Showing results for "The Tree" in Hard Science Fiction

In a fractured world where life rises and disappears without memory, one presence remains. Rooted deep within a silent divide, an ancient tree endures—watching the endless cycles of emergence and fading that surround it. Nothing lingers. Nothing returns. Everything passes…except the tree. Shaped by isolation and time, it becomes something different. A quiet awareness forms within it—one that does not dissolve with the rest of existence. What once defined its apartness begins to reveal itself as something else entirely. Strength.

Detectives Col and Danee are sent to Jubilee on a hastily organised mission to recover the body of a leading conservative politician (someone it seems, has been a naughty boy). But the corpse has been switched, and the imperilled partners are drawn together. They might be falling in love, or they might be saving the galaxy–either way, the authorities will not be pleased.

Lieutenant Commander David Ashton thrives on excitement. As he strolls to the White House, he has the feeling a new adventure awaits and he's not disappointed. President Gardiner offers him the mission of a lifetime, something he's trained for all of his life. Gardiner explains that the United States is running out of oil. In desperation, he is dispatching the Excalibur, the largest starship ever built, to voyage beyond the solar system to a distant planet 103 light years from earth.