by Mark Lingane
What’s inside…
TESLA
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DECAY
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FARADAY
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FUSION
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Los Angeles
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San Francisco
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Salt Lake City
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Denver
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New York
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First published in Australia by Insync Books
PO Box 526, The Gap, Queensland, Australia 4061
ABN: 74 087 648 600
Copyright © Mark Lingane 2016
The right of Mark Lingane to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This book is a work of fiction. Any similarities to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. If it is similar to you or your life then you need to reassess your life choices. Some paragraphs of this work use information gathered from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Deed.
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 written permission of the publisher.
Cover design by Insync Books
Steam Academy Logo design by Nathan Massengill
Cataloguing-in-Publication (CiP) entry:
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of Australia.
Tesla Evolution
Lingane, Mark
AWARDS:
DECAY
Foreword Reviews' 2014 INDIEFAB Book of the Year Award Finalist (Science Fiction)
SPR Full Moon Award Runner-up (Science Fiction)
the BookBag's Top Ten Best Self Published Books of 2014
National Indie Excellence Award Finalist (Science Fiction)
Wishing Shelf Award Silver Medal (Teen)
FARADAY
Foreword Reviews' 2014 INDIEFAB Book of the Year Award Finalist (YA Fiction)
Foreword Reviews' Most Arresting Cover
FUSION
the BookBag's Top Ten Best Self Published Books of 2015
PRAISE
A great read, as are all his other books. Tesla is evidence of a very talented writer. 5 stars.
- theIndieTribe
Once Mr L gets into his stride, he shows us his best stuff yet in this teen steampunk versus cyberpunk post-apocalyptic adrenaline rush. 4.5 stars.
- theBookB
ag
Sebastian really feels like a perfect character for a younger teenager to put themselves into his shoes, and his personal journey is a decent coming of age tale, albeit on an unusual background of a Dickensian home life, magic powers and killer cyborgs. 4 stars.
- SPR
A significantly darker outing where the first was more of a quest to discover Sebastian’s destiny and his mother’s fate, Decay has no such strong light at the end of the tunnel. The theme of the book is stagnation and despair. This is in no way a failing of the book’s writing, which is excellent; the tone of the book is well set and motivations of the characters have become individual and complex ... Lingane is certainly an author to pay close attention to this year and in the future. 5 Stars
- SPR
Dialogue is crisp, pacing is strong, and despite its generally grim tone and flashes of violence, the story is dotted with touches of humor. Seb and Melanie are fun, personable teens whom readers can identify with and enjoy.
- Kirkus Reviews
Decay offers good commentary on contemporary society. The cyborgs parallel contemporary technology overtaking our lives. Have we become robotic as we rely on technology? Are people increasingly critical of anyone different? There is good commentary about how to proceed in this wartorn world. Some are pacifist and some are calling for war, the debate from all sides effective and engaging. There is much subtlety and nuance in describing the humans’ plight. There is humor to balance out the darkness. The novel is plenty dark, but it is not unrelentingly grim. Recommended
- SPR Full Moon Review
Lingane’s prose style is warm, humorous, energetic, and controlled, a tough job to handle when the pacing moves at air-scorching speed. He’s mastered the art of moving a story through action without leaving the reader behind. 5 Stars
- Foreword Reviews
It’s obvious to see how Mark’s grown as writer and the Tesla series is more than a pinnacle: it’s a pinnacle with the phrase ‘movie material’ balancing on the top. 5 Stars
- theBookBag
With a perfect blend of humor and danger, this steampunk thriller is a truly exciting and intense reading experience. 5 stars.
- Foreword Reviews
The Tesla Evolution series continues to be in a category of its own with its signature blend of bizarre tongue-in-cheek fantasy and sincere, somewhat moving writing that really keeps you on your toes. 5 stars.
- Self Publishing Review
This sci-fi series is a roller coaster of thrills and shocks. The result? A great, one-sitting read for strong stomached adults and teens alike. 4.5 stars.
- the BookBag
The fourth and final installment of the SF YA cross-over Tesla series cracks on at an amazing pace. Compelling and possibly the darkest of the series, it reinforces our opinion that this is the author's masterpiece so far.
- the Bookbag
Lingane is an extremely talented author who can take a dark subject and offer spots of illumination along the journey that offer morsels of hope to the reader, effectively ensuring that the pages keep turning.
- theIndieTribe
Fusion is the final culmination ... of all the bizarre elements of the previous titles, and finally the shambling monster of the Tesla Evolution series has come to rest. Fusion has certainly inherited every positive of the series so far, with cunning wit at unexpected times, a rich setting of unusual elements, and a lot of popular elements popped together in a very appealing and readable package
- Self Publishing Review
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mark-mywords.co
To Sebastian,
It’s all been for you.
TESLA
ISABELLE WATCHED THE farmers lower her husband into the ground on that sultry winter’s day with a solitary tear rolling down her face. The wind howled through the eucalyptus trees, bending the branches and scattering the leaves. Lightning flickered behind the stormy clouds, and thunder growled empty threats.
It didn’t rain, and no one else cried.
She had arrived in the remote Australian outback town, charging out of the undulating clay plains with bluegrass downs, breathless on the back of a black stallion matching her own wild temperament. She immediately accosted Dr. Michael Filbert, the local vet, to reinvigorate the exhausted horse so she could push on into more civilized areas. That’s when she ran into Alex. His broad shoulders flexed as he helped Michael calm the beast, running huge hands over its pounding flanks. Isabelle had quietly stood behind him assessing his physique; he had turned and taken away her breath. She had gazed up into his sun-weathered, gentle and caring face and thought, You’ll do.
Isabelle’s arrival and lack of departure drew the ire of the local girls, especially Alex’s sister, Ratty, who felt humiliated and intimidated by the newcomer’s worldly confidence. Her sophistication and determination were unmatched, and Alex would never have eyes for another. On occasion, he probed into her past, but she quickly closed up and became melancholy. He never probed Isabelle past this point, as her happiness was more important, and he never asked about the black swirls and dotted patterns on her back.
So she settled in the backward and brutal town with barely enough technology to classify it as agrarian and made a home for herself and Alex. She hid her secrets beneath the house and let the dark corners claim them. And peace descended as the outside world became a forgotten memory. And she thought, Maybe I will be safe here.
Then Sebastian had been born, disturbingly quickly, according to the sour-faced Ratty. But for the young couple, reward followed after reward. Alex worked hard, tilling the land under his own power. He forced a plow through the unbreakable ground, cleaving furrows in their ever-expanding property to plant wheat seeds. The work didn’t bother him; he reveled in the uncomplicated physical labor and solitude of the open fields.
The townsfolk—jealous, bitter, and lazy, only dragged into the fields when the crop was running to spoil—laughed at him with his simple tools, and honest and solitary determination, while they relied on the generous and gullible nature of transient visitors. Sebastian watched his father toil and learned the value and reward of endurance. Alex always finished first, facing the challenge in front of him, no matter how insurmountable from the onset. He sold crops first and received the highest prices. For Isabelle, life couldn’t get any better.
But Alex fell ill. His long black hair fell out. He withered away to a walking skeleton in a matter of months. His eyes grew milky and distant. She had watched him fade from a man of iron to a fragile shell until he broke.
So Isabelle stood, as her own health failed, with Sebastian and watched the other farmers bury her husband—her shield against the world—a matter of months before Sebastian’s thirteenth birthday. Those buried secrets could come looking for her.
And if they could find her, then they could find Sebastian, and everything would have been in vain. The world would fall at the hands of the boy wrapped in time.
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THE STONE FLEW across the small classroom and hit Sebastian square in the back of the head.
The stinging pain jabbed into him, bringing tears to his eyes. He rubbed his head and glanced back over his shoulder.
“Ow!”
John Oakley high-fived the boy next to him. Mr. Oliver Stephenson was an excitable young teacher who scratched a living occupying the minds of children, trying to fill the minute attention spans of a handful of locals too young or sick to work the land. The conflict passed unnoticed and he continued to scrawl his notes on the blackboard.
Sebastian quietly moved his chair, got up, and lunged at John. He grabbed him by the shirt and raised his fist.
John gasped as he reeled back against the attack.
Sebastian heard a cough, and turned to see Oliver glaring at him. He lowered his fist, but didn’t let go of John, who was struggling to get to his feet. He released his grip. John scrambled to stand up and puffed out his chest against Sebastian.
The Talinga school was
as crude as the town’s inhabitants, with barely functional desks scattered through the wooden room on the soil-stained floor. Images of simple machinery based on an ideology of intense physical labor adorned the walls.
“What is the concern here?” Oliver said.
“Yeah, what is your concern, rich boy?” John mimicked.
Sebastian stood silently staring at John.
“Sebastian, sit down.”
“Me? But I didn’t do anything. He was the one who—”
“I said, sit down. Now. You don’t want me to report you to the school master, again.”
The rest of the class Ooo’ed. He didn’t budge.
“You’ll have to see me after for chores, or go to the school master now.”
Sebastian squeezed up his face, then returned to his chair. The anger rose out of him much like the steam from the kettles his teacher described. His fingers turned white as he clutched his pencil and drew deep and dark lines across the page that ended in ripping through the paper. The lines formed into a great winged creature that billowed fire over an exaggerated sketch of John, and the frustrations ebbed away.
“Where was I? Mr. Stephenson, not me, pioneered steam technology over a thousand years ago.”
John raised his hand. “What do we want that rubbish for?”
Even in the face of teenage derision, Oliver found it hard to dampen his passion for his hero and namesake. “Mr. Stephenson, not me, imagined a way of powering all kinds of devices with steam. He made great machines that could propel people from one side of his world to the other, across land, sea, and eventually even air.”
The teacher sported a carefully trimmed goatee, which hid his thinning face. A set of round glasses perched on his long, thin nose. In a tough time, in a tough town, his draw on the young and their duties was rarely appreciated by the residents, often resulting in late or missing payment. Several would laugh behind his back at his fancy “big city” clothes and quick and passionate speech … until they needed him to fix something. The children yawned their indifference.
“What’s a sea, sir?” asked a particularly young boy.