Showing results by author "Vaughn Heppner" in All Categories

Through desperate tactics and by deliberately keeping a low profile, we survived the machine assaults longer than any human or cybership thought possible. But now our luck has deserted us. The main A.I. brain-core has just given human extinction top priority. The robots are massing an armada to exterminate us. We’ve done what we could in expectation of this grim day, grabbing enemy factory planets to mass produce warships. And we found an ally, the Star Lords of Roke. But it’s just not enough, damn it.

Deep in the Indian Ocean, Dr. Selene Khan enters an underwater dome thousands of years old, one that is fully operational. She barely escapes to the surface, only to discover that her research vessel has vanished. Can she make it to shore 100 miles away? On the other side of the world, Agent Jack Elliot uncovers an impossible 900 grams of antimatter. The trail leads him to Egypt, betrayal, and a sinister brainwashing facility. There, in a desperate move, he rescues Dr. Selene Khan.

We fought the invading New Men to a standstill and defeated the alien destroyer sent to obliterate Earth. The worst should be over, but it's not. Perfect android replicas are impersonating high-level officials so trust is failing. Worse, the New Men have found allies with an impenetrable stealth technology. This time, however, Earth is going on the offensive. Admiral Fletcher is headed to C Quadrant with a Grand Fleet. He's to liberate the captured planets and find the enemy homeworld.

Alvor the Sleek—a Krekelen shape-shifter—hates Jake Bayard because the Galactic Marine slew the others of his plotting brood. Bayard wants to wring Alvor’s neck because the alien tricked him into teleporting to deadly Canopus instead of Saddoth to help his friend. Bayard’s teleportation opens the way for Alvor to reach Canopus so he can board an ancient, orbital sleeper ship and collect a cargo that should give the Krekelens ultimate victory everywhere.

We don't know when it happened. But somewhere an alien species built a strong artificial intelligence. The A.I. became independent, powerful, and it started killing biological infestations - life - any life, all life. It grew into a vast armada of death. Jon Hawkins and his team captured the A.I. destroyer invading the solar system. The genocidal assault should have been over, but it's not. An alien A.I. strand from the cybership survived in the distant Kuiper Belt. The strand has been multiplying and taking over by turning people into robots in order to build another supership.

In the stillness of space, several asteroids disappear in the 82 G. Eridani System. Time passes and space wavers, and the missing asteroids reappear. They’re traveling at near-light-speed for the single populated planet. Nuclear-tipped missiles from the lone battleship fail to stop the asteroids, which crash against the planet, turning it into rubble and killing the 650 million inhabitants. Someone has found and now tested the perfect planet killer, an ancient device that turns asteroids and icy planetesimals into world-destroying projectiles.

Task Force 3 is Star Watch’s elite deployment unit against any surprise threats to the Commonwealth. A mysterious enemy appears 40.7 light years from Earth. Task Force 3 deploys but fails to defend a populated planet against a massive alien Annihilator. Then the task force is sucked through a rip in the space-time continuum, disappearing with the enemy.

Androids used to mingle among us, pretending to be human. Then an alien puppet-master altered their programming. Unknown to us, androids began leaving human society, burning their clothes and peeling off their skin to reveal the chrome-colored bodies underneath. They gathered in a system were a star had exploded, blowing away the atmosphere of a Jupiter-like planet. The supernova had hurled heavy metals against the remaining core. The androids are mining supermetals that can turn ordinary ship weapons and shields into invincible armaments.

Earth becomes too hot for Jake Bayard. Too many shape-shifting aliens and people, including those on his own side, are trying to capture him in order to use his star-traveling abilities for their own greedy ends. Bayard flees to Kaldar, a world devastated by atomic war and lousy with mutated rat-men and the Dark Brotherhood. At first, he’s just trying to stay alive. Then, he uncovers a mystery, one that, incredible as it seems, reaches all the way back to Earth. It could mean the alien enslavement of everyone, which means that Bayard is fighting for more than just his own survival.

Starship Victory - Earth's ancient, alien spacecraft - has won a smashing victory against the New Men, driving them from "C" Quadrant. On their way home, Captain Maddox and his crew run into a vast machine trapped inside an ion storm. Maddox doesn't know it yet, but the meeting isn't an accident. There's a traitor aboard ship, implementing a secret plan, threatening to destroy everything Star Watch has achieved against the New Men.

A nuclear attack in the Persian Gulf wrongly implicates Jake Bayard. Everyone seems to be hunting for him. Bayard flees to Garm, an ice-age world full of sabertooths, dire wolves, mammoths, and Neanderthals. Unfortunately, Institute Homo habilises are also there: extraterrestrial, crafty, small, and deadly hominids. They've enslaved the Neanderthals to mine for dreaded alibite.

Marcus Cade had to cross 800 lonely light-years to Earth so he could begin searching for his beloved wife. But he was broke, and his spaceship badly needed an overhaul. So he traded his one-of-a-kind Gyroc rifle to a stingy and half-mad mechanic for a cheap fix and a Nion XT Navigator. When Cade went to sleep during the journey, the traitorous nav performed its secret function, bringing his ship to a rift, through a vortex and into the web of an extraterrestrial conspiracy.

It finally happened. Commander Thrax Ti Ix created a hyper-spatial tube for the Swarm Imperium. Across thousands of light-years, a vast armada of warships is heading for Earth to burn the homeworld down to its bedrock as the Swarm begins its genocidal campaign against the human race. No one - not the New Men, the Spacers, the Wahhabi Caliphate, or Star Watch - has faced such staggering odds. Alone or united, it makes no difference.

Star Watch stands guard over the Commonwealth, having defeated New Men, massed Swarm fleets and android attackers. The victories have cost lost ships, slain crews, and smashed star systems. The accumulated damage means that Star Watch now strains to keep order as political instability, increased space piracy and rebellions stretch the stellar organization to the limit. Humanity desperately needs peace so Star Watch can rebuild and regroup. Unfortunately, Lord Drakos is searching the Beyond for a splinter Swarm colony world.

You ever have one of those days? U.S. Marine Sergeant Jake Bayard did when he has to cancel a hot date to board a transport plane to the South Pole, which is hijacked by aliens with hostile intent to Earth. Bayard escapes into tunnels deep under the ice and stumbles upon advanced technology that teleports him to Epsilon Eridani. Desperately alone and on the run, Bayard falls back onto his combat training, soon discovering that these aliens keep human herds for meat. That’s it. He enlists some of the downtrodden and declares war against the hungry oppressors.

Years ago, Main 54s brain-core had to flee his exploding planet-sized warship because of the treachery of Jon Hawkins. Later, Main 54 gained special processors, a new warship - something changed in him...greater clarity of purpose and superior combat skills. He has been taking over the AI Dominion around here ever since. Now, his brilliant calculations reveal it is time to destroy the Confederation with a super fleet. Jon is on a desperate mission in the void seeking clues for making the alien Subspace Teleport Device work.

We defeated the invading death machines. But at a devastating cost, with smoldering radioactive craters on Mars, shattered moon-domes around Jupiter and floating junk where Saturn's satellite cities used to orbit. We know more killing machines are coming and that the ultimate outcome seems hopeless. To win this war, we need more warships, more soldiers, and a way to take the fight to the enemy.

Jon Hawkins and his crew are exhausted and homesick. They've destroyed the alien machine menace, going deep into the Kuiper Belt to annihilate the secret A.I. base. From out here, the sun looks like just another star. It's a lonely existence. They're ready to go home. What they don't know - what no one could - was that the A.I. destroyer was only a scout. More alien vessels drop out of hyperspace. This is an A.I. assault. The clock to human extinction has begun ticking.

Captain Maddox is marooned on a harsh alien planet 6000 light years from Earth. He struggles alone, desperate to survive, knowing that failure will forever cost him his wife and daughter. But there’s more at stake than Maddox’s life. In the planet is a relic of unimaginable power and the secret to the Builders’ demise. The Mastermind has sent Iris, his human lover, and a team of intelligent canine killers, to retrieve the relic for his greatness.

Director G.T. Titus inserted an obedience chip into his brain and sent him on a secret mission 800 light-years away. On a distant planet, he broke the programming, smashed the chip, and remembered that he was Force Leader Marcus Cade of Battle Unit 175. Now, he’s heading back to Earth to find his wife. If Director Titus tried to use her as well....