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- Herausgeber: Timberdoodle Press
- Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
- Sprache: Englisch
A Small Favor
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018
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A Small Favor
Charley Marsh
Timberdoodle Press
A SMALL FAVOR
Copyright © 2018 by CHARLEY MARSH
A SMALL FAVOR is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and places are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For more information contact: timberdoodlepress.com
All rights reserved.
Published 2018 in the United States of America by Timberdoodle Press.
ISBN# 978-1-945856-45-7
Cover art courtesy DepositPhotos
Publisher Logo by Peter Corbin
Rayne Rhymes scanned the broad orange plain as she landed the Bodicea. Nothing but desert lay off the ship’s port side. To the starboard lay impenetrable and dangerous jungle. The opposite biomes lived side by side as if precisely separated by an invisible, physical wall.
A pair of towering dust devils, tornadoes of orange sand, spiraled in the distance, twisting together and apart in a fluid yet deadly dance before winking out of existence.
She couldn’t think of a single reason why anyone would want to visit the inhospitable and dangerous planet known as Klamarra—and yet here she was, leaving the safety and comfort of her ship to perform a scoundrel’s errand.
“It’s barely out of your way,” her almost-ex husband had wheedled a week before.
“All you have to do is give my friend a lift, maybe help him a little. It would mean a lot to me. Besides, you owe me. Under Deneb law I could claim your ship in the uncoupling hearing. I’ll sign the Bodicea over to you free and clear if you do me this one small favor.”
The hell of it was, Trax spoke the truth. Rayne truly had no choice. Her almost-ex had every right under the Deneb system’s coupling laws to lay claim to her ship. Although hotly contested by the females on the three habitable planets in the star system, the archaic laws granted the male of a couple full ownership of all the woman’s possessions.
Fortunately for Rayne—or maybe not, she was just now realizing—Trax was the sort of man who embraced the art of the deal. He had made it painfully clear to her that unless she did as he asked he would claim her ship.
Rayne would pay any price to keep her ship—any price short of remaining coupled to Trax, that was.
The Bodicea not only provided her with a means of support, it represented freedom; the freedom to move about the star system, the freedom to leave if her partner turned out to be a conniving rat bastard.
Plus, blast it, she had worked and scraped and saved to purchase the ship well before their coupling. It was her ship. Not his.
She looked out at the abrupt delineation between desert and jungle and swore under her breath. It was only one favor. She could do this. She would do this, and then she’d be rid of Trax for good.
Rayne pulled on her enviro-suit and exited the airlock. While she waited for her passenger to join her she made a slow visual sweep of the endlessly moving sands, alert for any sign of the sand creatures who were nearly invisible against the orange landscape. Rumors claimed you never knew one was coming until it was too late.
Only one of the many dangers on Klamarra.
A harsh wind hummed in an octave so low Rayne felt its vibration in her blood as it swept grains of orange sand across the landscape. The blowing sand pelted the side of the Bodicea with soft pings and plastered Rayne’s enviro-suit against her lean body. Despite the protective gear her mouth and tongue were already coated with bitter dust.
She switched on her helmet mic. “What’s taking so long? Get out here. The less time we spend on this cesspit the better.”
