Silver Planet

Tom Johnson

Description

Death is no longer a mystery.
The magic of eternity has been found.
I often hear people wondering if life carries on after death. It always makes me smile. That''s exactly what happens.
And I used to think no one would discover the truth while they were alive. I was wrong. A sixteen-year-old boy just did. His name is Jonathan Powers and this is his story.
Jonathan''s from a planet called Centurian, but that''s not where his story begins. It begins on Earth with the tragic death of a boy from London, Jonathan Prior.
Jonathan Prior''s soul travelled from Earth to Centurian and became part of Jonathan Powers. That much is as it should be. Humans join the consciousness of other humans on a distant planet when they die.
It''s what happened next that I don''t understand. Jonathan Powers entered the world of the dead, alive.
I''m still searching for answers to how he did it and I''m supposed to know about these things. My name is Rose. I''m a little robin. You might have met me outside your house or in a local park.
Don''t worry if you haven''t, you''ll meet me inside this book. I''m helping Jonathan find a way home. It''s one thing to go where only the dead have been, quite another to find a way back.

Informations

• Publié par: Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
• Date de parution: 30 septembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9781528967860
• Langue: English

Extrait

Silver Planet
Tom Johnson
Austin Macauley Publishers
2020-09-30
Silver Planet About the Author Dedication Copyright Information © A Solar System Hosting Human Life, Light Years from Earth Sound Hunter Earth, Southwest London, England The Ghosts of Friendship Southwest London, England The First and Last Conversation Centurian The Boy and the Bus Southwest London, England Storm Pandora Southwest London, England The Learning Bush Centurian Spellology Exam A Castle in a Faraway Corner of Space Flickering Silver Centurian Destructive Interference Centurian The Sound of Broken Shards Terminus, Planet of the Skulls The Dispossessed Lord Southwest London, England Winds of Mass Destruction Centurian Rockmore Space Junction Centurian Crime and Punishment Centurian Communion with the Birds The World of Birds Judgement The World of Birds A Voucher is a Ticket for Life Castle Spinneret Grandmaster Sporadiq Terminus The Shadow below the Throne The World of Birds The Atomhawk’s Spell The World of Birds Becoming a Bird Opus-Earth The Guilty That Justice Won’t Sentence The World of Birds Warbler Finch, the Warbler Finch The World of Birds Bridging the Chasm Centurian A Rare Breed of Magical Pigeon Centurian A New and Vile Sorcery Centurian Calculus Augustus VIII The World of Birds Leaving the Nest The World of Birds The Jabiru’s Heart Centurian Anger Lights the Way The World of Birds The Prescient Aquila The World of Birds Sound Capture Centurian School Trip to the Spellenaria The World of Birds The Spell of All Souls Opus-Earth A New Life The World of Birds Rejoining the Flock A Place Between Life and Death Twilight Centurian The Dictionary of Magic The World of Birds The Lifeless Corridor Twilight Stars Gazing Centurian Testing Conditions at Silverrock Centurian The Ancient Terror Terminus Astronomic Bomb Twilight 1054 AD Centurian Letters from a Friend The World of Birds Ornifrac The World of Birds Emerald Lands Centurian The Lost Jewels The World of Birds Phantom Traces The World of Birds Shadow in the Sun Castle Spinneret A Contentious Council Castle Spinneret The Threads of a Lost Wizard Castle Spinneret Unexpected Journeys Centurian The Owl and the Raven The World of Birds Grand Mastery The World of Birds The Butterfly Effect The World of Birds Revelations The World of Birds The Hands of Angels Centurian Queuing for an Eternity Centurian Race to the Core Centurian An Exchange of Lives Centurian Silver Planet Centurian Homecoming Centurian The Sound of a New Planet Opus-Earth Jonathan Prior
About the Author
’ I shall not altogether die,
A mighty part of me will escape the goddess of death.
Again and again shall I rise,
Continually renewed by the glory of after time. ’
Horace, Ode 3. 30
Tom Johnson is a classicist and musician with a career in technology. He lives in London with his wife and three children.
Dedication
For those we fear to lose.
Copyright Information ©
Tom Johnson (2020)
Cover art work by Gwenn Danae @UponADayDreamer
The right of Tom Johnson to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781528934428 (Paperback)
ISBN 9781528934435 (Hardback)
ISBN 9781528967860 (ePub e-book)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published (2020)
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
25 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London
E14 5LQ
1. A Solar System Hosting Human Life, Light Years from Earth

Sound Hunter
Jonathan Powers blasted out of Elephant’s Trunk. ‘I nailed it, Filia! Recording’s in the bag.’ He had captured the sound of his solar system’s most spectacular wormhole.
Filia Wrens punched the air from the safety of an orbiting shuttle. ‘Yessss!’ she cried, flooding his helmet visor with shooting stars.
Jonathan twisted his single-seat levitator in doughnut circles and scribble-sloppy lines, carving his JP initials into the golden dust rings of a nearby planet. ‘I am, and always will be, a sound hunter,’ he roared. There was no argument from the quiet, pondering cosmos.
‘Jonathan, hurry, the worm will breathe you back in,’ yelled Filia. Elephant’s Trunk was a tidal wormhole. Tidals sucked you in and spat you out. The sound hunters joked that they were allergic to space-borne particles. They sneezed.
Elephant’s Trunk was plagued by the sun-kissed dust of the Tilmenian corona, an arc of seven splendid planets, each with its own dazzling rings. The Trunk was the tentacle end of a vast dark hollow that lay gasping at the centre of the crown.
Jonathan had positioned himself near the tip of the Trunk before the Elephant had inhaled. He’d been sucked inside and catapulted out with the amber-hail exactly as planned, but not everyone emerged in one piece.
Jonathan accelerated and docked his levitator in the shuttle bay. He removed his dust-encrusted space suit and sprinted to the observation deck where Filia was waiting.
Jonathan grinned from ear to ear as he ran, knowing he was moments away from being showered with praise like a big shot who’s brought home the galactic bacon.
‘Yuk, you stink of Elephant odour,’ blurted Filia, pinching her nostrils after embracing him. Jonathan raised his sweaty hands in mock surrender. ‘That’s worse, you lunatic,’ laughed Filia, waving conditioned shuttle-air into his face.
‘More please!’ he howled with delight as the public space bus began its return journey to their home planet, Centurian, the only habitable planet in their solar system and as far as the people of Centurian were aware the only planet capable of hosting human life, anywhere.
Jonathan and Filia had just turned sixteen and been allowed to spend weekend nights at the nexus of sound hunting, Rockmore Space Junction.
Rockmore was the busiest space hub on Centurian. It was situated at the heart of the planet’s capital city, Geocentrian, and it served a constant stream of mining freighters travelling to and from thousands of desolate moons as well as public shuttles visiting places of natural fascination such as Elephant’s Trunk.
Filia had recently joined Jonathan’s school, Tempo Chorium. They’d met briefly a long while ago in nursery classes, then spotted each other several years later going in and out of a local piano teacher’s house, but hadn’t crossed paths since.
The connection had helped break the ice and Filia had quickly come to share Jonathan’s passion for space rock, a genre of magic-music in which sounds were recorded in the wild using spells of capture, then brought back and distributed in music halls for bands to sample and develop with spells of shaping.
Magic-music aficionados would cram the platforms of Rockmore Space Junction whenever the sound hunters arrived, itching to get their hands on the latest recordings.
Filia and Jonathan had become part of the scene, carefully inspecting shuttle origins and flight paths to predict which new samples would best suit their taste or pique their interest.
The Tilmenian run, in and out of Elephant’s Trunk, was the sound hunter’s rite of passage. It was an unwritten rule that until you conquered the tidal ride, you could not be called a sound hunter. This baptism in dust embodied the basics of sound hunting: timing, the opportunity to capture incredible sound and a moment or two of danger.
Filia had thought Jonathan was mad to attempt the Tilmenian run with so little experience of sound capture and next to no training in bust-outs, the label given to these pressurised tidal rides. But Jonathan had insisted, confident as ever in his flying skills.
The boy racer had succeeded and was almost ready to assume the sound hunter accolade he coveted so dearly. There was one more box to tick: the recording had to be stellar. An original blend of magnificence.
Jonathan and Filia leapt off the shuttle as it pulled into Rockmore, locked the levitator they’d hired back into its slot and opened the sound container. The recording was perfect.
The foghorn of Elephant’s Trunk blew once at the start and then at the end like a ship that owns the ocean. In between was the sneeze, the crash-landing sound of a seashore wave as it smashes the sand and rushes to a gentle conclusion.
Jonathan and Filia stared at each other in triumph as they replayed the recording again and again. ‘Oh my gosh, that’s going in our next track,’ cried Filia, grabbing and shaking Jonathan’s arm with joy.
They took the uptown dronibus home. Jonathan walked Filia to her door. ‘Hey, thanks for watching me,’ he said.
‘Oh, not at all, you really did nail it,’ smiled Filia. ‘See you Monday morning, seven-thirty dronibus; none of your usual time-lapsing, Mr Sound Hunter.’
‘I’ll be right on time,’ grinned Jonathan, turning to walk away. Filia reached out but he was already halfway down the path. He looked back as he opened the gate and paused, noticing she was about to say something.
‘I, er,’ hesitated Filia, ‘I just wanted to say, thanks for being such a good friend since I joined school, and make sure you wash that filth off.’
‘I will,’ beamed Jonathan, saluting her before bounding up the road.
2. Earth, Southwest London, England

The Ghosts of Friendship
‘You’re quite shy, aren’t you?’ asked the registrar in charge of admissions. Fifteen-year-old Jonatha