Showing results by author "Mark Wandrey" in All Categories

The plot by the Galactic Union’s Mercenary Guild against the Four Horsemen has culminated in an invasion of Earth. Faced with an overwhelming force, the human mercs had no choice. They’ve fled, leaving Sansar Enkh to go to the Mercenary Guild headquarters on Capital Planet to stand trial for humanity. On the run, Jim Cartwright and Nigel Shirazi have travelled to the Winged Hussars’ secret base of New Warsaw, in an effort to convince Alexis Cromwell to join the fight, while the other mercenaries who escaped the fall of Earth have gone to the perceived safe haven of Karma.

Major Rodger Y. Murphy should have died when his helicopter crashed off the coast of Mogadishu in November, 1993. Instead, he woke up in August, 2125, in a binary star system 152 light years from home. Without any memory of the otherworldly abductors who spirited them away in cold sleep, Murphy and 100 other “Lost Soldiers” have been retrieved and awakened by officers of the Consolidated Terran Republic. Promising to return to the 55 Tauri B system after completing a distant mission, they leave the twentieth century castaways with a daunting objective.

It Takes Even More Kinds…Of Aliens! Harmon Tomeral and his friends wanted nothing more than to go to space, and they have beaten the odds, time and again. They developed a mech and won the Top Fleet Marine Competition. They brought back a battlecruiser from an unknown system and made it their own. They made allies who helped them achieve great victories, and they ultimately founded new colonies in what has become known as the Salvage System.

After a stunning victory at the Merc Guild shipyard of Golara, the leaders of the Four Horsemen mercenary units of Earth have decided it’s time to take back the colonies the Merc Guild has captured, and the Horsemen split up to liberate them. While the Merc Guild still has humanity outnumbered, Alexis Cromwell, the leader of the Winged Hussars, has incorporated the ships captured in Golara into her fleet, and she hopes the Humans can achieve local superiority across four systems with her new battleships and her Egleesius cruisers.

Heir to one of the leading "Four Horsemen" mercenary companies, Jim Cartwright is having a bad year. Having failed his high school VOWS tests, he's just learned his mother bankrupted the family company before disappearing, robbing him of his Cavalier birthright. But the Horsemen of eras past were smart - they left a legacy of equipment Jim can use to complete the next contract and resurrect the company.

A Tortantula and a Flatar. The most enigmatic teaming in the mercenary guild, it’s also a perfect pairing, where one’s strengths cover the other’s weakness. Raised together from birth, their lives are a brutal series of tests. Azah isn’t like most other female Tortantula; she’s much smaller and made fun of. No one expects her to survive, much less succeed, but she’s still given a chance and assigned a Flatar: Sadek. The two quickly bond and find they complement each other. Against all odds, they survive the breeding dome and join the ranks of their races’ mercenaries.

From the outside, The Lyon’s Den doesn’t look like much; there isn’t even a sign. But Mercs of all species know that if you head to Southwest Houston, near the Starport, there’s a particular run-down strip mall that looks like it’s been abandoned for years. The glass door second from the south end of the strip is plastered over on the inside with blue paper, and the faint golden outline of a rampant lion is the only clue.

In the late 2020s and early 30s, corporations managed to render the major governments of the world obsolete. The big corporations owned most of the territories as well as the majority of the world’s wealth. While many of the old traditions were still observed in various parts of the world, the true power was with the corporations. In the late 30s, what would be known as the Corporate Wars began as larger companies initiated hostile takeovers in a whole new fashion. Employees, armed with corporate weapons, warred for dominance. It was a bloody time.

With Alexis Cromwell shot in the back by her XO and the fleet in ruins, the Humans have run back to New Warsaw to lick their wounds, but the Merc Guild now knows the location of their hidden base, and they are in hot pursuit. Led by the New Era, a dreadnought built for the sole purpose of destroying humanity, they are an unstoppable force.

The Peacemaker-enforced ceasefire brought an end to the hostilities, but not a resolution, and now it’s up to the Four Horsemen to forge a lasting peace. Alexis Cromwell, despite her pregnancy, heads off to Capital with Nigel Shirazi to obtain justice from the enigmatic Mercenary Guild Council, but when they arrive, they’re quickly embroiled in galactic politics, and find out the situation is far, far worse than they could possibly have imagined.

It’s the 22nd century. The galaxy has opened up to humanity as a hyperactive beehive of stargates and new technologies, and we suddenly find ourselves in a vast playground of different races, environments, and cultures. There’s just one catch: We are pretty much at the bottom of the food chain, and there’s only one way for humanity to move up - by becoming mercenaries. In every mercenary’s life, though, there comes a time when things go wrong and even the best laid plans go awry.

When Todd’s critically damaged ship dropped out of hyperspace near the human colony world of Azure, he had no memory of his past. He didn’t know who he was, or even what he was, and the humans didn’t either. That didn’t stop the colonists of Azure - they took him in, anyway...even though they didn’t understand how he could do some of the things he could do. Todd and his descendants consider themselves human - eight-armed and water-breathing - but human, nonetheless. After 70 years living among humans, Todd’s descendants are going back out into the Union to make their mark.

It's the 22nd Century. The galaxy has opened up to humanity as a hyperactive beehive of stargates and new technologies, and we suddenly find ourselves in a vast playground of different races, environments, and cultures. There's just one catch: we are pretty much at the bottom of the food chain. Enter the Four Horsemen universe, where only a willingness to fight and die for money separates Humans from the majority of the other races. Enter a galaxy not only of mercenaries, but also of Peacemakers, bounty hunters, and even a strung out junkie.

It’s the 22nd century. The galaxy has opened up to humanity as a hyperactive beehive of stargates and new technologies, and we suddenly find ourselves in a vast playground of different races, environments, and cultures. There’s just one catch: We are pretty much at the bottom of the food chain.

Bjorn’s Berserkers was a respected and flourishing mercenary company. Founded by Bjorn Tovesson I, it was now commanded by his son, Bjorn Tovesson II. Commander Tovesson wanted nothing more than to eventually pass on the Berserkers to his son, Bjorn Tovesson III. But young Bjorn had a different destiny in mind. He didn’t want a future of fighting aliens and risking death on some distant planet. One fateful afternoon in the Alaska wilderness changed everything, though, when a bear attack left Bjorn maimed.

First contact has been made, and Earth's militaries and its premier mercenary companies stand ready to take their first tentative steps outside the solar system. With a galaxy of aliens to explore and fistfuls of credits to be made, follow along as the Four Horsemen select their contracts and venture forth to meet their destinies.

Fourteen years ago, Alan Porter returned from a contract with a hefty payday for his company, Silent Night, and a surprise: five orphaned Zuul pups. Although Humans and Zuul have faced off on many battlefields, little was known of the ancient mercenary race, and Alan and his wife, Dana, raised them the best they could. The five pups, Rex, Ripley, Drake, Sonya, and Shadow grew to maturity in Australia, happy with their lives. Until a Zuul with the Winged Hussars happens across the strange family and carries news of them home.

Terry Clark grew up surrounded by his parent’s life’s work, the rescue and rehabilitation of cetaceans. Born just after first contact with the Galactic Union, he’s never known a time when aliens weren’t visiting Earth. At 10 years old, he had a normal life, until a visit from one of the aliens resulted in a ground-breaking discovery. The cetaceans have a developed and complex language...and it can be deciphered by the aliens’ translators.

Five years ago, a group of human researchers and their mercenary friends helped evacuate 26 cetaceans from Earth just ahead of their arrest. The world government didn't approve of their giving the cetaceans pinplants, and it wanted to euthanize the dolphins and orcas in their care. After finding a home on the distant ice-covered ocean world of Hoarfrost, the humans and cetaceans settled in. Less than a year later, they were attacked when the planet's previous owners, the aquatic Selroth, tried to regain possession of it.

Harmon Tomeral and his friends wanted nothing more than to go to space, and they have beaten the odds, time and again, to get there. They developed a mech and won the Top Fleet Marine competition. They brought back a battle cruiser from an unknown system and made it their own. They made allies who helped them achieve great victories, and they, ultimately, founded new colonies in what has become known as the Salvage System.