I have missed this series. If you’re new to the series, I recommend you start at book 1 and get caught up. The concepts in this book take some getting used to and even Centurion James McGill takes some getting used to. McGill is a mercenary for Legion Varus. You should know all about that by now since this is the 20th book in the series. He’s been a Centurion for a long time, but considering how long you can live in this future, he could be a Centurion for a long, long time. Right now, he’s between missions which means he’s on his own to do whatever he wants until recalled. He’s back in what he calls the swamp in Georgia where his parents also reside. Fortunately, McGill has a small shack in the back of the property where he does pretty much anything.
He’s woken up this one find morning to an insistent buzzing on his tapper. That’s like a computer built into his forearm. He continues to ignore it still trying to wake up. The call stops shortly, but then starts up again which is unusual. If it was important and from Legion HQ they would just bypass any security protocols and make him answer. Yet, when he looked to see who was calling he found out it was his on-again/off-again girlfriend Gina Turov who also happened to be his bosses boss since she was a Imperator in Legion Varus. Gina was famous for busting into McGills activities for sometime important stuff while other times just to see if she could catch him with another woman. Anyway, this wasn’t an official call but Turov wanted McGill to do a couple of things for her.
McGill didn’t mind doing things for Gina since she usually paid him back in some very pleasant ways. But this time he thought she might have gone off the deep end. Gina wanted McGill to kill her in a very public place so everyone could see that she was dead. She also wanted McGill to find Drusus, the former Consul of Earth. Apparently, when the need for a Consul of Earth had arisen, the Ruling Council of Public Servants appointed him to the position. Now that the position of Consul wasn’t necessarily needed, they removed him planning on choosing a more manageable new Consul. Since Alexander Turov, Gina’s father, was on of the senior Public Servants, he had his eye on appointing Gina as the new Consul.
The problem with this is that Gina had an inkling that old Drusus had not only been removed from his position, but he had been put into permanent storage. She believed his brain was now housed deep in the pits of Legion HQ where he would stay for all eternity. The Legion and the Council did this from time to time to those they thought could be a threat to themselves or those they wanted to keep for memories and experiences, but not to get in the way. Gina didn’t want this to happen to her, she liked being alive and keeping her youthful figure. So, she thought if McGill killed her off then they would elect a new Consul by the time she was revived. Again, remember that those killed in this future can be sent through an alien revival machine and brought back to life with a younger body if they wished. Or if they had fallen out of favor with their superiors, they could be give a permanent death and never come back.
Of course McGill didn’t relish the idea of him being seen killing a Imperator in front of a bunch of witnesses. That was kind of against Legion policy and could get him in very serious trouble. So he devised another way of killing off Gina without him getting the blame. He didn’t tell Gina of his plan because she probably wouldn’t have gone along with it, but she was going to be dead so what did it matter to her how she died!
Ok, so what does this have to do with Crystal World? Well, the book eventually gets to that part. It seems like these crystal entities have been attacking a lot of the Empire’s colonies and they have decided to step-in and stop this nonsense. They would have just sent Earth Legions, but they knew that that wasn’t going to be enough. So, they had put together a large Mogwa fleet led by Admiral Sateekas. This alien Admiral and McGill had had dealings previously and McGill seemed to be the only human that could get along with the old Admiral. Still, that didn’t prevent him from using McGill in this fight against the Crystal entities. So, will this new war be successful and how will McGill come out smelling like a rose as he always seems to do. And when, if ever will Imperator Gina Turov come back to life? Good questions all answered in the book.
This series is fun to read because it has a big splash of humor all over the place. McGill is one cool dude and gets away with murder and much more. I already know book 21, “Throne World”, is out and available on Amazon. It’s on my reading list already.