Ownership of the last functioning piece of orbital infrastructure kind of puts you in a position of responsibility.  The fact that there's a lack of thumbs in the process makes it a challenge.  But challenge is, as far as anyone can prove, my middle name.

WELCOME TO THE RETROFUTURE!

The Future That Never Was is an extended universe where Mars was terraformed before the Beatles sang Penny Lane, the Soviets colonized the asteroid belt and pirates plundered the rings of Saturn. In this alternate space age, humankind couldn't dream of a brighter future. Alas, the minute Earth turned into a nuclear wasteland, shadows already conspired from the heart of the Moon to the mysterious Planet Nine—and maybe beyond...

The book series includes numerous R-rated titles. All of them will be uploaded on Royal Road. Check the Index or the list below for the main stories.

🐈  KITTY KITTY - START READING

Join sassy space cat Lee and his Desert Eagle-toting, soda-swigging human partner, Ali, in a future stuck in the late 80s/early 90s. Board the dynamic duo’s ship, the mythical Kitty, as they bounty-hunt their way through a dystopian solar system—so lock and load, and shout Cowabunga! because it’s crime-fightin’ time! 

🪐  PACHINKO BLUES - Fall 2022 - LEARN MORE

Amid the chaos of the Rings Civil War, a disgraced pilot called Miles finds itself tangled in a vast vendetta involving a Lunar corporation, android mercenaries and data-cartels. From Saturn’s Plastic Fields to the fringes of Kuiper, Miles’s violent redemption is an 80s-esthetic space western filled with tears, blood and... ducks?

Other stories related to the first arc of The Future That Never Was:

• RADIO FREAK - Standalone biopunk short story featuring Ali Koviràn, the Data Maiden and Bill Murray

• STELLAR PATRIOTS - Special episodes with Braun Kamirov, linking KITTY KITTY to the upcoming DATA dilogy and CYBER MACHO

• DATA ONE & DATA ZERO - 2023

• CYBER MACHO - TBA

Do you want to support our work or simply read in better condition? Visit our amazon shop and Patreon!

Eight Thousand Years after the Glassing of Earth, Terran Descent Humanity has largely become a post-scarcity society based on consent and enjoying life. With the discovery of another ancient race beyond the "Great Gulf", events and history collide to draw the Terran Confederacy into war against a hundred million year old empire that has always won and believes it always will. With allies and enemies of multiple species, the Orion Galactic Arm Spur will be wracked by warfare the likes of which have not been seen. Cracked, harried, wounded, and damaged, Terran Descent Humanity willfully throws itself against the universe itself.

"The universe hates you and will take away everything you love, laughing while it does so." - Terran belief.

A wiki is available (although under construction) at: https://fcgestalt.fandom.com/wiki/First_Contact_Gestalt_Archive_Wiki

Told largely from the viewpoint of other species, the story is currently ongoing. It involves graphic depictions of violence, war, adult language and situations, drug use, and other mature topics.

The story will be updated on weekdays, so keep an eye on this page for more chapters.

The story is 700+ chapters, and repeating characters do not start appearing until the Vuxten chapters. If you're in a hurry for repeating characters then this story will not be enjoyable to you. The interwoven plot is not based on a single person but the entire war, with its effects upon multiple people.

[participant in the Royal Road Writathon challenge for April 2022]

The series, Stories of the Apex, is a collection of self-contained science fiction short stories with different (but sometimes reoccurring) lead characters all following a central plot.

The story begins shortly after first contact with the peaceful Broda, a non-predator alien species that discovers Earth seeking new worlds for trade. Being a violent predator species among a galaxy of prey, humans soon decide to take up the cause of their new friends by opposing the plague species known as the Krador.

Threedak is a simple Dhajtel. Every night she scavenges and hunts for her tribe in the great desert, relying upon her skill and ancestral memories to avoid the night's many dangers. Her life remains largely the same until one night, one of the gleaming angels that hangs in the night sky falls into her desert. Deciding to investigate, she happens upon a scene far beyond her limited understanding.

The Dhajtel aren't alone. The galaxy is far vaster and more hostile than Threedak's people can even begin to comprehend.

Entrusted with the knowledge and memories of a dead race, it will be up to her to forge Dhajtel society into something that can survive the storm that is to come.

- - -
(This novel is heavy on Kingdom/Empire Building and is an attempt at fairly hard (grounded in real science) Science Fiction)

Cover credit to DrakonStorm

- - -

A couple authors with reptile MC's have started a discord, feel free to hang out with us.

Taylor survived being Khepri and she isn’t happy about it. Swearing that she would find a way to get back to those that left her for dead, she begins to make her way across the desert world of Tatooine in search of allies and just maybe, a new purpose.

[A Star Wars / Worm crossover fanfic]

The class divide still exists in the future, and it has gotten much worse. There are many different types of worlds, from the paradise worlds where everyone is immortal, to the resource depleted, war-torn planets where every day is a struggle just to live.

Freya O'Malley grew up on Earth, the worst of the war-torn planets, and wants nothing more than to leave. With few options, Freya joins the Federation Marines. But, unlike the past, it's a struggle to earn enough enlistment points to stay in. With the prize of a citizenship on a paradise world at stake, competition is fierce. Every week is a new war. Can Freya earn enough points in the constant warring of the Marines to modify her body and mind to stay competitive? Can a girl from the wrong planet make it against those who have all the advantages?

Posting every Monday. Chapters will be roughly 4k or more words. 

Edited by Aldous starting at chapter 19.

If you like this story think about checking out my other web novel Super Soldier not Super Hero.

Please come and enjoy the discussion at Discord

 If you have any extra cash laying around and you feel like supporting the story you can donate here at Pateron or PayPal.  Patreon donators have options to read unedited chapters before anyone else can read them if you can't wait for the next chapter.

Four years before the start of the Clone Wars, two newly-minted Padawans find themselves with two very unusual Masters who walk the line of what a Jedi should be.

Humanity has finally taken the next step into space. Governments run research stations throughout the solar system while private enterprises mine asteroids for rare metals and exotic minerals. However, space remains beyond the reach of the everyday person. In contrast, virtual reality technology has led to an explosion of full immersion entertainment for the average consumer, and many people turned to VR for the thrill of spaceflight.

One game, Parallax Gate, lets its players experience living in an interstellar civilization. For maximum realism, its developers created a world solely defined by the players' personal skills and ability.

Mark Asami, a student of aerospace engineering at MIT, dreams of bringing spaceflight to the masses. To his disappointment, his first year courses barely relate to his interests, so he passes time as Aero Rayne in Parallax Gate with his roommate and their organization, the Temple Wraiths. Before they realized, a chain of in-game events drew them deeper into the game's world and politics than they ever intended to go.

Strip away wants.  Strip away desire, strip away dreams and hopes.  When you peel it back, such things are luxuries only possible when you have first guaranteed your survival.  Survival is everything, and in its pursuit, even the self may need to be stripped away for the survival of the species.  Life, of her and her people, was nothing to the aliens if it was not useful.  So she would be useful, she would be obedient, and she would survive.  Under the control of the new rulers of her world and species, as a pawn in a conflict she could scarce comprehend, she would survive.  And in this cosmic war of forces beyond her understanding, when all that is known is stripped away, survival is not just everything; it is all there is left.

((Hosted for free on Royal Road ))
(( https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/46850/war-queen ))

[Winner during the Royal Road Writathon Challenge April 2022]
[Winner during the Royal Road Writathon Challenge October 2021]

(( Chapters are 5,500 words on average.  Upload schedule is set to every 3rd day, consistently.  You can always find my drafts and first story versions on Royal Road, are able to purchase Kindle or ebook-edition versions here, and if you want to support my work or gain further access to the world of War Queen, as well as early chapter viewing, consider donating for Discord access.  Thank you, and enjoy.))

Dr Uru'Nav Xant, Department Head of Research, has been detailing his interviews with the newly discovered 'Creator level' intelligent species 'Human'. The Subject of his study, Jasmine, displays many unique and interesting quirks, the most intriguing of which is the incredibly strong 'frequency' she is able to produce with the help of an implanted alien translator. Together the pair navigate their way through cultural misunderstandings, corporate politics, animal companionship and uncover the mysterious circumstances of the human's abduction.

Combining memorable characters, exquisite world-building and an exhilarating pace, Transcripts is an emotional read that will have you ready to take on the universe!

Transcripts was previously posted on Reddit and Patreon!

Christopher Hall's life was utterly uneventful - until one day he suddenly found himself in the far future. One in which Mankind spread among the stars... and is fighting a centuries long war against its own nature.

Now something claiming to be an angel has given him a mission. If he fails, disaster will befall Mankind. If he succeeds, he can get his old life back. Unfortunately, telling Christopher what exactly he is supposed to do wasn't a part of the plan.

Join him as he figures out figure out how to survive in a universe where Mankind branched out into dozens of religions, ideologies and biologies, all at war with each other. Universe as familiar as it is foreign - and as dangerous as it is vast.

[Updated every friday/saturday, depending on circumstances]

Humanity once ruled space, building an empire that stretched across hundreds of stars.  Now Earth is a cold cinder in the void, its colonies and ships annihilated in an instant.  For five thousand years the surviving races have huddled in the dying light of those few stations which avoided total destruction, eking out their existence in the shadow of the long-dead humans who built their homes.  When a piece of that lost legacy resurfaces, the few who still remember humanity have one last opportunity to find the truth and avenge the fallen.

Cover by Harry Rowland - https://www.instagram.com/rowl_art_/

When your planet gettings invaded by friendly but ruthless aliens and an AI offers you the opportunity to play the greatest tower defense game the universe has ever created, what do you do? 

You accept, of course.

Finding a way to survive can come later.

Morgan certainly thinks so.

But when aliens are attacking your station and giant six-eyed rats are eating your robotic face, you start to doubt these choices. Accidentally starting a war doesn't help, either.

Welcome to the Universe is a Litrpg space opera story with tower defense, adventure, and dungeon building elements. 

A rogue cyborg. A talking badger.

A bounty job that goes incredibly wrong.

Aaron is perfectly content to chase bounties in his run-down little space ship, avoid human interaction at all cost, and lay low from the cyborg planet that created him. But when he and Bat—his half-robotic badger companion (who talks just a little too much)—chase their largest bounty ever, they run head-first into not only some dangerous criminals, but other cyborgs much stronger than them, and worst of all, a handful of humans who aren’t going anywhere.

What you can expect from In Dying Starlight:

- Heaps of fast-paced adventure and odd planets

- A stubborn MC in over his head and trying to survive

- A talking, half-robot badger who likes fixing space ships

- Allllll the found family vibes

- An atrocious amount of sarcasm and snark

- A tiny bit of romance a ways into the story

Chapters between 1k-3k words, updating Monday/Wednesday/Friday.

[participant in the Royal Road Writathon challenge - April 2022]

Sci-fi dungeon crawler.

Set in the far future when humanity has reached the stars and finds it is not the first to do so. Alien technology has been left behind by a long dead race. Ancient cities, abandoned starships, temples and fortified bunkers all contain artefacts and devices far in advance of what humans have been able to produce. Technology that feels more akin to magic, so powerful it can allow a single person to dominate a star system. But these relics of another time have been left well-defended and behind bewildering and impenetrable security measures. 

There are those who are compatible with the alien technology, who can augment themselves to face the evermore extreme protocols in the depths of the alien ruins, and by doing so attain greater power. And there are those who just want to sell what they find to the highest bidder.

The rewards are high, but you have to be prepared to go further and risk more to discover the greatest secrets of a civilisation that vanished long before the first human walked upright. Secrets that could irrevocably change humanity's future, or end it.

An ancient conqueror awakens to find his galactic empire in ashes. A street rat discovers a core that changes everything.  A noble woman must fight for her place in her family and for her very survival.  

Vengeance. Artifex spent hundreds of years, forging an empire that could protect humanity from the endless hunger of the Unity.  Now he finds himself in the ruins of all he built, and the people who betrayed him have made a deal with the Unity…

Power. The brutal sands and endless struggle for survival is all Safira has ever known.  But a lucky find gives her the chance to be so much more than a scavenger. But opportunity and danger go hand in hand, and escaping with her life just got that much harder.

Ruthlessness. Elinor North has spent her entire life struggling to prove herself.  As the head of a cadet branch of the powerful Montclair family, she must fight against enemies from both within and without, for her rivals are not just outsiders - they are her own kin. 

All of them are light years apart, but inexorably tied to the ulterior motives of those around them and a shared destiny that will shake civilization to its foundations.

[participant in the Royal Road Writathon challenge]

ALL HUMANKIND died thousands of years ago...

…but the xenos still worship them as GODS.

Today, hundreds of alien civilizations thrive in the gods’ lost cities and fallen megastructures. One Empire has learned to harness the remains of humanity's forgotten technology to reconnect the distant worlds... and dominate them.

Eolh is an old, jaded, avian thief who lives in the dark underbelly of a conquered city. When the Empire first opened the gate between worlds, they stormed his home, killed his gang, and burned everything he held dear.

But that was a long time ago.

Now, the resistance is dead. No one dreams of fighting back—for the Empire wields the weapons of the gods: warships that fly, robotic constructs that hunt, and rare mysteries scavenged from the tombs of the gods. Eolh lives a half-life, thieving, running jobs, and selling his services as a freelance listener for the last gangs of Lowtown. He trusts no one, and only looks out for himself.

When an unusual heist takes a deadly turn, Eolh must bargain with an overzealous android who carries an impossible secret—one that will shake the foundations of the universe.

There is one last hope for salvation. For his people, or maybe just for himself…

Read this series if you love Dune, Star Wars, or stories about prophecies and long-forgotten technology.

Take a journey across far-flung worlds filled with alien cultures and impossible technology. This epic Space Opera mixes elements of science fiction and fantasy, and features a cast of underdog characters who find untold strength as they awaken the ancient wonders buried by time.

All this was foretold... One day, a human god will return.

Now a Published Novel!

Buy a Copy Here or keep reading on RoyalRoad :)

Jason had thought about punching a Shil’vati.

Who hadn’t?

Not only had the aliens conquered Earth with almost trivial ease, the seven-foot purple amazons also had the audacity to start running the planet better than Humanity ever had.

He'd never do it though. He was a reasonable guy, just trying to get by under his new feminine overlords.

Wasn't he?

Cian is a broke, freshly graduated engineering student working as a janitor when he gets the opportunity to play a new VR MMO. Touted by fans as "More Real than Reality," it has taken the world by storm and in-game credits are even traded on real world currency markets. It's a potential path to real world riches, or financial ruin. But Cian soon realizes this game is more than it seems. A series of events leads him to question the nature of the game and his own reality. What is the true nature of the Weave? Who are the Weaveborn? And why do the game masters want him dead?