A fun way to sample new books and find new writers! Here’s the link to the Weekend Writing Warriors central page, so you can visit all the participants sharing excerpts today…
The luxury ship Nebula Dream has suffered a middle of the night catastrophe in space. My hero, Nick Jameson, has fought his way to the nearest lifeboat and found chaos.As he’s just about finished loading the lifeboat, businesswoman Mara Lyrae arrives, much to his relief. But she refuses to get on the lifeboat, as there are children in need of rescuing…after a brief argument, Nick sends the lifeboat on its way. He and Mara set out to rescue the children, accompanied by Khevan, a D’nvannae Brother (think bodyguard/assassin sworn to serve an alien goddess).
They’ve reached the family’s cabin and discovered a growing hull breach. This snippet is after the children have crawled to safety and Mara and Kevan have taken them into the main corridor. Nick fights his way through the collapsing debris tunnel, and out of the cabin, where he discovers the hull breach has worsened. The blast doors are closing…(I skipped a little bit of the struggle and edited a bit here.)
The escaping air was a solid force, pulling Nick toward certain death.
Locking his grip on Nick’s wrist, Khevan pulled with a superhuman effort, yanking the captain through the portal to the other side. They fell to the deck as the blast door slammed shut and locked, inches away from their feet.
The sudden silence was deafening – Nick’s ears rang from the changes in air pressure. Mara and the two children stared at him from an alcove where she’d wedged herself, keeping them safe, leaving Khevan free to concentrate on Nick’s rescue.
Exhausted by the battle against the escaping atmosphere, Nick rolled slowly over, covering his eyes with one arm, breathing deeply.
“Are you okay?” Mara clutched Gianna closer to her.
Note from me: next week the fate of Huntington the Bear and that will probably be my last excerpt from WRECK.
All feedback and comments appreciated!
The Story
Traveling unexpectedly aboard the luxury liner Nebula Dream on its maiden voyage across the galaxy, Sectors Special Forces Captain Nick Jameson is ready for ten relaxing days, and hoping to forget his last disastrous mission behind enemy lines. He figures he’ll gamble at the casino, take in the shows, maybe even have a shipboard fling with Mara Lyrae, the beautiful but reserved businesswoman he meets.
All his plans vaporize when the ship suffers a wreck of Titanic proportions. Captain and crew abandon ship, leaving the 8000 passengers stranded without enough lifeboats and drifting unarmed in enemy territory. Aided by Mara, Nick must find a way off the doomed ship for himself and several other innocent people before deadly enemy forces reach them or the ship’s malfunctioning engines finish ticking down to self destruction.
But can Nick conquer the demons from his past that tell him he’ll fail these innocent people just as he failed to save his Special Forces team? Will he outpace his own doubts to win this vital race against time?
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Wow, what a struggle! You captured that tense moment well! I pictured the Titanic in my mind with that snippet. Well done as usual Veronica!
Another great snippet, Veronica!
Nice done climax to an action sequence, well done!
Thanks so much for sharing this, Veronica. New to me and something I’d like to be part of. Grabbed all the info and will read current entries.
Best to you,
Sally
Thank heavens for Khevan! 😀
Will next week’s snippet give us a chance to breathe? 😉
Wow – tense. Held my breath hoping he’d be ok. And sad to see next week is the last from Wreck but glad to see we’ll learn Huntington Bear’s fate.
You’ve got us by the throat and won’t let go, dear author. Get them home safe so we can breathe.
Great tension! I could picture the scene! At least he made it!
Whew! I think I was holding my breath- good thing it was only eight sentences. 😀 Amazing action and tension, as usual!
A fantastic action scene that had me wondering what comes next. Love the book cover too! 🙂
Yikes, that was a close call! Had to cling to the edge of my seat! Excellent!
What Millie said. A very close call! Great action snippet!
I like how the tension lingers in this moment of relief that everyone’s okay. Nicely done!
I really felt this one. Great tension and release. A fantastic snippet!
I enjoy these snippets. I have to reread the book soon.
That feeling of relief is tangible. Great snippet. 🙂
I can picture this as an action-packed movie.
That’s intense! They’re really between a rock and a hard place.
Glad he made it;). Another fabulous snippet.
And good thing the book is now on my e-reader so I can dive in when you finish next week.
gripping tense, the door closing inches away from them had me cringe, well done !
Nick is such a great hero:)
Great detail and excitement Veronica, a tense scene!
Intense. Always pulling me in more and more with each snippet!
Yay! I’m glad he made it 😀 This was a great action scene. It really sucked me in. With so many stories I tend to forget what happened from last week, but I remembered this one ~_^
Space… where everything wants to kill you! Smart move on Mara’s part. They didn’t need any more flying people to deal with.
Enjoyed the tension-filled scene! And next week will be our last snippet… 🙁
Well, from this novel 🙂
Very nice! I love the tension of the aftermath! Great action, too! My only suggestion would be limiting the “-ing” clauses. They are the bane of my own writing, so this is an instance of preaching what I don’t practice. 😀 Then again, sometimes I edit things to add MORE “-ing” phrases when editing for 8 sentences, so yeah….
Regardless, this is an AWESOME piece! Thanks so much for sharing!
Wow! That was intense! You should have seen how fast I bolted out of my seat with that first line LOL. You’re very good with description. I can feel his ears popping from the pressure. Great job!
Keep smiling,
Yawatta
You made Nick both heroic and vulnerable, lots of great tension. Well done.
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