Ascendant Saga Collection: Sci-Fi Fantasy Techno Thriller by Brandon Ellis (easy to read books for adults list txt) 📕

Hobbs sighed. “I’ll get on that. Expect a ticket within an hour. How are you going to get to the airport?”

“You’re going to get me a taxi. Have him pick me up at the Belmont Library in Southeast Portland.”

“That’s it?” questioned Hobbs.

“That’s it.”

42

June 8thUnderfoot Black, Grenada

Donny seemed as surprised as Jaxx to see Rivkah, when she burst through the door, waving a rifle. The scene that played out was as depressing as predictable. Rivkah fought like a dervish, while the guards piled on and on and on until they had her pinned and subdued. They removed her and no one—not Donny, not Slade, not the guards who escorted Jaxx to and from his bunk—would tell him anything about her whereabouts or condition. He hated them all.

Jaxx attampted to hypnotize himself in his room, but it never worked. Slade had said something about there being tech buried in the walls of Donny’s office, but that was back when he lied about implanted memories. The reason he couldn’t hypnotize himself was auto-suggestion. He’d been trained, Pavlov-style, to respond to Donny’s voice. He knew that. Still, a bummer. He needed Donny in order to travel back through his own damned memories. He needed to do something about that. Maybe if he laid down, imagined he was in Donny’s office, and regulated his breathing, perhaps he could trick himself into an altered state. He’d heard that dweeb count him down enough times; he could probably conjure up his voice, so it felt like he’d take him in…

All it took was his head hitting the pillow. He didn’t need to hear Donny counting him down.

Jaxx landed on the forest canopy’s floor with a thud, a portion of his parachute slipping through the branches and landing on top of him. He pushed the parachute away. Ripped to shreds. He unstrapped, pressed the rescue beacon on his belt, and sent out a signal to Star Cruiser Liberty in hopes they’d send a rescue mission.

A couple of cuts in his jumpsuit pants had reached deep enough to scratch a few bloody lacerations on his leg, but minor. His lower back a bit sore, nothing he couldn’t deal with.

He climbed out of his ejection seat and trudged forward, away from his starfighter’s wreckage a few klicks behind him and toward Rivkah’s burning wreckage. Maybe she was alive somewhere near her downed craft.

The forest was one big shadow under the canopy of trees. The air was humid. A mix of jasmine and soil tickled his senses.

A bush swished back and forth next to him and something scurried off deeper in the brush.

He was on a planet he’d never visited. Hell, he’d never been on any planet but Earth. He unholstered his Interstellar Plasma Gun, IPG-14, from his belt, a weapon he’d never used before. A laser sight attached.

He held his gun out and cautiously moved around a spiked tree. He touched the spike then pulled his hand away when an insect, a scorpion on pumped-up hyper-steroids, jumped from behind the spike and hissed. “Holy Shit.” Jaxx reeled back and reflexively pulled the trigger.

The bug splattered, and a gooey mess was left in a charred divot in the tree’s bark. A thin line of smoke twirled upward.

He stood, his breath shallow and hard. “Calm down, Jaxx.” His heart beat in his throat. “Relax.”

If a bug could scare him that easily, Rivkah might get a hole in her chest if she came out from behind a tree and startled him. He pushed the thought away, squeezing his free hand into a fist, pushing his nerves as deep down as possible.

He stepped over a rock and brushed aside a low hanging branch full of reddish-orange fruit. He inched his way silently across the forest, the heat getting to him. Spots of perspiration spread across his jumpsuit. He needed water but the Taiyonians were probably looking for him and in force. If they had a trackers, he didn’t have much time to find Rivkah, locate a hiding place, and wait for a rescue team; if one was on its way.

“Just keep trekking,” he whispered.

Pushing aside a palm leaf and ducking a thick tree limb, he took a long stride. His foot fell into thick sludge. A rabid cry pierced the forest and mud splashed across Jaxx’s torso like someone threw a can of paint with no lid at him.

He back peddled, his forearm coming up and covering his face.

A trumpet sound mixed with a low, whining drone—not unlike bagpipes—erupted in front of him and a tentacle lashed out. It connected with his shoulder.

Jaxx flung his arm back, losing his weapon. It bounce across the ground as he tumbled and landed on his back.

The large tentacle loomed and whipped away. The earth lifted in front of Jaxx and an animal, with a bulky frame and a tentacled nose, emerged from the slime. Its eyes were almond-shaped and blue, its body like a hippopotamus. It leaped forward, landing in front of Jaxx.

Jaxx cautiously moved, his palms out. The universal symbol for slow it down, buddy. “Whoa, back up. I don’t mean any harm.”

Its tentacle extended and gave Jaxx two gentle pats on his head, then sidestepped around him. Its hairless, hippo-like torso grazed his shoulder as it walked by and over a small hill.

“What in the world...?” Jaxx wiped himself off and looked in all directions. If the Taiyonians hadn’t known his exact location a minute ago, they did now.

He picked up his IPG pistol and hurried to a boulder at the base of a hill. He crouched behind, watching and listening for movement; any indication that the enemy neared.

Nothing.

Not even an alien bird whistling.

The battle, the crash, and the strafing of the city might have driven the majority of the animals into hiding.

Jaxx raced up the hill, staying low.

At the top, he spotted smoke spiraling from a line of burning, fallen trees. Rivkah’s crash. He could see the the top of