About Defiant Space:
The crew of Fidelity are the only hope to save their planet from destruction.
When an armada of predatory warships come to annex their world, the inhabitants of planet Vale Reach must face the dreaded threats that stalk their galaxy. Terrors lurk in the uncharted depths of space, ready to crush their world and enslave its people. A lone starship is sent on an impossible journey. But is it already too late?
Caladon Heit wants to prevent the destruction of everything he knows. Together, the ship’s crew must overcome the ferocious marauders and brutal empires that seek to eradicate them all.
In space, they will find a harsh and remorseless environment. Unimaginable enemies await behind every moon and asteroid. The starship Fidelity will demand sacrifices from every crew member to reach its destination. They must encounters with horrific enemies across unknown star systems. Will they emerge with their resolve and their starship intact? Or will Fidelity and their homeworld be annihilated?
This is the first novel in the Infinite Void Series.
Excerpt:
The skies were red and orange over Planet Fifteen. Like all worlds, it had an official name, perhaps multiple, but that didn’t matter. Thick storms threw their ship from side to side. They were now fully within the planet’s atmosphere, the front deflector driving a path through the gloom. At the speed they were traveling, each cloud hit them with enough momentum to rattle the whole ship. The lower they descended, the more opaque the skies became above them and the more protected they were from laser damage. Occasionally, Fidelity reached a pocket of empty air in the clouds, and the screens showed a view toward the horizon that stretched for thousands of miles across the gas giant.
“Reduce the main thruster to low power. Cool the temperature,” Captain Haran said. “We can use the air friction on the deflector to control our path.” Fidelity could minimize its heat signature to aid their disappearance among the clouds.
“The Enforcers aren’t far away,” Cal reported. “They aren’t hiding their signals much. I detected a significant heat impact as they entered the cloud level. They’re driving through the atmospheric burn at a huge temperature, it’s a much faster velocity than we can manage.”
A starship could travel through vacuum far faster than through any kind of air, Haran knew. Ships descending into gas clouds experienced significant deceleration and immense heat friction. Fidelity was limited in the speed they could push through the thick atmosphere, or else they would break apart from extreme turbulence. The Enforcers’ ship, with its armored front prow and energy shields, could tolerate far higher entry heat and could plunge deeper and faster through the murky gases of the planet than Fidelity.
“The Enforcers may have actually overtaken us by now,” Cal said. “We can’t tell if they’re ahead of us or behind.”
If Fidelity entered into an empty patch of clouds and the Enforcers were waiting for them, their ship could be hit by a close-range laser strike. That would mean death for them all.
“We need something more,” Captain Haran said. “We need a powerful storm. A big one.”
Haran brought up a series of map locations on screen. The only data they had about their environment was from simple visual analysis as they passed between the ochre clouds.
“Here, bring us into this.” She directed them toward a massive turbulent vortex towering over the planet.
Fidelity swerved, and everyone aboard was thrown to one side as it changed direction. The ship maneuvered completely differently inside atmosphere. Far steeper turning angles could be achieved using the air resistance, but sudden disintegration was an ever-present danger. The entire structure of the ship was facing stress forces much higher than it’d been designed to handle. If the ship turned too sharply and too fast, the wind forces would shear through the metal.
As they approached the vast storm, the bridge screens showed the churning face of the vortex, the external wall of the hurricane beyond which chaos awaited. The twisting pillar of vapor rose over the world like the limitless wrath of god, and tumbled down into bottomless depths below.
“Report on the Enforcers’ ship,” Captain Haran said.
“It’s close,” Cal said.
Fidelity risked annihilation if they hesitated to take cover.
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