Author Description

Murkor's barren surface, stifling heat, and noxious atmosphere make it a barely habitable hellhole. But even its isolated location on the Spiral Arm could not deter Earth's two opposing superpowers, Unión Latino and Coalition, from establishing planetary bases and pursuing their economic and ethnic animosity. At great expense, Coalition established an opulent facility where a valuable mineral is prepared for off-world shipping-until the lack of water required for processing ends operations and dreams of riches for a group of increasingly disgruntled and belligerent mining techs. One hundred kilometers away lies Unión Latino's deteriorating outpost. Facing a critical failure of their environmental support system, Comandante Andre Garcia and his beleaguered crew weigh the consequences of their only advantage: They control most of the planet's subterranean water reserves. The one commodity the enemy desperately lacks. Risking a wider confrontation, Coalition sends Commander Jennifer Ellis to Murkor with orders to seize the opposition's resources- an order that, at any cost, she is determined to resist. As tensions quickly escalate, there are troubling signs that an elusive entity haunts the planet. Are the colonists' strange symptoms the result of paranoia, mistrust, and fear? Or, as some believe, they are not alone?