Tag / sci-fi

by booksoverlookedblog

FFM 28: Unclaimed Territory

Without in any way limiting the author’s exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

July is Flash Fiction Month! I’ll be sharing short short stories here through the month of July. More notes at the end of the story.

“Eight years.” Carver rubbed the bridge of her nose. “We’ve been in space for eight years, and now you’re telling me we can’t land?”

“The problem is we’re not near our claim, Captain,” Beacon, one of the company’s solicitors, told her. “Our claim is specifically for Territory Zeta-Ogden-Five, which this is most certainly not.” 

“As far as we know, our claim is uninhabitable,” Carver protested. In the years since launch and finally reaching Port 895-b, colloquially known as “That Ugly Planet,” unethical spacers had used the land reserved for colonists as dumping grounds. Specifically, dumping parts of their nuclear engines, potentially poisoning the land, air, and ground water for generations to come. Spacing hazardous waste was protocol. This reeked of bad actors, and Carver was having no part of this. “And our supplies won’t hold out for another trip back. We land here, or we starve in orbit.”

Beacon fidgeted with his handheld computer. “This area hasn’t been claimed by anyone. That means you won’t be under the jurisdiction of any government. Any emergency signals won’t be answered, off-world supplies won’t be delivered, you’ll have no additional funding…” 

Carver looked down through the wide windows to the planet below – yellow and gray and everything they had been seeking. The most viable landing spot was half a world away from their legal claim. Safe from radiation, but maybe not much else. She didn’t know what awaited them outside of the territory that had already been mapped out for the colonists. No one did. 

“We don’t have much choice,” she said. Maybe they could ration enough of their supplies to survive a trip back to Earth, or scavenge along the way. It wouldn’t be easy, but they might make it back. “It’s not all up to me. Four hundred souls on this vessel, and I’m not turning back or landing without their say-so. Let’s take a vote.” 

Carver stood in front of the would-be colonists and explained the situation: the good, the bad, and That Ugly Planet’s unknown risks. “If we land, the Allied Western States will not help us. We’d essentially be declaring ourselves independent. It means that we would owe them nothing, but we’d be taking on a big risk. Maybe bigger than some of us signed up for. If we turn around now, we might make it home. If we land, we might survive, we might not. But I can’t be the only one to decide.” 

After a few minutes of murmuring, a woman named Remember stood up. “I signed up for a one-way trip. I vote we land.” 

Many others, if not all, agreed with her. Eventually, the votes were counted, and the ship finally set its landing gear on terra firma for the first time in nearly a decade. 

Carver called the colonists together before they stepped on land. “The minute we set foot out there, we are independent. And before we do, I think it’s best that we establish our own agreed-upon code legal.”

That Ugly Planet’s first code legal was simple, but it was upheld throughout the planet’s history as one of its fundamental documents: 

Don’t be a dick.
Don’t be a coward.
Don’t be a hero.
Be excellent to each other, and survive on. 

This was one of the prompts I got for the Day 22 challenge, where participants challenged each other with types of documents to include and write a story about. Holly gave me The Mayflower Compact, which was such a cool idea. However, I couldn’t seem to make it work for an epistolary story, which was also part of the challenge.

The name Carver comes from John Carver, one of the signers of the Mayflower Compact. Remember is the name of the main character in Dear America: Journey to the New World, a book I loved as a kid. And the other big reference…well, you should know that.

by booksoverlookedblog

FFM 21: Waggle Dance

Without in any way limiting the author’s exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

July is Flash Fiction Month! I’ll be sharing short short stories here through the month of July. This is a companion story to FFM 11: OPERATION HIVEBREAKER, but you don’t need to have read it to understand this one. More notes at the end of the story.

The Apidaar were a lost people. It was nearly sixty years after the Colony Collapse, and it seemed their society would never recover. With no queen to follow, the Apidaar had lost their instincts, and for some, their minds.

Z’lkne was in the second generation of Apidaar hatched off-planet. He was ten years old, a third of his way through his life cycle. Before Colony Collapse, he would have been assigned one of two roles in his society: scout or breeding male. This choice would not have been his. It was written in his genetic code, unalterable. 

But he, and so many other Apidaar, had never known the influence of a queen. Many of his kind went mad without their purpose, flying until exhaustion overcame them or refusing to eat or drink until they perished. Others formed swarms, declaring they would search the stars and find their queens again. Even more fell into drink, destroying their bodies and minds until they had drowned entirely. 

Z’lkne was one of the few who did not. He danced. 

He didn’t understand why mammalian humanoids considered this a shame. Many of them, especially the females, made a good living by shedding their fabricated exoskeletons in time to the beat. Z’lkne didn’t understand what was so exciting about that. The naked body of one person was quite similar to the naked body of another, provided they were members of the same species. 

Z’lkne only wore his natural exoskeleton, yet drew in large audiences nightly. He premiered at Freak Night, the weekly event where native species came to gawk at the bodies of aliens to their planet. Z’lkne’s popularity grew, and he soon became a nightly attraction. 

The lights shone against his exoskeleton and stripes. The veins in his wings lit up with fluorescent hues. Z’lkne danced. He didn’t practice choreographed routines. He just felt the music’s vibrations in every hair on his body, and moved as it told him. Two, four, or six legs on the floor or moving through the air, it didn’t matter. 

His dances entranced. They made crowds gasp, or weep, or bounce in time and scream for more. They were not always graceful or pretty dances. Some were brutal, angry and ugly. They all captured something in the audience, something deep within them that they could not express.

When Z’lkne danced, the crowd moved as one, hearts and lungs all pulsating in time to the beat. 

When he danced, he had a colony.

How stories change over time: I had planned on Z’lkne being some kind of researcher or meeting an anthropologist and learning about his planet’s history. Then as I was writing it, he became a bee stripper (striper?) instead.

Anyway, here’s my weirdest “I swear it’s for research” Google search to date:

Spotify does not have a playlist called “Songs for Bees to Strip To” (yet!), so I would like to offer this alternative:

by booksoverlookedblog

FFM 17: Cleanup Crew

Without in any way limiting the author’s exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

July is Flash Fiction Month! I’ll be sharing short short stories here through the month of July. In this story, Fen uses e/em/eir (Spivak) pronouns. More notes at the end of the story.

Low Earth Orbit Cleanup attracted certain type of people to the job. A lot of them were people like Angeles and Hiro, recently graduated and looking to beef up their resumes before going to find “real” jobs in space. Or people like Nox, who’d made it their career, because they had nothing going on down on Earth.

Then there were people like Fen, twentysomethings with no degree and no plans. Cleanup was easy work to get into: pass a physical, take a personality test, and get through training. The next thing you knew, you were shot into space and dragging a giant net through the void. 

Fen floated down the short corridor along with eir crewmates. Priya had been on dark shift and headed back to the sleeping quarters from the opposite direction. Everyone had to work dark shift once every six sols, monitoring the ship’s systems while everyone else slept.

There was a lighter mood in the kitchen/dining area that day. There were only thirty sols left before this mission ended and they all had their feet on terra firma once again. “Of course I’m going to re-up,” Nox said between slurps from his protein pouch. “They need to shorten the waiting period between missions. You can see if I’m healthy in six hours on Earth, not six months.” 

Angeles, as always, had something to say. “You know it’s not just about checking to see if you’re healthy. You need to build up bone density again, and then there’s radiation to worry about.” 

“Then what’s the treadmill and shielding for?” Nox grunted. 

Fenn and Hiro exchanged a look. Exchanges like this between Nox and Angeles were common. “What about you, Fen? Gonna re-up?” 

“I dunno,” Fenn replied, opening eir own protein pack. It tasted vaguely of eggs. “I do miss real food, though.” 

“Real food’s overrated.” Nox finished his protein pack, crushed it into a ball, and tossed it into the disposal.

“And who was getting all drooly at the mention of a real steak not too long ago?” Angeles countered. 

“Well…maybe steak’s not overrated,” Nox conceded. 

“Glad we agree on something.” Angeles turned her attention to Fen. “But have you thought about going to university, Fen? I could help you with your application if you wanted.” 

“Or maybe trade school?” Hiro suggested. “You could help make the ships, instead of working on one.” 

Thankfully, the mission commander, Dr. Tetra, glided into the room before Fenn had to answer. “Shift’s schedule’s posted,” she announced. 

Fenn checked eir handheld, which e always kept in one of the pockets of eir skinsuit. E was on inventory for the first four hours of eir shift.

E went to the zone of the ship that was colloquially known as “the dump.” Here, space junk was sorted and stored. Any materials that could be repurposed would be brought back to Earth to be recycle. The rest would be tossed into one of the superdeep boreholes in the polar regions on Earth. 

Fen’s station could seat two comfortably, and a clear wall allowed em to look at the collected trash, if e really wanted. E was still fascinated by it: antennas sticking out of piles and broken bits of solar panels, lost tools that may have been floating in orbit for decades, even paint flecks and the occasional logo of some company or another. It was beautiful and eerie all at the same time. 

Fen reviewed the inventory from the previous sol’s shift, saw no anomalies, then sent the report back to the flagship Kessler I.

Finally, the first net’s worth of junk arrived. This was one of the few areas of the ship that had artificial grav, just for the ease of being able to drop everything from net level on the floor above to inventory level. Once Fen was certain nothing had been missed, e began the scanner. 

A green light fell over the pile, and tiny bots picked it apart to get more accurate readings. Fen watched the data fill up eir screen. 

ITEM: PAINT CHIP
STATUS: UNSALVAGABLE
ITEM: M086 SATELLITE PANEL (PARTIAL)
STATUS: SALVAGABLE
ITEM: ANOMALY
ITEM: UPPER-STAGE ROCKET DEBRIS (UNKNOWN ORIGIN)
STATUS: SALVAGABLE

Fen blinked. Anomaly? E paused the scan. Almost a year doing this, and e had never seen anomaly appear on screen. “Dr. Tetra,” e signaled through eir headset. “I’ve got an anomaly in inventory.” 

“Sometimes it’s a glitch,” Tetra signaled back. “Restart the scan and see if it happens again.” 

“Ten-four.” Fen shut down the scan, cleared the data, and tried again. Paint chip, satellite panel, anomaly. Fen signaled Tetra again. “Still there. Restart the scan again?” 

“No. I’m coming down there.” 

In a few minutes, Tetra was looking at the report over Fen’s shoulder. “Let’s have the bots fish out the anomaly. We can take a better look at it.” Fen nodded, and issued the command. The bots dove into the pile, until finally two came out, carrying a torn space suit glove. 

“That could be it. The scanner’s really sensitive to organic material, so a broken nail or stray hair could set it off,” Tetra said. Fen opened the door that separated em from the dump, and took the glove from the bot. 

E held the glove upside down, looking for anything that the scanner might have detected. E paled.

Dr. Tetra looked in the glove. Her mouth fell open. Then she signaled the crew. “All personnel, suspend operations immediately. Wake up Priya, and meet on the bridge in fifteen minutes.” She turned to Fen. “Not a word of this to anyone. Not yet.” She took the glove from Fen. “I’ll keep that in my quarters.” 

Suddenly what e was going to do after this mission didn’t matter so much.. All e wanted to do was get back down to Earth. Maybe e didn’t have a lot of prospects down there, but it was better than this.

Because down on Earth, Fen had never found a glove with a severed hand still in it.

Today’s a challenge day!

Element 1: For today’s challenge, instead of she/he/they pronouns, use neopronouns! Unfamiliar with them? Here’s a link to a MasterClass article that lists a manageable number of options and has other info too.

Element 2: One of the characters must redo something before the end of the story. Done, Fen has to redo the scan.

I actually had the idea for a space junk clean-up crew for FFM 2023, but never finished the story. Most of the character names are the same, though!

I might write a follow-up to this, since I don’t like ending things on cliffhangers for FFM, Fen’s story doesn’t have a conclusion. I just didn’t have enough words…I even went over the word limit at first with this one. I managed to cut it down to 999!

by booksoverlookedblog

FFM 11: OPERATION HIVEBREAKER

Without in any way limiting the author’s exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

July is Flash Fiction Month! I’ll be sharing short short stories here through the month of July.

OPERATION HIVEBREAKER

BACKGROUND: 

Planet 347-cΦ is a Goldilocks-type planet in the Steorro System. Its sole intelligent inhabitants are the insectoid species Apidaar. Apidaar are divided into two sexes, male and female. Strict sex roles are maintained in their species. Males are scouts, and females are warriors. Apidaar do not possess interplanetary technology, including interplanetary weaponry. 

All Apidaar respond to a colony queen. The queen controls her subjects through a combination of pheromones and psionics. There are three (3) major colonies active on Planet 347-cΦ at the time of writing.

Planet 347-cΦ has a high mineral yield of anti-rhodonite that has not been accessed by the Apidaar. Its old growth forests have large amounts of lightning wood trees. Both materials are rare and have many industrial uses, including fabricating interstellar ships. 

RECOMMENDED ACTIONS:

Deploy oxygen bombs in the upper atmosphere of Planet 347-cΦ, centered on the three Apidaar colonies. These will disrupt the biological functions of the Apidaar. Once inside the colony, a team of constructs will deploy cyfluthrin gas to destroy the queen, queensguard, and breeding males. One royal larva will be taken from each colony. 

RISKS:

Equipment failure – if the oxygen bombs do not deploy correctly, a ground fight will be difficult to win, even with conventional weaponry.

Retaliation – Any surviving queen may choose to retaliate against the Planetary Collective.

Public Perception – Attacking Planet 347-cΦ unprovoked may be viewed as an act of aggressive imperialism, which will result in bad publicity and lack of support.

From the Director of the Office of Material Resources: 

Planet 347-cΦ is not a member of the Planetary Collective so we don’t need to worry about the legalities of attacking it. There’s a Collective diplomat and a couple anthropologists on the planet now. Kill them, blame it on the Apidaar, we’ll get this rolling. 

-MRD, approved 2XXX – 08 – 36

by booksoverlookedblog

Indie Review: Hounds of Gaia

I’m a Reedsy Discovery reviewer! I received a free ARC of Hounds of Gaia by Sean Tirman for this review.

⭐⭐⭐

Home to notorious criminals fleeing justice, the asteroid Deadwood was never a safe place. But something far deadlier lurks just under the surface of the mining colony. Something brutal and merciless, that leaves only death and gore in its wake. The Contractor Foxhound doesn’t know that. She’s only here to catch a human trafficker called Fink, and get back to Earth to collect the bounty on his head. Neither does Sister Penelope, a nurturing and peace-loving woman striving to protect the forgotten children of Deadwood. Foxhound’s, Fink’s, and Penelope’s lives collide with devastating results, but the real danger is closer to them than they think.

Hounds of Gaia starts with a bang, steadily building up the horror of the tunnels underneath Deadwood. The action-packed prologue is sure to keep readers turning pages.

The worldbuilding is extremely detailed, which works well in the first few chapters of the book. It’s interesting and immersive, and makes the reader more interested in the setting. Yet as the story unfolds, the exposition becomes clunky and often unnecessary. These information dumps bring the action of the story to a shrieking halt, and sometimes repeat information that the reader already knows. It also took away some of the mystery about Foxhound’s identity. Most readers will be able to figure out where she comes from long before it’s ever revealed.

The uninterrupted action sequences themselves are excellent. Thrilling chases through seedy neighborhoods, criminals hopped up on elicit drugs, futuristic weapons, and bouts with some truly evil villains will keep readers on the edge of their seats.

While the setting is given great depth, the heroes are not. The three protagonists – Foxhound, Penelope, and a girl with no name – all suffer from thin characterization. Foxhound is a tough woman with a job to do; Penelope is a kind woman who cares deeply about the children in her care; the girl is an innocent child. Those are their character traits, and not much else. As this is the start of a series, however, there is plenty of room for character growth and development in coming books.

On the antagonist side of things, Fink and his criminal associates are utter delights whenever they appear. They revel in their villainy, which is really fun to read. Like the other characters, they aren’t fully fleshed out, but given their role in the story (and how fun they are), they don’t need to be.

Overall, Hounds of Gaia has a lot of potential for a sci-fi series. Sci-fi fans who enjoy plot-driven stories and detailed worldbuilding will enjoy this book, and the ending will keep readers curious for the next volume.

by booksoverlookedblog

BIDP: Partials by Dan Wells

Today’s edition of “Books I Didn’t Pick” is brought to you by Partials, courtesy of a holiday book exchange.

Some books are timeless: stories that ring true from generation to generation, no matter how circumstances change. Other books are timely: it’s no surprise that Hamnet: A Novel of the Plague was a New York Times best seller for weeks in 2020, even if it was set in the 1500s.

Then there’s books that I’ll call “personally timely.” These are the ones that might not have meant as much to you if you’d read them at another point in your life, but they’re meaningful now.

Partials by Dan Wells is one of those for me.

To begin, Partials is set eleven years after the devastating Partials War. The Partials are genetically engineered super-soldiers that turned on their human creators, and then vanished. Before disappearing entirely, the Partials left humanity with a parting gift: the RM virus. The virus all but annihilated the human race, and robbed humanity of its future. Every human baby born since the introduction of the virus has died, succumbing to RM within days, if not hours.

The Defense Grid, one of the last pockets of humanity, requires all women age 18 or older to become pregnant as often as possible, in the hope that one of the babies will be born with an immunity to RM.

Kira Walker is a medical intern whose father was killed by the RM Virus. When her best friend becomes pregnant, Kira will risk her life to find a cure for RM. With every other avenue of research failing to find a cure, she will attempt to do what no one else has done. To save the life of her best friend’s child, she must capture and study one of the brutal and deadly Partials.

That’s a lot to unpack, I know. I’m sure that everyone will have a different reaction to reading a story about a pandemic now than they would have pre-2020. Before COVID, I was even working on a post-apocalyptic short story which had been brought about by a plague. I liked the possibilities that pandemic fiction offered: a reset of the world that you live in, while keeping much of the world’s infrastructure intact. It also felt like a safe, remote end of the world scenario. Nuclear war and devastating natural disasters are threats that felt much more real at the time. But after three years of a pandemic that has killed millions of people, plague-related fiction isn’t nearly as fun as it used to be. COVID-19 wasn’t the end of the world by any means, but living through it has changed the way I engage with media that use a pandemic as a plot or setting element. As for my post-apocalyptic story? I haven’t touched it since 2020, and it’s unlikely that I ever will again.

Other than the fictitious pandemic, there’s something else that triggered a strong reaction in me, which wouldn’t have been as strong if I’d read Partials as a teenager. But for a thritysomething woman who’s been married for just shy of three years now, pregnancy is kind of a huge deal.

I have baggage around pregnancy/childbirth/motherhood. It’s not severe enough that I wouldn’t be able to read a book like Partials, but instead of feeling like a dystopia, the novel felt like a horror story to me. And that’s okay. Sometimes I seek out something that I know will scare me, if only out of some eerie fascination with it. The 1996 Mount Everest disaster, for instance. Horrifying, and yet I’ve read every Wikipedia page related to it, Into Thin Air by John Krakauer (and the made for TV movie), along with watching the movie Everest, and two separate documentaries on the subject. That’s what reading about pregnancy (forced or otherwise), childbirth, and infant mortality is like for me. It’s a nightmare, but when there’s a fourth wall between it and me, it’s easier for me to engage with it. It’s a safe way to interact with something you’re afraid of.

But that’s not what you’re here for, so let’s get back into the book itself.

The writing is fine. There’s nothing stellar about the prose, but it’s not bad, either. It gets the job done, which works for the breakneck pace of the plot. However, the moments with the biggest emotional impacts sometimes feel lackluster because of it.

The plot is pretty dense, and I think the novel suffers from excess. There’s so many characters and factions to keep track of, along with their relationships with one another. Several of Kira’s friends play a role in the story. Alongside Kira, there’s her boyfriend, Marcus; foster-sisters Madison, Ariel, Xochi, and Isolde; Jayden, Madison’s brother; and Madison’s husband, Haru. There are also a plethora of other characters that the audience needs to remember and keep track of: the senators that run the island, various military and medical superiors, and members of the rebel group, the Voice. These people play no small role in the story, but it’s nigh impossible to keep track of all of them.

Then there’s also the factions in the story. Kira and her multitude of friends live in the Defense Grid, on Long Island, possibly the last human city remaining on Earth. The Grid is occasionally attacked by The Voice, a group of rebels seeking to end forced pregnancy. Both the Grid and the Voice hate and fear the superhuman Partials, who have created their own society away from the Grid and the Voice. As the story goes on, we discover that the Partials have also all subdivided into factions of their own.

It’s a lot. Sometimes I felt like I needed a notebook to keep track of what was going on. With so many characters, they can’t possible get all the time they need to be fully developed. This made many of Kira’s friends an indistinct blur, and the villains largely forgettable. They’re evil, but they’re not interesting.

There’s also plenty that I do like about this book, too. It’s exciting with plot reveals that keep you guessing. While it could be overly complicated at times, the story never stagnates. I also liked the reasons why teenagers had to be the protagonists in this book.

In YA fiction, especially dystopian YA, teenagers often get put in dangerous situations that they have no business dealing with, especially if there are adults better able to handle the situation. Partials at least does a good job of addressing this. When sixteen-year-old Kira is placed in charge of research that goes well beyond her training and knowledge, she and her friends question why the senators are allowing her to do this. Their reasons are revealed later and actually make sense.

Even more than that, Kira makes a point about why it had to be teenagers and young people to make a change, and why her generation will the ones who cure R.M. Kira and her generation are called “plague babies,” born before R.M., but too young to remember remember what the world was like before the virus. The adults do remember the old world, as well as the horrific events of the Partials uprising and the spread of R.M. Most of them have given up hope that R.M. can be cured, and refuse to take the drastic measures required to guarantee the future of the human species. Billions of humans are dead, and they’re unwilling to risk any more lives on trying to a cure. They insist on doing the same thing over again, mandating pregnancy, hoping one day a child will be born with an immunity to R.M. This has not produced a single healthy baby, yet the Senate refuses to change tactics and try something new. When the adults have given up on the future of the human race, Kira realizes that only “plague babies” like her have enough will and passion to act and try to fix things.

I remember what it was like to be a kid. I remember feeling unheard, or that no one took me seriously because I was young. Thankfully, I had parents, teachers, and adults in my life who understood that children and teenagers have something worth saying. In the wake of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, students rose up and demanded change. I observed many adults criticizing the student activists. One of the common refrains of their detractors were that they were kids, with no real-world experience and no business in telling adults what to do.

It made me think of one of my favorite high school teachers, who gave quizzes on current events and made us watch political debates as homework assignments. In 2006, he took a group of students, including me, to a Save Darfur rally in Washington, D.C. It was incredible to be there with so many like-minded people supporting a cause I cared deeply about. My teacher understood that just because we were young didn’t mean that we couldn’t be passionate about saving human lives, or civil rights, or a million other things outside of typical high school worries.

I didn’t realize how remarkable that was. At this point I’ve spent most of my career working with children and families, and I have a better understanding of how young people need to be heard. And how rare that can be.

In Partials, this is all Kira’s choice. She doesn’t have a special fate or destiny. There’s no prophecy about her. She just knows what she has to do, and she’s willing to risk everything for what she believes in.

I don’t think I’ll be reading the any of the sequels, but I liked Partials as I was reading it, even when it hit a bit too close to home.

by booksoverlookedblog

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars

First of all, thank you to everyone who read my work for Flash Fiction Month! I don’t normally post my original fiction online for various reasons, but FFM is special. I will be taking down most (if not all) of my stories after August, so please read them while you have the chance!

We now return you to your regular book rants.

This review contains spoilers for To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini. I’ve written a quick chapter summary here.

A few years ago, I re-read one of my favorite books as a teenager: Eragon, by Christopher Paolini. While my fifteen-year-old self had loved it, adult me was very aware of its flaws. I determined that Paolini was great at worldbuilding and description, but wasn’t great at writing characters. Paolini was a teenager when Eragon was published, and still wet behind the ears when it came to his craft. It’s now been twenty years since Eragon first came out (cripes, I’m old!). In my review, I wondered what a novel by a more experienced Paolini might look like today.

Well, in 2020, we got our answer. And like most things from 2020, I didn’t like it.

I think I’m in the minority in this case, though. To Sleep got good reviews overall, and there are plenty of fans online who really like this book. I generally like sci-fi, but To Sleep just wasn’t for me.

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is Paolini’s first adult novel, and his first science-fiction book. It’s a whopping 800+ pages of space, aliens, futuristic technology…and a decent amount of fantasy elements for an otherwise “hard”* sci-fi.

Before we get into the novel, I want to talk about the physical book itself. I don’t pay a ton of attention to how books are marketed, but its pretty obvious they were trying to sell this one on Paolini’s name alone. The spine only has “PAOLINI” on it. The title isn’t on there. It’s pretty common for popular authors to have their names featured prominently on book spines, sometimes in a larger font than the title. But they all still include the title.

With that said, let’s get into what’s between the covers. I have tried to get away from nit-picking books to death, I still have included one-sentence reviews/reactions to each chapter at the bottom of this post, because they’re too much fun for me not to do.

The plot is very dense, to the point where writing a spoiler-free review is kind of impossible. I wrote a companion post for this review, with brief (and hopefully humorous) summaries of each chapter for those who haven’t read the book, or read the book but forgot some of it. Can’t blame you there – there’s a lot.

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is a galaxy-spanning saga of alien invasion, mysterious and powerful artifacts, and high-tech space battles. Kira Navarez is a xenobiologist who travels with a crew of scientists to uncolonized planets to see if they could be made habitable. After she falls into alien ruins on a mission, a complex piece of alien technology becomes attached to her. The xeno encases her body, and is eventually responsible for the death of most of her crewmates, including her fiancé, Alan.

Then things get complicated.

The story moves quickly, and has lots of twists and turns. In an interview that’s available in some editions of the book, Paolini said that he was essentially trying to write an entire series in the span of one novel. It justifies the length, and it really does feel like he’s managed to succeed in telling an epic story from beginning to end, without needing to break it into multiple parts.

There are things that I both liked and disliked about this. First, it kept the plot moving. In my posts about Eragon, I occasionally complained about filler chapters, but I don’t think there were any here. There were times when it was hard to put the book down because I wanted to know what happened next.

On the other hand, sometimes it moved too fast. It meant that I didn’t have time to get to know or care about the characters (often before they met, or nearly met, their dooms) in the start. There was also no room to breathe, especially in the beginning. Humans, both real and fictional, need time to rest. When we only see characters in a crisis – which was the majority of the book – we see how they react to the situations they’re in, but not necessarily who they are. Too often, the characters often felt like reaction, rather than fully fleshed out people. Paolini does a better job with character development than he has in his previous novels, but sometimes it felt forced, like a chapter where Kira systematically learns the backstories of all her crewmates.

Then there was the way the plot itself was constructed. As I mentioned, there are a lot of twists and unexpected events throughout. It keeps the story unpredictable, and the reader curious about how the characters will solve the newest curveball that’s been thrown their way.

But it also meant that some story arcs felt pointless, or like padding, once they concluded. For me, the most aggravating instance was when Kira and her new crew are searching for something called the Staff of Blue. No one is really sure what the Staff is, but Kira knows that it’s an important weapon that will help humanity combat the invading alien race nicknamed the “Jellies.” For more than 100 pages, Kira et al. search for the Staff, travel to a remote location to finally retrieve it, and engage in a deadly battle with the Jellies (and an even scarier creature, the Seeker). They find the Staff, but it’s broken in the battle and rendered useless.

Some readers might think, “holy crap! How will our heroes save the galaxy now?!” and read on feverishly. As for me, I was so frustrated that I just put the book down and refused to open it for two days. A “holy crap!” moment should make you want to read on, but I was annoyed that so much time had been devoted to something that ultimately had very little bearing on the actual plot.

This is also probably a good time to point out another issue I had with the book: excess. It seems a bit obvious when talking about an 800+ page book. Of course not every scene has to contribute to the overall story or character growth, but there were some spots that were just unnecessary. My first gripe with this was the character Inarë. Inarë is a refugee of the intergalactic war Kira inadvertently caused, and she and Kira meet on a ship taking refugees away from the fighting. Inarë is in the book for one or two scenes, described in a large amount of detail, and has a cat. She’s pretty weird and gives Kira cryptic advice about the journey ahead of her. Anyone who’s read Eragon could tell you that she’s pretty transparently Angela from that series, morphed into some sort of space witch. This isn’t just my assumption, either. Paolini even says so in the acknowledgements at the end of the book.

[T]hose of you who are fans of the Inheritance Cycle may have noticed some references to the series in To Sleep. You weren’t imagining things. And yes, Inarë is who you think she is.

As I mentioned in my post about The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, I don’t mind callbacks to an author’s previous works if it’s something small, or if it feeds into the plot later. However, Inarë has a few pages to herself, and except for her final words to Kira popping up occasionally, she had no overall bearing on the plot. In fact, the arc words that Inarë gives Kira (“Eat the path”) could have been said by nearly anyone in her crew and still have the same effect. When I see something like this, to me it feels more like fanservice and the author patting themselves on the back.

Towards the end of the book, I also wondered if a very large part of the plot was even necessary. There’s a subspecies of Jellies that the humans have to fight against, called “nightmares,” or the Corrupted. But there was already so much going on in the book without them. Space battles, ancient alien lore, a large cast of characters and almost non-stop action, reading about the nightmares and their progenitor monster, the Maw, was just exhausting. A book only about the humans and Jellies would have been interesting enough, but for me, this was too much.

It also suffered from the same ending fatigue present in movies like Return of the King. First, Kira kills the evil overlord of the Jellies. Then, she destroys the Maw. Then, she must go and destroy seven copies of the Maw. That’s seven copies that were never mentioned prior to any of the huge space battles in the climax of the book.

Then there are the appendices, which include the science behind faster-than-light travel and ship-to-ship combat in space, a timeline that covers over 500 years, and a glossary. Of all these, it’s the glossary that sticks in my craw. I complained about excess before, but there’s also the problem of absence of information, and the glossary exemplifies both.

I might start out by saying that I didn’t know that there was a glossary in the book at first, and I only found it by accident. I don’t think that there’s anything inherently bad having a glossary included in a fiction book, especially in sci-fi and fantasy stories. At the same time I was reading To Sleep, I was also reading Mastiff, by Tamora Pierce. Like To Sleep, Mastiff also has a glossary that defines the made-up words in the book, but you can also figure out what they mean in the context of the scene.

To Sleep‘s glossary doesn’t work like that. There are times when it feels like the reader was expected to have read it before starting the book.** This is best exemplified in the case of the “ship mind.” There’s almost no context for what a ship mind actually is for the first two-thirds of the book. As I read it, I was so confused about what ship minds actually were. Were they complex AI? Human-AI hybrids? Until I accidentally found the glossary, I had no idea. It turns out that ship minds are essentially augmented human brains, removed from their bodies, that sit in sarcophagi on board their ships, overseeing all the ship’s functions. This is such a huge thing, and totally different from anything I had imagined. Props to Paolini for originality, and for my new nightmares. But I really shouldn’t have had to accidentally find a glossary or wait until the near-climax of the book to see a reference to a sarcophagus housing a human brain sitting in a nutrient bath.

To Sleep takes great care to show the reader how things like faster-than-light travel and combat in outer space are possible. At the same time, it also uses a lot of fantasy tropes. I know, I know: “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” And I can buy that when it’s something like two humans from a highly advanced technological civilization using highly advanced technology to blow up aliens and glibly referring to it as “magic.” It becomes harder for me to take when the xeno attached to Kira becomes able to do almost everything and anything. Kira first used it as a weapon and armor, but by the end of the book, she uses it heal characters with devastating wounds and build entire living space stations.

Drawing upon the Seed’s banks of encoded knowledge, she began to build the needed machines, constructing them from the atomic level up. With energy gathered from the panels, she sparked a burning sun inside herself: a fusion reactor large enough to drive the biggest UMC battleship. With energy from the artificial star, she started to manufacture antimatter–far more than the inefficient techniques of the humans or the Wranaui allowed for. The Old Ones had mastered the means of antimatter production before either species had even come into being.

p. 791

Even though this takes place after the second (sigh) major battle of the climax, it’s still quite a lot to take in.

That paragraph also shows another fantasy trope present in the novel. You probably noticed a reference to the “Old Ones.” The Old Ones were a sentient species that predate the existence of humans and the Jellies. They made the xeno that attached itself to Kira, along with the Staff of Blue, and the Great Beacons, which gave humanity a huge leap forward, technologically speaking. In other words: all that sufficiently advanced technology came from a species that was at least over 300,000 years old.

I don’t mind the “old stuff is more powerful” trope in fantasy works. It can be a bit tiresome at times, but it usually fits with the setting and the feel of the story. Ancient artifacts and mysterious ruins are part and parcel for fantasy stories. Sci-fi (especially “hard” sci-fi) is more focused on technology and what could be if any number of events or scientific discoveries occur. Sci-fi focuses on the future: how technology and/or societal changes have changed our lives, for better or for worse. A book like To Sleep should be one that dreams of humanity reaching the stars – and much more – through its own ingenuity and innovation. Relying on ancient artifacts from a vanished civilization doesn’t feel like it’s reaching out into the future. It makes it feel like all of humanity’s achievements are small, and that there’s no way they could ever create what the Old Ones have.

Throughout my review of Eragon, I had to compliment Paolini on his descriptive abilities, as well as his world building. As before, the worldbuilding is thorough, and it really does feel like he’s created a whole galaxy full of humans and aliens. The characterization could be weak at times, but the crew of the Wallfish all had distinct personalities that made them stand out. Falconi was probably my favorite character, but I had trouble getting to know who Kira was as a person.

I know I can focus too much on the negative, but I actually really did like the aliens in this book. In fiction, it’s common to have sentient, non-human races look and act quite…human. The Jellies only resembled humans in that some of them were bipedal. They’re sea-based creatures inspired by octopi, complete with tentacles that can change color. The Jellies are genderless and have a hive mind, which has been used to control them. They communicate using smells, called nearscent. They have vastly different lifecycles than humans, from birth to death. In short, they’re an alien species that feels refreshingly alien. While the book sometimes felt like it was bloated, the story moved fast, and changed in ways I didn’t predict.

Overall, I did like some of To Sleep – but not enough to pick up the next book in the series, Fractal Noise.

*The quotation marks aren’t meant to be pejorative. I don’t like the terms “hard” and “soft” to describe sci-fi, but I’m using it in this post because it’s easily understandable. Read more on the debate between “hard” and “soft” sci-fi at Tor.com
**Not recommended. This was how I accidentally spoiled what the Staff of Blue was for myself.

If you want more nit-picking, read on for (mostly) one-sentence chapter reviews. Lots of spoilers follow.

  • Chapter 1: A chapter centered around a romantic relationship, and I’m not at all convinced Paolini can write romance.
  • Chapter 2: I’m really trying to avoid comparing this book to Mass Effect, but let me have this chapter.
  • Chapter 3: Paolini’s love affair with thesauri continues, though isn’t as prevalent here than his Eragon books.
  • Chapter 4: I didn’t know enough about any of these characters, even Alan, to be sad when they died.
  • Chapter 5: Kira’s character is still made up of her reactions to things, rather than actual personality, but I’m finally getting into this book.
  • Chapter 6: Okay, I’ll admit it, I’m enjoying this.
  • Chapter 7: So far I’m not liking Kira, but I am excited for the the pew-pew space battles I’ve been waiting for.
  • Chapter 8: I understand that Kira is scared, but give us a moment to feel SOMETHING about what it’s like to be flung out in space.
  • Chapter 9: Really didn’t need a paragraph dedicated to a woman inspecting her vagina, thanks.
  • Chapter 10: Kira is just kind of numb, which is disappointing, because I was hoping to get some fantastic descriptions of space flight, but instead I just get blah.
  • Chapter 11: So…are ship’s minds humans or AI or what?
  • Chapter 12: I think Inare is supposed to be an interesting character, but she’s just a clone of Angela from Eragon, complete with cat.
  • Chapter 13: Another instance that had the possibility of being heartbreaking, except Kira is just worried about…who will find her attractive after all the trauma she’s gone through. #MenWritingWomen
  • Chapter 14: The Soft Blade is responsible for the death of Kira’s fiancé and crewmates, but Kira never seems conflicted about her gratitude towards it for keeping her alive.
  • Chapter 15: Sparrow jumping into action to save a kid is heroic, but I don’t know enough about any of these characters to care if they live or die.
  • Chapter 16: It’s clear that Hwa-Jung takes her job seriously and knows the risks of their current situation, so she should not be arguing with the captain about repairing the ship pronto.
  • Chapter 17: Paolini forgot about his love affair with the thesaurus and has begun a love affair with parentheses.
  • Chapter 18: I think the Entropists are pretty cool so far, but their shared dialogue is really annoying.
  • Chapter 19: I don’t know what a construct is any more than I know what a ship’s mind is.
  • Chapter 20: According to the characters, Kira can do no wrong, even after she’s done a lot of wrong.
  • Chapter 21: Kira was a biologist long before she was part of this story; she should be pissed that the Wallfish crew effectively destroyed an entire planet’s ecosystem, not amused.
  • Chapter 22: It just really seems like a bad idea to me to routinely send every member on a spaceship into cyro.
  • Chapter 23: Kira’s grief over the death of her fiance was barely present to begin with, but now it’s just been hand-waved away.
  • Chapter 24: Why the hell is anyone letting a teenager go on a potentially dangerous alien planet, when there are actual space marines who are much better equipped and qualified to do this mission?
  • Chapter 25: All right, I’m here for planetary exploration!
  • Chapter 26: And now the Entropists are doing actual magic.
  • Chapter 27: One thing that bugs me: there’s never any room to breathe in this book, and the action points are all the same. Solved something? Jellies attack! Go to a new planet? Another attack!
  • Chapter 28: This is just trippy.
  • Chapter 29: If the nightmares were created from the Jellies only about six months before, why are the nightmare ships so much better than the Jelly ships?
  • Chapter 30: Falconi’s advice to a shattered Kira: stop feeling guilty about this intergalactic war that you started. And Kira just…does. No struggle to get over it, no lingering guilt. Owning it and trying to fix it is far more heroic than going, “I broke everything and I don’t feel bad about it.”
  • Chapter 31: This is frustrating and Kira is frustrating.
  • Chapter 32: Kira and co. have every reason to dislike the UMC, but the UMC also has every reason to arrest and quarantine them.
  • Chapter 33: So…the Soft Blade can just be used to make vehicles now? And grow to ridiculous sizes?
  • Chapter 34: Can’t say I didn’t see Gregorovitch going off the deep end coming, but for awhile I thought it would be a lot build of about his mental state for nothing.
  • Chapter 35: This is the first time the reader gets a clear indication of what a ship mind actually is, without looking in the glossary.
  • Chapter 36: I like the Jellies/Wranuai as a species, though I’ve never been a fan of “hive minds” when it comes to fictional species.
  • Chapter 37: And now the Soft Blade can fix neural damage, because of course it can. Sex between Kira and Falconi wasn’t unexpected, but it was unintentionally funny for me to read.
  • Chapter 38: Got one big evil alien you need to destroy? That’s not enough, let’s add ANOTHER final boss to the mix!
  • Chapter 39: Ctein is…kind of cool, actually.
  • Chapter 40: The fight between Ctein and Kira is ridiculous and cinematic, and I liked it for that. Embracing the enormity of fighting a huge monster in outer space.
  • Chapter 41: I would like Kira’s unconventional defeat of the Maw via forgiveness much better if the theme of forgiveness or compassion was anywhere else in the book.
  • Chapter 42: This chapter is so cool that I can ignore how annoyed I am that Kira is basically a god now for a little bit.
  • Chapter 43: This book could have ended twice already, but now Kira has to save the day from seven other big bads that were never mentioned before. If you really wanted a third villain to show (again) that Kira is all-powerful, why not have her face off against the deadly and nigh-indestructible Seeker, who got loose ages ago?
  • Chapter 44: All powerful Kira is uninteresting and it ruins her character development.
  • Chapter 45: Fucking WHAT?! You tack on one final problem for God Kira to solve and it doesn’t even end? No actual conclusion about the seven extras Maws? It just ENDS?!
by booksoverlookedblog

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars: A Scripted Summary

This is a companion post to my review for To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini.

When I’m reading books that I find challenging, especially classics, I sometimes boil each chapter down to its most basic plot points, and format my notes as a very short script. It’s fun, and it helps me keep track of things. To Sleep in a Sea of Stars has a dense plot with a lot of elements to it, so much so that giving an honest, spoiler-free review is kind of impossible. So, for those of you who haven’t read it and don’t plan to, or maybe you’d like a refresher, this is for you. If you are interested in reading the book and want to avoid spoilers, skip this post.

Part 1: Exogenesis

Chapter 1: Dreams

Alan: Will you marry me?
Kira: Yes!
(An awkward sex scene happens.)

Chapter 2: Reliquary

Kira: I’m going to check out these weird ruins.
Alan: Don’t.
Kira: I’m doing it. Neat, alien ruins! Alien space dust! *falls unconscious*

Chapter 3: Extenuating Circumstances

Crew: ‘Sup, Kira. You got a weird xeno organism enveloping your body so you’ve been in cryo sleep a week. Also we’re on a military ship and they’re investigating what happened at the ruins.
Kira: Damn, we lost our bonus checks. This is my biggest concern.

Chapter 4: Anguish

Kira: Well, here I am in the med bay.
Xeno: *kills all of Kira’s friends*

Chapter 5: Madness

Major Tschetter: Well, we can’t put you in cryo sleep because of the xeno. Dr. Carr will examine you and the xeno.
Carr: *does intense and invasive tests on the xeno*
Xeno: Haha, you can’t destroy me muthafuckas!!
Kira: It’s not working, stop.
Carr: *blasts Kira with lasers* Nah.
Kira: Ow. *rips giant laser machine off wall* We’re done here.

Chapter 6: Shouts and Echoes

Carr: Nothing is working, we can’t get the xeno off of you and you’re dangerous, so we’re gonna throw you out of an airlock.
Kira: So…are you gonna vent me or what, ’cause I’ve been in here forever?
Aliens: *attack ship*

Chapter 7: Countdown

Aliens: Pew pew!
Kira: I can understand what the aliens are saying?!
(A hole gets blown in the ship’s hull, which sucks Carr, Kira, fragments of the xeno, and an alien out into space.)

Chapter 8: Out & About

Kira: Ack, I’ve been flung into space space, but the xeno is protecting me. No, you don’t get to read about the wonder or terror of going into the void, the mystery of which has inspired humankind since the dawn of time. All you need to know about this is that the xeno is cool. Anyway, I’m in a shuttle now. Hope I don’t die.

Chapter 9: Choices

Kira: Ship, send a distress signal.
Ship: Can’t.
Captain Tschetter: Go to 61-Cygni.
(Military chatter happens.)
Kira: Gonna set the ship on a course and examine my entire body. Here’s a paragraph to let the reader know that the xeno is everywhere, but it’s still important to know that I’m “smooth as a doll*” between my legs. In case anyone was wondering.

Chapter 10: Exeunt I

Kira: Xeno, thanks for saving my life even though you killed my friends and fiancé. We can communicate now. Its name is the Safe Blade it does weird stuff. Now I’m gonna float in space for awhile.

Part II: Sublimare

Chapter 11: Awakening

Vishal: Welcome to the spaceship Wallfish. I’m ship’s doctor. We found you in your shuttle and rescued you.
Trig: I’m the plucky team mascot.
Falconi: I’m the captain. And we have a ship mind. His name is Gregorovich and he’s a little crazy. We’ve also got Nielson, Hwa-Jung and Sparrow.
Kira: That’s a big deal.
Me: What’s a ship mind and why is it a big deal?

Chapter 12: Wallfish

Kira: I’m hanging out with the refugees on the Wallfish who are escaping the alien war I started.
Inare: I’m wacky, have a cat, and give cryptic advice. Does this remind you of anyone?
Kira: I’m getting flashes of information about the Jellies but I don’t understand it.
Veera: We’re entropists. We’re very smart
Jorrus: and we have more advanced technology
Veera: than the rest of human society
Jorrus: and we talk like this
Veera: all the time.
Kira: I can understand the Jellies’ language, I need to get on one of their ships and stop them.

Chapter 13: Assumptions

Gregorovich: Sup meatbag.
Kira: Falconi, we need to change our route so I can investigate the Jellies.
Falconi: Nah.
Kira: There could be a lot of money in it for you.
Falconi: ‘kay.
Kira: Also, I finally got a chance to look at myself. I’ve been through a ton physical and mental trauma I’ve been through, including being responsible for the death of my fiancé…BUT WHO WILL FIND ME ATTRACTIVE NOW?!
Falconi: Heads up, Jellies coming our way

Chapter 14: Kriegsspeil

Trig: I used to live on a space station and it sucked.
(Pew pew space battles between the Jellies and UMC aka the space army)
Falconi: Okay, the Jelly ship is damaged, let’s check it out.

Chapter 15: Extremis

Kira: Okay, we’re going on this ship. It’ll probably be dangerous. Who’s in?
Veera: Yes
Jorrus: We are in.
Wallfish Crew: Let’s do this!

Chapter 16: Near & Far

(on board the Jelly ship)
Everyone: pew pew!
(Trig gets captured immediately)
Jellies: The Soft Blade is here!
(Kira grabs Trig and gets the hell out of dodge. A Jelly gets onto the Wallfish and holds a child captive. Sparrow saves the kid and is almost killed. Using the Soft Blade, Kira kills the Jelly.)

Chapter 17: Icons & Indications

Sparrow: Ow. I’m gonna live, but this is gonna hurt.
Kira: Gonna look into the information we got from the Jelly ship. I learned a little about their past and about this crazy powerful weapon called the Staff of Blue. We’ve gotta get it before the Jellies do. I also don’t know anything else about it.
(A Jelly gets onto the ship again, and is killed.)

Chapter 18: Nowhere to Hide

Kira: I’m searching star charts until I can find the one I saw in my vision that will lead us to the Staff of Blue.
Nielson: Ah, shit, more Jellies incoming.
Kira: No, those aren’t Jelly ships. It’s some new kind of alien.
(The new alien ships start firing.)

Chapter 19: Graceling

Falconi: Okay, we’re offloading the refugees here.
Refugee: Ah feck off yah hatchet-faced bint. An you, let me go, yah walloping, misbegotten graceling.*
(Kira almost kills the the offensively Scottish refugee with the Soft Blade)
Kira: Shit.
Veera: Kira, take this token
Jorrus: It will allow you to
Veera: Go to our home base if you
Jorrus: Don’t want to help the UMC
Inare: Eat the path.*
Falconi: Well, we’re going to be questioned by the UMC after our excursion on the Jelly ship.
Kira: Let’s do this.

Chapter 20: Darmstadt

UMC Officer Akawe: Tell me everything that’s going on.
Kira: I understand the Jellies’ language and they’re after me because I have the Soft Blade.
Akawe: Well, shit. And there’s another alien species called the nightmares that are attacking humans and Jellies.
Kira: We need to find the Staff of Blue to defeat them.
Akawe: Let’s do that then.

Chapter 21: Exposure

Falconi: Space marines, all aboard to find the Staff of Blue!
Jorrus: We are
Veera: Here too for
Jorrus: The mission.
Falconi: Kira, go see Sparrow to get training so you don’t accidentally stab anyone again.
Veera: We’ve discovered
Jorrus: The Jellies and nightmares
Veera: Are not the same
Jorrus: Even if they look similar.

Chapter 22: Lessons

Kira: The Soft Blade eats through stuff while I sleep, like my bed and blanket.
Sparrow: Time for training. I used to have a military career until things went sour. But I’m gonna use that experience to train you to get the Soft Blade to do what you want.
(The crew prepares the ship for a long FTL journey)
Kira: Since we’re all working together, I have a right to know why you guys aren’t allowed on the Planet Ruslan.
Falconi: Fair enough. We introduced an invasive species to the planet and it caused severe damage to the ecosystem.
Kira: Ha! That’s hilarious!
Me: Kira, you are a BIOLOGIST.
Sparrow: Everyone’s getting ready for cyro sleep. Since you can’t go into cyro anymore, Kira, make sure you practice with the Soft Blade while we travel.

Chapter 23: Exeunt II

Gregorovich: Just you and me while I power down the ship.
Kira: Yep. Gonna mostly hibernate and get up once a week to train. I’ll have some weird dreams/visions too.
(Three moths pass.)

Part III: Apocalypsis

Chapter 24: Past Sins

Kira: We’re in the star system where the Staff should be. We just need to find the right planet now. Oh, there it is.
Nielson: Have some of my backstory.
Sparrow: Let’s do more training and see how far you’ve come. Have some of my backstory too, while we’re at it.
Trig: And some of mine, too!
Kira: Let’s find the Staff, all of us. That means me, the crew, the space marines, and Trig, who is a teenager. Yes, Trig, you’re coming with us, even though we have highly trained space marines who are trained for this kind of thing and are also grown-ass adults.

Chapter 25: A Caelo Usque ad Centrum

Kira: Let’s get down to his planet and find the Staff. And here come the Jellies to attack us. Again.

Chapter 26: Shards

Kira: We finally landed on the planet. It’s full of alien ruins, which is pretty cool.
(Jelly ships keep appearing. It’s a pew pew race to find the Staff. Kira and Falconi finally find it. It’s broken. Nightmares appear.)

Chapter 27: Terror

(Jellies attack humans. Trig is super wounded.)
Tschetter: We come in peace! Yes, I’m still alive, and I’m with the Jellies now. The nightmares are attacking Jellies and humans and we’re kinda screwed without the Staff. The xeno is an artifact from The Vanished, a powerful ancient alien race that gave them and us a huge leap forward in technology. The nightmares are after it too.
(A new alien, the Seeker, breaks loose.)
Kira: This is super bad! Run!

Chapter 28: Sic Itur ad Astra

(The Seeker is basically unkillable. It is scary and awesome and will never be mentioned again once our heroes get away.)
Tschetter: I’m sticking with the Jellies. We have a chance to make peace between us and them. Now get on their ship, the Wallfish can’t land here!
Falconi: I cannot believe we’re doing this.
Kira: And here come more nightmares to attack us.

Chapter 29: Into the Dark

Nightmares: Join the Maw!
Kira: Oh shit! This crazy vision I just had showed me that the nightmares are a freakish combo of Jellies and Dr. Carr from from way back in chapter five. They serve the Maw, which I sort of created, and live only to feed it. Gotta cut my own arm off now to escape from a nightmare.

Chapter 30: Necessity

Falconi: We have a friendly Jelly on our ship now, but right now we need to focus on getting the hell out of dodge. But the Wallfish isn’t fast enough to outrun the Jellies or nightmares.
Kira: Maybe Itari, the Jelly, can mess with our FTL drive and make it go faster.
Itari: Sure can. Since you have the xeno and the Staff of Blue is broken, you’re now our best weapon against the Jellies.

Chapter 31: Sins of the Present

Falconi: Why are the nightmares bothering you so much?
Kira: Because I accidentally made them, killed my friends, and started this war.
Falconi: Stop feeling guilty.
Kira: ‘Kay.

Chapter 32: Exeunt III

Falconi: The Jellies and nightmares are having a hard time finding us. We’re going to the Sol System.
Kira: Cool. Akawe and I are going to interview the Jelly.
Itari: Here’s some of my people’s history and facts about our biology. But the big news is we have an evil alien overlord named Ctein. The friendly Jellies want to destroy him and free our people.
(The crew goes into cyro sleep for the journey.)

Part IV: Fidelitatis

Chapter 33: Dissonance

(The crew arrives in the Sol System.)
Falconi: Holy hell, it’s a war zone.
Nielson & Vishal: Gotta see if our families are okay.
UMC: Now that you’re in the area, we need to talk to you. And by talk I mean imprison.

Chapter 34: Orsted Station

(The UMC interrogates the Wallfish crew.)
UMC Stohl: Well, fuck. Anyway, thanks for the info. We sent a bunch of space marines to kill everyone at the upcoming meeting between humans and Jellies where they might be able to make peace and take down Ctein.
Kira: Fuck that, I’m getting out of here.

Chapter 35: Escape!

(Kira breaks out of her cell and rescues the crew. The Soft Blade grows to an enormous size to protect everyone during the escape. They get back to the Wallfish.)
Jorrus: My hive mind with Veera broke. She can’t talk right now.
Me: Thank fuck.
Falconi: Cool, more nightmares are here.

Chapter 36: Necessity II

Falconi: This is a lot. Crew, you up for working with friendly Jellies and taking down Ctein?
Crew: Yep.
Gregorovich: Nope.
(Gregorovich locks down the ship. Hwa-Jung shuts him down. The Wallfish resumes normal fuctionining.)
Kira: Well, that was a thing. Let’s move on with our kill Ctein plan.

Chapter 37: Exeunt IV

Kira: I’ll try talking to Gregorovich. Yeah, he’s still pretty crazy. Time to hibernate while we make another long journey to the meeting spot.

Part V: Malignitatem

Chapter 38: Arrival

Kira: Daaaamn the Soft Blade grew crazy plants while I was asleep. It even grew a new arm for me.
Falconi: I sent out a warning that the UMC is coming, but it’s going to take awhile before we hear back.
Itari: Here’s some more facts about my species and our history.
Falconi: Kira, let’s get to know each other better.
Kira: Okay.
Falconi: Well, we’re close to the meeting spot, and we’re not alone.

Chapter 39: Necessity

(The crew wakes up from cyro. The friendly Jellies have arrived.)
Tschetter: I’m still alive. We lost track of the Seeker and it’s just flying around in space now, doing whatever it wants. If you think this will be resolved later in the book, you’re wrong. Anyway, Ctein is close by, and we’re gonna be sneaky sneaks, infiltrate his ship, and kill him.
Falconi: Okay, crew, this is a lot. We sill doing this?
Crew: Yep.
(The UMC arrives.)
UMC Klein: We’re actually here to kill all the Jellies, including the friendlies. But I guess you guys can give killing Ctein a go first.

Chapter 40: Integratum

Crew: We’ll be facing off against Ctein in 7 hours. Who knows if we’ll live or die. If only we had Gregorovich here, we need him.
Kira: I bet the Soft Blade could fix his brain. (The Soft Blade fixes brain damage, because of course it does.) I’m going to talk to him. Then I’ll get to know Hwa-Jung better. Now I’ll go have sex with Falconi. Falconi, how brave are you?
(As it turned out, he was very brave. Very brave indeed.*)
Kira: I had another vision. I learned that the Soft Blade is a Seed, meant to create life, not be used as a weapon.
Falconi: Let’s go kill Ctein.

Chapter 41: Ferro Comitante

(The Wallfish attacks Ctein’s ship. The Jellies from Ctein’s ship board the Wallfish. Action happens.)
Gregorovich: I’m back and better than ever at a crucial moment to save the day! Let’s ram our ship into Ctein’s.
Falconi: Let’s go kill Ctein.
Gregorovich: The nightmares are here. And they’ve brough the Maw with them.

Chapter 42: Astorum Irae

Kira: Oh fuck.
Falconi: Let’s focus on killing Ctein.
(They navigate Ctein’s ship with Itari’s help. There is action. Jorrus is killed. The Soft Blade becomes insanely big to protect the crew.)
Kira: Everyone on my side is incapacitated. Guess I have to face Ctein on my own.
Ctein: I see you.*

Chapter 43: Sub Specie Aeternitatis

(Ctein and Kira have an cinematic and pretty awesome space battle. Kira kills Ctein.)

Chapter 44: Exeunt V

Falconi: The Maw and the nightmares are coming, and our weapons aren’t hurting the Maw at all.
Kira: Maw, leave my friends alone and I’ll join you. The Soft Blad will feed you life forever.
Maw: Om nom nom
Kira: I forgive you.
(With the magical act of forgiveness, Kira and the Soft Blade absorb the Maw.)

Part VI: Quietus

Chapter 45: Recognition

(Kira is basically a god now and builds a space station out of nothing.)

Chapter 46: Unity

Kira: I made this space station for humans and Jellies to live peacefully together. I also healed Trig and made this thing called the Staff of Green which will basically grow infinite food. But I also learned that there are somehow 7 copies of the Maw running around in space.

Chapter 47: Decession

(Kira and the crew say their goodbyes.)
Kira: I’m off to find the other copies of the Maw. Y’all be good while I’m gone.

Chapter 48: Exeunt VI

(Kira searches for the Maws. She learns her family is alive after everything that’s happened. She goes to hibernate in her ship until she finds the other Maw copies.)

The End.

*Actual dialogue/narration