Galactic - Ten Book Space Opera Sci-Fi Boxset Read online

  Contents

  Title

  Introductions

  The Atlantis Ship

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Attack on Phoenix

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Hollow Space: Venture

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Icarus

  Part One - Test Flight

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Part Two - Twist of Cain

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Part Three - Uncharted

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Prelude to Resistance

  Against the Rising Force

  Darkness Defied

  To The End of the World

  The Terran Gambit

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Light of the Earth

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Containment

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  The Hunted

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  The Children of Selene

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Galactic

  A 10 book Space Opera Boxset

  Introductions

  Galactic is a collection of space opera stories ranging from an epic scope to smaller, personal stories. Many of these novels have been Amazon bestsellers, while others are fresh content debuted here in the collection (The Hunted, The Children of Selene, and Prelude to Resistance). Some of the books kick-off a series while others are complete stories. One thing is for sure, though—you’re in for a wild ride!

  The Atlantis Ship - by A.C. Hadfield

  Carson Mach, a former war hero turned freelancer, seeks the biggest payday of his life when he’s tasked to hunt down a ghost ship that has echoed through the centuries. The legendary Atlantis ship has become a reality, appearing at the Commonwealth frontier, and obliterating an orbital station. Failure to stop the Atlantis ship will not only mean the death of Mach and his crew, but the end of the Commonwealth and all of humanity. Somehow, Mach must find a way to solve an ancient mystery if he’s to succeed where everyone else before him has failed.

  The Terran Gambit - by Nick Webb

  Lieutenant Jacob Mercer likes fast motorcycles, faster women, and screaming space fighters. As a reckless fighter jock in the Resistance fleet battling the Corsican Empire, he lives solely for the thrill of taking out as many Imperial bogeys as he can. When Jake is put in the captain's chair of the most advanced warship in the galaxy, he has to face down a psychopathic Imperial Admiral bent on utterly destroying the Resistance and Earth itself.

  Hollow Space: Venture - by T.F. Grant & C.F. Barnes

  Forced to hyperjump during a brutal ambush, Sara Lorelle, navigator of the the last human colony ship, discovers they’ve jumped to somewhere that shouldn’t exist. Trapped inside a pocket universe known only as Hollow Space, where technology inexplicably fails, Sara and her crew have to defy all odds to survive.

  Attack on Phoenix - by
Megg Jensen

  Two hundred years ago, an interplanetary expedition crashed on a deserted planet. They caught the attention of the dragzhi, an aggressive alien species, and found themselves in the midst of a war they were doomed to lose. Torsten Vikker, a soldier who’d rather read than fight, is on a mission to recover an artifact rumored to have the power to defeat the dragzhi. Rell, a woman raised in a cult, will stop at nothing to keep him away from what she holds sacred. Yet only together can they hope to save humanity from utter annihilation.

  Icarus - by Matt Verish

  Cole Musgrave’s dream of interstellar travel is about to become a nightmare. When a high-profile delivery is compromised aboard a state-of-the-art cargo vessel, the newly appointed captain finds himself embroiled in a deadly assignment far above his pay grade. But this unorthodox cargo pilot won’t go down without a fight—even after he is faced with a choice that will alter the course of his life forever.

  Containment - by Susan Kaye Quinn

  The Mining Master of Thebe is all alone… not counting the scavenger drones, foundry nanites, and magtread tractors buzzing across the tiny Jovian moon. So when a spindly tower of rocks mysteriously appears at the pole, it’s enough to vex the Mining Master’s machine-sourced intelligence like dust trapped in a harvester joint. Reporting it could mean reassignment to the Outer Belt… but probing the mystery further threatens to unlock something that might have been better left... contained.

  Light of the Earth - by Annie Bellet

  Ian and Jack Talley and the Prometheus Space Program set a record for the fastest manned flight to Jupiter. But the journey ended in disaster, crippling Jack and killing the rest of the team. Ten years later, an eccentric multi-billionaire offers them all his money, and a second chance, if they'll fly him to Pluto. The Talley brothers reunite their team, ready to rekindle the dream of manned space flight. But self-doubts and technological issues both old and new appear, leaving the question open: are they making history? Or repeating it? And finding the answers could cost them far more than the Prometheus program.

  Prelude to Resistance - by Nick Webb

  Fighter Pilot Lieutenant Jacob Mercer learns the leader of the Resistance, Admiral Pritchard, has a secret that could change the course of the war. The question is, will he live long enough to find out what it is.

  The Hunted - by Melissa Lason

  On the dusty streets of Sentos thugs and thieves abound. One man who used to call those same streets home is sent into clean them up. Kyro is a bounty hunter of great reputation but when he returns to Sentos his skills are truly tested. How will he escape the streets when they are all against him? Where will Kyro run when the ghosts from his past out-number those he can trust? Who is truly the hunter and who is the hunted?

  The Children of Selene - by Michelle Garza

  Captain Bronson and his crew work for Project Conservator, hauling artifacts from the dying planet earth back to the three colonies that now hold the last of the human race. They are sent on a run in the desolate waste lands beyond all cities or military bases to retrieve the contents of a mountain tomb, but there is something wrong with the cargo…

  The Atlantis Ship

  A Carson Mach Adventure

  By

  A.C. Hadfield

  Copyright © 2015 by Vast Frontiers Ltd.

  All Rights Reserved

  Chapter One

  The outer rim planet, Retsina, never ceased to amaze Ethan whenever he had to carry out repairs on Orbital Station Forty.

  A crusty frozen surface enveloped the dwarf planet. Black lines of dust deposits, left by erupting nitrogen geysers, streaked across its thick polar cap.

  One of the Quick Reaction Force satellites, situated outside the station’s hypervelocity shield, failed to authenticate the defensive drones on the planet’s surface. Images from the command center’s remote-controlled maintenance vehicle showed a small hole punctured in the transponder unit, which meant a manual repair.

  Space junk left over from the Century War, twenty standard years ago, littered the frontier section of the Commonwealth-controlled Salus Sphere, a twenty-light-year-wide sector of stars and planets.

  Debris from a destroyed ship was usually the likely candidate.

  Ethan maneuvered his hand-control unit and thrusted toward the top of the huge ring-shaped structure that housed two hundred crew. He floated past the solid dark gray walls of the habitation deck and hydroponic farm and grabbed the maintenance rail that led to the fifty-meter-wide communications platform.

  A small ship powered across space thousands of meters below; its fusion motors emitted a blue glow. Ethan’s magnetic boots connected with the platform and he used the power of his suit’s exo-legs to approach the damaged satellite.

  “Engineer Five in position,” he said through the helmet’s comm system.

  “Roger that,” replied a female voice from the communications deck. “Do you see any other damage?”

  A visual inspection of the solid black bases around the nine working high- and low-gain antennas revealed no other impact damage. The beam expander housing for the long-range comms had two dents and a black scuff, but they had been present since he started his posting on the station a year ago.

  “All looks good apart from Sat Two,” Ethan said. He crouched in front of its base and ran a gloved finger around the jagged hole. “Stand by for an assessment. Out.”

  He unclipped his bolt remover from his hip and placed it against the panel.

  On the newer stations, this could all be done from the inside, but all junior engineers were posted to the older stations on the frontier to serve their time. The war against the horans ended twenty years ago. Drones were only occasionally scrambled from Retsina. They shadowed ships that strayed into the area of dead space designated as the NCZ—non-combat zone—defined in a peace treaty between the two empires.

  A weak orange glow crept across the platform, brightening the antennas and base unit. Ethan clipped the tool back on his belt and turned to view the light source.

  Orange mist swirled in a huge circle about fifty klicks away from the station.

  Ethan’s heart rate spiked. “What the hell is that?”

  Static interference hissed through the comm speaker, masking the response. He switched to the command channel.

  “This is Engineer Five on the comms platform—”

  Frantic voices cut him off. They talked about a massive energy source and transmitted back to CW command on Fides Prime, asking for advice.

  A brilliant white light engulfed the center of the swirling mass. The orange mist extended out, forming a huge, roiling tunnel. Ethan squinted and turned away from the eye-piercing glare.

  He grabbed the maintenance rail and moved back down the station, wanting to get to safety, realizing this phenomenon was probably a wormhole; it certainly looked like one to him. But where the hell did it come from?

  Nobody in the Commonwealth or Axis Combine empires had harnessed wormhole technology. They were still considered spontaneous occurrences, but it seemed too convenient that this phenomenon had appeared next to the station.

  The bright light reflecting off the metallic walls of the habitation deck dulled to an orange glow. Ethan glanced over his shoulder.

  An impossibly large light-gray trapezium-shaped ship, with myriad cannons mounted on the top and both sides of its hull, had blocked out the light at the end of the tunnel. It was bigger than anything in the CW or Axis fleets, with the width at least the size of two destroyers.

  Could it be? He thought… could it be the… Atlantis Ship? But it was just a rumor, a myth from the Century War: a ship so powerful that it could appear and disappear at will, and take down the most powerful of destroyers, seemingly on a whim. No one knew if it was real or not, it had never been caught on camera. The only records were those from panicked captains and ensigns.

  A command center operator sent repeated messages asking for identification. Nobody responded and the ship proceeded through the tun
nel. The captain ordered the weapons to lock on. The QRF (Quick Response Force) drones immediately scrambled from Retsina.

  “This is Engineer Five. I’m still—” Ethan said.

  Two blue bolts zipped from the top cannons of the approaching ship. Ethan gripped the rail and tensed. A second later, both energy bolts slammed into the side of the station.

  The structure shook violently, huge pieces of infrastructure splintering and spinning off into space.

  Ethan lost his grip and floated away from the station. He gasped at the pair of ten-meter-wide smoldering holes in the superstructure. Mangled debris surrounded him. His comms feed cut to silence.

  Cannons on either side of the attacking ship fired. Ethan thrust away, avoiding pieces of wreckage. Four blue bolts smashed the station, creating a blinding flash of light all around him, obscuring his vision.

  The comms platform had been reduced to a twisted mess. The command center took a direct hit and lights flickered off around the top half of the cylindrical station. The alien ship cruised out of the side of the orange tunnel and headed away. Its cannons swiveled on their turrets, maintaining aim.

  Ethan knew the damage was terminal and closed his eyes for a moment, thinking about the horror his colleagues must have suffered. They could’ve handled two hits away from the key infrastructure by shutting down the areas, but nothing like this. He let out a deep breath, activated his distress beacon, and checked the air supply readings on his HUD. His only chance of survival was if a CW ship came in response.

  Small parts of debris floated to Ethan’s left. He glanced back at the wormhole. Its swirling orange wall continued to extend forward. Parts of the station that exploded were being sucked in.

  The mouth of the tunnel widened. Ethan drifted toward it. He thrust against the force, but it had no effect. His velocity increased and a brilliant white light flashed at the far end of the tunnel again.

  He screamed as he let out the full load of energy in his motors, but it was useless. He spun around and looked back. The wormhole had surrounded the station and it careered toward him, closing in and gathering momentum as it entered further into the swirling anomaly.