Ryan S. Fortney's blog - PaxCorpus - Available now!
Finally, over a year later, PaxCorpus is available in print! At the moment, it’s only available through Lulu.com, but will be shipped to Amazon and the like.
Before you visit this link, know that the higher than average price (nearly 25 dollars) is due to the enormously greedy amount the retailer takes. Any lower and I won’t even make a cent. But that’s okay! There’s always the eBook, which is and always will be available for 1.99!
So, here you go: (simply click the image)
I’ve been on something of a break, I guess.
The past month (December) was one hell of a stressful month. But I made it.
And now, after taking some time to read a few books and set some goals, I return to the development of the sequel to PaxCorpus.
Return to Manhattan, you say?
I spent last night fleshing out the six beginning chapters of PaxII and struck an idea this morning on a drive through York. Why not have all of the original characters return to the city of Manhattan? Which is in complete ruin, as far as they know.
If you’ve read the first book (If you have, please leave a review, be it Amazon, B&N, iBooks, etc., Thanks.) you’ll know that there’s the question of Dante’s (the main character) brother. And, right from the beginning of the second book, we begin with a few new questions.
I had posted rough draft previews here somewhere, but I may just refrain from more of that, for the moment.
Aside from that, I’ve gotta force myself to format Pax for paperback.
After some months of procrastination and the re-adjustment of a few aspects of life, I’ve gotten back into both the sequel to PaxCorpus and the “off-shoot” Osiris-9.
At first I was going to use the same formula I used for the beginning of Pax, in both the beginning of Osiris and PaxII, but then I decided against this. Instead, I present to you the roughest form of the new beginning of PaxII (WT):
It’s nights like these that make me think, more often than not, when I should be sleeping.
Death.
There are two kinds of death – Quick and painless, or slow and agonizing.
This takes me back to a time when I was still cop. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; before the war, before the end of everything — I was just a cop.
Down on eighty three, you’d get a call for a minor accident just about every day. You don’t think much of it and it ends up just a couple sheets of paper on your desk.
But the day I’m thinking of was different. Different because it was my first time.
My hands shuffle around the rotten wooden desk I’ve been propping my arms upon and I find my old, leather wallet. Opening it to see my yellowed identification card, that young and oblivious face. A receipt is folded within the pocket where money should be and a smaller bit of an area holds a few green encrusted coins.
Both lanes had been completely shut down before I’d even had the chance to get there. So I knew it was bad.
Just before the bridge that goes over the Susquehanna, an eighteen-wheeler had collided with a smaller car, which also caused a bit of a pile-up.
And I tell you, I didn’t expect to see what an entire four lanes of traffic were being held back for.
I remember, over the wheel of my car, first the swarm of traffic, then the flashing lights and sirens of a dozen ambulances and some fire-engines.
Stepping out, as I park, I walk cautiously through a crowd of people as one of my superiors turns away with vomit literally gushing out of every hole in his face.
Then, there it was. Head strung down over the steering wheel with the top of his vehicle pinning him down causing his body to make a rubber-looking bend around the entire column itself. Blood slowly seeps from the crack at the top-most part of his skull and fragments of brain still push out of his mouth and nose, bubbling and popping from the residual air left within his lungs.
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak.
Eventually they had to force me away, realizing I’d be no help to them in this state.
I remember not even eating or sleeping, for that matter, for days. Maybe a week. I’ve kept that hidden for a long time, but after all of what’s happened since twenty-thirteen, it may as well be fluffy hearts and rainbows.
My eyes close and I let the rain take me away, minus the taint of a nuclear cloud of devastation that still looms overhead, even a year later. Breathing deep, I let out a long sigh and my head falls a bit toward my chest.
A warm hand touches my shoulder and her voice, like serenity’s whisper, soothes my mind, “What’s wrong?” Meryl’s fingers curve in a motion of caress, “Every night, you’re here sitting at this damned desk. What are you thinking about?”
I steal a glimpse; her hair smooth as silk, draped atop her shoulders and even with that tattered old patch that covers an empty socket, she’s beautiful as ever.
Usually, when I’m all by myself and it’s the middle of the night (when I’m not working, of course), I get to thinking about life. I think about a lot of things and I wonder if I should even mention them on an open Internet platform, since every person has a different idea of what life should be.
A good example of this would be a lot like the one time I posted (on an Internet gaming forum, no less) about my atheism and skepticism about the Universe, overall, and how I take what scientists say with a grain of salt and leave room for contemplation – not to say I don’t believe in facts, I just enjoy having a few yards to insert my own theories – and I was met with some of the most close-minded ranting I’ve ever come across, anywhere. It was almost like arguing with hardcore Christians, except these people were the exact opposite, taking all facts and scientific theory without thinking for themselves, not even a bit.
It’s actually a little depressing to think that most of the world is either one extreme or the other.
To get back to the topic at hand, though, I can tell you that I’m a huge procrastinator; I know what my goals are and what I need to do, but I’ve constantly got this voice in the back of my mind whispering, “You’ll get to it, don’t worry.”
I felt great when I published PaxCorpus and I guarantee there will be more, as long as nothing crazy happens, but the aspects of marketing and “audience finding” can be a major drain on my overall moral. It’s like screaming at the top of your lungs in the middle of an ocean filled with people who are also screaming – mostly things like “Me! Me! Me! Listen to me!” – and then I wonder what would constitute “giving up.”
I haven’t technically given up. I’m still writing. I still have this blog. I’ve got my presence on all of these social networks, but I’ve stopped “whoring” myself at every chance I could find. It just doesn’t feel right. I mean, I see people on Twitter constantly touting their guides on how to be a successful author and how to market and what they think you should and shouldn’t be doing.
I see people on Facebook spamming for “likes” and I wonder, “If you’re just getting likes for the sake of likes, what does that really accomplish, if none of these people clicking “like” actually know who you are or even give a hoot about your work?”
And then I remember that “Universe and other thoughts” discussion I had a while back and remind myself that everyone has a different idea of what life should be, what your career should be and what your beliefs should be. I remember that the general consensus is that you should either entirely believe in this or that, you should own a home, get married and have kids. But at almost twenty seven years old, I still find myself asking, “Why?” and “Who cares?”
The answer? Self importance and the attempt to justify what you do and what you believe in. Because, if it turned out that you were wrong, that none of this had any meaning at all, where would that leave you?
It is because of all of this contemplation, self-realization and questioning that I struggle to really connect.
I feel as if I should just write my books, publish them and then continue. Keep weaving these webs and stringing them together, eventually, I might not have to scream so loud.
And then maybe I can stop thinking so much.
Hope I don’t sound like I’m pretentious, conceded or bitter.
For the second time this year, I am promoting PaxCorpus via Smashwords.com at the stupid low price of $0.00!
If you hadn’t had a chance to grab this book for free the last time I shared a coupon code, now’s your chance!
Just use this code ( EN56R ) here: paxcorpus
As far as everything else goes, I’ve been working (in the world of reality) and working to churn out different ideas for this pair of novels I plan on releasing in the near future. Stay… tuned?!
And I leave you with a favorite song of mine:
I read an article about a certain “syndrome” a lot of authors and bloggers have and it got me thinking about numerous things.
I thought to myself, “Ryan, what is your message to the world?”
I believe that, in every work of art or fiction, there is a message to be had. PaxCorpus has this, a few actually, but are you able to find them? That is the question. Would I ruin it for everyone by posting the answers here? Yes.
But, it’s not all negativity.
For those that have been following the White Night series, so far, you may feel a bit put-off by the attitude of the narrator himself. And while I’m really not the kind of person that goes around scowling at everyone and wishing the world would blow up, I believe that there is a darker side within all of us.
A primal beast that bares its teeth and growls angrily at passing strangers.
This is part of the human mind and through my work, I’m hoping that I can dissect the feelings and hidden thoughts that we all have, from time to time.
Is that what I’m trying to accomplish with PaxCorpus or Osiris-9? Not entirely.
My fiction also comes from a hunger that I have. I indulge in fiction, horror, scifi, whatever. But none of it ever fully satisfies me. Maybe I’m just really picky, but that’s why I’m here. At least, that’s one of the reasons.
If you’re a reader and you’d like to know where I’m going with all of this – the stories I’m weaving – I’ll say that, in real life, my ultimate goal, the only thing I really want to do, is go to Space.
I could go the rest of my life unmarried and without children, as long as I make it out there, some way, some how, I would be complete. Besides, over the years I’ve come to realize that things like marriage and relationships are only ever really temporary. No matter how you look at it. And I feel that all my life I’ve been fed this mold for humanity that people think you should meet and live up to, simply because its the way life goes.
But I’m starting to see that life can only be one thing – What you make of it.
She should’ve killed me. A bullet to the head, one more time, just to make sure I’d have no chance of ever coming back. But now that chance is gone, swept away in the wind and left with nothing but a gut filled with anger – Anger like souls trapped in limbo with no place to call home – and no target for the rage that she planted deep inside.
So I’ll just keep it for now, set it aside and wait for the exact moment when I’ll need it.
Because we all know this is my fault, everything.
For six months, I told myself it was all hers.
The loss of Harrisburg and the lives that it kept within and the nuclear fallout that creeps over our heads like a looming cloud from the past, taunting me every single day with what I’ve done.
Death would save us all. Nuhm De’Ara’s words seeping out of my mouth like acidic corruption, as if a piece of her had been buried within.
Not so long ago, I had thought that something could be salvaged from all of this, but the days bleed together now. It begins to seem as though there never will be a light at the end of the tunnel – The struggle, the death, the madness – It’s coming back for more.
A shake and shift, vision bounces back and forth, heat fumes from every crevice of concrete and the roof of the building swings back into full view, all over again.
She’s there pointing my gun right where she’d shot me once before and she’s babbling on about homicide and her hatred for mankind. What they did to her, everyone, in her eyes.
The crimes they had committed against her, she thought she’d turn it around and push back, with full force. But I stand there trying to reason; you can’t just condemn the entire human race over the mistakes of a few.
And eyes burn with blue flame, that finger gripping the trigger, ready to blow me back to oblivion – Sometimes I beg for it. I beg her, please, pull the goddamned trigger!
Though it never happens, it’s always the same. Chest bursts open, flesh, breasts – torn, seared away by the heat of a fifty caliber shot – Bone, metal and wires expose themselves.
What in the hell did they do to you?
I find myself thinking, in a moment of clarity and pause, but the look on her face reflects no pain, only a look of satisfaction; a grin with perfectly white teeth that flashes in my mind every time I close my eyes.
My knees hit the ground and I’m holding my own weapon, barrel against my tongue and it’s so very bitter. Something keeps my alive, keeps me going. Before they pull up all heroic and full of enthusiasm – my team that consists of Meryl, Rob and Ed – A whisper hits my eardrums as loud as the nuclear warning sirens.
You must go on, this is far from over.
The beginning of the end, I would imagine and my apparent role in the salvation of mankind.
Wherever salvation lies, I muster a thought, it’s far from here.
A blast as hot as the surface of the Sun hits like a waterfall and turns everything and everyone to ash. Her hand reaches out and grasps for the withered and brittle parts of my face and a familiar stare peers through the darkness that shrouds my vision.
Meryl? A cough, a gasp and then fingers slide down along my chest, soft, gentle, almost comforting – My eyes twitch open and the steel walls of a Jersey fallout shelter welcome me to another day in Hell.
– PaxCorpus – End of the World Coupon for Smashwords: JE78S —
Tomorrow I’m going to wake up and I’m going to pour myself a glass of orange juice, as I usually do. Swish it around a while, enjoy its texture – it’s pulp.
I’ll pull a single cigarette out of my pack once the grogginess has been wiped clean from my eyes and I’ll step out onto my deck, feet sticking to cold, damp wood from days and days of rain. I’ll watch in wonderment as people scurry through the streets carrying televisions and stolen iPads – Wielding automatic weapons and standing guard at the doors to their houses, apartments or vehicles, because, as movies have taught all of us, possessions are pretty important.
I’ll take a shower and I’ll listen, with the bathroom window wide open, as screams begin to echo endlessly through each street that occupies York, Pennsylvania – The gunfire a mere afterthought. Crunching and bending steel, loud pops, hisses and bangs. Thunder claps and the pouring rain beating against the roof of the apartment building and the sound of footsteps pounding around, barely audible through the sound of the water that fills my ear as I lean my head to the side, wondering, “is this what Space would sound like, if it had sound?”
And on my drive to work, maybe I’ll even be witness to the parting of the clouds and the wondrous beams of light that shine down to carry those who have not sinned away to an eternal paradise — Sitting around, drinking tea, dressed in their best pearly whites, all wearing monocles proclaiming, “Hip, hip, cheerio!” Someone’ll snap their fingers and a leather-clad waitress will materialize beside them carrying a bottle of the finest wine.
Then again, maybe my drive will end less than a mile out.
But I’ll pay it no mind. For I have lived my twenty six years on this Earth to their fullest. I’ve sinned left and right – up and down, so I’ll just stay here and enjoy the scenery of it all.
Then again, I don’t believe in any of that. And I most certainly don’t believe in the math skills of the man claiming that the world is going to end a few days before my birthday!
But even though the world isn’t going to come to an end tomorrow, maybe I’ll just wake up as if it is.
– This review will be appearing all over the Internet, but you read it here first! –
Title: PaxCorpus
Author: Ryan S. Fortney
ISBN: 978-1-4581-1321-4
Genre: Dark Fantasy
Pages: 143
Reviewed By: Brian Knight (website here)
Official Premium Promotional Services Rating: 
(out of 5)
To protect and serve the survivors…this is PaxCorpus.
The virus that brought about the apocalypse quickly turned into an epidemic before anyone truly knew what was happening. Dante Marcellus, then of the NYPD, soon found himself protecting the last remnants of humanity, as they evacuated from New York, from blood thirsty, ravenous zombies. The murder of the president by a zombie sends the country into marshal law. As he, and his unit, clear another neighborhood of possible evacuees things take a turn for the worst. A routine mission to a bank unleashes visions and creatures never before seen. In “PaxCorpus,” Dante struggles to survive in a dangerous and uncertain future without memories from his past.
As Dante’s memories come back things continue to spin out of control. Soon he questions his own sanity as the truth of the situation is discovered. Unfortunately for Dante his troubles are far worse then zombies. A third group is determined to usher in a new era; one without humans. As the mystery unravels Dante and his unit discover the plot and set out to stop it. But the forces against PaxCorpus are closer than even they now. As the odds build against Dante he grows more determined to survive and save those around him. In “PaxCorpus,” we see the power of determined survival.
Will humans be eradicated? Can Dante put the pieces of his past together in order to untangle the secret surrounding the zombies?
From the first word, Ryan S. Fortney weaves a fast paced story of survival, thrills and horror. With each passing page, it is virtually impossible not to be absorbed in the struggle of man versus extinction. The more you read the more you connect with the characters and their will to survive.
The strength of “PaxCorpus” lies in the plot and ever changing scenes of struggle and survival; the characters grow, adapt and transform from page to page as circumstances and challenges confront them. This novel is for those who enjoy apocalyptic sagas and mental thrill rides.
Author Ryan S. Fortney’s debut novel is sure to draw you in and toy with your sense of reality. This is a story that will flash in your mind long after the last page.
Felt like messing around in Photoshop and whipped up a cover for my upcoming novel, Osiris-9!
Over the past week and a half, in between writing, drinking and gaming, I’ve had a bit of time to think of a few things for the sequel to PaxCorpus. (And if anyone is wondering – I’m writing both PaxII and Osiris-9 at the same time)
I’ve decided I can go one of two directions. One way would involve an immediate continuation, right from the end of the first book. This means Dante would literally pick up right where he left off and, obviously, our situation with the world would continue to escalate to more dire circumstances.
There really isn’t a lot that I can say without spoiling things or saying something and doing it completely differently later, but my vision for the Earth in my Universe (which exists in PaxCorpus, Osiris-9 and the unknown project/book series, NetherBound) is eventual total destruction. What does this mean? A lot of things. I also fear that if I should build a larger following and even manage to bring in some diehard fans of the original, they might be a little upset as to where I’m going with this.
I’ve seen it a million times. You give people one thing and they grow emotionally attached to it. You continue down the line expanding on that one special thing and then decide to change things up a bit, maybe even for the better and a community will lash out — violently. Visit any popular videogame forum around the time the company releases expansive content and you will see what I am talking about.
But this is just human nature, resistance to change — good or bad. I am guilty of this as well, although, I think a lot of people would get pissed if Hollywood decided to recreate Bladerunner.
Here I am trailing off with my words. What I want to know, if you’ve read PaxCorpus (and if not, holy crap, what are you waiting for?):
1. Which point in the story did you feel strongest about?
2. What do you like/hate about it?
3. Which character do you like the most?
4. Do you feel the characters, overall, could use an overhaul?
5. What are you expecting most out of the sequel? (if you enjoyed Pax, that is)
If you feel inclined to respond, you can do so here in the comments or anywhere on Facebook — where I can see it, of course.
PaxCorpus may seem like a story that’s only about the end of the world or zombies and absolute insanity. But there’s something else behind it. Something I may have talked about on here before but only really scratched the surface of.
I feel now that it has been well over the grace period for talking of such things and I’m way past that mark in time. So, let’s decode all of this and give you, the reader, a little more insight into my mind and what created PaxCorpus.
And if, for some reason, you hold a special emotional connection to parts of the story, you may not want to read past this point.
First of all, here’s the unedited, never-made-it-past-rough-draft, original 2005 prologue. That’s right, 2005. The Gas Station (warning, do not read)
I held this piece of writing close to me for years and then I met someone. Someone that would change my perspective and even my life.
I am not the person you may have known if you would’ve met me early 2007.
The someone I speak of was a woman. Everything starts with a woman, am I right? She entangled me, changed my way of thinking and made me believe that she was the one. I thought that I was in love.
I never got any sleep — maybe two or three hours a day. My free time was spent working or watching over her children while she slept. Always sleeping.
Most people probably would have been out of this beforehand.
But I was hypnotized — brainwashed, maybe.
For months, I sloshed through each day, dragging a weary husk along believing that eventually things would be exactly the way I wanted them to be. Even if those things weren’t what I actually wanted.
I lashed out at her. Sleep deprivation was taking its toll and a monster was clawing at my eyes.
Yet, she still managed to string me along beside her. Saying this, saying that — never truly meaning anything and hardly taking action upon her words.
And when I thought all of this would finally meet a resolution and that the love I truly believed I had would come back, full force — I received her phone call, driving down the highway at seventy miles per hour.
After three months of drunken melancholy, I put a pen to paper and the last thing I said to her, in person, was that I was going to write a book. She’d see, someday — no matter how long it took me.
And even after almost four years, I still don’t feel like the same person that I used to be. But maybe that’s a good thing? I am writing novels, aren’t I?
This will be the last time I mention any of this. The story behind Pax has finally been laid to rest and buried deep in a catacomb I will never walk again.
And, for those interested, here’s chapter two of the Osiris-9 first draft called “Solitary.”
Six months.
For six months I was locked away. Shut behind a dummy airlock and trapped without a single cigarette or even a drop of caffeine.
An entire six months.
It was training. At least, that’s what they called it. I call it deprivation, conditioning, preparing for the worst.
They did this for all of us. Put us in a room that was identical to the interior of our ship and left us all alone, by ourselves, to monitor our behaviors. To prepare for the loneliness that would most likely come if all but just one of us were left aboard a massive vessel floating aimlessly along through an ocean of black, maybe finding our way back home, maybe not.
So far, in history, man has only ventured to the Moon and back. I imagine it could get lonely on such a journey. But with our mission…
I really have no idea why there’d even be a thought of a return trip if, say, ninety-nine percent of the crew were wiped out, for whatever reason.
Perhaps our medical team would miss a person and the flu would kill all of us off, one by one, as we drift a few million light-years from any known slice of civilization. Then again, we’ve got doctors assigned to us.
There’s always the chance that someone could slip and accidentally shove a gigantic steel object through one of the larger windows and turn our pretty little artificial environment into a vacuum killing machine. Though, of course, this is why all docks are designed to seal upon identification of a threat, such as this.
This would be accomplished via the ships computer, J.E.N.N.I.F.E.R., fitted with an automated, very human sounding, female voice. Plugged into every major and minor system aboard the Osiris-9 – articulate and loaded with enough hardware to control most of Earth’s, already, automated systems.
Jovial
Engineered
Nano
Network
Interfaced with
Fully
Efficient
Robotics
And that’s Jennifer for you.
I suppose, if we should all die, she’d steer herself home – Just so they’d have evidence as to what happened aboard something that seems more and more like a deathtrap the more you think about it.
But that’s what we trained for – To endure – To accomplish our goal.
“Which is your favorite novel?” She speaks throughout the mock-hull.
We were taught how to cope with the madness that long excursions through Space would induce on its inhabitants.
“Hmm…” I think with a hand against a beard that’s grown almost full, “that one about the end of the world. The space construction workers clearing away Earth for an intergalactic super-highway.”
“Ah, yes, I believe you programmed its words into my systems. Shall I have a read?”
“That’s fine,” standing with a shaking hand, reaching for glass plastered with black carpeting on its exterior. “I’m feeling a bit uneasy anyway.”
“What is it, Dr. Marcellus? You’ve reached far beyond the point of withdrawal. I’ve watched you. Not a single cigarette – Not even a cup of coffee in four months.”
“Yes,” I turn to faux blinking panels, “but I’m human, after-all.”
We were forced away from any health-damaging habits that could and would jeopardize our mission. So I had to give up smoking. And let me tell you, those people that always ask, “Why don’t you just quit?”
Why don’t you just quit breathing?
It’s like that, but harder.
Your mind all but melts away and you’re nothing but a shaking, angry husk that wants everything within a mile radius dead.
Or maybe that’s just how it was for me.
“You have one vial of supplement remaining. Might I suggest you sit this one out and save it? You’ve only a few months left.”
“Yes, you’re right. Enough is enough.”
I stagger around momentarily and clench my eyelids together, dragging feet for a small cupboard of a bed, with a few white sheets and a single pillow.
“Jennifer, dim the lights please. Play me the songs of the ocean.”
“As you wish, Vincent.”
That was the first time she’d called me by my first name – A warning sign, not of the system’s integrity, but of my own.
I just recently read an article via Julien Smith’s blog, here: Priceless Lessons Learned from Scathing 1-Star Reviews on Amazon and learned a few things.
While I do not have many reviews for my novel, PaxCorpus, as of yet – I did receive quite the snobbish discussion topic on my book’s product page on Amazon.com. (which can also be viewed here: Snobby Narcissist)
My first reaction was to dissect what he had dissected from my hastily written book summary and while just about every single one of his points were invalid (since he hasn’t read the book, therefore can’t possibly fully understand what it’s talking about or what the word usage means unless he has), he presented himself as an angry nitpicker with an axe to grind with indie authors.
Then I made the mistake of continuing to feed him — continuing to follow-up each of his posts with something I thought would invalidate his previous assertion of me or my writing.
It got to the point where I had become almost seething with anger and, for the most part, attacked him with words. This was quickly removed by the Amazon staff.
All-in-all, the guy really wasn’t worth the time nor the energy it took for me to reply or even become angry — because that’s what people like this want.
Days later I read the aforementioned article and I realize exactly what my blog topic says.
If you’re not pissing anyone off, you’re not doing it right.
Lesson learned.
(and in relation to the linked article, I did learn a few other things from what this person had said)
It is with great pleasure that I announce the presence of my novel, PaxCorpus, on the Kindle network! YAY!
Originally, I was going to wait for Smashwords to complete their integration with Amazon, but had received word that their project with them had been pushed back another five months. Since Amazon’s Kindle is my personal favorite device for eReading, I decided that I’d do it myself – considering how much easier it is to market your work on Amazon, as opposed to other eBookstores like the Nook or iBookstore.
And of course, it is available at the current and permanent price of $1.99. So all of you people that were holding out, your time has come!
PaxCorpus[Kindle Edition]
Don’t forget, if you do purchase via Kindle and enjoy the novel, please rate it or even give it a review!
Thank you.
(Also, there’s no DRM and lending is enabled)
I had an eventful night last night. Originally, I had written something that looked like the beginning to Osiris-9, but after a few read overs (okay, more like a million) I realized that the narrator felt as if he was just rambling at the reader.
So I had a stroke of awesome and came up with this, the new opener. I think this may be what the final version of it looks like, pretty sure. (rough draft, obviously)
If darkness is all that you have inside and you’re fully consumed by the veil of emptiness that beckons and reaches out for you with only an icy grasp and a howling silence – Do you lose yourself? Do you retain your humanity?
And when you reach that point of no return, do you shut down and allow the whispers to take you away; to stifle out any glimmer of normality left inside?
These are the meanderings of my mind as I drift alone here along the solid hull of a ship I never thought I’d see in its true environment.
In space, if left alone for too long, its darkness becomes you.
Chapter1:Ignition Sequence Start
“Power clear,” A man in a control tower, about twenty miles off the coast of Antarctica, confirms.
The countdown begins at ten and falls fast.
“All systems are go. We wish you, Vincent and your crew, luck and Godspeed…”
From the dead silence around us the ships systems hum loudly, with an ear-shattering tone that vibrates all the way up your spine and then sounds off with something like a tuba blowing air directly at the back of your skull.
“…whatever you find out there, we hope it’s worth the enormous distance you’ll be traveling.”
A faint tickling sensation grabs at the corners of my eyes and my cheekbones fill with warmth.
“We are go for launch.”
The sky shoots outward, coming closer and closer like the world’s collapsing in front of you – Coming down, all memories and fragments of things from the past float by in a surreal, cloudy haze.
Sagging eyes twitching over version twenty seven of a massive blueprint that details a ship reconstructed from an alien piece of hardware. A piece of something found out in the deserts of Afghanistan during the hype of Operation: Desert Storm, orchestrated by the science and military institute, government funded, “ZeroFactor,” whom don’t exist, along with whatever classified projects and research that they conduct.
A giant bug of a ship re-modeled, re-welded, re-everything, just to look closer to something NASA might have built. Part Discovery, part covered in cold gray snags and fifty foot long spikes that all spin around regulating the gravitational normality of the vessel.
Years later, every monitor, every speaker in a tiny little office in a drab little building somewhere in the middle of a penumbra reverberates with a humming bass pound and a tickling, screech that shatters glass and pulls the blood from the furthest part of your nostril.
These klaxons assault the mind with every tick of a second and what do we find?
Something out there, something far and deep within the Andromeda Galaxy is signaling us, for reasons entirely unknown. Symbols shift into numbers and numbers stretch into lines, nothing makes sense and that thought washes away like a waterfall – Reminded of the red, blood shot eyes staring wearily at myself through a mirror for two years until we finally gave up and decided that it had to be done.
For the better of mankind, we’ve got to figure this out. I tell myself. Leave the family behind, Kathryn, Dante, Jack, without a clue in the world as to what I am or what I’m about to do. And all the liquor in the world can’t quell that paining square in the middle of my chest.
Even though this has been my dream for as long as I can remember, sitting all scrunched up inside of a cardboard box, as a child, surrounded by crude drawings of star clusters and planets – I regret leaving behind my brightest stars and even with the idea of never coming back, I tell myself – I must come back. I will come back.
Night as dark as the cocoon of space, we finally burst through and pound into Earth’s orbit, coming to a jolted halt and the planet I once called home seems so other-worldly with its blurred blue and white and far-away distant green.
The two people beside me, Aryanna and Lex, both let out an exhausted gasp and I allow my head to fall back, eyes glazing over at the sight beyond.
I do belong here.
“Please confirm your status, Osiris-9.”
###
So, if you’ve made it to the bottom of this post, allow me to say one more thing. Even though the coupon for a free copy of PaxCorpus is gone, you can still acquire the novel via Smashwords.com, Nook, iBooks and Diesel for $1.99. That’s probably less than you spend on a cup of coffee! (although, there will be other coupon offers in the future) As always, thanks for reading. I wouldn’t be here without you, the reader.
Well, I put up a coupon code for Pax on Smashwords and suddenly got a huge amount of downloads, so, I’m going to share this with everyone.
Use this code: DV37S at Smashwords.com
Some people may be wondering, “Ryan, why are you giving away your book for free?!”
And my answer would be, “Because I want you to read this book.”
I’ve been talking about this story now for a little while (last month or so) and I’ve been developing different ideas for it. Now I’d like to dig in a little deeper and invite those that are interested to find out more of what this story will be about, since it will not be a continuation to Pax. It’ll be more of an off-shoot.
In the novel, PaxCorpus, Dante mentions the disappearance of his Father and sometimes gives the impression that he even resents the fact that he simply vanished and gave no explanation.
This is the beginning of the series that will explain all of that, in correlation with the continuing series of Pax.
The idea is that his father, Vincent Marcellus, is both a scientist and a soldier, working for a top-secret (I cringe at those words, I’ll think of something different) organization labeled “ZeroFactor.”
During Desert Storm, in the early ’90s, a covert team is dispersed into the deserts of Afghanistan to search for WMDs. Vincent is one of the men involved.
What they find is much larger and much different from what they had expected — a three to five-mile long spacecraft, buried deep beneath the sand.
Years will pass and then the next significant event happens — a signal from the Andromeda Galaxy, that no one can interpret.
This is what leads into the meat of the story.
Having studied this ship for the better half of the ’90s, Vincent and a large team of scientists, engineers and astronomers are tasked with not only utilizing the ship to venture into Space, but to travel out to Andromeda to find out, once and for all, where this signal came from and what it means.
At least, that’s what they’d like to do.
Using state-of-the-art and part alien technology to “jump” across the extremely vast reaches of space, they are to track, investigate and collect, with enough fuel to jump them back home to share their findings.
That is, until they actually make the jump and are interrupted mid warp — dropping them somewhere, millions of light-years between both the Milky Way and Andromeda.
The idea is still very sketchy in my mind, but this is the basic plot. I imagine that certain aspects may change. I’m also thinking that the extra long timeline may present problems, not sure. We’ll see.
If you’d like to have an even better understanding, visit my Trailers link at the top and listen to the Osiris-9 teaser. Close your eyes, turn out the lights and turn up your speakers. Just listen to that.
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| The Pax Integral |
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