphere, threatening to subsume and consume reality—to become reality. Nickel whimpered, unable to take control of his body. He felt eternally cursed to a life where the digital Ether was so alluring it would always subsume his existence, becoming the only reality—while reality itself, with its myriad burdens, traumas, and misgivings, lurked to haunt him. How could he withhold the Ether from that?

A giant holographic statue was projected atop a skyscraper rooftop, held in place by a field of lasers encircling the base. It was of a nude woman, with dark, empty eyes, languishing over a city Nickel feared and desired all at once.

The sight began to pulse, sending rays of light into the sky. The city was an entity giving birth to pleasure and allure over and over again. It could swallow him whole at any moment. The images of the buildings and lights began to flicker and pulsate, growing larger in size and hazier—just as they had in Nickel’s visions of the singing sorceress. But was this a vision? Or was it the light effects of the city itself making the buildings flicker and pulsate?

Nickel moaned but bit down on his lip. He closed his eyes. Inhaled deeply. Cool air tickled the insides of his nostrils. Warm air blew out. Icicles grew, freezing along the caverns of his nose. A rising sun melted them in a hot bath.

Hedonim. City. My life. Mom. Dad. Bullies. Regret. Mistakes. Kythria.

Breathe in.

Steve’s gone.

Breathe out.

I might never see Farrul again.

Breathe in.

Did I screw up our friendship?

Breathe out.

Will I make it through Hedonim?

Breathe in.

I feel better.

Breathe out.

I’m okay.

Breathe in.

Nickel opened his eyes, feeling that the churning of his mind was quieter than before. His thoughts were mere flashes against the sun of his mind. And Hedonim was no longer ebbing as it had been before, made stiller by his meditation. He closed his eyes again.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Breathe in.

THE END OF

2200 BLUES

to be continued in Book Two

2200 Blues Chapter 73

Steve’s funeral was a long affair. When Nickel met the Thraíha again by the rock island where the row men had sailed him, they had prepared a long tribunal and death ceremony for him. His body had been recovered and brought inside their wooden tribunal. The Thraíha hadn’t been on this island in over a century, but it had remained their ancestral burial ground.

“Raised from the Past World,” intoned Akela, standing at the berth of the funeral circle surrounding Steve’s casket, “and passed through the Huntsman’s eternal journey, the man known as Steve has returned to the stars, having lived a journey jeweled by the touch of the constellations of life whence he came.”

Nickel stood in tribal Thraíha attire, adorned with ceremonial hawk feathers encircling his neck as a necklace, marking his torso. He stood, somber and reflective, listening attentively, alongside everyone else standing in the circle surrounding the funeral pyre space.

Having finished his speech, Akela stepped into the circle, ushering women in ceremonial tan gowns, their heads covered by hoods. They moved toward Steve’s casket, carrying it in a slow procession to lay it afloat on the currents of the Rinkwik River.

_______________________________________

__________________________

___________

A day later, the Thraíha resumed their long march away from the landmass of their ancestral settlement, continuing their journey away from the oncoming glacial melt. It marked the resumption of the Thraíha pilgrimage to Hedonim, which had been ruled to take place only after the tribe found a new home to settle.

Farrul had decided to leave for Hedonim with a small band of hardware technicians who were working the few docks stationed around the island. They were there to take full advantage of the mass population movement—the largest presence of Thraíha seen in generations. Usually, only rogue game hunters or lone pilgrims seeking Hedonim were seen.

Nickel felt his relationship with Farrul fraying more than ever before. While they held a bond, a special connection forged through their loyalty to one another and their mutual survival, it was, in the end, just that—a product of their shared circumstances.

Farrul wanted nothing to do with the woes of Thraíha culture. He was still preoccupied with his own internal demons, seeking a different way out.

“So long, Nickel,” he said, clasping Nickel’s hand as he prepared to leave with his band of bandits and technicians. “I hope we meet again,” he muttered. “And I hope that both of us make it through Hedonim. Maybe we’ll see each other on the other side.”

Nickel murmured agreement, wishing Farrul farewell. As his hand slipped from Nickel’s grip, he felt as though he were losing a piece of his world—the world he had known for nearly a year. Farrul turned away, walking down the hill where trees with craggy leaves stood. He was heading back into the world of orange fog. Nickel wasn’t so sure he wanted to return to it himself. A deep sadness and pang of loss swept through his chest, weighing on his stomach as Farrul disappeared into the forest.

A conch blew in the distance, marking the start of the Thraíha’s long march. Nickel’s eyes widened, and he bolted in the opposite direction, rushing through the trees. Breaking through leaves and foliage, he stumbled into the clearing where he had last stood with the Thraíha.

A group of young women were about to board a long grizard-drawn circular carriage made of wood. Nickel had waited for the last conch to blow because he knew it would announce the departure of the last batch of Thraíha—including Kythria.

She looked bleary-eyed, throwing Nickel off as he stumbled into the clearing. Tear marks glistened on her face as she hugged the remaining Thraíha before stepping up onto the tree-stump leading into the wagon. Her friends were already seated inside, waiting for her to join them.

Talk to her! Nickel’s mind screamed. But she looked ready to leave. The conch blew again, this time in successive bursts, over and over, announcing the final departure. The grizard leashed to the carriage stomped its large, scaly legs and swerved its giant anvil-shaped head, its beady black almond eyes darting every which way.

Talk! Say goodbye!

Nickel was frozen in place, watching as Kythria stepped into the carriage. As she turned to sit down, her eyes met his. Frozen, unsure whether to speak or move toward her, he quickly looked away—and she did too, settling into the carriage, leaning against her friend’s shoulder, wiping tears from her face.

The conch blew continuously, an unceasing call, as the grizards were whipped into motion. They howled before breaking into a steady trot, carrying the Thraíha away and leaving a trailing wave of dust and dirt afloat in the air.

Nickel sighed, closing his eyes and lowering his head.

“Why don’t you go with them?” came a cool, austere voice.

Nickel looked up, frowning. He stared through the haze of floating dust without turning toward the direction the voice had come from.

“You won’t go with your friend Farrul into the depths of a computer hacking world because you don’t want to get lost in Hedonim, but you won’t go with the Thraíha,” the man said. “Even though they hold the lore and sites of a reality beyond what they call the Past World.”

Nickel’s eyes widened, and his frown deepened, but he still didn’t turn around, feeling a prickling sense of alarm and confusion. This man wasn’t a Thraíha. Then who was he, and how did he know so much about Nickel?

“Will you look at me,” the man said, taking a few steps closer, the crunch of leaves underfoot carrying through the air, “if I told you I am a disciple of the man you know as—Rishi?”

Nickel gasped, finally turning to face the stranger standing calmly behind him, his hands clasped behind his back.

“Prove it,” Nickel muttered, turning his whole body to face him fully.

The man was broad-built, dressed in robes like Rishi’s, but equipped with a utility belt and a strap of survival tools. His hands were gloved. His long black hair was tucked into a bun, and a long black beard flowed freely before him.

He watched Nickel, moving his fingers under the folds of his robes, pulling out an orb with a sigil, all the while keeping his eyes trained on Nickel.

Nickel stepped closer, his frown deepening. The man waved the orb in the air, revealing a circular sigil with a jagged line crossing it.

Nickel inhaled sharply. “He said to look for those with the sigil of his monastery.”

The man chuckled, returning the orb to the folds of his robe.

“Nickel, you’ve shown tremendous strength, bravery, and resilience. You’ve escaped the clutches of the Ether, first by accident, then by your own volition. That is a destiny not oft attained by men of your generation.”

“My name is Venkar, and I was the disciple of Rishi’s held hostage by the Thraíha. The Death Riders intercepted Rishi’s message and played the bluff with the computers in the Thraíha temple. It was meant for me, but you stumbled upon it instead. They captured you when they meant to capture me.”

“There are not many who know the ways of a Rishi, who wander the lands to watch nature and guard the sacred arts of human consciousness—not of a spirit world like the Thraíha, but of all the worlds that were and can be.”

“Then why won’t he teach me these ways?” Nickel asked. “I can’t live with the Ether! But I can’t leave my old life completely behind! I feel like I’m trapped between two completely different worlds!”

“Which is why I can show you another,” Venkar said, stepping closer. “One that people like me, an underground operation, are working to build. We are armed with a consciousness few hold, and we have been running covert missions in Hedonim. We are the only people outside of the Technocracy who can pass between Realms. And for that reason, we are hunted.”

“But you know the ways of the Rishi,” Nickel said.

“Our group’s founders, and myself included, were taught by Rishis. But our work is more political. We’re trying to subvert the hold of the Ether Realms on the world.”

“Then count me in,” Nickel said, holding out his hand to shake Venkar’s.

“I’m warning you,” Venkar said, eyeing Nickel. “You will be hunted.”

“I don’t think I have any other real choice,” Nickel said, keeping his palm out.

Venkar watched him silently, unmoving, his cold and calculating expression unwavering.

Nickel kept his hand out, waiting for Venkar’s response.

Finally, Venkar reached out, clasping Nickel’s hand tightly and shaking it firmly.

2200 Blues Chapter 72

As Nickel sat in the boat, having paid the last of Rishi’s money, he sat stooped, shivering, and paralyzed by all that had happened. The tears kept coming, but his skin felt numb to them, shriveled by the cold.

The waters were calm yet frolicking in even waves. The fog had lifted, scarcer over the waters, heaving its blue expanse clearer for Nickel’s eyes to see—a landscape free of the fog for the first time in what felt like forever.

The rowing men were stragglers, not looking dissimilar to Steve and Farrul when Nickel had first met them; rugged, creased skin, stained, worn clothes and coats tattered by use, covered in straggly beards and hair from years of living in the canyons. They were also looking for Hedonim, they had said, but nothing more.

They sang more than they spoke. After a couple of hours of being rowed by the men, Nickel’s attention finally drifted to their words, all of them:

There’s a hundred men
to sail the seas
and row them to the sun

When all is done
and my screens have cleaned
my weary eyes to sow,
the sun of my dreams
unraveled from the fog,

I lift my head
to the woman of the sky,
unbeknownst to her,

I drink from the bosom
of a canyon creek,
and then I truly know,

When I lie in the puzzle
of my Hedonim dreams
and the paths that may go

The man without his eyes,
But a cunning device,
Looking through the Ether’s fog,

I thank the maker,
whoever may be,
tomorrow or the day before

For all I know
it’s the drink I give
to forget all my woes

When I row, row, row
I know there’s nothing to lose,
It’s why I call it my

Twenty-Two Hundred Blues
Why I call it my

Twenty-Two Hundred Blues.

2200 Blues Chapter 71

After a raucous battle and a near-fatal destabilization of the android farm, Nickel escaped Merrix, instructed to hitch a boat at Rinkwine River to Hedonim. Theren had told him of an Ashram Temple, where Rishi’s disciples could be found. Nickel knew he didn’t want to enter Hedonim unprepared.

He ran and ran, past the outskirts of Merrix, until the city buildings disappeared, leaving only empty rock flats around him, save for sparse vegetation and plant growth.

As the shore of the flat by the faint blue of the river appeared, Nickel ran faster than ever.

Three monolithic structures loomed ahead of him. As he neared them, they began to hiss, their doors sliding down to reveal three figures staggering out of their capsules. They were heavily armored in battle suits from the twenty-first century. Their heads were completely bald and pitch white, scarred by small metal devices embedded into their skin.

Nickel stumbled forward, his feet faltering beneath him as he crashed to the ground. Gunfire erupted—but it wasn’t aimed at him. It was directed at the cryogenically released soldiers, their corpses animated by electrically induced movements from their embedded devices, returning fire at their attacker.

Their attacker was Steve, who had promised to wait by the shore to take Nickel and himself to safety—and to Hedonim.

Steve fired at all three soldiers, neutralizing them one by one. But not before the last soldier got off a final shot. The last line of fire struck Steve, both him and the soldier collapsing to the ground, rendered slack.

“STEVE!” Nickel screamed, running toward him, falling at his side. He clutched Steve’s hand, begging him to stay with him, tears blurring his vision as he sobbed convulsively.

When Steve finally spoke, he made a gentle shushing sound: “Ssshhhhhh… here, boy, don’t be afraid.”

Nickel quieted, trembling as he listened to Steve’s last words:

“Thank you for taking me this far,” he croaked. “When you return to the world we came from, remember why we’re here… for each other… I’ve lived with the Ether, starving for it… over and over again. But I know, and you know, that there’s more to the world—to each other. To be with the Ether is to be alone… Don’t be alone, Nickel.”

2200 Blues Chapter 70

After signaling the distress beacon, Nickel hacked his way through the rest of the androids, exhilarated by his newfound will and strength. Just as he was about to jump off the walkway onto the other side of the street, a piercing circle of burning pain burst across his back, spreading in tendrils of shocking electricity. Nickel cried out, his body contorting involuntarily before going slack. He fell face-first beside his clattering sword, loosened from his grip.

Nickel winced in pain, gasping and panting for breath.

“Nickel Veda,” came a cool voice from behind, accompanied by clanking footsteps on the walkway.

How do you know my name? Who are you?

The speaker finished walking down the walkway in slow, deliberate steps before lightly hopping down onto the ground. A hard hand rolled Nickel over by the shoulder. As Nickel turned onto his back, he gasped repeatedly, moaning incoherently, staring up at his attacker with wide eyes.

Slowly walking before him was a soldier, dressed in none other than the military secret soldier armor that Nickel had seen on the experimental elite force being developed back at the military base he studied in before leaving on his hovercraft.

“I tracked your hovercraft coordinates before you crashed in Atalantia,” the soldier said through his muffling helmet. “What is it that makes you leave a lucrative and high-status role in the Ether Realms for this wasteland of all places?”

Nickel wheezed, his limbs shivering and shuddering from the shock, still unable to move or coordinate his body.

“The Ether Realms have made all places on Earth wastelands!” Nickel growled, his voice ragged as he struggled to control his breaths.

The soldier cocked his head, eyeing Nickel. Through the muted black exterior of the soldier’s helmet visor, Nickel thought he could almost see eyes squinting at him in a jeering expression.

“Defect from the Realms, and you defect from the interests of the United Republic, whether you call it a wasteland or not,” the soldier said. He lifted his gun, twisting the cap around the nozzle—no doubt shifting the mode from stun to… probably kill.

“Trust me,” the soldier breathed. “This is much better than anything you’d go through in interrogation.” He trained the gun on Nickel, and the circular device inside its chamber began to spin, emitting a noise that grew louder and faster, turning into a whirring hum. “Besides,” he added, tilting his head to the side, shrugging his shoulders, “they’d kill you at the end anyway—”

A flash of light blinded Nickel. He cried out, squeezing his eyes shut. His whole body screamed with panicked adrenaline, his nerves fraying under the blast.

“You’re good.”

Nickel gasped again, shuddering. He slowly opened his eyes. The soldier lay limp on the ground before him, a trail of smoke rising from his torso.

Someone made a blowing sound behind Nickel.

“I guess farming wasn’t all I was meant for,” came a voice, laughing. It sounded oddly familiar.

Nickel groaned, rolling onto his stomach, looking up at Farrul’s smirking face. Farrul stood with two blaster rifles in his hands, his mouth puckered as he blew the smoke from the end of one of them.

Nickel laughed. He couldn’t help himself. He closed his eyes, laughing hysterically. Farrul walked over, lifting him up by his back. As Farrul offered his hand, Nickel took it, still laughing, unable to contain himself. He steadied himself with Farrul’s help, gripping his arms for balance. The worst of the shock had faded, leaving only tingling tremors and sharp feelings of itchiness.

“I’m good,” Nickel said, still chuckling. Farrul slowly let go of him.

“Oh, man,” Nickel breathed, wiping his nose. “You continue to surprise me.”

“So do you,” Farrul replied. “Why the hell are you even here?”

Nickel chuckled again, this time dry and weak. He shook his head. “M-man, it’s a long story.” His face slackened. “Wait, why are you here?”

“He has a pilgrimage to finish.”

Nickel turned to see Theren walking toward him, followed by several other Thraíha dressed in the same stone-plated battle garb the Thraíha patrolmen had worn when they met Rishi.

“Theren,” Nickel whispered in disbelief.

“You did good work, Nickel,” Theren said, placing a firm hand on his shoulder. “The beacon you activated alerted not just the Merrix defenses but my platoon following the pilgrimage to Hedonim.”

“Where’s Steve?” Nickel asked, turning to Farrul.

“He’s the reason we’re here,” Theren said. “He flew to show us the way.”

Nickel stared into the distance between Theren and Farrul. “My hovercraft?” he asked suddenly, turning to Farrul, frowning, his mouth agape in surprise. “It works?”

Farrul inhaled deeply, making a cringing expression. “Yeah… he pretty much flew it until he destroyed it,” Farrul said. “Sorry.”

Nickel stayed quiet for a moment, then shook his head, smirking.

“Probably for the best,” Nickel muttered, looking down. “I’m done with the Ether.”

“But it’s not done with you,” Theren said, stepping closer. “The year of the Past World is 2200—the only year from it we Thraíha recognize. The tides of the Huntsman’s travels are shifting below our feet.”

“The Ether Wars,” Nickel said. He rubbed the back of his neck, feeling a prickling tremor of nervousness. “I have to warn my family.”

“The war is coming for all, Nickel,” Theren said. “Hedonim is part of a project for our minds,” he added, tapping his temple with his finger. “But before we take a stand for our minds, we must fight the battle for our land.” He pointed toward the alley’s end, where the ruckus of fighting and chaos raged beyond the haze of dust and rubble.

“For Atalantia!” Theren called.

“FOR ATALANTIA!” boomed the Thraíha behind him, raising their weapons in salute. Their voices echoed through the streets of Merrix.

A conch war horn blew from an adjacent square. Nickel picked up his fallen sword and joined the running mass of Thraíha fighters.

“ATTACK!” Theren shouted. “Shut down the heart of our enemies! ATTACK!”

They surged through the streets, rushing toward the android farm hanging in the sky.

2200 Blues Chapter 69

The world was ablaze. And Nickel was alone. The fog danced violently around him, split and pushed aside by smoke and rubble falling, careening around him. The man, Gancho, the friend of Steve who had led him through the city to safety, had told him to wait for his return after fending off soldiers and pirates seeking to exploit the chaos, the ruckus, and the disarray. But Gancho never came back.

Nickel was curled up in a ball, covering his head to shield himself from the rubble and dust. He was back in his hovercraft, all alone, nothing to do but stay out of sight while the world inside and out crumbled.

“Rise…”

Nickel opened his eyes a crack to see the air outside—gray plumes of smoke and ash mixed with the orange fog.

“Stand, perch yourself like a hawk before flight.”

The voice of the Thraíha Oracle returned to him. He remembered his last conversation with her, flashing through his mind in this moment of chaos. He recalled sharing with her his inheritance from his parents and the conflicted feelings he had about it.

“When you perch yourself atop the tree of Life, you see the universe unveiled. You must perch atop the highest canyon peak before a hunt.”

“For that, you must rise. Stand, not with your chest inward, but expanded like a hawk’s plumage.”

Nickel removed his hands from his head and started to uncurl himself.

“Stretch your wings high… hold them to the air, not against it, and you may soar like Great Father Hawk.”

Nickel straightened his back and pressed his fists into the ground. He growled and punched the earth.

“I am a Thraíha!” Nickel shouted to himself, striking the ground again. He straightened himself further and slowly stood up, dusting himself off.

He saw the blade that Gancho had left behind. Turning around, he spotted the disjointed walkway hanging from the side of a building with shattered railings. There were android guards sent by the United Republic war fleet, guarding the distress beacon to mobilize the emergency units of Merrix Depot. Nickel had been hiding from them thus far, sitting alone, cowering in fear.

No more.

Nickel leaned over and picked up the blaster rifle that Gancho had left behind. While his mind screamed against his footsteps, he moved forward and aimed the rifle at the blaster-points of the androids. In a flash and burst of crackling light, they were disarmed of their guns.

Without waiting to see their reaction, Nickel grabbed the sword Gancho had left behind, swinging it through the air as Akela had taught him, calibrating his positioning and accustoming himself to its weight. Then, holding it in his practiced offensive stance, Nickel rushed toward the walkways like the Thraíha warrior he was.

2200 Blues Chapter 68

Steve’s brow oozed with beads of sweat that dripped through his bushy eyebrows, threatening to blur his vision even more than it already was through the window of Nickel’s hovercraft. He wrenched his hands around the pilot controls, struggling to stay aboard. His vision strained against the halo of light proliferating in multiple directions as the American Eagle hovercraft neared the edge of the rising canyon, its silhouette abrading the horizon’s sunset.

“Aaagh!” Steve wheezed, clenching his teeth. Despite having gotten the craft airborne again, its systems were heavily compromised—some outright destroyed—including the digital haptic overlay that should have provided a filtered ViewFinder, making it easier to navigate the horizon’s swaddling, obscuring light. That, along with other vital equipment and safety measures, had been lost when the Eagle crashed into the Thraíha settlement compound months ago.

To Steve, it felt like years ago—the moment he had met Nickel, the start of a beautiful, promising adventure—separated by his coma and the following period of uncertainty and deepened disillusionment. But he knew that all those weeks spent reconfiguring and cooling the fuel chambers during the final stretch of his recovery would be worth it now. Strapped together with twine-supplements tying broken pieces of the hovercraft into a barely functional whole, Steve was on a recourse, taking the American Eagle on another bender—probably for the last time.

Fizzling electronics and groaning, colliding machinery sputtered from behind, at the end of the control room, where pieces of the hovercraft’s outer shell clattered together.

“Can you fly safer?” Farrul screamed from the rear control modem, where Steve knew he was hanging on for dear life as the blasting winds slipped through the hovercraft’s fractured hull. “If I don’t fall out, my pants will!”

“Ahh! Quit yer’ jabberin’!” Steve roared, squinting as he leaned back against the pilot’s chair, swerving the hovercraft around the canyon edges, back into the space of unobstructed light. “Just like always—” Steve grunted, driving the piloting wheel to the left, jamming it hard to swing the hovercraft, accentuating pressure to the wheel of its pulmonary axis. “—it’s me doing all the work, and you yappin’ yer ass—OOOAAH!”

The entire disjointed frame of the hovercraft shuddered, violently jerking Steve in every direction. The movements jiggled the steering controls in his grip, causing the hovercraft to shake even more. The light grew even more blinding as the lifting fog layer rose off the ground, synthesizing the light-rays that hadn’t reached the canyon bottom before. Now, the fog was rising, meeting the sky in an effulgence of swarming light and vapor, threatening to overwhelm Steve’s sight.

He hadn’t attempted anything like this since before he had been stranded in these canyons—before he’d served as a cook aboard the expedition ship that brought him to Atalantia in the first place. He had once dreamed of becoming a pilot, joining the U.R. flight corps, escaping a life of destitution in a polluted city—or worse, a labor camp on that Pacific trash island. After his parents had died in prison—starved, undernourished, sentenced for failing to pay their housing—Steve had become a paranoid young man. In his grief, he had been terrified of ending up like his parents… or like his sister, whom he couldn’t save.

Hell, he had even once dreamed of joining a Space Force, if only it had still been an option. But with the Earth polluted to death and space exploration abandoned, all that remained for Steve now was a life more pleasurable than before—whether in Earth’s heavens or deep within the Atalantia Canyons.

A groaning creak reverberated through the hovercraft as a wave of vertigo tipped it sharply to the right, lurching Steve against the armrest of his chair. Screw it. He was going to bank the hovercraft this way, leaning into the capsizing motion to fully swerve around the rising canyon’s remnants.

“HOLD ONTO YOUR BUTT!” Steve roared, spinning the navigational control as the hovercraft’s hull thundered under the force of the twisting ascent. The entire craft rattled from every direction. Steve gasped, gagging against the motion sickness twisting his insides. He had only ever seen other pilots try to escape a burgeoning windstorm in the canyons once—when he was just a cook aboard a craft attempting to flee. But he had watched those pilots struggle and ultimately fall against the onrushing forces of light, air, and wind.

Steve slapped the sonar gridding map screen switch, desperate to wake it up. Nothing. His breaths were coming so fast he could barely hear them. How was he going to see enough of the canyon to maneuver around it? He screamed in exasperation and horror. The sonar map wouldn’t turn on, wouldn’t clear his surroundings of obstruction, wouldn’t—

The tips of the canyon flickered through the fog—visible, then gone, then back again.

“Fuck it!” Steve grated, screaming through his teeth. “I’m going manual!”

For the first time in decades, Steve truly let go—not just of the ship controls, but of the controls in his mind. He stopped tweaking the haptic commands and flung his entire body into the main navigational wheel, standing up from his piloting chair, his chest straps tightening around him as he moved.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH……..”

Steve swung the hovercraft completely around, fully leaning into the capsizing motion. The hovercraft turned upside down, the air outside and the entire body of the craft screaming against the maneuver. Wherever the edge of the canyon was, it was now far below, the American Eagle completely inverted over the last rise of the canyon.

Vertigo surged up Steve’s body, coursing through his stomach, chest, and throat like a stream of bile. His hair swung wildly above his head, falling over his shoulders with the motion. He continued to scream, but Steve couldn’t hear a sound over the cantankerous roar of what seemed to be the hovercraft tearing itself to shreds. He clung to the wheel for dear life, pushing against it to stay in place as the ship maintained its upside-down ascent over the canyon and through the fog.

When the hovercraft climbed high enough for the fog to dissipate into a rolling density of churning clouds below, Steve screamed again and shoved against the navigational wheel to finish his rolling flight maneuver.

The hovercraft righted itself quickly and violently, flinging Steve backward, ramming him hard against the piloting chair. He cried out, wincing as pain flared through his left arm and back, the ghostly remnants of his old injuries throbbing from the impact. He squeezed his eyes shut, panting. I’m too old for this shit. But he, Farrul, and Theren’s small group of Thraíha accomplices had dragged this broken hovercraft through scores of canyon impasses, sailing it over the Renowak River with grizard beasts swimming alongside them, pulling the Eagle by rope—just so Steve could try, one last time, to do for Farrul and Nickel what he had failed to do for his sister all those years ago: give them a better future.

He knew that if he could do that—if he could try—then he would finally be at peace, resting his weary, broken soul and body in Hedonim.

A chill swept over him, submerging him like the waters of a wintry ocean shore. Stronger gusts whipped past, tearing through the hovercraft’s cabin. Something else had been sheared off during the flight, allowing even more wind to pour inside.

“Farrul?” Steve shouted, coughing and sputtering. His body trembled with residual adrenaline. “Farrul? You still there? You okay?” More coughing. No response. Steve let out a moaning sigh, his face twisting in sorrow and fear. “Oh no, Farrul,” he groaned. “Farrul, please be there—” His voice faltered into a feeble, whispering plea. “Farrul, tell me you’re still there… Farrul—”

A shimmering glow warmed the insides of his eyelids, turning them a bright, hot red. Steve gasped, eyes snapping open. Before the hovercraft’s window, the air had become a blazing orange. Sunlight filtered through, its flickering rays sending strange tremors through the fog, coalescing from the thick bank he had just passed.

The fog swirled around the glowing center, then split apart in torrents to the left and right, leaving a luminous figure at its core.

Steve moaned feebly, his eyes widening. He pressed his back against the chair as hard as he could, fingers clutching the handholds in a grip so tight it felt as if his joints would snap.

The radiant halo of the singing sorceress manifested at the heart of the fog before the hovercraft’s window. Her body was unadorned, a luminous form of molten light, her larger-than-life figure shifting sinuously, twisting like a snake, her movements warping the fog around her. In a gust of wind, she began to sing:

“Come to me,

You will see,

The words your mother forgets.”

Tears welled in Steve’s eyes. He brushed them away with his hands, only for more to gather at his eyelids. He had never known his mother well. He felt like he had never truly known any woman well enough. Born to the Ether, destined for the Ether.

“Gather near,

You will hear,

Pleasures of the heart’s lament.”

The sorceress grew larger, her halo of hair becoming a swath of mist as she snaked around the hovercraft, gliding across its light, diving below, leaving a trail of glowing air and swirling matrices of digital configurations in her wake.

Steve closed his eyes. He knew it. He was near Hedonim. Finally.

He opened them, pushing the navigational wheel to full throttle. Nickel was near Hedonim too—he had made it to Merrix Depot before Steve did. When he’d heard the distress call signs, he couldn’t believe it. He had assumed Merrix Depot didn’t even exist anymore. He had transmitted a message to an old cowboy there to take care of Nickel before the assault took place.

Steve propelled the hovercraft through the wake of the glowing fog, searching for Nickel, knowing it would lead him to Hedonim too.