years later.
The Heritage Trilogy
2039–2042: Semper Mars
2040: 1st UN War. March by “Sands of Mars Garroway.” Battle of Cydonia. Discovery of the Cydonian Cave of Wonders.
2040–2042: Luna Marine
2042: Battle of Tsiolkovsky. Discovery of An base on the Moon.
2067: Europa Strike
2067: Sino-American War. Discovery of the Singer under the Europan ice.
The Legacy Trilogy
2138–2148: Star Corps
2148: Battle of Ishtar. Treaty with An of Lalande 21185. Earth survey vessel Wings of Isis destroyed while approaching the Sirius Stargate.
2148–2170: Battlespace
2170: Battle of Sirius Gate. Contact with the N’mah, an amphibious species living inside the gate structure. Data collected electronically fills in some information about the Xul, and leads to a Xul node in Cluster Space, thirty thousand light years from Sol. A Marine assault force uses the gate to enter Cluster Space and destroy this gate.
2314–2333: Star Marines
2314: Armageddonfall
2323: Battle of Night’s Edge. Destruction of Xul Fleet and world in Night’s Edge Space.
The Inheritance Trilogy
2877: Star Strike
2877 [1102 M.E..]: 1MIEF departs for Puller 695. Battle of Puller 695 against Pan-Europeans. Contact with Eulers in Cygni Space. Battle of Cygni Space. Destruction of star in Starwall Space, eliminating local Xul node.
2886: Galactic Corps
2886 [1111 M.E.]: Raid on Cluster Space by 1MIEF. Discovery of stargate path to major Xul node at Galactic Core.
2887 [1112 M.E.]: Operation Heartfire. Assault on the Galactic Core.
4004: Semper Human
3152: Volunteer elements of the Marine third Division enter extended cybernetic hibernation.
3214: Formation of the Galactic Associative.
4004 [2229 A.M.]: Dahl Incursion. Contact with the Tarantulae. Attack on Xul presence within the Quantum Sea. Xenophobe Collapse.
4005 [2230 A.M.] Re-establishment of the United States Marine Corps.
Stranded …
Behind him, the Samuel Nicholas was fast dwindling to a lopsided disk as Garwe and fifteen other War Dogs hurtled toward Objective Reality. Fusion bursts and antimatter warheads, positron beams, gravitics disruptors, and lasers at x-ray and gamma frequencies crisscrossed the gulf of space between worldlet and asteroid-sized starship, eliciting dazzling flashes and twinkles of light, expanding clouds of dust and white-hot plasma on the surfaces of both. Chunks of molten rock and hull metal boiled off into hard vacuum. The Nicholas wouldn’t be able to take that kind of point-blank bombardment for long.
Which was why, several long seconds later, the Samuel Nicholas vanished, rotating back up into normal four-D space.
And the cloud of Marine fighters, strikepods, and twelve heavy naval vessels were left alone to confront the Xul world.
“Bastards!” Dravis Mortin said over the squadron channel.
“Belay that,” Captain Xander’s voice snapped. “Pay attention to your approach!”
Garroway knew, with the Samuel Nicholas gone, none of the Marines of 1MarDiv would be going home.
We are now on our own …
Prologue
Some three hundred fifty light years from the exact center of the Milky Way Galaxy, the Marine OM-27 Eavesdropper Major Dion Williams forced its way through the howling storm.
The howl, in this case, was purely electronic in the vacuum of space, a shrill screech caused by the flux of dust particles interacting with the Williams’ magnetic shields. But since the tiny vessel’s crew consisted of uploaded t-Human minds and a powerful Artificial Intelligence named Luther, all of them resident within the Williams’ electronic circuitry, they “heard” the interference as a shrieking roar. The tiny vessel shuddered as it plowed through the deadly wavefront of charged particles.
“Sir! There it is again!” Lieutenant (u/l) Miek Vrellit indicated a pulse of coherent energy coming through the primary scanner. “Do you see it?”
“Yeah,” Captain (u/l) Foress Talendiaminh replied. “Looks like a gravitational lensing effect.”
“Yeah, but it’s not noise! There’s real data in there!”
“What do you make of it, Luther?”
“Lieutenant Vrellit is correct,” the AI replied, as the data sang across the ship’s circuitry. “There is data content. I cannot, however, read it. This appears to be a new type of encryption.”
“But the signal’s coming from inside the event horizon!” Talendiaminh said. “That’s impossible!”
“I suggest, sir,” the AI said, “that we record what we can and transmit it to HQ. Let them determine what is or is not possible.”
“Agreed.”
But then, as seconds passed, Vrellit sensed something else. “Wait a second! Anyone feel that?”
“What?”
“Something like …”
And then circuitry flared into a white-hot mist, followed half a second later by a fast-expanding cloud of gas as the Williams began to dissolve.
The monitor’s faster-than-light QCC signals were already being received some twenty-six thousand light years away, on the remote outskirts of Earth’s solar system. The last transmission received was Lieutenant Vrellit’s electronic voice, a shriek louder than the storm of
