So, Van Tudor is no longer a Peacemaker, Master or otherwise! Yeah, that’s were the story ended in the last book. He made a huge tactical error in his attempt to attack and destroy a Equal Grasp convoy out near Wolf 424. That attack resulted in the loss of the battleship *Iowa* which had been crewed by many Conoku, children of Linulla. Van and his crew are now on Starsmith to deliver nineteen boxes, i.e., coffins containing the departed Conoku. To say that Van and the rest of his crew were torn with guilt would be an understatement. Van didn’t even know if Linulla would even want to talk to him, but he was going to at least make sure these young Conoku were returned home.
Fortunately, for Van, Linulla, while definately saddened with the lost of so many young Conoku, knew that they were adults that had chosen to serve aboard the *Iowa* knowing full well the consequences of going into battle. So Linulla didn’t have any resentment towards Van and understood that Tudor would be suffering for this loss as well of a number of other friends that were killed in the battle. He even offered Van the support to use Starsmith as a home base now that he was actually wanted by the Peacemaker Guild.
Yet, Van knew that he couldn’t stay in one place. They now were not only wanted by the Peacemakers, but also members of the Equal Grasp. That criminal organiaztion was now only growing stronger while the Guild appeared to be coming apart at the seams. Yotov was now know to be the mastermind behind the Equal Grasp on Earth and she was also pulling strings on Anvil Dark slowly putting her supporters in ever powerful positions. Van had to do something, but he didn’t have a clue as to what.
But first they had to asset what they didn’t have to work with. They did have a small, very stealthy ship called the *Prowler* given to them by Groshenko. It could allow them to approach places and people that otherwise they couldn’t reach without being blasted in to dust. But, that ship, the *Fafnir* and the *Frankie* were all they had to move around in. So they headed to Shhh, the hidden planet which they did have some sort of base to work out of, but it didn’t have many supplies or equpipment they were going to need. They didn’t even have a place to refuel any of their ships so traveling was going to be very difficult if that problem wasn’t solved. They needed a plan and a break even if it was something minor that went their way.
They finally decided they couldn’t just sit on Shhh if they were going to get rid of their enemies. Food was one of the primary needs of all the crew, except of coure the AIs, and food was plentiful on Earth. So that’s where they were going. Van needed to find out if everyone on Earth was doing Ok and staying out of trouble with the Equal Grasp. He also wanted to demonstrate that while he might be down, he was not out and was still going to have the Equal Grasp pay for their crimes.
They also had a list of missing or stolen goods and ships that the Guild had been working on for quite some time. Each of the items on this list was valuable to someone who was willing to pay a bounty to have them recovered or the items themselves were valuable. Some had been on the list for so long that the original owners might not be alive so whatever was found would be the property of the founder. The Fafnir began looking for some of these items and was having some luck initially, but the stuff they were finding just didn’t bring in that much in bonds. Yet, there was one individual that was on the list with a 200,000 bond bounty. He seemed to have been implicated in several murders but was quite elusive to find. But with Netty, Netty-P and Perry working on searching databases around the galaxy, they sound found his probably location. The guy they found turned out to be a dupe of the Equal Grasp, but he was a very wealthy dupe. He did offer Van quite a sum to allow him to go on his way with the promise that he wouldn’t be working for the Equal Grasp any longer. That suited Van since he knew the guy was just being framed and was really harmless, so they let him go, but not before getting his money.
They started hitting other things on the list of lost and stolen items and eventually came across items that seemed to have been strategically placed so they could be retrieved at some later day. One such place was a fuel depot that also had a secret storage compartment with some very valuable chips and bonds. Plus once the hacked into the fuel depot system, they had instant access to larger quantities of fuel for their ships. This was a win-win for Van and his crew. It was more so because this fuel depot also belonged to the Equal Grasp who had just lost a great deal of their assets. Van and his crew were going for more and this was going to hurt the Equal Grasp a great deal.
But, at the same time, Van was getting concerned with the happenings at Anvil Dark and with the Guild. Still, he found a lot of his former associates more than willing to help him out. They also didn’t like what was happening on Anvil Dark so most were staying away from the place. Van came up with an idea that required them to infiltrate the fortress so he could release a number of AIs that were locked into the Guild by their programming. If he could release these AIs, then they might give him the army he needed to take down the Equal Grasp and then do something to fix or remake the Guild into the organization it was supposed to be.
This was going to take a tremendous effort, but Van was finding out that they people he had previously helped were more than willing to return the favor. But, one thing he knew that had to be done immediately was to return Torina to her homeworld so she could eventually have their child(children). She was in no shape to go into harms way. Even she knew that.
This series is building up to something. Van finds himself at the center of all that is going on and he has plans on how he wants to get things done. Yet, his the bounty on his head placed by the Equal Grasp is growing alarmingly large. Will one of his “friends” finally succumb to the lure of such a high bounty? Maybe we’ll find out in the book 22, “Bright Red Line, now available on Amazon.