This seems to be a story where everyone of the plot streams seem to be heading towards the same thing. I’m not sure that’s what’s going to happen, but I bet it does. Still, in this book, nothing much does really happen to get the various parties together. In the last book, Gareth Weston met up with his daughter, Lieutenant Commander Chelsea Weston, in a rather explosive way. They all had met at a military refueling station only to find it had been taken over by some pirates not affiliated with Lyra Vahst. She and her small group had gone there to steal fuel and get some classified maps. Lyra was looking for some kind of hidden military outpost or warehouse that she thought could be looted and make them rich. Unfortunately, the pirates at the refueling station weren’t friendly. She and her two sidekicks barely escaped when the fueling station blew up.
They all managed to get on the small starship that was owned by Dr. Keppler. Former Commander Weston, Chelsea’s Dad, had flown that ship from Earth to find his Daughter. While doing that, he became aware of the refueling depot and helped get everyone away from it before it exploded. Everyone included a Sergeant Driver, a quasi-bodyguard for an Ambassador, Lyra, Barty, Zed, and of course Chelsea. While this was going on, a Corporeal Sarah Tesh and one other had managed to flee a space station above an Earth colony planet only to crash on the planet and find that the Veldon were invading.
The Veldon’s as you read in the last book, made an unprovoked and very surprising attack on Earth, destroying the five Earth fleets and then bombarding all the population centers on the planet. That was also why Commander Gareth Weston and Dr. Keppler had to flee Earth. Admiral Thomas Gaston was commanding a fleet way out in the middle of nowhere space so they weren’t around when the Earth attacked. Now he finds himself in the position of being the only surviving human fleet, but no where near capable of taking on the Veldons. So, he’s trying to find out what exactly happened on Earth and what other military assets might also have survived. He does find out that the Defense Secretary had managed to escape and fled to Korla space. The Korla were an alien race that were supposed to be allied with Earth. Admiral Gaston was hoping the Korla would begin assisting in his fight against the Veldon. The Sec. Def. had been in discussions with the Korla government, but it didn’t seem promising.
Back to Commander Weston and his group, they have located a very secret, classified supposed military outpost that might provide them refuge for a time if they can get into it. This is the bulk of this story. They crash-land Dr. Keppler’s starship on the station and now have to find another ship in order to get back to anywhere. Unfortunately, the station is occupied by some rather strange humans. They are definitely not friendly.
So, I think the Admiral’s fleet, Commander Weston’s group and even Corporal Tesh will all some how get together and then see what they can do against the Veldons. It’s going to be interesting to see how this all ends since there doesn’t seem to be any other military forces capable of attacking and defeating the Veldons. In the meantime, they have or are thoroughly destroying everything on the planet. Even if these humans some how do defeat the Veldons, they might not have a planet to go home to.
This series continues in book 3, “War Torn”, which I have already placed on my reading list.\