This section had survived the pirate attack relatively intact, but had needed to be cut around when the repair crews had replaced the forward turret. “You realize we’re supposed to be on station meeting Bistro in less than two hours,” the Captain observed, slowing his drift through zero-gravity t...
The man was one of Azure’s favored mercenaries, though he had twice turned down membership in the Blue Star Syndicate. If he succeeded at the mission he was currently set upon, Azure would offer again. If he declined again, more permanent measures would have to be taken. Azure appreciated the man...
Since this wasn’t an unhappiness he could actually direct at anyone, he was grumpier than usual as he sat on his flag deck drinking his coffee. They were still six hours outside of Kematian, where the convoy would make their last delivery, and he hadn’t yet received orders...
She was a hundred yards long, with a maximum beam of about fifteen. In water, she displaced about a thousand tons and could sail at the better part of ten knots. In the air, she ran on three primary lift crystals and could fly at just over eleven knots. Four Dwarven built fire-cannon and two Aera...
Kelly had joined Damien in the Simulacrum Chamber and was looking around wide-eyed as they emerged into the new system. The screens all around them began to fill with images as the Jay’s many cameras began to record the universe around them again. “Well, we’re here,” Damien said quietly to the sc...
She was not used to being kept waiting. The gray-haired woman stood impatiently in the outer office of Mage-Admiral Lillian Castello, commander of the Royal Martian Navy’s Seventh Cruiser Squadron, and the station commander of the Nia Kriti Naval Base. &n...
Years of practice had trained her to awaken instantly, but she still could swear she’d only been asleep for a few moments as she pulled herself from her bed and tapped a key, accepting the transmission voice-only. “Captain, it’s Lieutenant Fiero,” her junior communications...
Despite only having a minor upgrade to their speed, the two Terran scout ships were still the stealthiest ships in the pirate armada. Of course, hyperspace portals weren’t particularly stealthy at the best of times. There were solutions to that. “Ho...
He had finally managed to get to sleep, trying to get some rest before arriving in Sol, where he was going to get very busy very quickly, but now bolted upright in his small quarters near his office. Since he mostly lived in the office, the room was barely large enough to ...
Only an instinctive jerk of magic pulled him back from a dangerous collision, and a voice bellowed across the cavernous space at the rear of the freighter. “Watch what you’re doing, you dimwits! That’s the only damn entrance; let’s try not to kill ship’s officers, eh?” Damien remained motionless ...
My agent, Mike Kabongo, liked it and suggested I expand it. The story could quite neatly become a novella, but to turn it into a novel I was going to have to add a lot of content, which would in some ways be completely separate arcs. At the same time, I was starting to rea...