Dragons In Space: A Middang3ard Series (Dragon Approved Book 10) Read online

  Dragons in Space

  Dragon Approved™ Book Ten

  Ramy Vance

  Michael Anderle

  The Dragons in Space Team

  Thanks to the JIT Readers

  Kathleen Fettig

  Diane L. Smith

  Kelly O’Donnell

  Dave Hicks

  Deb Mader

  John Ashmore

  Veronica Stephan-Miller

  Dorothy Lloyd

  Kerry Mortimer

  If we’ve missed anyone, please let us know!

  Editor

  The Skyhunter Editing Team

  This Book is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Sometimes both.

  Copyright © 2020 by Ramy Vance & Michael Anderle

  Cover Art by Jake @ J Caleb Design

  http://jcalebdesign.com / [email protected]

  Cover copyright © LMBPN Publishing

  A Michael Anderle Production

  LMBPN Publishing supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

  The distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  LMBPN Publishing

  PMB 196, 2540 South Maryland Pkwy

  Las Vegas, NV 89109

  First US Edition, May 2020

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-64202-911-6

  Print ISBN: 978-1-64202-912-3

  Dedication

  For Orla Julia Sim Habeeb – the little alien in my life.

  —Ramy

  To Family, Friends and

  Those Who Love

  to Read.

  May We All Enjoy Grace

  to Live the Life We Are

  Called.

  — Michael

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Author Notes Ramy Vance

  Author Notes Michael Anderle

  Other Books by the Authors

  Connect with The Authors

  Chapter One

  The skies of Earth have an understated beauty. It’s as if when they took form, they wished to be seen as ordinary. They are the sort of skies that open up to you. They are human skies.

  In the nine realms, there are skies that are filled with stars throughout the day and the night, skies that boast two suns or three moons, and skies that hold hosts of floating whales and creatures made from the stuff of myths. Yet whenever an elf or gnome steps onto Earth for the first time and is greeted with the accepting blue skies peppered with clouds that look soft enough to sleep on, they stop and stare. There is a beauty in the simplicity of Earth’s sky, one that cannot be easily understood or replicated.

  It was this sky that Alex and the rest of Team Boundless tore into. A portal with a two-mile radius opened over the Big Sky state of Montana.

  The portal was from the hadron collider at the Wasps Nest, one of the older models. It was Myrddin’s first attempt to find a way for humans to move throughout the realms without spells cast by magi or the use of a familiar. This collider wasn’t as precise as the newer models, and it tended to make oversized portals that could easily be noticed by many different kinds of technology.

  A metallic warship roughly the size of a Navy aircraft carrier floated out of the portal. It buckled for a moment before it adjusted to the gravity of the planet, firing its thrusters to even out and remain in the air.

  The ship was running a skeleton crew, just enough to keep it operational. Myrddin didn’t have enough recruits or officers to spare, so they were making do with what was available. The crew was in the main viewing area of the craft.

  And because most of them had never been to Earth before, all duties were put on hold as they crowded around the windows.

  Manny, a Beholder who headed up the recruitment process for the dragonriders and just about any other group that had to deal with the human realm, was one of the few passengers who didn’t seem interested in the view. Instead, his many eyes were poring over a collection of paper and digital dossiers.

  The other person seemingly uninterested in the ship’s descent through Earth’s skies was Alex, the leader of Team Boundless. As the rest of her team clambered to the viewing ports, Alex sat near Manny, reading a book on the theories behind human integration of draconic fluids. She yawned loudly as she read. The book was far from interesting.

  Manny looked up from his work, one of his eyes narrowing as he watched Alex reading. “Would’ve thought you’d be more interested in being home,” Manny murmured under his breath but loud enough for Alex to hear, then even louder, “Some people would kill for this kind of shore leave.”

  She tried to ignore Manny, concentrating on her book’s text. It was difficult. She was having a hard enough time paying attention to what she was reading, but it was better than trying to crowd around with everyone and pretend to be excited.

  Manny was right; most people would have been excited about the chance to go home. Alex wasn’t one of them, though. Nervous wasn’t the word. She was more stressed than she’d ever been, and that was saying a lot since her life had devolved into a series of tense battles and events.

  Alex looked down at her robotic hand. She’d left in such a rush, she hadn’t been able to head to the med bay and see if they had anything to make her arm any less noticeable. She wasn’t looking forward to explaining how she had lost her arm to her parents.

  There was going to be a lot of yelling and crying, and that wasn’t the way to spend her first day home.

  Alex glanced at the rest of the crew, who were losing their minds over the Montana skies. She was glad they were all enjoying themselves. She had even heard Brath, the perpetually grouchy gnome who seemed to despise human culture, gasp in awe when the ship had exited the collider portal.

  It was probably better to give the team some space and let them take everything in on their own without risking raining on their parade. That was all she was able to do. There was too much on her mind to be social right now. Thoughts ran through her head faster than her dragon Chine could fly.

  Before Alex left the Nest, she had spoken with Myrddin about the alien Vardis, who had come to Middang3ard with the promise of a weapon that could destroy the Dark One. From the get-go, Myrddin didn’t seem to want Vardis’ help.

  The wizard had disclosed his fears to Alex before she and the team had left. He didn’t trust the alien. There were many different factors going into Myrddin’s opinion, and he didn’t know where he stood on the situation. It was an odd thing for a wizard who had been managing the war efforts for so long to be so indecisive.

  Alex still didn’t know what she thought of the situation. On the one hand, it would make sense for Myrddin to be mistrustful of an unknown variable such as Vardis. The wizard knew what was going on in the nine realms, and anything outside his sphere of influence would seem untrustworthy.

  On the other hand, he had brought up a couple of points that had embarrassed Alex but that she couldn’t disagree with. Vardis would only sp
eak with Alex. At first, she had taken it as an insult that Myrddin thought this was a reason to be suspicious.

  Alex had led three missions against all odds and had come out alive. She was steadily growing a reputation in the Nest as one of the best dragonriders in the Corps. That was what made Myrddin’s words so hard to swallow, but he was right.

  Alex was only a kid, one who was still piecing together what was going on in the war and who didn’t have nearly as good an understanding of the war effort as Myrddin. If Vardis talked to anyone, it should have been Myrddin. Alex could see that now.

  Needless to say, all this made going home for a dinner with her family more than a little troubling.

  Manny cleared his throat loudly, catching Alex’s attention. “Are you planning on ignoring me for this entire ride? I haven’t seen you in weeks, and then it was hardly any more than a curt hello. You humans never cease to puzzle me.”

  Alex sighed as she closed her book and placed it on the table next to her. “Sorry, Manny, I just have a lot on my mind. And you seem to be very busy.”

  “Part of my job is looking out for your well-being when I’m around, and you don’t look like you’re doing very well, if I may say. All that stuff on your mind dragging you down?”

  “It’s just…well, how much do you trust Myrddin?”

  Manny put down his dossier, all of his eyes focusing on Alex. “What do you mean?”

  Alex threw her hands up. “Not like that. I know he’s trustworthy. I just mean, do you think he’s always right? Do you ever doubt him?”

  “Rarely,” the Beholder said, “but sometimes, yes. He’s not infallible. He’s human. An old human but a human nonetheless.”

  “When was the last time you thought he was making a mistake?”

  Manny smiled as he turned back to his work. “When he suggested recruiting a blind human to be a dragonrider. We both saw how that turned out, didn’t we?”

  Alex slouched back in her chair and groaned. “Manny, I’m not trying to fish for reassurance, I’m being serious.”

  Manny didn’t bother looking up from his work this time. “I am being serious. Humans are notorious for not having quick enough reflexes to be dragonriders. It’s the whole reason we have mech riders. And from what I understood of humans, being able to see was pretty important to riding. On paper, it all looked like a terrible idea. Yet here we are.”

  Alex felt like Manny was trying to guilt her into blindly accepting Myrddin’s wisdom. True, she hadn’t seen any reason not to, but it still seemed like a bad idea to blindly follow anyone. “I’m not saying I don’t appreciate what—”

  Manny interrupted. “Neither am I. Just saying I have my doubts too. I usually hope Myrddin is right.”

  Alex wished Manny had heard what the wizard had told her about Vardis. There was nothing Alex wanted more than for Myrddin to be wrong about that one. She hoped this was as straightforward as Vardis having a weapon that worked. Then they could put an end to this damn war.

  Jollies, a pixie with skin that flashed different colors depending on her mood, flew over to Alex. The pixie was about as long as Alex’s hand and often stood on her palm to talk. This time she zipped over and landed on the human’s shoulder. “You never told me Earth was so beautiful.”

  Alex sighed and stood up. She wasn’t going to be able to sit this one out. Her roommate had come over to talk to her, so she either couldn’t take a hint or didn’t care. “Okay, okay, I’ll come check out the view with you.”

  Most of Team Boundless were gathered at the same viewing portal. They were passengers on this one, though, their dragons traveling on a separate carrier heading toward an Earth base with an appropriate setup.

  Alex squeezed in next to Jim, another human who was part of their team. Jim wasn’t a dragonrider but was one of the mech riders, a group of humans and elves who piloted dragon mechs.

  As she took her spot, Jim reached down and quickly squeezed her hand. “How does it feel to be back home?”

  Alex forced a smile as she avoided his eyes, looking out the viewing window and watching the clouds roll by. “Good,” she lied. “I can hardly believe I’m back here. Visiting has been all I’ve been able to think about.”

  Jim watched Alex closely as if he wasn’t sure what to make of her words. “Yeah, same here, I guess,” he finally replied. “It’s going to be great to see my folks. Still can’t believe we’re here. Honestly, I forgot Earth existed for a little while. This is a good reminder.”

  Next to Jim stood Brath, the red-headed gnome. Alex didn’t ever miss a chance to give him a hard time, and now was as good a time as any. Brath seemed to be genuinely in awe of the sky. “Hey, Brath, you gonna pick your jaw up off the ground anytime soon?” she quipped.

  Brath slowly turned his head until he was facing Alex, his eyes still wide and a little dreamy. “Wait, what? Did you say something?”

  “You okay, dude?”

  “Yeah, definitely, definitely,” he murmured as he turned back to the view.

  Gill, who was standing beside Brath, leaned behind the gnome and tapped Jim on the shoulder, hissing a little to catch Alex’s attention as well. “Brath is from a community of deep gnomes,” Gill explained. “They rarely see the sky when they’re growing up. As a result, the first time deep gnomes see a new sky, they go into something like a trance. It’s similar to a recreational drug. He’ll probably do the same when he sees the sunset here, too.”

  Brath punched Gill in the kneecap. “What have I told you about babbling on about why I do what I do?”

  Gill laughed and shoved Brath playfully. “I only wanted to let the humans know why you’re behaving so adorably. Didn’t want them to think you were getting soft.”

  “I’m not getting soft. It’s just so damn beautiful,” Brath murmured.

  The rest of them couldn’t help but laugh at Brath’s attitude change. The gnome didn’t seem to mind. He was thoroughly engrossed in the sky.

  A voice came through the intercom. “Please return to your seats. We’re going to begin our descent. We should be on the ground in ten minutes.”

  The team grumbled as they complied, but Alex couldn’t have been happier. Staring out the window had been making her anxious. She would have preferred to have been riding Chine. Instead, she was locked up on a ship, trying to pretend her mind wasn’t racing a mile a minute.

  She took a seat across from Manny. “Are you coming with us?”

  Manny shook his head as he leafed through papers. “Nope, not this time. Just here to get you to the base. After that, it’s just you, the team, and Vardis.”

  “What do you mean, Vardis?”

  “Myrddin didn’t tell you? Vardis is going with you guys. Guess he thought it would be better for you to keep an eye on him.”

  “Than for him to remain in quarantine?”

  Manny rolled some of his eyes as he continued to read. “Like I said, sometimes I have my doubts. Things usually work out, though.”

  Alex hoped the Beholder was right.

  Chapter Two

  The carrier touched down on a base on the plains, far from any form of civilization. From the sky, it looked like a blip in the wilderness.

  Once the carrier had landed, the doors opened and the main crew filed out, leaving only the dragonriders and Manny. That was when Alex realized she had no idea what was supposed to be happening other than arriving on Earth. Now she realized why Manny had been sent along. Myrddin must have thought it would be easier to send a chaperone than to explain all the details.

  Just as Alex had suspected, Manny was gathering his things. He transported them into a void realm, then approached Team Boundless. “Looks like it’s time to get going,” the Beholder said as he floated past the teenagers, who exchanged glances for a moment before following him. No one except Alex was used to taking orders from Manny.

  Outside the carrier, the crew had lined up and were being talked to by the commander of the base they had just arrived at. Manny led the dragonriders in
to the base, which looked worlds different than the Wasps Nest.

  Alex had never seen a military base before—truthfully, the Nest was the first base of any kind she’d ever seen—but the Nest and this base were two very different places.

  What Alex first noticed was the difference in the air. There was something about the air at the Nest. Alex had thought it was unnamable while she was there, but now she knew what the scent was: it was magic.

  The air at this base, however, was as unmagical as it got. It smelled like oil and old grease and sweat. Like a place where a lot of people worked very hard.

  Another difference was the lack of advanced tech. Manny had to open a door with his eye tentacles, a feat that took a few minutes despite Alex and Jim offering to help.

  Once the riders were inside, Alex marveled at the sheer size of the base. Its construction was impressive in the simple way that all human things seemed to be. The base reminded Alex of photos her dad had sent her of his office since she’d gotten her vision.

  The rest of the team didn’t seem to be the least bit disappointed. Jollies and Brath stared fixedly at everything the team walked past as they followed Manny down the halls. The vending machines interested Brath the most. He couldn’t understand why humans would be so cruel as to put food behind a glass wall.

  Jollies was mystified by how dark it was. Alex wouldn’t have noticed if Jollies hadn’t brought it up, but the pixie was right. Not that the base was badly lit; it was just a different kind of lighting than she was used to. The Nest probably didn’t use electricity for power.