Witch and Spider

Whips of lightning cracked the dreary night’s fragile shell. The sea was a harridan, driving away what little warmth was left in the wind. The beastly sky rumbled. The earth trembled. The explosive boom of a starship taking off ripped a hole into the distant horizon.

The earth had long become another backwater industrial throw away. Most ships only stopped here long enough to fill up on fuel and necessities on the way to someplace else. Even the meanest weather couldn’t convince a pilot to del...