Severance

Outer Echelon #3

by Zack Parsons

Specialist Martel is one of the most fearsome warriors of the Carolingian Pact, the Christian empire that now dominates most of Western Europe. Martel's experience as a killer is so valued by his commanders that they ignore his insubordination and, when he falls in battle, he always finds a new body waiting for him back home.

When distant colony worlds begin to go silent, a military and diplomatic expedition is assembled to investigate the cause. Martel is convinced to join with the promise that he might finally be allowed to die. For ambitious fleet intelligence officer Karizma Nox, a maniac like Martel is just the man she needs to ensure diplomacy fails.

Severance is the third novelette in Outer Echelon, a series of loosely-related, satirical military science fiction from Zack Parsons, author of Liminal States, My Tank is Fight! and contributor to Welcome to Night Vale.

75 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 24, 2014

About the author

Zack Parsons is a Chicago area writer known for his acerbic commentary and bleakly humorous science fiction. He has authored two non-fiction books, MY TANK IS FIGHT! and YOUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBOR IS A DRAGON. His works, including That Insidious Beast and CONEX: Convict Connections, have appeared online and in various published anthologies including A COMMONPLACE BOOK OF THE WEIRD: THE UNTOLD STORIES OF H.P. LOVECRAFT and OPPOSING VIEWPOINTS: DOOMSDAY SCENARIOS.

His debut novel, LIMINAL STATES, will be released in April of 2012.