Salvage Search

They fled their home system to escape war and the machinations of the elites seeking to control them. Unfortunately for former slave Symeon Brashniev and his former owner, Princess Kavya Rurikid, there was no escape. Within minutes of exiting the newly constructed Bith gate, the two were conscripted into a civil war between two planets.

Symeon, having lived the life of a slave, sees his conscription as an opportunity. In return for his service, he will receive full citizenship from his sponsor planet, Vargas. He will be free. And while Symeon might not relish the idea of war, having an artificial intelligence in his head makes the prospect of combat a lot less daunting.

Kavya wants no part of the war. Though she has no desire to return home to the Phoenix System, she’s equally uninterested in fighting for strangers. From her perspective, forcibly conscripting outsiders to fight a war is tantamount to the slavery she and Symeon escaped when they left. When false memories are implanted in her mind, though, she will have to fight hard to retain her independent spirit, or she risks losing everything.

But there is more to this ongoing conflict. A new race of automatons—seemingly sentient but totally soulless—are on the rise. And they have only one enemy…

All biological life.