Badge of Infamy

A battered spacecraft crashes into a bleak, snow‑driven wasteland, leaving pilot Chris and the unnamed survivor scrambling for oxygen and a functioning suit. In the moments after the impact they clamber from the twisted hull, barely escaping a lethal leak. Their desperate fight for breath sets a stark tone, hinting at a world where even the most advanced technology can become a death trap.

The survivor, Dr. Daniel Feldman, now lives hidden in a city’s cheapest flophouse, a former physician reduced to a pariah among the destitute. When a fellow drifter collapses from “space‑stomach,” Feldman’s medical instincts surface despite his ragged appearance and the contempt of the shelter’s caretaker. His attempts to help expose a gritty underbelly of space‑age society—where the fallout of interstellar travel reaches the streets, and redemption may still be found in the most unlikely of places.