Monday, February 16, 2015

Future Fossil: A Magnum Thrax Short Story


Published a Magnum Thrax (you know, this wild and crazy book) Prequel Short Story: Future Fossil.

Return to a screwed up future filled with mad mutants, religious raptors ushering in the rapture, and scantily clad fembots totting big guns. Because tropes are great fun.

The opening:

The leopard spotted tank raced across the searing hot salt flats, pulling a train of wagons loaded with oak barrels. A large, Vegas-style sign spun atop the turret, emblazoned with ‘Pleasurepit Five’ in neon pink. 

The vehicle slowed as it approached a rock formation that jutted out of the salt ocean. It paused, engine revving. 

The ruin of a big purple transport rig lay forlorn in the sand to the right. The windshield had been shattered and the glittering purple paint was streaked by ragged claw marks. 

Far above, in the crystal blue sky, drifted advertising clouds shilling products that hadn’t been made for a thousand years.

The tank's cupola swiveled towards a cleft in the rock to the left, wide enough for a vehicle. There were signs on either side of the entrance, promising water and goods for gold, and death for those who couldn’t pay.

The engine roared. Greasy smoke belched from rusted exhaust pipes. The tank charged up into the narrow passage, clipping the sides of the granite canyon. Sparks and stone chips sprayed out form each impact as the tank raced recklessly forward. 

Several harrowing hairpin turns later, the metal beast pulled out of the canyon’s cool shadows into a gloriously sunlit sand cove. The walls were lined with stacked, makeshift residences constructed out of salvaged materials looted from ancient buildings. Along the north face, cog wheels mounted on steel supports suspended a rickety freight elevator over a thirty-foot wide hole in the ground. Above it was a wooden sign that proclaimed, "Welcome to Utan Oasis."

The top turret hatch popped open, and an impossibly good looking man stuck his head out. Full head of glorious hair, sharp cheek bones and square jaw. Genetically enhanced. He wore wrap around sunglasses and a Seventies-style white disco suit that never, ever got dirty. 

His name was Magnum Thrax. He was eighteen.

“Kal!” he called. “Kal! Where are ya, buddy? It’s Thrax!”

Silence.

“KAL!!!"

Thrax swore. It’d been a week since he’d last had radio contact with his friend. He bit his lip and scanned the compound.

No one in sight.

Dust blew. 

An unsecured door clattered in the wind.

Thrax tapped on the tank surface with the butt of his rifle, and hauled himself out. “C’mon, ladies. Time to play hide and seek.”

Other hatches clanged open and five impossibly beautiful women, wearing skimpy outfits of latex, fishnets, and camouflage, clambered out. They hefted incongruously large energy weapons that hummed with gigawatt-voltage menace. 

“No sign of your friend?” asked one of the ladies. She wore a white armband with a red cross on it. Thrax struggled to remember her name. Candy. Team medic.

“Nada. Gotta find him,” proclaimed Thrax, roughly running a hand through his hair. "I gotta!" 

Check out the whole thing over on Amazon. Give it a read, recommend it with wild abandon, and click endlessly on the like button. If, that is, you feel so inclined. I know I do.

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