Decker's War

Forced into early retirement, the former sergeant crawled into a bottle and stayed there, moving from planet to planet, looking for some reason to keep on living. Until, that is, he wandered into a bar owned by an old marine buddy who offered to help. Curiosity was Decker's other major failing and in short order he was on the run, hunted by a shadowy government organization, and in possession of a secret that could destroy the Commonwealth. It was a secret to die for, and the people on his trail wanted to make sure he did.

Zack Decker just wanted to be left alone so he could live a quiet life with the woman he loved and make up for lost time, but his enemies simply couldn’t resist the temptation to pursue their vendetta. One moment, he was hauling cargo across the depths of interstellar space, the next he was in the hands of pirates and headed for the barbaric worlds beyond the Coalsack nebula, to be sold into captivity. Marines don’t make good slaves and Zack was more than happy to show everyone why he should have been killed straight away, because he was coming back, looking for blood.

Someone was setting fire to the Commonwealth Rim, nurturing a storm to drag humanity through the horrors of colonial warfare and thereby hasten the rise of Empire. Their plan had just one fatal flaw: It didn't count on an ex-Marine pathfinder with a grudge, a dagger, and a deadly partner.

When Command Sergeant Hal Tarra, one of Decker's oldest friends, vanishes on the Commonwealth frontier shortly after taking early retirement from the Corps, Zack knows what memories are driving the former Pathfinder, because he sees the same face in his worst nightmares.

After Zack Decker and Hera Talyn, the Special Operations Section's deadliest agents, narrowly escape betrayal for the third time in a row, the marine suspects something more than bad luck is in play. For years, the Fleet has been fighting a shadowy cold war against factions in the Commonwealth determined to strangle democracy and give birth to an empire. Has that war turned hot without warning? In a quest for answers, Zack Decker volunteers to undertake his riskiest mission yet.

Wanted by their enemies for exposing the Black Sword cabal and faced with the difficult task of rebuilding the Special Operations Division while treason remains rampant, Major Zack Decker and Commander Hera Talyn are stuck in desk jobs. Until, that is, the Coalition and its minions decide to make things very personal. Forced back into the role of field operatives, they discover a plot to destabilize an entire sector and bring it under the iron-fisted control of a Commonwealth government eager to abandon democracy in favor of imperial dreams.

Terrorists working for traitors intent on transforming the Commonwealth into a brutal empire are preparing to spread mayhem across the vulnerable and increasingly unstable Rim Sector. Their aim: replace sovereign star system governments with satraps under the direct control of Earth, thereby undoing generations of civil peace between humanity's many fractious branches.