Chapter 19 Teaser! (Patreon)

Just some polishing left on the chapter.  Now for the teaser :-)

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Screams. Smoke. A persistent ringing in my ears. The acrid taste of blood in my mouth. Oh, how I’ve missed you.

In this new life filled with amazing, wonderful, and decadently hedonistic firsts, being at the epicenter of a large explosion and being set on fire was one I could safely say was an experience I could have happily done without. The pressure wave coupled with shards of burning superheated metal had struck my personal shield like the hand of an angry God and thrown me into the side of a nearby building.

Thank the Prophets that my paranoia was as high as ever and I hadn’t let my guard down. Spending so much time together onboard a relatively small ship meant both Jaxa and Antias knew that I wore my armor and personal shield everywhere, virtually all the time, with the exception of sleep and sex. They’d scoffed at me, literally scoffed at me, when I’d chosen to continue wearing it on Earth itself.

‘Earth is the heart of the Federation!’ they said, ‘The safest place in the galaxy!’ they said, ‘You won’t need that here!’ they said. Their naivete must have painted such a lovely rosy picture of the galaxy, how I sometimes wished that I could still pretend that picture was real.