Hunt

By Myles Songolo

In the sand and dust covered plains of the First Planet’s infamous Sahara desert, Lorek-Tovka Ranutak follows his captain and his fellow hunters as they trek across the endless sea of dunes. Will Lorek and the team succeed in their hunt or will they all become prey of that which they sought?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Feb 7, 2016
• ISBN: 9781329887855

Book preview

Hunt

Hunt

Hunt

Copyright © 2019 Myles Songolo

All rights reserved.

ISBN:  978-1-329-88785-5

Prologue

The Venatok silently departed from DST Hope's public shuttle dock, joining the hectic swarm of starships common to most DST-Nodes. The sleek, murky green and deep brown  body of the Svirin-class shuttle effortlessly manoeuvred around Hope. The small ship’s well-worn gunmetal external link drive and light green belly where masked  in the shadows of the station and traffic as it cut sharply through the frenzy to align with the outgoing stream to Sanctity – the first stage of the multi-Node route from Fang B. to Prima C.

As the Venatok’s pilot pulled the shuttle into the transit queue, the majority of the rest of the crew began to shake off the shackles of slumber. A process that was greatly hastened by the modified cargo hold’s uncomfortable grey crew benches.

Lorek-Tovka Ranutak was the only member of the crew of five Rivian – save for their pilot – who was already awake. Not wanting to disturb his comrades as they got up, he silently gazed at the activity beyond one of the cargo compartment’s six elliptic windows.

In the glare of Hope's plethora of lights and gleaming white exterior, his view was obscured by his reflection. The green-brown scales that covered his spike-crowned head gleamed in the frame.  Similarly, the four thin vertical ellipses that formed the two pairs of jet black eyes that sat on each side of the gill-like structure that covered his nasal cavity stared back at him. Two pairs of thin white fangs protruded up and down from his thin-lipped mouth, the outer pair up, the inner down; making his relaxed expression seem much more vicious. A fact not entirely helped by the short round spikes that jutted from either side of his jaw and his chin. Topping off his rather fearsome appearance were the pair of pit eyes that sat above either end of his mouth.

As the Venatok prepared to cross with the transit horizon, he silently rose and stretched his muscled and scale-covered arms and legs. After completing his stretches, he readjusted his dark grey OmniCam t-shirt and tucked them into his black OmniCam hunting trousers. Before quietly returning to his seat, he individually flexed each of his ten clawed toes that were wrapped in his favourite grey  combat socks.

Prepare for Grid transit back there. Navor-Thorok Mokrator – the pilot­ – said over the shuttle's comm system.

The cargo compartment was suddenly full of disgruntled hissing as the three remaining crew members fully escaped from sleep’s warm grasp.

Lorek, did you check if the first payment cleared? Grunted Vorl-Fovat Drovlat, Lorek’s beige-scaled, badly scarred and spike