Category: Gates of Life

Why Trailing Kaiwulf Exists

When readers encounter the science fiction origin story Trailing Kaiwulf, they're stepping into a moment in a universe that has been unfolding for thousands of years.

In two other sagas—Immortal Empires and Fallen Empires—the Gates of Life are spoken of in fragments and echoes. Massive paired arches found on worlds across the galaxy, their purpose obscured when Pietas, the Bringer of Chaos, was exiled and their locations lost. For over ten thousand years, humanity feared that the truth behind these Gates had vanished forever.

It hadn't.

In the Colonies of Man—set in the central galaxy rather than the fringes—archaeologists have begun recovering lost history. On the independent world of New Braeswcyck, the Monastery of St. Aldentia preserved records spanning more than 2,300 years, chronicling events from the Great Colonization through the Second Cycle of Wars. These discoveries have reopened questions humanity once believed unanswerable.

Trailing Kaiwulf begins in CE 15,181, with Dr. Viva Post, a premier archaeologist studying one of the few remaining functional Gates—still in use for an annual ritual on the planet Ust. The Gates are not just relics. They are active, meaningful, and central to forces still in motion.

This science fiction origin story exists to bring that history to life—not as a lecture, but as a lived experience.

Competence, Trust, and the Absence of Romance

Rather than centering the story on cosmic power, Trailing Kaiwulf follows two professionals doing their jobs.

Jee & Dane work for the Trace, Rescue, and Identification League—TRAIL—a regulated organization with rules, reports, and consequences. Dane is the towering academic: well-educated, methodical, and happily married with five sons. He works for TRAIL not because he's restless or broken, but because it allows him to care for his family the way he chooses.

Jee is the muscle. Compact, lethal, happily single, and utterly comfortable in her role. She reads manuals meant for assassins. She enjoys efficiency. And she has no interest in romantic complications—especially with her longtime partner.

Their relationship is built on absolute trust.

That choice was deliberate. Fiction often relies on gendered shortcuts to create tension, but this story pushes back against that expectation. Jee & Dane respect each other's competence. They share space without awkwardness. They protect each other without posturing. The result is a partnership that changes how danger, humor, and stakes land on the page.

In a science fiction origin story, sometimes the most radical thing a story can do is let people work together well.

Humor, Irony, and Paperwork

Danger in this universe is commonplace. Violence is regulated. Rules exist for a reason—and bending them comes with paperwork.

Which is why, at the end of Trailing Kaiwulf, Jee is genuinely thrilled to realize something unprecedented has occurred:
a mission where she didn't shoot anyone.

Not because she couldn't—but because she didn't have to.

That moment says everything about the world these characters inhabit. Chaos happens. Threats emerge. But competence, preparation, and trust can sometimes resolve things cleanly. And when they do, the real victory is fewer forms to file.

The humor in this story is situational, character-based, procedural, and dry. It's meant to sneak up on you. Ideally, it lands somewhere between a chuckle and a coffee-snort.

Why a Novella?

I designed Trailing Kaiwulf to be a science fiction origin story that was quick, complete, and accessible—a doorway into a much larger universe. The shorter length allows the story to do one thing well: introduce readers to a corner of the galaxy without requiring a long commitment.

For new readers, it offers a glimpse of a deep, interconnected setting. For longtime readers, it reveals another facet of a universe already in motion.

And for those who only ever read this one story?

I hope they remember this:
They visited a fun, deeply built world—one where the door remains open, and good stories are always waiting.

If you enjoy science fiction that values competence, trust, and irony over spectacle—and partnerships built on respect rather than tension—Trailing Kaiwulf might be your kind of story.