Space Opera with Heart – “VI” from Bringer of Chaos

Military Space Opera

When I was preparing to write Watch Your Six, I had a hard time thinking through the story. This was a space opera. A military space opera. And the main characters were an immortal and a mortal who were best friends. Closer than brothers. Shield bearers. And the immortal has in the back of his mind that the mortal will be gone and there will never be a way to bring him back. I didn't want to write a book where that happened. I tried all sorts of different approaches. Nothing worked. Finally, it came to me that I didn't have to show him dying. The angst was enough. So how to do that without writing a downer of a book?

I'm afraid you'll have to read the book to find out, but I promise you this, at the end, you won't be feeling sorry for them. For a space opera, it has a happy ending.

The impact of one mortal friend will change the immortal king forever. How would Pietas want Six remembered? Pietas was born in Wales, and he is well familiar with standing stones. So what better way to immortalize his friend than with solid rock.

The image above is Pietas leaning against Six's standing stone. He will stand there, talking to Six, mulling over ideas, thinking through dilemmas until he comes to a decision. I created the art in Photoshop many years ago, and always knew it would be important to Pietas. As he put it, "Remembering a life well-lived is among its greatest honors."

This poem came to me almost all at once. It's called VI - roman numerals for Six.

VI

Traitors. Betrayers. Thieves.
Stole my breath
Plucked away my sight
Starved and imprisoned and abandoned me

They expected me to submit.
They assumed I could forget.
They planned for me to die
and never thought I would be free.
Such fools.

The warrior they sent
to be my enemy
became instead
my air, my light,
my soul's greatest hope.
My salvation.

Forever will I stand, unworthy,
in his shadow.

~ Pietas