Passageway

Science Fiction/Fantasy/LGBTQ Fiction

Darwin McQuaid runs into an urban forest while fleeing thugs from his high school. They’re gaining when a young stranger steps behind him and confronts them. Within seconds they flee in terror. 

Darwin discovers that his champion is of indigenous heritage, his own age and with a mental and physical prowess far beyond his own. 

The teenager, called Daruk, greets Darwin by name and claims he was sent by a family friend, Uncle His, an old man who lives in a nearby cabin. They are members of the Ohlone tribe but are often vague on specifics. 

Daruk offers to train Darwin in his brand of fighting, which includes mind stimulation, to enhance skills and mental capacity. Skeptical but trusting Uncle His, Darwin allows it and is surprised he is faster and doing better in school. As their friendship deepens, Daruk offers to take him to his village. 

Daruk and Uncle His are Guardians of The Passageway, warriors who protect the crossroads of three parallel universes, three Earths, each five hundred years apart that touch together deep underground in San Francisco. The two are from the distant past and selected by leaders in the future who discovered the link and began an audacious experiment to preserve one Earth from the environmental and political catastrophes destroying the other two. In Daruk’s world, America will never exist because Columbus was forced back and Cortez captured by the Aztecs. The New World was left for the natives. It is a complex, often fractious world. Eleven Guardians keep the peace. They want a twelfth.

Daruk takes Darwin to the Ohlone village where he was born five hundred years in the past and invites him to become a Guardian. The teenager is overwhelmed. Even if he gained the skills, Darwin has family and friends who could never know. Daruk’s earth is a paradise but not everyone wants peace.

Upcoming
Copperhead (Book 2) (Upcoming)Misago / Armour of God (In the works)