Guest Blogger- John Trevillian Gives us a Sneak Peak of his Book 'The A-Men Return'
Blurb:
Abandoned by her beloved Jack, Susannah Jacqueline Saint-Clare has flown to the ArcAfrican continent for a fresh start and a new career; as assassin for hire. Unfortunately her activities have provoked the native Wolves of Owando clan, and also brought herself to the attention of those who can offer her a chance for her long-awaited revenge. Here we join her as she makes the drop into Dead City to locate and destroy her ex-lover – who also holds the key to the salvation of the near-space starstations from imminent destruction.
Excerpt and Sneak Peak:
Twelve thousand metres up, my baby-blue eyes open to a world that is dark and foreboding. Just like the last time I left this miserable, rat-forsaken hellhole of a city. That miserable bastard of a man. And now I’m going back. I am a faceless, trikevlar-clad hardbody and like a bullet fired down into the night, I fly. Straight down. This is a shock. As are the broken maw of buildings racing up to greet me beneath my trianon-graphite kickboots. Readouts mark this as Dead City. One of fifty-eight inderdicted zones in this once-great continent. My former home. But they’ll be time for reminiscing later. Right now, I have to make some sense of my situation and make that checkpoint.
“Run tropix,” I say.
>Executing tropospheric sequence. Primary subject: Troposphere. Secondary subjects: Free Atmosphere and Planetary Boundary Layer.
“Go pressure.”
>Geopotential pressure equals 850 hPa. Height equals 9042gpm.
Shit, there’s a storm coming and I’m dropping right through the front of a developing cell. Finally thank my dedication at Astrogations class. It’s ironic. I only went ’cause of the cute instructor.
“Compensate frictional drag,” I mutter and the tech manual corrects.
The sky is gun-metal grey, tinged with a sickly cast of green. Even within the suit I can feel the heaviness in the air. The sticky, uncomfortable humidity. Blips on the periphery of my retinal interface show distant thunderheads, a well of anxiety headed almost tangential to my position.
“Should I be worried?” I ask the onboard node.
>Coriolis Effect in mid-Tropopause. Cyclonic. Type: Hazardous.
I also get a construct view. Spelling out its position, shape, vorticity and shear.
“Define hazardous.”
Systems rattle out data. It’s a severe local storm. A short-fused, small scale thunderstorm, with expected wind damage and possible flash floods. Like eighty-three-over-one-hundred possible. Rough upshot: it’s a pit of darkness and it’s heading my way.
And all the while I’m evaluating this, the city’s getting closer.
Falling with me, corded to my suitpack, is a roughly missile-shaped carrier case. Seemingly random spray lettering adorns its outside while inside lurks my kit for this mission: a first-in-class performance Osakimo geocycle. Well, how else did you expect me to get around a devastated, corpse-strewn megalopolis? Take a taxi?
“Initiate flex at thirty-five-hundred.”
Twist in the air and bring the bullet between my thighs. Force my gauntlets into the handles and snap-on. Readouts whirr metre counts until three-thousand five hundred when the pod deploys. Grip tight as the wings appear, then release and go for hands-free trim. The weather hazard makes the manoeuvre tricky, but I manage. Ditch the casing as three thousand turns to two, then one. Kickstart the systems and release the macrolight. Wheels click down, engine selfstarts and I feel the gut punch as forward speed kills downward momentum.
Full-initiate the geo. Watch as the triangular casing splits and unfolds, disclosing a copper-plated tank and waxed fabric seat. Just like the rest of my kit the geocycle has an aggressively militaristic design. Beneath the harshness though lies a heavily revised engine that even at one-ninety emits the merest bee-hum of resonance. The sculptured seat, chopper-style foot pegs and air-cooled, 1,131cc V-twin engine combine to give a girl the ride of her life.
Flip up my face shield to get a smell of just how bad the air is down here. Roll my wrists forward, engaging smoothly into fifth, propelling myself gently down the roadway. I feel a molten burning sensation travelling upwards from my inner thighs, across my genitals and into my belly. I twist the throttle and race away like the tooled-up turn-of-the-new-century dominatrix I am.
I crack a grim smile. Hi, honies, I’m home!
My muscles strain, my face wind-glazed. I think down the visor, shift flat on the Ny-Tok seatpad and punch one-sixty.
With me on the ground I get to thinking about what Lucille said before she left. The bit about revenge. I’m not one for regrets, but the day The Nowhereman tossed me aside still stings. Memory’s buried deep in a place I rarely acknowledge let alone touch. But now I’m back and I’m packing. Ravn always said that my love of the gun would one day cross the line between sex and death, but I blame my mother. On the day of my first date when I broached the subject of protection, she loaned me her Luger.
Dodging wrecks and debris I speed as fast as the terrain and sensors allow, pushing one-seventy on the long dark stretch that was once U Street Corridor.
“Estimated zero-point.”
>Point-zero in 6.645 klicks.
Once this neighbourhood was what the corporates would laughingly call culturally diverse. For Exxo this was where the workers went for their kicks. A district stuffed block after block of tri-rise bistros, hip sidewalk cafés and rooftop restaurants. I can see them now squatting on low leather hassocks around a mesabgrab at some swanky Ethiopian. They’d drink medium-dry, small talk, watch the world go by.
Then the world went bye-bye.
And now there’s just a death valley cluttered with four years-worth of neglect.
Zero-point is a former blues club, the playfully named Hooker June’s. Osakimo stooges will be there. Some goons called ZipSqueal and Brender.
Race down Connecticut, K Street and finally into Vermont. And there she is. Ms June. All dead neon swirl of naked sax-playing blonde. Club’s name emblazoned across her flashing cleavage.
Kick the geo down to second and slide up outside. Wonder how Lucille’s faring with her part of the mission. Wonder how I’ll fare with mine. How when I see that dirty skanker I don’t just lose it all again and paint another wall another shade of crimson.
Blurb:
Abandoned by her beloved Jack, Susannah Jacqueline Saint-Clare has flown to the ArcAfrican continent for a fresh start and a new career; as assassin for hire. Unfortunately her activities have provoked the native Wolves of Owando clan, and also brought herself to the attention of those who can offer her a chance for her long-awaited revenge. Here we join her as she makes the drop into Dead City to locate and destroy her ex-lover – who also holds the key to the salvation of the near-space starstations from imminent destruction.
Excerpt and Sneak Peak:
Twelve thousand metres up, my baby-blue eyes open to a world that is dark and foreboding. Just like the last time I left this miserable, rat-forsaken hellhole of a city. That miserable bastard of a man. And now I’m going back. I am a faceless, trikevlar-clad hardbody and like a bullet fired down into the night, I fly. Straight down. This is a shock. As are the broken maw of buildings racing up to greet me beneath my trianon-graphite kickboots. Readouts mark this as Dead City. One of fifty-eight inderdicted zones in this once-great continent. My former home. But they’ll be time for reminiscing later. Right now, I have to make some sense of my situation and make that checkpoint.
“Run tropix,” I say.
>Executing tropospheric sequence. Primary subject: Troposphere. Secondary subjects: Free Atmosphere and Planetary Boundary Layer.
“Go pressure.”
>Geopotential pressure equals 850 hPa. Height equals 9042gpm.
Shit, there’s a storm coming and I’m dropping right through the front of a developing cell. Finally thank my dedication at Astrogations class. It’s ironic. I only went ’cause of the cute instructor.
“Compensate frictional drag,” I mutter and the tech manual corrects.
The sky is gun-metal grey, tinged with a sickly cast of green. Even within the suit I can feel the heaviness in the air. The sticky, uncomfortable humidity. Blips on the periphery of my retinal interface show distant thunderheads, a well of anxiety headed almost tangential to my position.
“Should I be worried?” I ask the onboard node.
>Coriolis Effect in mid-Tropopause. Cyclonic. Type: Hazardous.
I also get a construct view. Spelling out its position, shape, vorticity and shear.
“Define hazardous.”
Systems rattle out data. It’s a severe local storm. A short-fused, small scale thunderstorm, with expected wind damage and possible flash floods. Like eighty-three-over-one-hundred possible. Rough upshot: it’s a pit of darkness and it’s heading my way.
And all the while I’m evaluating this, the city’s getting closer.
Falling with me, corded to my suitpack, is a roughly missile-shaped carrier case. Seemingly random spray lettering adorns its outside while inside lurks my kit for this mission: a first-in-class performance Osakimo geocycle. Well, how else did you expect me to get around a devastated, corpse-strewn megalopolis? Take a taxi?
“Initiate flex at thirty-five-hundred.”
Twist in the air and bring the bullet between my thighs. Force my gauntlets into the handles and snap-on. Readouts whirr metre counts until three-thousand five hundred when the pod deploys. Grip tight as the wings appear, then release and go for hands-free trim. The weather hazard makes the manoeuvre tricky, but I manage. Ditch the casing as three thousand turns to two, then one. Kickstart the systems and release the macrolight. Wheels click down, engine selfstarts and I feel the gut punch as forward speed kills downward momentum.
Full-initiate the geo. Watch as the triangular casing splits and unfolds, disclosing a copper-plated tank and waxed fabric seat. Just like the rest of my kit the geocycle has an aggressively militaristic design. Beneath the harshness though lies a heavily revised engine that even at one-ninety emits the merest bee-hum of resonance. The sculptured seat, chopper-style foot pegs and air-cooled, 1,131cc V-twin engine combine to give a girl the ride of her life.
Flip up my face shield to get a smell of just how bad the air is down here. Roll my wrists forward, engaging smoothly into fifth, propelling myself gently down the roadway. I feel a molten burning sensation travelling upwards from my inner thighs, across my genitals and into my belly. I twist the throttle and race away like the tooled-up turn-of-the-new-century dominatrix I am.
I crack a grim smile. Hi, honies, I’m home!
My muscles strain, my face wind-glazed. I think down the visor, shift flat on the Ny-Tok seatpad and punch one-sixty.
With me on the ground I get to thinking about what Lucille said before she left. The bit about revenge. I’m not one for regrets, but the day The Nowhereman tossed me aside still stings. Memory’s buried deep in a place I rarely acknowledge let alone touch. But now I’m back and I’m packing. Ravn always said that my love of the gun would one day cross the line between sex and death, but I blame my mother. On the day of my first date when I broached the subject of protection, she loaned me her Luger.
Dodging wrecks and debris I speed as fast as the terrain and sensors allow, pushing one-seventy on the long dark stretch that was once U Street Corridor.
“Estimated zero-point.”
>Point-zero in 6.645 klicks.
Once this neighbourhood was what the corporates would laughingly call culturally diverse. For Exxo this was where the workers went for their kicks. A district stuffed block after block of tri-rise bistros, hip sidewalk cafés and rooftop restaurants. I can see them now squatting on low leather hassocks around a mesabgrab at some swanky Ethiopian. They’d drink medium-dry, small talk, watch the world go by.
Then the world went bye-bye.
And now there’s just a death valley cluttered with four years-worth of neglect.
Zero-point is a former blues club, the playfully named Hooker June’s. Osakimo stooges will be there. Some goons called ZipSqueal and Brender.
Race down Connecticut, K Street and finally into Vermont. And there she is. Ms June. All dead neon swirl of naked sax-playing blonde. Club’s name emblazoned across her flashing cleavage.
Kick the geo down to second and slide up outside. Wonder how Lucille’s faring with her part of the mission. Wonder how I’ll fare with mine. How when I see that dirty skanker I don’t just lose it all again and paint another wall another shade of crimson.
Links
Author website:
www.trevillian.com
Full and unabridged audio podcast of the first novel:
http://trevillian.libsyn.com/
http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-a-men-john-trevillian/id372409870
John Trevillian is an author of punk-noir science fiction novels. His newest work The A-Men Return is available from Amazon and at the author's website (www.trevillian.com).
