Fiction Space Fantasy

Earth has fallen under the influence of the Fermion Party, whose members believe humanity’s future lies in the metaverse, a simulated environment to which people can upload their consciousness to become immortal. As a simulant, one cannot get sick, grow old, or die. Human beings have no business risking their lives in the betaverse, where injury and illness can kill them. And those who wish to explore beyond the solar system blaspheme what the Fermions believe is the natural order.

Soldier and adventurer John Carter tells the story of how he returns to the planet Mars to be reunited with his love, the Martian princess Dejah Thoris. With his great friend Tars Tarkas, mighty Jeddak of Thark, Carter sets out in search of his princess. But Dejah Thoris has vanished. And Carter becomes trapped in the legendary Eden of Mars, from which none has ever escaped alive.

Chiku Akinya, great granddaughter of the legendary space explorer Eunice and heir to the family empire, is just one among millions on a long one way journey towards a planet they hope to call their new home. For Chiku, the journey is a personal one, undertaken to ensure that the Akinya family achieves its destiny among the stars. The passengers travel in huge self-contained artificial worlds - holoships - putting their faith in a physics they barely understand.

Valerian and Laureline are special operatives for the government of the human territories charged with maintaining order throughout the universe. Under directive from their Commander, Valerian and Laureline embark on a mission to the breathtaking intergalactic city of Alpha, an ever-expanding metropolis comprised of thousands of different species from all four corners of the universe.

This captivating anthology presents a selection of fourteen short stories by the legendary science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein, showcasing his unparalleled imagination and narrative prowess. Among the featured tales are "Space Jockey," which explores the life of a daring pilot navigating the perils of interstellar travel, and "The Long Watch," a poignant reflection on duty and sacrifice.

Devi Morris isn't your average mercenary. She has plans. Big ones. And a ton of ambition. It's a combination that's going to get her killed one day - but not just yet. That is, until she gets a job on a tiny trade ship with a nasty reputation for surprises. The Glorious Fool isn't misnamed; it likes to get into trouble, so much so that one year of security work under its captain is equal to five years everywhere else. With odds like that, Devi knows she's found the perfect way to get the jump on the next part of her plan.

Pyre's humans suffer multiple cultural shocks. They discovered the Messinants dome, an ancient construction that houses a quantum-coupled gate. More shocking, they find that sentient alien races utilize a network of these domes to journey between their far distant worlds in pursuit of alliance matters. If humans wish to join this elite collection of sentients, they must contribute significantly in trade, tech, or something of equal value.

In 2118 the first daring mission to another star, Tau Ceti - 12 light-years away - is launched. Tom Hites and Harry Cosgrove command the starship Endeavour on an epic journey to solve the Fermi paradox. From the first nearly disastrous steps on a distant world, their quest takes them further than they ever imagined.

Thousands of years ago, Earth's terraforming program took to the stars. On the world they called Nod, scientists discovered alien life - but it was their mission to overwrite it with the memory of Earth. Then humanity's great empire fell, and the program's decisions were lost to time. Aeons later, humanity and its new spider allies detected fragmentary radio signals between the stars. They dispatched an exploration vessel, hoping to find cousins from old Earth. But those ancient terraformers woke something on Nod better left undisturbed. And it's been waiting for them.

Some starship captains explore strange new worlds, seeking out new life and new civilizations. Some lead missions of discovery through wormholes to the other side of the galaxy. Then there's Captain Iridius B. Franklin, someone who spent too long seeking out strange new bars and new alien cocktails.

After being court-martialed by the Space Legion for ordering the strafing of a treaty-signing ceremony, multimillionaire Willard Phule receives his punishment: He must command the misfit Omega Company on Haskin's Planet, a mining settlement on the edge of settled space. At his duty station, he leverages his personal money and a knack for managing people to get the company to come together as a unit.

Captain Felix Duval and the crew of the Temerarious quietly patrol a remote Mentak Coalition colony system where nothing ever happens. But when they answer a distress call from a moon under attack, that peaceful existence is torn apart. They rescue a scientist, Thales, who's developing revolutionary technology to create new wormholes. He just needs a few things to make it fully operational...and now, ordered to aid the scientist, the Temerarious is targeted by two rival black-ops teams intent on reacquiring Thales.

After endless years of fighting in a galaxy-wide war, the most decorated super-soldier of the Old Federation was granted leave, sliding into a stasis tube aboard a sleeper ship. The ship never reached its port, and the soldier woke up a thousand years later on an operating table. The Old Federation was gone, most planets hurled back into the Stone Age. A devastated Earth used spies instead of spaceships to compete against the tougher, richer worlds.

Born on an abandoned colony barely held together by sealant tape and hope, Aurora Sato is at the very bottom of the social pecking order. Hard work and brains got her into a coveted spot in the quadrant's top university. But her new supervisor is a woman who's not about to let an upstart like Aurora get anything close to a break. And her home colony is dying. Aurora's research project is their last hope, but only if she can complete it in time. One night out is all she'll allow herself. One night to forget her troubles. She never expects to meet a man who dazzles all her senses.

Ruthless bankers are breathing down their necks, vengeful warlords are promising to pursue them across the galaxy, and now a mysterious new client wants Rade and his Argonauts to escort her to a frontier planet. Problem is, the new client won't reveal her cargo. It's probably something illegal. Well, Rade needs the money, so a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. They arrive to find the frontier colony strangely deserted. When the shit hits the fan and the Argonauts face a possible alien infestation, it's time to pull out the big guns.

New ER doctor Alexi Sur always intended to join an aid agency. She'd just expected to work among humans. When the Pax Galactica Corps becomes her only option (don't ask—the debts aren't hers, but the family is, much to her regret), Alexi finds herself traveling the galaxy and learning alien physiology and culture, all while becoming a reality TV star. Being pursued by camera drones and starring in her very own Welcome-to-the-Universe documentary was never on Alexi's to-do list.

Spearpoint, the last human city, is an atmosphere-piercing spire of vast size. Clinging to its skin are the zones, a series of semi-autonomous city-states, each of which enjoys a different---and rigidly enforced---level of technology. Following an infiltration mission that went tragically wrong, Quillon has been living incognito, working as a pathologist in the district morgue.

The planet Golgotha - supposedly lifeless - resides in a remote star system, far from those inhabited by human colonists. It is home to an enigmatic machinelike structure called the Blood Spire, which has already brutally and systematically claimed the lives of one starship crew that attempted to uncover its secrets.

Earth is dying, and humanity is scrambling to set up colonies in other star systems. But the search process for habitable planets is not perfect, as the crew of the Ouroboros discover on arrival at their new home.

GSW - a.k.a. a gunshot wound - back to front. That’s what landed me in Sophie’s operating room after a black op went to hell. After I bled out, she “volunteered” me for Project Angel, a top-secret program determined to revive KIAs with alien tech. I became their first success. Fast-forward to Armageddon: Demons are everywhere. Bodies even more so. After some intense fighting, we’ve reached the hospital where she worked. The place looks grim, but I’m not about to stop searching for the angel who saved my life.