ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First I would like to dedicate this book to my own Spacer clan: my family.
Next, I would like to thank the kind folks at High Mark Publishing for supporting and believing in this series. Special gratitude to managing editor Jennifer Cummings, the publishing board, and publicist Josh Marten. Without their kind and attentive help, this project might not have become a reality. And finally, I would like to thank my online writing group, my fellow toilers in the salt mines, who always have my back.
Please enjoy the following teaser…and excerpt, from the next Spacer Clans Adventure:
NAERO
’S
GAMBIT
by
Mason Elliott
Klyne set the huge Mystic testing room to muted gray. Smartwalls, floor, and ceiling. No equipment visible, no padding.
The lights were set down low.
From experience, Naero knew that in a training room, just about anything could pop up out of anywhere.
She wore nothing but her black Nytex flight togs.
To her surprise, Klyne and his two adepts wore dark gray Nytex togs also, with hoods pulled up over their heads. Only their keen eyes showed. All three looked to be in top physical condition.
One of the adepts was female with huge green eyes and light freckles across her nose. The other was male, with the black slanted eyes of the Li-Kim Clans.
If black was the color of Spacers, the Mystics traditionally wore gray.
They all sat with their legs crossed in lotus fashion, focusing their abilities through meditation, and mental discipline. They formed a triangle, each about three meters apart.
“Follow our instructions,” Klyne said. “Take your place among us. Sit in the center; sit as we do, face the instructor.”
A circle of white light appeared at the center of the triangle. Naero walked over and sat down in it, facing Klyne. Her skin barely began to tingle.
A ring of similar light appeared, including the instructor and his two adepts.
Every hair on Naero’s body went stiff with electric force.
“You have chosen to come before the circle of Spacer Mystics to be tested for Mystic training. Speak your name.”
“Naero Amashin Maeris.”
“You agree to be tested?”
“I do.”
“I am Klyne, the instructor. My assistants are Adept Iselle, and Adept Makita. We shall refer to you as Adept Candidate Naero. Follow our instructions. Respond only if asked to respond. If you require any medical attention, it will be administered at the end of the testing. Until then, you are expected to endure and continue to do your best. If you understand, say yes.”
“Yes.”
“The training will begin. Defend yourself.”
Without warning, Makita’s attack smashed into her.
She blocked one or two out every four or five blows.
A snap-wheel kick sent her flying twenty meters, nearly winding her.
The only things that saved her at all, once again, were the experience and knowledge she gained from her training sessions with Baeven.
Makita proved stronger and faster than her, but he still paled in comparison to the outcast’s terrifying prowess.
Makita charged her.
Naero met him part way.
She took several punishing strikes, but flipped him hard to the ground.
He swept her legs.
They tangled on the ground, wrestling, slipping out of holds, twisting like snakes. They pummeled each other all the while.
They broke, crouched low, and launched themselves at each other again, like Telurian fighting blue cranes.
Naero landed one kick on the side of Makita’s head.
He clipped her under the chin, grabbed her leg and ankle and swung her hard into the floor, stunning her.
She struggled to get up.
For a few dizzy moments, she couldn’t.
She rose up and staggered back into her fighting stance.
She half-smiled.
“Come on.”
Makita bowed his head, just slightly, and drew back.
“Defend yourself, “Klyne said again.
Naero whirled to face Iselle.
Too late.
An invisible force slammed into her arms and torso, flinging her back.
She rolled with the strike and came back up into her stance.
Iselle fought her from a distance, punching and striking with her hands in rapid combinations.
Naero struggled to advance, to close the distance between them, while heavy, unseen blows rained down on her from every direction, knocking her one way, and then the other.
“Telekinetic combat,” Klyne called out. “Try to sense and block the blows. You cannot see them. Reach out with your battle senses. With your mind. Feel them coming. Counter and deflect them. True masters can fight thus without even moving, simply by concentrating.”
At least Iselle still had to physically move in order to project her attacks. That was some help.
Closer. Get closer.
Iselle thrust both hands forward violently.
A wall of force drove Naero slowly back. She pushed against it, slowing it even more.
“Resist. Focus on the energy before you,” Klyne told her, “before it smashes you into the far wall. Fight back. Defeat it.”
She rolled to one side and then the other. The barrier felt solid.
Naero leaped up four meters, felt the top, and flipped herself over it.
Iselle withdrew a step, cupping both hands loosely on the sides of her face.
Spinning orbs of pure telekinetic force shot out, rapid-fire.
Naero barely perceived them where they warped through the air; they made an explosive popping sound.
She tried to dodge them. One whirred past her head like an invisible ball at high speed.
The next clipped her left shoulder, spinning her aside.
Another knocked one leg out from under her.
She kept her feet and ducked, weaving to either side in turns.
Iselle directed her attack at Naero’s feet.
She lost her footing, slipping and sliding on what felt like a bunch of invisible ball bearings cast beneath her.
She tried to roll back to her feet, but panes of force battered her from all sides, keeping her off balance.
It felt like being a rubber ball, bouncing around in a box that someone shook.
The sides of the box rapidly closed in.
They tightened all around her, threatening to crush her.
She couldn’t breathe.
Iselle released her without warning.
Naero sprawled, gasping, face down on the floor.
“I’m somewhat surprised,” Klyne noted. “Preliminary tests demonstrate no psyonic aptitude or innate talent to my trained senses whatsoever. That in itself is very rare. After your battle with the former Danner entity, we simply assumed that you would exhibit some kind of psyonic ability.”
“I burned myself out dealing with Danner. I burned both of us out. I’m a nud once more.” She admitted it openly. “None of my former abilities have returned.”
So she wasn’t psyonic anymore. Not even a teknomancer. Disappointing, but not the end of the universe.
“Yet I sense something incredibly strange within you,” Klyne said. “What could it be?”
Was it Om? He was still inside her somewhere. He had not emerged again either.
“Take your place at the center of us once more.”
Naero did so, resisting an urge to massage several bruises.
Klyne suddenly appeared directly in front of her, sitting lotus fashion just like her and the others.
“I’m going to attempt to merge directly with your mind telepathically, one of my gifts. I’m also an Auralcognitor. Once I link to your mind, I can sense any type of psyonic energy field you might have, active, passive, or latent. I might even be able to trigger or bring them out to the surface. There might be some discomfort. Shall we proceed?”
“Sure.”
“Do as I do. I will show you how to place your hands to effect the mind merge.”
Klyne cupped his left hand firmly behind the base of her skull.
Naero followed his lead.
He placed the fingers of his right hand on precise spots on her face.
Thumb on her forehead, directly between her eyes.
Index finger on her left temple.
The next two fingers curled slightly in front of her left ear. His smallest finger hooked at the point of her ear and jaw.
As soon as Naero placed her right hand the same way, she gasped slightly.
Thin hairs of what felt like burning hot energy threaded their way slowly through the layers of her awareness.
She could feel Klyne connecting with her thoughts, joining their two minds.
The dull ache continued to grow.
“You should be feeling the initial discomfort. Hold still. Keep focusing. Almost there. Almost...”
A spike of pure agony exploded within her skull.
Naero screamed, transfixed as if by lightning.
Through the torment, a voice awoke in her mind full-force.
Protocols unlocked and engaged. We...are.
Interface...partial.
Om awoke, reacting instinctively with fear and vast power.
T
hreat detected...Protect all access.
Neural net...INTRUSION. UNWARRANTED.
LEVEL 1.359 DEFENSIVE RESPONSE.
An intense blast wave of white-hot psyonic energy fanned out rapidly from the epicenter of her immolated mind.
Naero continued to scream.
As if far away in the distance, Klyne and his two adepts also shrieked.
*
Naero blinked, her eyes and mouth frozen open.
She lay with her head to one side, in a puddle of her own mixed blood and spittle.
More pain when she attempted to move.
Blood continued to stream from her eyes, ears, nose, and mouth–a bloody mess.
Something as if a fusion grenade blew her head open.
She reached up with her hands to make sure her skull was still intact.
Some kind of noise.
Warning alarms sounded.
A ship. Yes. they were on a ship. The Spacer Intel Ship
The Kathmandu
. She was...being tested, for the Mystics.
Something had gone terribly wrong.
Naero focused, getting to her hands and knees.
She heard other voices, groaning and whimpering.
Makita lay sprawled in a broken tangle, blasted across the room. His gray clothing had been shredded and scorched into tatters. He choked and coughed.
To the other side, Iselle fared little better. She lay convulsing, blasted, scorched, a yellow-white bone of her forearm sticking out of her wrenched flesh. One side of her face was blistered, her red hair burned, some of it still smoking. She trembled and shuddered in pain and terror.
Naero looked around for Klyne, finding the instructor in a burned, bloody heap, lying beneath a dark red smear on the far wall. His hands were charred black, and he was missing fingers.
Naero could not walk. She couldn’t even stand.
She crawled to Klyne as quickly as she could.
He still lived, just barely.
Then she noticed the intense effects of the blast. All around the room, less than a meter up.
A massive expanding ring of Cosmic force had sliced into the duranadium hull of the smartwalls, punching a deep crease right through them where they buckled, all along its full diameter.
The force of the strike disrupted all systems. The entire training room compacted, crushed, and heavily damaged.
Rescuers struggled to force their way through the various ruined doors and access panels.