I thought you all might enjoy this.
You may or may not know, but my first love in writing was horror. Until a friend from college, Dave Wolverton (a.k.a. David Farland of Runelords fame) suggested that I try my hand at military science fiction, the idea had never occurred to me. As the author of
The Courtship of Princess Leia and
On My Way to Paradise along with the Runelords books, he had an inside track. Also, I thought that a horror writer would have the right skillset for military science fiction.
To stick my toe in the water, I contacted an old acquaintance at LucasArts and offered to write the strategy guide for an RTS game called
Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds if he would agree to include an original short story in the book.
As I was writing the story, I got a call from a woman at LucasFilm asking about the short story. She asked to see the story after letting me know that people are not allowed publish Star Wars fiction without Lucas's approval. I emailed her the story, and the next day she called to say that Lucas enjoyed it.
I thought that meant that I had an in. After finishing the strategy guide, I decided began expanding the story into an entire novel, the Star Wars saga told from the point of view of a storm trooper. I mentioned this to my friend at LucasArts, who mentioned it to the woman at LucasFilm, who called and in a polite but firm fashion informed me that, as George Lucas had not asked me to write the novel, it was unauthorized and could never be published.
Anyway, with the Star Wars termonology removed, here is the opening to my abandoned Star Wars novel.
Ahead through the fog, I could see Sk*****er sitting on a boulder looking confused, if not scared. To his credit, he did not sob or panic. Sweat and mud pasted his shaggy, white hair to the sides of his head, and his eyes darted from side to side searching desperately to find... to find me. I did not care if he searched for me with his precious F****. It would not matter.
Though I was three years older than Sk*****er , I did not age like him. Now nearly 60 years old, I still had the strength and endurance of an athletic 30-year-old man. Not Sk*****er , he showed his age, and his battles.
Throughout his life he had fought enemies that were far more dangerous than I, though none were so perfectly mated to disarm him. With his l*******ber, his X*** fighter, and his F***e, he toppled the E*****e.
He held a l******ber now; but he might as well have carried a simple knife or a stick. My very being made me a black hole to the F****e, nullifying all of Sk*****er J*** skills. He could not predict my b****r shots, could not block them with his l******er.
Without the F***e directing him, his J*** reflexes moved no more quickly than those of any other 56-year-old man. When he used the Force to throw rocks and branches at me, they fell to the ground, as did his attempts to read my thoughts.
Hidden by dead trees, I circled to within 10 meters of Sk*****er without him sensing me. I could shoot him or strangle him with the garrote I carried in my sleeve. Lightning flashed in the textured sky illuminating layers of swollen gray clouds. A fitting place for this to end--a polluted stream surrounded by dead trees on a planet shrouded by mist and endless storms.
And old L*** Sk*****er , wearing his drenched beggar's cloak with his baggy hood hanging behind his shoulders, could not see me… not with his eyes, not through the F***e. Whether it was fate or the F***e, destiny had brought us together. Even when an entire galaxy separated us, destiny's bonds drew us back together with almost suffocating might.
Placing my b****r back into its holster, I stepped into plain view.
