Excerpt: Return of the Convict by William Alan Thomas

About the Book:

http://www.williamalanthomas.com

It’s March 9, 2143. In the aftermath of wars, plagues and environmental breakdown, there’s growing hope. Humans have colonized the solar system and now they’re looking to the stars. 
Thanks to extensive brain implants, space cadet Dom Tessier enjoys a perfect memory. In another year he’s to be fully transformed, and join the world-wide technocracy. He and his girlfriend Astra Allison practice telepathy together, and attain new heights. 
Unbeknownst to Dom, his upbringing and education have been provided for by his parent clone, Lucas Rivera, a diseased convict who’s now returned from Martian exile. 
Dom’s brain implants offer Lucas the chance for a life-saving mind merger, and he intends to make that happen. 
Meeting Lucas is a real shock for Dom. Lucas is uncultured, and no stranger to vice. Worst of all, he’s a convicted criminal. Can Dom overcome his prejudices, and embrace the one who’s given him everything? Or will he coldly let Lucas die? If you like hard sci-fi you’ll love this book.

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Featured in Aug/Sept 2016 Issue: Sixth Anniversary Issue

Dec. 16, 2143

There were forty-five of us transports crammed into the space bus, and even though everyone was sedated, the two and a half day trip was arduous.

After we docked there was a slight shaking. Our capsule shot backward, and stopped. With a hissing of air, the door slid open. “Welcome to Mir,” a man’s voice said. “Everybody out.”         

The artificial gravity here was less than the moon’s; I got up without much difficulty. Two uniformed guards checked us off as we came out. “You’re Dominic Tessier,” one said crisply, when she touched my ID tag with a scanner.

My legs uncertain, I stepped onto a moving sidewalk that took us through a tunnel. In a few minutes the passageway curved, and the main terminus area of the space station came into view. I held tight to the railing and stared. The people here arrived and departed from all over the solar system: personnel from the space ships, businessmen, and new-world workers. Some, while roughly dressed, had a special swagger. I thought they might be prospectors. Then a group of T-men walked through in unisex suits and skull caps. Although silent, their expressions and gestures showed communication. Thanks to their brain implants, they were telepathic. 

Only a few months earlier, I’d been a student at the Space Training Academy. My brain was being transformed through implants, and I looked forward myself, to a career in space as a T-man administrator. An awful injustice had been done to me, and my dreams were trashed. Yet I felt no regret, resentment, or any emotion at all. A silver bracelet around my wrist created a chemically-induced docility, more powerful than chains.    

 Our guards took us along a walkway above a large, brightly lit loading dock.  Through the side-mesh I could see the Stellar Blossom. The ship’s blue hull seemed to stretch on forever; it dwarfed the men gathered to service her.

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