One of the things I've been writing since I have been away is a science fiction story called The Alien Library. Here's the opening below. Let me know what you think:
Severan gazed out over the horizon, his red cyborg eye glittered like an alien insect in the dawn of the barren planet. His face was expressionless as he scanned for danger and, round his neck, a gold medallion caught the sun; on it was the image of a blindfolded figure holding a set of scales.
To his right, Gaijann the Assassin, black skinned with eyes green as malachite, admired the crackling plasma blades of his knives. Then he looked to his boss, waiting for the word.
The white sun was just up. Its platinum light splintered by the glistening orbital ring of quartz, amethyst and citrine, placed there long ago for no one knew what purpose.
Gaijann knew Severan wouldn't move until he had figured out the level of threat. He watched him scan the sere landscape, taking in every dry rock and every stunted plant on the desiccated plain, watched his red eye scan every inch, from the landing place behind them to pyramids in front.
An observation drone hovered at about 100 metres above them. The youth, Atorkh, checked the screens, recording heat signatures, movement, ultrasound and every other emanation a living thing would give off. If anything moved in this place, the mercenaries would know.
"So?" asked their employer, the so-called ‘Count’ Owain ab yr Ynad Goch. Severan looked back past his four team-mates to where the Count sat on a litter covered with satin and gold thread. He didn't answer immediately.
Count Owain, in his kindness, had allowed the slaves to rest the litter on the dry earth. The four men stood sweating in the early desert sun, even though their white silk robes were cooler than the k-mesh armour worn by the mercenaries.
Gaijann figured there was nothing immediately to be done so he lazed back on the flat rock, his stealth cloak turned off. He switched his gaze from his vorpal knife to the shapely backside of his colleague Morah. It definitely had its charms.
Suddenly Morah turned her head and saw where he was looking. Her face twisted. Gaijann had the decency to look away. Smiling, he said to Severan, "We moving anytime soon?"
Atorkh barked, "Kizzac'h scout ship about seven clicks west. Looks like an orbit-to-surface Hyena class." He pointed into the bright sky.
"What the fuck are the Kizzac'h doing here?" Gaijann said. "Can they even read?"
Behind them, Torina stood up from her prayers. "It's not for the Library that's for sure. They're hunters not readers." Her short blond hair was ruffled by the hot breeze. She shielded her eyes from the white sun and gazed in the direction Atorkh was pointing. "Don't see them," she said.
"They're there." Severan said and turned to ready his weapons.
"So what?" Morah said. She was all black — black hair, black lips, pale skin made up with an opalescent cosmetic the colour of a bad moon rising. Her eyes were white with red irises. Startling, but Gaijann guessed it was purely cosmetic: Morah was a demonologist - mistress of pact magic and he knew she liked to dress the part.
"Is it true the the Kizzac'h keep human females in pens as sex slaves?" Atorkh said.
"It's true," Severan said briefly.
"Fucking lizards," Atorkh said.
"Technically men with lizard heads," Gaijann said. "DNA spliced freaks, escaped from zoos, started breeding and took over their entire planet."
Morah rubbed grit out of her eyes. "I'm bored," she sad. "Let's go."
Gaijan watched her. He liked the way her sharp canine teeth brushed her plump lips. "Severan's the boss," he said. “We wait for his order.”
The Count cleared his throat. Then said, "I'm the boss." Gaijann took him in. He was dressed in a rich red coat with gold trim. An old-fashioned holster hung on a broad brown leather belt, and in that, an energy pistol.
Sitting on the litter next to him was his blonde daughter, dressed more like a fashion magazine's idea of a Desert Queen than for delving in the deep Libraries of Xaolin. She wore white trousers with knee length white leather boots. Her blouse was cut from puffed up white silk and her hood far too chic for the surroundings.
An awkward silence hung in the air after the Count made his pronouncement. Gaijann looked to Severan for a reaction but the big man didn’t acknowledge the Count’s comment. Instead, he merely checked and rechecked his gun. Eventually, appearing satisfied with it, he looked at the Count and said, "I give the orders. You pay the bills. It's different."
Gaijann spotted a faint tic in the aristocrat's eye. The Count coughed and waved his hand."As long as you bring me what I want."
Severan turned back to Atorkh. "Anything else on the scanner?"
Atorkh chewed at his finger nail. He said, "I've got a cluster of Kizzac'h life traces - about ten of them."
"Not a full hunting party then. Which way are they headed? Towards us or to the Library?"
The young man shook his head, "They're not committed. They maybe know we're here and are waiting to see what we do."
Severan gazed back in the direction of the Kizzac'h ship, his cyborg eye red like a crystal rose, his natural eye blue and cold as glass.
Atorkh said, "Yeah. And then a really weird, huge but amorphous life signal from the library itself."
Gaijann looked over at the entrance to the Library. It stood beneath the middle pyramid of a group of three, a huge black dusty door in its front wall. Above the door the pyramids were so ancient and worn they looked like broken teeth.
"You think that the library itself is alive?" Torina said, standing slim and white in her cleric’s robes.
"Nah, I mean - alive? The building?” Atorkh giggled. “I doubt it.” Then his face became boyishly serious. “Something in it is though. Something big and squidgy."
"What does that mean?" Torina said. The breeze blew her white hair into her face and she impatiently brushed it away with her fingers.
"Dunno," Atorkh said. He touched his screen and his drone descended towards him like an obedient fly.
"Then why say it?" Morah said. Her tongue licked the ends of her teeth as if testing their sharpness. Even when irritated she looked bored.
Atorkh didn't respond. Then his face flinched.
Gaijann knew the boy was scared of the demonologist. Everyone should be. He gave a reassuring smile. "Okay, tech guy. Just let me know if anything is sneaking up on my ass." Then, noticing the cleric standing anxiously looking at the screen, he said, "Finished with your chat with the gods, Torina?"
Misinterpreting his attempt to put her at ease as sarcasm, she smiled sourly at the black man. "My bond with the divine keeps you alive and healed up." Then she made a movement with her hands, twisting them round in an sign of prayer to the rising sun. "The Queen of Disks protect us in our endeavour."
"And I'm grateful for your interventions with the unseen but all powerful," Gaijann said. She smiled sourly at him. He guessed she still thought he was mocking her. She was young and he felt protective. Then, taking a few steps, making it look casual and unplanned, he leaned over and put his hand on Morah's shoulder. He knew he was chancing his luck. Her felt her muscles through her suit. The witch glanced at his hand and he withdrew it. He smiled. "Was just thinking after all this is done, maybe me and you should go out and celebrate with the profits? Maybe visit your dungeon?"
"My dungeon?" she said, raising an elegant eyebrow.
"Thought you must have one." He teased her. He guessed she knew knew he was teasing, but she chose to smile. “You want to be my slave?"
"Well, we could discuss it."
She laughed out loud. The sound startling in that barren waste. Then she ran a sharp black fingernail over his cheek. "I like a man with balls," she said.
"Don't most men have balls?"
"Not always - not when I've finished with them anyway."
He gave a mock wince. Flirting with Morah was like playing with knives, something to be done carefully. He stood back. "But it's not a no?" he said.
She sized him up with her white and red eyes. Her black mouth half smiled. She was like a preying mantis sizing up a potential mate. "It's not a no," she said finally.
Behind them, Atorkh sniggered. This was the closest Gaijann had ever got to a positive response from Morah, despite weeks of effort. Atorkh’s giggle developed into a guffaw and he turned away so they couldn’t see him laughing. Gaijann narrowed his eyes. Severan stood up. The party looked towards him and then began to check their straps and weapons.
Missing the signals, the Count said "Are we ready yet?" He looked at Severan silhouetted against the sun’s glare, his eyes narrowed and his fingers drummed impatiently on his belt.
"Wondering whether to kill the Kizzac'h now or later," Severan said looking out to where Atorkh had indicated they were.
"Leave them," said the Count. He paused. "If you kill these, they'll only send more from their Mothership. They probably don't even know we're here. We need to get into the Library."
"They know we're here," Severan said. He raised his metallic green hand, another part of him replaced by engineers. The hand shimmered iridescently and flexed as if eager for the fight. Gaijann knew the thing was sentient, locked into Severan's body in a symbiotic relationship. It always seemed to him that his friend hardly seemed to notice the cyborg limb's movements but he watched it ball into a fist. Then Severan shrugged. "The Kizzac'h are a problem we'll have to deal with sooner or later. I always like to solve problems as they arise." The big man smiled at the Count.
Atorkh pulled on his straggly beard. "They're maybe just hunting on the planet," he said. Atorkh's screens were folded and ready to go into his backpack.
"Nothing to hunt here," Morah said. "The only native life is about the size of a rat; Kizzac'h like bigger meat."
Atorkh avoided her gaze. "I dunno. Just guessing." He folded the screens and shouldered his pack. He had one drone still up, communicating directly to his suit’s telemetry. He looked at Severan in a mixture of irritation and awe, like the giant was his father. Gaijann shook his head. He guessed Atorkh tried to make himself look older by sporting that wispy beard but it only made him look even more boyish.
Torina put on her pack, full of medical supplies and healing nanobots. She tightened the straps, sighed, and she too looked to her boss.
The Count’s slaves appeared eager to move. They stood at the four corners of the litter, ready to pick it up. Even Morah abandoned her studied languor and looked keen.
Everyone waited on Severan's word.
"Go," he said.
