Silver Sahara (eBook)

Jonathan Miner (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
640 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
9798992993912 (ISBN)

Infos

Set in a war-torn Earth still reeling from over a century of conflict, Silver Sahara takes place nearly twenty years after the end of the Chrome War. As global corporations and fractured governments reshape the world, a scrappy, overambitious wayfinder named Jay Harlow crosses paths with Richard Willon-the naive, bastard son of a powerful technocrat. Both are eager to carve their legacy into the newly terraformed West Saharan Steppe. But their actions don't go unnoticed. Unseen forces are already shifting the frontier beneath their feet. And it's only a matter of time before Alex-a deadly assassin forged by the mercenary giant Kranos Incorporated-comes for them. 'It's a masterpiece... an adrenaline rush of high literary tact and unprecedented subtlety...' 'Familiar in the sense that your characters are timeless--utterly timeless! That is the word I keep coming back to that I felt echoing in my mind while reading...'

Born and raised in Southern California, I've always had a deep love for storytelling. For as long as I can remember, I was playing pretend with anything I could get my hands on-making up recurring characters and plotlines just to make whatever I was doing feel more awesome. As I got older, I became captivated by world history and science fiction-especially Star Wars and early cyberpunk works, like one of my favorite books, Neuromancer by William Gibson. But when I boiled down what really drew me in, I realized it was the introspection behind it all. In history, you get these sweeping arcs of empires rising and falling, religions and ideologies beginning and ending-but at the heart of those arcs are individual people, people who rarely ever got to see the story's end. Cyberpunk, in its way, captures that same feeling: a grim and soulful look into futures shaped by forgotten lives. That's what I'm drawn to. Stories feel most meaningful when the character has a place in them. When I was 18, I began writing a time-travel thriller about a young man named Kaid, who was trying to escape his own foretold death by endlessly traveling to different time periods. The trilogy I planned would've followed three major arcs, each centered around someone Kaid was trying to help-each one teaching him something about life and death. I never finished the second book. The first, written in all my early naivety, was passed on by agents who said time travel stories were too saturated to sell. I shelved it, hoping to return one day. Still, that first book taught me a lot. Its central figure was Napoleon Bonaparte II-an almost unknown historical person, the actual biological son of the Napoleon. His short life was a story of what could've been. He was raised among Austrian aristocracy-his grandfather was Emperor of the former Holy Roman Empire, which Napoleon had dismantled. Some said he had a talent for statecraft, even a hint of his father's strategic mind, but international politics barred him from ever trying. He died at 21 of illness. His story struck me-because I, and so many people I know, grew up with that same feeling: full of potential, but restrained. Held back by a world that seems eager to smother what you love before it takes shape. That, to me, is the point of writing. I often think of Dostoevsky-not just the man struggling to survive off his work, but the philosopher who used fiction as conversation. I hope to follow that path. Not just to make a living through writing, but because it's how I speak to others. It's how I express what I can't say aloud. Writing isn't my escape because I'm voiceless or lonely. I write to put something out there and hope someone reads it-and if I've done it right, they won't just read the words. They'll feel the hands that wrote them.

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It has been nearly twenty years since the end of the Chrome War. The century-long conflict left the world in ruins, limping along a fragile road to recovery. Tattered governments and towering megacorporations now divide the wounded Earth between them. Crime festers. Outlaws return to the only way of life they've ever known. Even under the "e;protection"e; of mercenary giants like Kranos Incorporated, peace remains a distant dream. In this broken world, survival is no different than it was during the war. Amid the newly terraformed West Saharan Steppe, 21-year-old wayfinder Jay Harlow scrapes together a living with his aging Uncle and adopted sister, Kiera. Uncle, once a legendary war vet and wayfinder himself, is too old to keep up but Jay has plans. Big ones. With charm, grit, and reckless ambition, he's preparing for a heist that could change everything: enough credits to buy safety, freedom, and a place in history. On a job in the neon tourist sprawl of New Marrakesh, Jay crosses paths with Richard Willon, an overly enthusiastic outsider with deep pockets and bigger dreams. The bastard son of a wealthy technocrat, Richard wants to live like the old-world cowboys he read about in books. Jay, sensing an opportunity, reluctantly agrees to show him the frontier. Neither realizes how far this deal will carry them or what it will cost. Meanwhile, a deadly assassin begins to question everything she's ever known. Raised inside the walls of Kranos Incorporated, she's been forged into a weapon efficient, obedient, inhuman. But with every mission, her armor cracks. As her path converges with Jay's, something stirs: a flicker of connection, the possibility of something more than survival. Silver Sahara is a soulful, character-driven cyberpunk western a tale of outlaws, corporate killers, and forgotten lands where the future is still up for grabs. Brutal, tender, and rich with philosophy, it asks what it means to find your place in a world built to keep you lost. "e;It's a masterpiece... an adrenaline rush of high literary tact and unprecedented subtlety..."e;"e;Familiar in the sense that your characters are timeless--utterly timeless! That is the word I keep coming back to that I felt echoing in my mind while reading..."e;

Textauszug

Chapter 1: New Marrakesh

Cold air funnels through a lonely window, built within a homestead far from city lights. The distant brown woodland breeze shakes the thin synthetic curtains. Pricks of frigid wind brush across sun-kissed human skin. Tired, frightened breaths temper the breeze, causing a white mist before a young man’s dry lips. He attempts to calm himself, despite his restless mind replaying his name uttered from foreign lips, “Jay Harlow.” Roused awake by recurring memories patched into exaggerated tales of horror.

He steps out from the low-bearing bed, with various boxes and locked containers beneath it. Rubbing his face, he wearily steps to the open window. With heavy breaths, he fights his quivering body as another gust crashes like a wave upon his bare chest. A corporate commercial is heard for a moment; carried down by the wind, it dissipates like exhaust vapor. The young man winces before adjusting to the fluorescent lights peering over the midnight horizon; it was the city of New Marrakesh to the north. He has to travel there today collecting debts and finishing contracts. The stirring of his restless mind has him venture soon for the nightless city. Nevertheless, no matter what time he was to go, his unspoken plan was always “once I wake up.” He eases himself within the sunless void. He wonders how many creatures scavenged amongst the sparsely lit realm beneath the moon’s eye.

Sunlight begins to shine from the edge of his vision. Dry grasslands and thirsty trees slowly create silhouettes amongst the dwindling darkness. A slow-moving creature catches the young man's eye. As the world grows brighter, the beautiful tan summer coat of a coyote can be seen lurking just beyond the bounds of the homestead. He recognizes it—the thick, nearly black line running down from the nape of its neck to the tip of its tail. The creature was here several nights ago, lurking just as it does now. With curious eyes, he fixates upon the creature, presumably hunting the livestock several times larger than itself.

“So eager and ambitious for something so small.” He says softly. His voice causes the beast’s ears to twitch. A ray of light fires into his eyes suddenly. He blocks the sun’s luminescence and rests his gaze once again upon the coyote. The lean creature stares back with intuitive eyes. Its pupils pierce the dry morning air; a fluttering nervous sensation fills his gut as the two hold eye contact. They stared at one another for an indescribable amount of time. Smelling the incoming morning rain carried along the breeze, the young man readies himself for the day. Retrieving his holstered revolver as he looks out the window one last time. As if it were a mere dawn-struck hallucination, the aspiring coyote was nowhere to be seen. Placing a brown drifter hat upon his head.

Jay Harlow steps upon the hot concrete of New Marrakesh’s city plaza. As he walks, an old hologram welcomes travelers. “Though not an old city by any means, New Marrakesh holds an archaic post-modern look. The seemingly ancient design is a testament to the founder, Eugene Argos, the fifth CEO of Phaethon Energy. The architecture calls back to a better time, new horizons, yet great challenges still ahead. New Marrakesh was the first step into the New Sahara. This city holds the first WCS (Weather Control System) placed by Phaethon Energy in 2781.” The old tourist greeter repeats itself after a short delay. To the citizens of New Marrakesh, the hologram is nothing more than white noise within the busy metropolis. A nearly forgotten attraction within the city square. Grandiose towers, bright flashing lights, elaborate advertisements for the next “Data Binger” episode, or a tablet able to change someone’s organic eye color. The tourist greeter has little to no attention. With holographics just a few years old, it can’t rival the holograms and luminous corporate logos that soared overhead the city.

Further within the city were low-bearing buildings that only climbed higher on the march to New Marrakesh’s industrial district. Rising above the superficial motels, blood-stained dive bars, amoral tourist traps, and litter-drowned alleyways were pillaring holograms bellowing vibrant products. The claustrophobic streets and commercial centers echoed the symphony of travelers. Every word spoken and each sound made compiled into one singular noise that vibrated the thick windows of every building. Trailing through the squarish roads and nonuniform architecture roughly resembling brick and adobe structures of the 21st century, the residual scream of the city crashes and recedes like a warm Mediterranean wave. Yet there is never a moment of complete silence.

Within the bright advertisements and tedious bellowing of noise, a stranger strolled through the city of New Marrakesh. The unabashed swagger of his stride told all within New Marrakesh that this man was new to the Frontier. His flamboyant white and gold apparel only exaggerated this fact. The old-world mud and sand would dirty his coat and leave him blind as vagabonds stripped the cyberware from his bones. The oddest feature of the man was not his high-end augments that appeared to have no affiliation with a Frontier faction, but instead his lack of weaponry. No firearm, monitor vesting, nor even a small knife. This stranger was neither a corporate ranger from the West nor a politician of the “developed world.” The man was yet another biped seeking to muddy his boots and fatten his pockets upon the Saharan wetlands. Naive to the jaguars dressed as vultures.

It isn’t uncommon for outsiders to travel through New Marrakesh. There is always a vast flow of tourists ferried over from Morocco's lucrative Airshipping. But even the most naive tourists brought with them at least two firearms or, if able, a small militia of bodyguards. This unarmed stranger walks through the streets of New Marrakesh in a daze of astonishment. The old-world concrete sidewalks were akin to a road of refined Tantalum. Even more precious were the countless numbers of organic creatures infesting the convoluted city, which only grows in complexity and density the further one travels north.

“Hey Redgy. Uncle needs you to repay him.” Amongst the triumphant city's roar, a young man’s voice strikes the stranger’s ears. There was a pertinent tone that caused the stranger to seek it out.

“Sammy needs his money? Why ain’ he here then?” a rough, static voice snarkily replies.

“Uncle is too busy.” The young man says with a disinterested glare.

The stranger finally finds the conversation. The two men conversed across the street within one of the thousands of shabby buildings overlayed with withering brick paint.

“Wha? Old Harlow too busy to grab his own money?” A robust man walks into the conversation. He calmly rubs a rusty old gun with a piece of synthetic green cloth. His voice holds a nasally southern draw.

Redgy sits in a lawn chair while the other lords over the young man. Redgy, with his heaping beer gut and shambling bionic leg, stares unamused. The other man stands at an imposing height. Both of his arms were spindly augments assembled from scrapped gun parts. The three men hold the conversation just outside of a scrap barn named “Ander’s Alloy.”

The young man rubs his face in frustration. “Uncle has better things to do than deal with a pair of Rust-junkies. Just give me the credits.”

“I ain’ given my creds to a ganic, especially not a worthless one like Jay fuckin’ Harlow. Get out of my shop.” The tall man begins to walk back into the building.

“Get yourself lost, lil’pup, or you’ll returnin’ to Sammy in chunks.” Redgy rises from his lawn chair and begins to follow the large man into the building.

“Give me the money, and I’ll let you keep your arms. I wouldn’t want to deprive your joytoy Bonnie of her husband’s artificial touch!” Jay yells back with an agitated smile.

The large man stops all motion for a brief moment before violently turning 180 degrees to confront Jay. A stillness captures that moment; the city’s volume washes into complete silence for but a moment. Distant honking, the stomping of feet, the laughing of drunks, and the cry of the deranged filled the void before either spoke.

“Wha’ did you call my sweet Bonnie?” The man drops the rusty gun. The aluminum alloy joints of his arms creak as he clenches his fists.

“Listen, I’m trying to be reasonable. Give me the credits, or else I’ll give Bonnie a visit after I’m done with you two. She lives above the shop, right?” Jay smirks as he slowly places his hand on his holstered revolver.

“Just give em the money, Ander.” Redgy wearily says while holding onto one of Ander’s arms.

“I ain’ given’ this worthless shit a single piece of my shit! Don’t be flashin’ iron if you ain’ gonna use it, boy!” Ander says with a disgruntled tone.

Jay exhales and begins to speak softer. “Give me the money Uncle is due, and I’ll leave. Last time I’m asking. Be reasonable, Ander; at your age, you can’t afford to care for losing the lower half of yourself.” Jay extends his free hand to accept the credits. “My gun can load 50s. You sure you want to gamble like this?”

“Give me your piece, and we have a deal.” Ander smirks.

Jay rolls his eyes as he lowers his extended hand. “Guess I’m done askin’.” Jay stretches for a brief moment.

A storm of havoc struck Redgy and Ander. With three shots, the floor is covered in scrap metal and bullet casings. The dust clears, Ander is suddenly left without arms and Redgy with one leg. The city becomes silent from the abrupt intrusion, as if Jay’s ash-tipped...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 27.7.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Krimi / Thriller / Horror
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• Schlagworte: Cyberpunk • psychological fiction • Science Fiction • Western • Young Adult Fiction
• ISBN-13: 9798992993912 / 9798992993912