Indigo Rain (Part 2)
Reaching the White Orchid Inn required walking all the way back to the business district, then three more blocks north into one of the oldest sections of Norinton. Professional offices, high-priced restaurants and beautiful old hotels and inns lined...
Trade All the Stars
At this exact moment, everything aligned to make daylight in New Coyoacan the brightest it could be. In another twelve minutes, the Ring would face Ceres' dark side and the ambient light would dim, if only by a few dozen lumens thanks to mirrors and...
Going Concerns (Chapter 9)
Sinvy had reached the hotel room before they did; as they walked down the hallway toward him, he had his own pocketwatch out. "There you are!" he exclaimed. "You're five minutes late!" "That's it?" Gibson sounded surprised. "We made better time than I...
Carrier
Joan sat on the front steps of her condo, watching the sun start to crest the western hills, sipping coffee brewed from carefully-hoarded beans and listening to bird song, loud and bright from a dozen trees. One of the few ironic graces these days: you...
A Day With No Tide (excerpt)
In Asharia, thousands of years pass with the same leaves on the same trees, the same blossoms opening at sunrise and wilting by dusk. To mortal eyes no seasons pass. But the day the universe became aware of its own existence was the first day of...
Kismet (Chapter 2)
_Beedle boop_ "Ms. Simmons?" Gail's ear twitches at the voice on the radio. She's prying a beer out of a rack in the cabin's compact refrigerator. The beverage station does coffee well enough, but its "porter" tastes like cold strained...
Kismet (Chapter 3)
If you don't count the Ceres Ring, Panorica is the largest arcology in terms of both population and sheer size. It's a cylindrical design like Kingston, but a vast, slow-spinning behemoth. You can dock either at the stationary center or at the rim,...
Kismet (Chapter 4)
When she wakes up there's a moment of disorientation until she realizes Catboy--she did learn his name, didn't she?--is taking up slightly more than half of her bunk. For a single person it's more than big enough, but not for two. Why did they come...