The unbounded, p.1
The Unbounded, page 1
THE UNBOUNDED
THE SUNDERING SERIES
BOOK 2
D RAE PRICE
Copyright © 2022 by Donna Rae Price. All rights reserved.
Maps and diagrams Copyright © 2022 by Donna Rae Price.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Book Cover Design &
Illustration © Tom Edwards
TomEdwardsDesign.com
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022921478
ISBN 979-8-9852043-5-3 (paperback)
ISBN 979-8-9852043-6-0 (e-book)
First Edition December 2022
Published by: DRaePriceBooks, Concord CA, USA
Contact: DRaePriceBooks@gmail.com
Created with Vellum
For my Family
CONTENTS
Books in this Series
Notes on Science and Religion
Where we left off at the end of Book 1:
1. No Escape
2. Circle of Lies
3. Broken Constraints
4. Fracturing Paths
5. Unexpected Tangent
6. New Trajectory
7. Outliers
8. Stationkeeping
9. Torus Technicalities
10. Out of Sync
11. An Extra Variable
12. Degrees of Freedom
13. Segments
14. Jump Discontinuity
15. Outbound
16. Spiraling Back
17. Hidden Data
18. Unexpected Input
19. Division
20. Identity Equation
21. Miscalculation in Arc 9
22. Completing the Circle
23. Irrational Expressions
24. Alien Translation
25. Dangerous Convergence
26. 1084
27. Degrees of Separation
28. Blackbody Curve
29. Ghost in the Machine
30. Review and Reflection
31. Cold Dark Matters
32. New Dimensions
Excerpt from the Sundering Series, Book 3: The Harbingers
Also by D Rae Price
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Notes
The Sundering Series
By D Rae Price
Published by DRaePriceBooks
Book 1: The Sundering
(Published in August 2022)
Book 2: The Unbounded
Coming soon:
Book 3: The Harbingers
Book 4: The Convocation
For printable maps and diagrams:
https://www.draepricebooks.com/maps-diagrams
NOTES ON SCIENCE AND RELIGION
LAGRANGE POINTS
Not to scale
In space, for a planet orbiting its central star, there will be five places, called Lagrange Points, where gravity balances. A small object, such as a space station or asteroid, could be placed in those spots and stay there. This also works for some planet and moon systems. These points were discovered in the late-1700s by the mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange.
Three of these points, L1, L2, and L3, are “metastable.” It’s similar to a ball balancing on top of a hill. A small push will send it down the hill.
However, the L4 and L5 points are stable, as if the ball were inside a bowl. A little push will make the ball roll around in the bowl, but it won’t get out. In fact, there are asteroids that ended up in the L4 and L5 points of many planetary orbits, especially the bigger planets like Jupiter. These asteroids are called Trojans.
To see maps and diagrams, go to:
https://www.draepricebooks.com/maps-diagrams
The Bahá’í Faith
The Bahá’í Faith is a real religion, founded by Bahá’u’lláh in the mid-1800s. The quotes used are real quotes from the Bahá’í Faith. For more information: https://www.bahai.us/.
The Badí‘ Calendar
The Badí‘ calendar, used by members of the Bahá’í Faith, is also a real calendar. New Year’s Day is set on the spring equinox on Earth. It has 19 months of 19 days and 4-5 intercalary days, known as Ayyám-i-Há, so the calendar will match the solar year. The day begins and ends at sunset.
Names of the Months
(On Earth, dates vary slightly with the equinox, but these “set” dates are used in the sectors.)
Splendor: Mar 21 - Apr 8
Glory: Apr 9 - Apr 27
Beauty: Apr 28 - May 16
Grandeur: May 17 - June 4
Light: June 5 - June 23
Mercy: June 24 - July 12
Words: July 13 - July 31
Perfection: Aug 1 - Aug 19
Names: Aug 20 - Sept 7
Might: Sept 8 - Sept 26
Will: Sept 27 - Oct 15
Knowledge: Oct 16 - Nov 3
Power: Nov 4 - Nov 22
Speech: Nov 23 - Dec 11
Questions: Dec 12 - Dec 30
Honor: Dec 31 - Jan 18
Sovereignty: Jan 19 - Feb 6
Dominion: Feb 7 - Feb 25
Ayyám-i-Há: Feb 26 - Mar 1
Loftiness: Mar 2 - Mar 20
WHERE WE LEFT OFF AT THE END OF BOOK 1:
Heading back to Earth:
Oatah—Special Agent of Sector 1 Council, in charge of Project Restore and Project Contact
Reeder—Oatah’s assistant
On the Drumheller, inbound to Redrock Station:
Beezan—Captain of the Drumheller
Jarvie—Former teen runaway, now Beezan’s adopted son
Iricana—Deputy of Oatah, relaying his orders to Captain Beezan
Katie—Doctor
Sky—Beezan’s black podpup, sister of Star
Star—Jarvie’s white podpup, brother of Sky
The first part of The Unbounded backtracks to Dominion 1082 (February, 2926 CE) when the Harbor a-rings were destroyed, possibly by an alien ship. What really happened there?
1 NO ESCAPE
Date: 3-Dominion-1082
Harbor Station
A young man, 27 years old, outer-sector thin, circled furtively on the Harbor Station TopRim. His cold hands were tucked nervously under his poncho, holding a red packing box. He had medium brown skin and dark eyes that darted constantly, as if he were on the run. But if others noticed anything, it was the expensive alpaca wool of his brown and tan poncho, an uncommon show of wealth. Although he wasn’t wearing a pilot’s jacket, his intense demeanor was enough to identify him and keep strangers away.
Lanezi stopped abruptly, realizing he was pacing in circles. Poncho swirling, he turned and made himself pace in a line—but then he had to retrace that same line—so it was still a circle, no matter how flat he made it. There was no escape.
Circles. He had walked TopRim four times today: giant circles of nowhere to go. Now he paced in his flat circles, outside the art gallery, waiting for the buyer to pay him. The owner was concerned about Lanezi’s request for a cash slider, but since Lanezi was a sector-famous artist, as well as a respected pilot, it had been arranged. The gallery had already hung one of his paintings, “To Atikameq.” A cluster of people gathered around it, seeing in the painting what only long jumpers could see in life.
Lanezi circled away to avoid the crowd, so the buyer had to come out to pay him. Finally, slider in hand, Lanezi hurried to the cargo agent to put his box on a ship out of Harbor.
Lanezi hesitated outside the cargo customer desk. The gears of his circling mind ground to a stop. He was about to ship a package that would change his life. Before he lost his nerve, or his hope, he took a breath and went up to the desk.
He said a prayer for the smaller box within the red packing box, the engagement ring for Katie. It carried his hope for a future with his own family, a spouse and children, a future where he would no longer be cycled from family to family, ship to ship, just to be cycled on, in indifference, in practicality, in tragedy and more tragedy. Surely he had had his share.
Lanezi scolded himself. Life in the outer sectors wasn’t easy. He wasn’t the only one struggling. Better times were ahead. He would break free of the circles. Katie would get the ring and they would be married, and someday Jarvie might even catch up and be his shipmate again, his surrogate nephew, the co-survivor of Lanezi’s latest cycle of loss.
Lanezi was so, so grateful that he had not been separated from his few remaining loved ones in the Sundering, the tragedy that had recently rocked the outer sectors.
As far as most people knew, Firelight System, in Sector 5, had lost its a-rings in an accident. Lanezi, on Thayne’s top-secret team, knew that aliens were attempting to jump into human space—and every time they tried, there was a terrible accident.
Of all the possible losses, Firelight, the one transit point between the inner and outer sectors, was the worst. Now separated from Earth, Lanezi feared that the outer sectors could not survive much longer.
But the Sundering had not been personal. He had only two people in his life, Katie and Jarvie. Katie was part of Thayne’s team, on Redrock now. And Jarvie—Lanezi fervently hoped that Jar vie was on his way to Harbor and would soon arrive.
He watched until the box disappeared down the sorter, then took another deep breath and sighed, relieved that it was finally done. He’d been off the ship all day. Thayne was too sick to notice, luckily. Thayne, as leader of their secret mission, “Project Restore,” and Captain of the Cheetah, could command Lanezi not to go to the station, as Thayne usually did. Today Lanezi had been able to take his paintings and get out without anyone even knowing.
Lanezi had a little pang of guilt. Thayne would have been able to jump last month and the month before if not for Lanezi’s secret stalling, hoping that Jarvie might arrive. Now Thayne was too sick. The weakness of Thayne’s body and the storms of his mind combined to disable him, sometimes dangerously.
Lanezi started back toward TopRim, not as fast as his moment of guilt might have driven him. Thayne had an Earthborn personal doctor, a genius engineer, and the best data hunter in the outer sectors, along with assorted ship robots to support his every whim. Lanezi could be free for a day. Free from the constriction of circling around Thayne.
Lanezi was not jealous. His own unusual jumping skills were an undeserved gift. If Thayne wanted to use him to augment the mission, Lanezi was happy to help, for the sake of the sectors. But Thayne was work, not family.
Lanezi meandered along TopRim, savoring his last circle of freedom, before heading back to the Cheetah to see what Thayne’s latest mental firestorm had launched. His p’link beeped again. He ignored it, for the twentieth time, and concentrated on staring into the nearest shop window.
“RESCUE” The sign caught his eye, but it wasn’t a teen training sign. Lanezi was staring into the Podpup Nursery. The “available” sign advertised seven pups and one rescue. The seven pups were right in the window, tumbling about and ignoring all else. Back in the corner, an adult podpup in a pink knitted sweater cowered inside a box. Lanezi bent down to see better and she, seemingly on guard, looked up and met his eyes. They stared at each other. What happened to her? Was she abandoned? Was it possible she was mistreated? Lanezi had never heard of that happening, but the way she cowered in the box was heartbreaking. I haven’t been mistreated, but I feel that way sometimes.
Go! We don’t waste our time on podpups! a voice insisted in his mind, but it was only the echo of Thayne invading Lanezi’s conscience. Lanezi ignored it and read the sign again.
“RESCUE. Female, 8 years old. Former Locator.”
A locator! Locators were specially trained to find people or bodies after a disaster. She was a rescuer herself, and now she needed rescuing. Lanezi shook himself. He had people to worry about. He looked back down at her. She was still staring at him with hurt and beseeching eyes. He needed to go, but he felt a great surge of sympathy. She had been torn from her former life and family just as he had. “Goodbye, little one,” he whispered and turned quickly away.
He had not gone three meters when he was overcome by a heart-rending sound, a keening that seemed to strip the blood from his veins. He dropped to his knees in shock and pain. He could see others cover their ears and look around, but they were not struck down as he was.
Several people were coming to help him when it happened again. Now his heart was on fire. Heat pulsed through his body and engulfed his brain. What is happening? He turned on his hands and knees to look behind him where the sound was coming from.
A tall, very dark-skinned man ran out of the Podpup Nursery and paused in the rimway, his fierce eyes scanning the stunned people. “Bring him!” he commanded as soon as he saw Lanezi on the deck. Two green-banded teens hovering beside Lanezi grabbed his arms under his poncho and dragged him into the Podpup Nursery.
“What is it?” One teen asked the other.
“The death cry. The last cry of an abandoned podpup.”
“No,” Lanezi feebly shook his head. “I just looked in the window.”
“There,” commanded the man, pointing to a reclining chair.
The teens hauled Lanezi into it.
“He says he was only looking in the window,” one reported.
The man leaned down to look Lanezi in the eye. “I am Dr. Obala. Do you deny you are bonded to the podpup?”
“I was just looking in the window,” Lanezi repeated. “I haven’t had a pup since I was a child.”
“Go,” the doctor told the teens. “Restore order outside.”
“Yes, honor.” And they were gone.
Another cry started and Lanezi thought he would faint in the chair. He was gasping for air.
“Look at you!” The doctor had a tinge of desperation in his voice now. He yanked Lanezi’s poncho off. “The cry is killing you. Somehow you have bonded with her.”
“I . . . just . . . looked . . . in—”
“You were chosen.” The doctor turned and signaled to his assistant, a purple-banded teen with tears streaming down her cheeks. “Bring her. Perhaps it is not too late.”
The doctor looked on sternly as the assistant put the podpup, in her little pink sweater, into Lanezi’s shaking arms.
Lanezi held her against his chest, but did not feel any relief, on his part or hers. If she cried again, he feared for his life. There was a rumbling in her chest and Lanezi let out an involuntary sob.
“Where is that human med team?” Dr. Obala demanded into his s’link.
The rumbling was building. “No, no,” Lanezi begged her. “I’m here. No more crying. I didn’t know.” Lanezi couldn’t keep the panic out of his voice. “I won’t leave you.” The rumbling reached a roar inside the pup and she uttered a cry that shook Lanezi to his core. He heard himself scream the same strangled wail as if they were crossing through some crucible together, and then she collapsed against his chest, expiring her last breath.
Lanezi was vaguely aware of the doctor holding his shoulder, hard. The assistant was sobbing while trying to comfort the seven pups. Other medical people were suddenly around him. They had his p’link. Supposed to be secret, his foggy mind fretted.
“Lanezi. He’s that famous artist.”
“He’s a long jump pilot,” the other said. “We may be able to save him.”
“We must save them both,” the doctor declared, sliding a resus pack around the podpup’s chest.
Lanezi said a parting prayer as he faded from the world, but he was not afraid. Whether they saved him or not seemed of little consequence. The rumbling had stopped. If he never heard that sound again he would not care if he lived or died.
Lanezi awoke with a start. The same people hovered around him. It must have been only moments later. The resus pack was still on the pup. Resus pack. Green light. She was alive. He heaved a sigh of relief and almost fainted again. His chest felt crushed and burned out even though the weight of the little pup was nothing. He feebly felt her, sliding his hand under the sweater as they took off the resus pack. He could feel her heart beating. She was breathing. Her head rested on his chest. Lanezi opened his mouth to talk, but the pain in his throat stopped any sound from coming. He tried again. The medical people sprayed something down his throat, momentarily panicking him.
“That should help,” they reassured him, afterwards.
