Retreat To the Stars - Leigh Brackett

Short Story

Number of words : 7000
Percent of complex words : 7.6
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 10.3


READABILITY INDICES

Fog : 7.1
Flesch : 77.4
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.0



SETTING

Trojan asteroid base

In the 40th century. Home to 10,000 Rebels.

"Two thousand years ago. Why couldn't I have been born two thousand years ago?"
* * *

The strangeness of it came over Arno—how Marika could look back to the Twentieth Century as day before darkness, and he as darkness before dawn. In the Twenty-first Century the last Terran rebels had fled to Venus, and from there to Mars, and from there to the state where they were now. The all-encompassing strength of the State had followed them, driving out their heresies, their anarchies, their haphazard individualism.

Now there was peace and system everywhere, except for the hidden plague-spots on the planets and this barren asteroid, which, through him, the Tri-State would soon destroy."

Titan

Moon of Saturn. Site of a mining operation.


CHARACTERS

Arno

Spy for the Tri-State. Father of three. Falls in love with Marika and is torn.

Ralph

Squadron leader of the rebels.

Marika

Rebel mechanic.

Laura

Rebel woman with a child.

Frane

Part of the rebel council.

Father Berrens

Rebel civilian leader.

People's Protector

Arno's superior and handler.

Vern

Pilot of Ralph's squadron, killed.

Parlo

Pilot of Ralph's squadron, killed.

Karl

Pilot of Ralph's squadron, killed.


ORGANISATIONS

Tri-State

Controlling political body in the Solar System, for quite some time, over 2000 years.

Rebels

Opposition to the Tri-State.


VEHICLES

Sparling

An old one-man spaceship that Ralph flies on a desperate raid to Titan.


TECHNOLOGY

Tractor beams

Prize haulers.


CONCEPTS

The Creed

Tri-State doctrine.


PLOT

A small group of Rebels remains after a two thousand year struggle against the Tri-State, but they are almost out of supplies, and almost have a ship ready to carry them out.

The Tri-State have infiltrated a spy, Arno, and are waiting for enough intel to begin blowing the base to hell. Arno, however, falls for the tough mechanic Marika after she has a moment of weakness with him, and he eventually reveals his purpose.

With Ralph dead, she guns him down too, and the Rebel ship is ready to head for the stars.


3.5 out of 5