David George Richards

Slide-Rule had been their strategist. A planner, a plotter, devious, cunning and most probably the best military mind that anyone had ever seen on Ellerkan. She had taken the beaten armies of Falonbeck to victory over the Sullenfeld Hordes, and now even the Dragon Prince of Halafalon wouldn't stand in the way of her secret plan. She could have been the Queen of Falonbeck, but she wanted more. And if she could keep Sir John L’Crue on side, what she wanted she would get. But it would be to Ellerkan's great loss. Bus-Pass was one of their best fighters. Athletic, tireless, she was a thief who made an art out of her trade. Her long standing adversary was the Sheriff of Jasanta, and the frequent confrontations between them had instilled an admiration for one another that went way, way beyond mere professional competition. But while the Sheriff most definitely wanted to lay his hands on Bus-Pass, did she want to be caught? Chalk-Dust was their scout. Thoughtful, skilled methodical, and with the ability to find anything anywhere. What she couldn't track just couldn't be tracked, and what she couldn't find just couldn't be found. The hidden tomb of Edred the Mighty was no different. But what she had stolen from there would have to be returned before the Sullenfeld Hordes caught and skinned her to get it back. Blue-Tack was their leader. Strong, intelligent, and like Bus-Pass, she was a skilled and fierce fighter. She had only one true enemy, an enemy who had taken away the only thing she cherished. And she lived only for the day when she would finally get even. Gym-Slip was the thorn in their side. Always full of the joys of life, she was a trickster, a comedienne, she found fun in everything they did. She had a lust for life that was only matched by her lust for men and robbery. If she couldn't steal it, she could lay it. And if anything went wrong, she was always at the heart of it. And what she told Bus-Pass about the Sheriff was just low-down dirty rotten. Buy-Row was their biographer. Quiet and almost shy, she was a romantic book worm. She read everything she could find about lost cities, hidden tombs and secret treasures. And what she learned she told Chalk-Dust to find. A constant scribbler, she wrote everything down. It had started as Soo-Kai’s journal, but now most of it was about the adventures of the Sixpack. They had spent a lifetime together on Ellerkan. It had been a lifetime of adventure, battles, war, robbery, mayhem and sex whenever they could get it. Now, after twenty-eight years came their reunion. The flesh may have been weak, but the spirit was still willing, and what happened was what always happened when the Sixpack were around –all Hell let loose. And into all of this came Johnson Fold. He was only interested in a little horse trading. Ellerkan was just the sort of backwards planet where his skills and artistry could be most fruitful. And as he often said to his partner, Sinita Khan, “What could possibly go wrong?”

The Return of the Sixpack is a mixture of science fiction and fantasy. Although it can be read on its own it is the second part of a story that began with The Lost Girls. In that story the arrival and early adventures of a lost girls hockey team and how they came to be on the planet Ellerkan was told. Ellerkan is a failed colony where ancient technology and survivors from a galactic war now live in strained co-existence with the human population. Although the culture appears feudal, under the surface is a long abandoned advanced infrastructure. In The Return of the Sixpack twenty-eight years have passed since the girls arrived and it is their reunion year. Some of the girls, now aged in their forties, have grown up and lived in the rich houses of Ellerkan. But most of them have made their lives in the mountains with their adoptive parents, Gustavo and Mai-Zen. They became the Sixpack, a band of female brigands infamous through-out the land. But even this adventurous life can become boring with time, and each of the women has gone off to do ‘their thing.’ For Bus-Pass and Gym-Slip, it is still robbery and general mayhem. For Chalk-Dust and Buy-Row, it is tomb raiding. And Blue-Tack is still preparing for the final conflict with the person she holds responsible for the death of her twin. Meanwhile, Slide-Rule pursues world conquest and intends to use the abandoned technology for this purpose. As the reunion day approaches the result is complete anarchy and all out war as the women each bring with them their own brand of violent baggage in the form of a Sheriff, a witch/bounty hunter, a vengeful Knight, and the entire Sullenfeld Hordes in hot pursuit. Two off-worlders, Johnson Fold and Sinita Khan, act as the readers’ guide to the mayhem as they slowly realise that Ellerkan is not the sleepy backwards planet Johnson thought it was. And this isn’t the first time he and Sinita have ended up in hot water. Enjoy the fun.