From time to time, I will add bonus material from The Chronicles of Sludge universe, including prologues, back stories, maps, timelines, etc.
Prologue
This prologue did not make in the first book; it serves as an overview of the Sludge world. Remember, it’s meant to be humorous.
Humans’ robust migration into outer space owed its origin to an unlikely source, a cure for cancer and other fatal maladies. The breakthrough freed humanity from a scourge that had plagued it since its emergence from the primordial soup.
What was the cure? Somewhere in one of the last unspoiled reaches of the Amazon rainforest, a hapless botanist made a discovery after encountering a small enigmatic tribe of spirited women with no knowledge of the outside world. They served him tea, a pungent brew that resembled sewage. He accepted it, fearing his refusal would invoke their wrath because they were quite proud of their offering. Upon sipping the brew, instead of revulsion, he felt like a new man. Joint aches, incessant itching from the bites of jungle denizens, and sore feet immediately subsided. He feared that his eyesight degraded as an unfortunate side effect, because his vision became blurry, until realizing his eyeglasses were the problem. Upon removing them, his vision was perfect. Overall, he felt great as though he was twenty years younger. After another swig, encouraged by the results of the first, he was overcome with a jolt of unbridled amorous vigor, inducing his passionate advance toward his hosts. Transfixed by his jungle lust, his discovery may have been lost forever in a fog of ecstasy. Fortunately, the tribeswomen were repulsed by his newly found bravado, discouraging his advances with a showy display of flailing machetes. Being a pragmatist and not irreparably disheartened by their rejection, he returned his attention to the power of the miraculous elixir that had vanquished his conditions. This obscure little man grew bold with delusions over the potential of this jungle cure, adopting a self-proclaimed title of savior of the human race, and fantasizing over a life of unparalleled glory and fame.
Having brought back the active ingredient of the tea, a berry, and its source, a vine, his announcement to the world created the hysteria he imagined, but ironically, not the recognition he envisioned. The implication of his revelation overshadowed his role in its discovery. He became the “Noted Botanist” whose name was hard to remember. Ford Geht received a tidy royalty for his effort, but no notoriety. His original sponsors took possession of his work, truly eager to encourage his anonymity and add a certain mystery to the juice of the pea-sized black berry, produced from an innocuous vine. They promoted it to the world as the Magic Berry, a trade name secured by their backers, a consortium of major pharmaceutical groups. Critics asserted without evidence, these corporate interests deliberately marginalized the Noted Botanist, insisting he had returned to the jungle to live in bliss with his band of mythical Amazon women.
The Magic Berry did more than cure existing cancers—it proved an effective prevention of multiple inflammatory conditions, and a general improvement in vigor. Testing demonstrated that tiny doses provided sufficient efficacy. Demand nevertheless outpaced supply because expeditions into the rain forest produced small quantities of the berry, and attempts to produce a synthetic alternative failed. The berry could not be cultivated away from the rainforest because of an essential symbiotic link to an animal living there.
Discovered by other scientists, less notable than the “Noted Botanist,” the vine of the Magic Berry only grew in soil enriched by the fecal deposits of a newly discovered species of monkey, the six-fingered blue tamarin. While attempts to cultivate the vine in vast plantations with soil fertilized with monkey deposits showed initial promise, the blue tamarin withered in captivity. Confinement made the poor creatures severely constipated, leading to insufficient waste output. Ultimately, releasing the blue tamarin monkeys into vast expanses of restored rainforest provided ample Magic Berry production.
As the Magic Berry miracle spread, a predictable consequence manifested, mortality rates plummeting to near zero and threatening overpopulation. Longevity was the new threat, prompting civil authorities to forecast shoulder to shoulder conditions within a century, and introducing a grim reality once reserved to the speculation of dystopian authors. The specter of global hyper-congestion suited certain profiteers, eager for a rationale to direct more resources into space exploration. The pitch relied on adventurism, the revival of the last frontier, and for Americans, a new Old American West without rattlesnakes.
The first shift outward began when mining crews on Mars reported huge discoveries of mineral wealth. One notable miner, Bud Adams, invented a new type of ultra-pneumatic drill, the Punisher 1000. With his invention and a sordid crew of followers, he ventured to the Red Planet in the late-twenty-first century. Content on filling Mars with the deepest holes ever dug, he never returned home. He made a name for himself shipping precious metals to his financial backers on Earth, and a huge fortune selling his drilling technology to other prospectors. Encouraged by the momentum of this new rush, the government leaders added their sweetener, an absolute tax exemption on any income derived from Mars operations. A boom of pioneers rushed to Mars.
Discovery of new chemicals in the gas clouds of Jupiter made the artificial synthesis of the Magic Berry essence finally possible. The event was bad for the rainforests and the six-fingered blue tamarin, but good for the continued cancer-free expansion of humanity into the deepest reaches of space. Because the manufacturing process of the synthetic berry was volatile and toxic, Pluto was chosen as the manufacturing site for Pseudo Magic Berry element. The dwarf planet, which had lost its status as a full planet, finally had its day.
Promises of freedom and new opportunity inspired a multitude of off-world migrations, what some call the “Great Expansion.” Yet the solar system remained humanities’ farthest reach throughout the twenty-second century. During this time, a new breed of human emerged, bridge builders to the outer expanse of the galaxy—tough, bold, and restless.
During the twenty-third century, Pluto became a wayward station for greater adventure. Humanity expanded slowly along the densest region of stars within the confines of its spiral on the Milky Way. Boosted by the success of colonization around other star systems, the hovel of humanity named itself the Galactic Realm. The name stuck until the discovery of a wormhole that provided a gateway to hundreds of sentient civilizations, as reported by the arrival of a race of predominantly blue aliens who called themselves DeSolans. Although the DeSolans named only a few dozen of the worlds from their region, humans eagerly incorporated the whole expanse into their system. In absentia, humankind designated the wormhole worlds as part of a new system, known as the Constitutional Organization of United Planets (COUP). From that point forward, COUP replaced the Galactic Realm, along with a new slogan.
“Hooray! Hooray! Bring COUP to the Milky Way!”
Colonization occurred in two directions along one galactic spiral, slow integration with the wormhole worlds that were located on the farthest edge of the Milky Way Galaxy. Human expansion toward the galactic center was rapid. When humans encountered sentient species, the events were generally peaceful despite an insistence that Earth was the cultural center of the galaxy.
One notable encounter involved the discovery of the Plagatore, a civilization of orange-haired humanoid merchants claiming a presence throughout the entire Milky Way, but identifying the Milky Way’s closest galactic neighbor, Andromeda, as their birthplace. Humanity called them the Plags and viewed them with skepticism for their propensity to lie. In their culture, Plags regarded lies as excessive boasting, a flamboyant show that went hand in hand with making deals. Trade with the Plags, nonetheless, benefited COUP.
The hairy traders also has a penchant for tales and mesmerized the humans with stories of the many civilizations of distant galaxies, far, far, away. One account was more a warning than a tale. The Plags advised humanity of an approaching great empire that would present humans with their greatest challenge, integrating with a race that would regard humans as subordinate. The Plags encountered them ages ago when these beings entered the Andromeda galaxy. This new race had entered the Milky Way outside the extent of COUP, but its expansion guaranteed contact with humans. The Plags insisted on brokering the first interaction. No one took note the Plags, who always had a price, offered to oversee the event for free.
The fateful encounter occurred in the early thirtieth century. The Plags introduced the new race as the Bley Zohn est Scoot, a Plagatore phrase meaning “Masters of the Dark Air.” Their empire was known as the Imperium. The Plagatore cautioned humanity to approach these new beings with unparalleled restraint.
Humans took measured heed of the warning until catching their first glimpse of the new arrivals. The Bley Zohn est Scoot resembled flightless birds with awkward gaits. Historians agreed it was the first contact between people and the Imperium that set in motion all that followed. That fatal moment occurred when one egotistical and boorish human ambassador, gorged with a cavalier and smug attitude, born from claims of ancestry with one of the signers of the COUP formation, insulted the Bley Zohn est Scoot Milky Way galactic commander. The commander had presented a stone as a gift to the ambassador. It resembled an innocuous piece of common granite from Earth, and the ambassador huffed under his breath.
“It’s just a rock.”
Although there was a language barrier between them, the ambassador’s indignant attitude and tone came through loud and clear.
The rock was a relic from the Imperium’s home world. Revered by the commander, she was fiercely enraged, retrieving the stone and abruptly ending the diplomatic meeting. As far as humans knew, the encounter prompted the Imperium edict for the destruction of humanity. People called them “Blazants,” a corruption of the Plagatore label.
Whether or not one contact had initiated a far-reaching conflict, the Blazant Imperium launched an invasion from their foothold in the Milky Way, sweeping over human territory and conquering dozens of worlds within a few decades, unabated by feeble attempts of resistance. With a practice of eliminating every trace of humanity from each conquered world, the Blazant conquests foreshadowed a poor future for the two-legged creatures from Earth. Even though the pace of war promised centuries of conflict, humanity believed they faced eventual extinction.
As hopeless as it seemed, while the Blazant military mightily crushed human forces, a respite emerged at the end of the thirtieth century. Without warning, the Blazant advance halted and the enemy began to surrender planetary gains. Humans credited the retreat to an infestation inside the Blazant ranks, a hybrid beast born from the intermingling of Blazant and human civilizations. This mutation of ordinary animal pests became known as Rattz, a new menace, a perfect amalgam of brain and brawn. And at the dawn of the thirty-first century, one human soldier, an unaspiring backwater brigand, emerged as the apogee of salvation for the whole human race through his mastery of the Rattz.
His name: Sludge Dragoon.
Letters from Grandma
Hyper Space Plain Text Transmission (HSPTT)
Source: Mars, Deep Mine Six, M. Dragoon
Destination: Twelfth Fleet, Forward Campaign, Advance Marine Platoon Alpha, Corporal C.M. Dragoon
Date: Day 261, 2990
This is your Grandma. How’s my little goofball? Decapitating the avian scourge?
Sorry to hear about Blasthead’s ear. Tell him, he should have that little greenling fry in the plasma inferno. Would serve the newbie right for sticking his head up during a fire fight. Glad Blasthead’s hair will grow back. Not that anyone would notice the way you boys buzz-cut everything that grows.
Crap, I’ve got to go. I’m getting a call. A mining rig is down again. Seems those know-it-alls with the institute degrees, can’t fix a bloody thing without yours truly. Let your grandma know how you’re doing . . . unless your dead.
– End Transmission.
Hyper Space Plain Text Transmission (HSPTT)
Source: Twelfth Fleet, Forward Campaign, Advance Marine Platoon Alpha, Corporal C.M. Dragoon
Destination: Mars, Deep Mine Six, M. Dragoon
Date: Day 267, 2990
Howdie Grandma,
I’m still kicking, but not my CO, ha!
Blasthead sends his best. He wanted to send you a picture of his face, but decided against it. He didn’t want to rattle your old bones. Yeah-yeah. I know what you’re going to say, you could face him anytime, and in any condition. There’s nothing you haven’t seen.
I’m glad you’re showing those corporate thinkers what it takes to run a mine on Mars. Don’t give away your trade secrets.
The war is the war. The fighting has been hard. Even those of us with Beta ratings are in the thick of it. I can’t reveal where we are, but there’s lots of tunnels. I hope this gets through the censors. My sergeant is Jawbreaker, and he does knock our CO around. You won’t see the sergeant in the brig; he’s too valuable in the field.
Tell me about that three-legged mutt of yours . . . Sparky. Does he still have that skull-and-cross-bones patch over his missing eye?
Got to go. Blasthead and me are going to the bar before we hit the front lines again.
Keep kicking!
– End Transmission.
###
By the entrance into the mine on Mars, the new foreman rushes up to Grandma Dragoon when he sees her, just before she enters the elevator, a white silo that leads to the primary excavation site three kilometers below the surface. A brown Chihuahua with three legs and a black eye patch trails her.
“Ms. Dragoon. I’m Utterdunk, the relief foreman,” stutters a spindly man. His choppy speech is common for new arrivals still adjusting to the Martian atmosphere. “Molly, so glad you’re here. The whole operation is on hold. Something about a pig in the primary digger.”
Grandma sneers at him with a stoic face, a dead pan rigidity as though something Utterdunk has said has boiled her blood. Sparky follows her cue and snarls.
“Sparky doesn’t like it when someone uses my given name,” scolds Grandma.
Utterdunk peers down. He laughs at the spectacle of the yipping creature, which remains remarkably balanced for a canine missing his right rear leg. Grandma’s little companion is an impatient sort and won’t wait for the fledging foreman to apologize for the transgression against his human. Maybe it’s the Martian gravity, or Sparky’s impeccable strength, but he lunges, surprising his prey and landing his teeth directly in the man’s neck, demonstrating pretty good aim for a one-eyed mutt.
“Yow,” is all the hapless foreman says before he snaps his head back and forth trying to dislodge Sparky.
Grandma reaches out and stills the man. “Sparky, release.” The dog complies. As he drops to the ground, he lands awkwardly, tumbling in the red-brown dirt. Within moments he stabilizes and begins to spring up and down before Grandma. “Good dog.” She reaches in her pocket and tosses him a treat. “His teeth aren’t long enough to do any real damage.”
Utterdunk rubs his neck. “Ah, how should I address you?”
“Around these parts, people call me Hammerhead.” She activates the elevator and it hums. While she waits for the door to open, she scans the foreman with her eyes. “I’ll call you Dunk.”
The foreman, a quick learner, simply nods.
The elevator is a mesh cage of worn and oxidized metal, large enough to accommodate a dozen workers. Dunk presses the descent button. “I’ll brief you on the way.” After a quick jerk, the compartment drops like it’s in freefall. The foreman clutches the wire wall. Grandma stands comfortably, holding Sparky with her left arm while he licks her cheek.
“Oh, by the way, we drop near freefall because the hole is so deep. Otherwise we’d lose a half day waiting to get to the tunnels. First run is worse. You’ll be a pro by tomorrow.”
“Good to know,” says Dunk. Like a new born monkey clinging to its mother, the foreman clutches the wire mesh. He utters no briefing like he promised and does all he can to prevent vomiting.
When the descent is over, Grandma steps over Dunk, who is now planted on all fours, heaving his breakfast on the cage bottom. His goo drips through the iron grate. “Ah, the pigs will like you. Come on, Dunk. We have a long walk to the rig, and we have to get operations moving.” She enters the primary staging base, a bright cavern ten meters high, a hundred meters across, with mauve walls of smoothly carved rock. The cavern is shaped like a giant sphere. Five tunnels lead out to the mining areas.
As Dunk struggles to his feet and hobbles behind Grandma, the shift supervisor Braunhower, a stocky woman with straight hair which protrudes from her hard hat like black straw, waves her hand.
“Hammerhead, you’re here. We sure need you on this one.” She glances at the dog. “Hey, boy.”
“Grrr,” says Sparks.
“Oh, you’re in a good mood.”
“It’s the new foreman,” says Grandma. He is standing right behind her. “Isn’t that right, Dunk?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Call me, Hammerhead.”
“Right.” Dunk pauses. “Hammerhead.” He scans the base area and addresses Braunhower. “Give us a status, please.”
“Yes, sir. We were running the grinder in Tunnel Three, when Vardis heard a big squeal. Damn pig worked its way ahead of the rig. Being a good operator, he cut the motor immediately.”
“For a pig?” asks Dunk.
Braunhower bounces back a bit. An expression of surprise erupts across her face.
“Dunk, pigs are key partners in operations down here. Being from Earth, you probably don’t know that,” says Grandma.
The foreman shakes his head. “No, it seems quite unusual. How do they live down here? And why?”
“Safety, of course,” snaps Braunhower. “If the CO2 scrubbers or ventilation fail, the pigs catch it first.”
“What do they do?” asks Dunk, glancing around with a sour face as a few pigs parade by him.
The answer is so obvious to Braunhower that she pauses, shocked that Dunk would ask such a stupid question. “They squeal!” Braunhower declares, “like a pig.”
Grandma bends over laughing. After she composes herself, she pokes a finger against Dunk’s shoulder. “We don’t have those fancy air quality tech gadgets you’re used to. No one bothered to calibrate them for Mars.”
“I’m sure it’s an oversight,” says the foreman.
Grandma crosses her arms and plasters Dunk with a skeptical sneer. “Sparky?”
“Grrr,” says the dog.
“As I was saying, sometimes toxic gases build up between shifts after a new cut,” says Braunhower. “Sometimes, they don’t make it.”
“Better a pig, than me,” says Grandma.
“You bring them food then?”
“Oh yah, there’s plenty of slop from the cook that’s not fit for a miner to eat,” Grandma says, letting Sparky down. He skitters over to an idle rig and pees on the tire.
Dunk’s face sours at the sight of the three legged dog upright on his back legs, pissing like a man in a floor urinal. He focuses on the pigs. “Where do they do their business?”
Grandma and Braunhower smile at each other. Grandma answers. “Right now, tunnel two is closed. Don’t go down there. It’s the pig toilet.”
Braunhower snorts. “You’re sure to catch a whiff while you’re down here.”
“What do you do about the methane?” asks Dunk.
“Our scrubbers capture it. We power sixty percent of our operation with our bacon-poopers,” says Grandma.
A trio of pink and black pigs exit tunnel two and run along the wall, grunting and wailing. Sparky finishes his business and scampers across the base, barking. He returns to Grandma’s side when they duck into Tunnel Three.
“Mayhem,” squeaks Dunk. “So what’s holding up the digging. I assume the pig is dead.”
Braunhower shakes her head. “No, not at all. They’re fast as lightening. It lost half a leg but the damn thing took off. It’s become aggressive and attacked Vardis when he checked on the critter. It’s still down there and won’t let us near it. Can’t start the rig until we get it out.”
“Nothing worse than a wounded pig,” says Grandma. “Being three legged will give it a terrible disposition.” She looks at Sparky. “No offense, boy.”
“Grrr,” says the Chihuahua.
“So what do we do?” asks Dunk.
“We wrangle it,” Grandma snorts.
“Hammerhead is the best pig wrangler in the mine . . . next to me,” boasts Braunhower.
Dunk scratches his head. “It’s too bad canaries are extinct.”
###
Hyper Space Plain Text Transmission (HSPTT)
Source: Mars, Deep Mine Six, M. Dragoon
Destination: Twelfth Fleet, Forward Campaign, Advance Marine Platoon Alpha, Corporal C.M. Dragoon
Date: Day 269, 2990
You’re right about Blasthead. Tell him if I could make the distance, I’d go there and box the one ear he has left. At 93, I’m not about to waste a few years in hyper-sleep to do it. Lucky for him.
Thanks for asking about Sparky. He’s as scrappy as ever. He tried to take a chunk out of the neck of one of those corporate Earth boys telling us how to run our mines. Too bad he’s too small to do any damage.
We solved our mine delay. I wrangled a discontented pig. Reminded me why I like mining on Mars. I have seven years before mandatory retirement. That’s seven years to plan how I’m going to tell the big wigs on Earth to shove it.
I hope when you went into battle you weren’t drunk. That’s how people get killed. Don’t be stupid and listen to your Grandma. Be smart.
Got to go, Grandma . . . Hammerhead.
– End Transmission.
Hyper Space Plain Text Transmission (HSPTT)
Source: Twelfth Fleet, Forward Campaign, Advance Marine Platoon Alpha, Corporal C.M. Dragoon
Destination: Mars, Deep Mine Six, M. Dragoon
Date: Day 274, 2990
Don’t worry Hammerhead, we always stay frosty.
Had some heavy action. Every Company took heavy losses. Our squad was the only one that lost nobody. I guess that’s why everybody wants to transfer to our surly group, even the Alphas.
I bet if we had a dog like Sparky out here, we would be winning this war.
There’s rumors that something is happening with the enemy, stories about massive retreats. We wouldn’t know it by the last fire fight, but I’ll keep you posted.
I bet you’ll still be mining when your 120.
Fondly, Sludge.
– End Transmission.
