Eric Thomson

What is the value of one life in an interstellar war that has already claimed millions? And if that single life doesn't matter, are any others worth saving?A distress signal draws Siobhan Dunmoore's Q-ship Iolanthe, a battlecruiser disguised as a bulk freighter, away from her devastatingly successful hunt through Shrehari occupied space and plunges Dunmoore into a dark, merciless universe of competing government organizations, undercover warfare, and organized crime on a galactic scale. Along the way, she crosses paths with an old foe and an uncertain ally as she and her crew race against time and determined opposition to rescue innocent civilians condemned merely because they were in the wrong place at the wrong moment. Powerful forces within the Commonwealth would call a handful of lives collateral damage in humanity's existential struggle against the Shrehari Empire. But Dunmoore won't accept that they aren't worth saving even if it puts her at cross-purposes with her new commanding officer and the Commonwealth's fearsome security bureau. After all, her oath to serve and defend has no limitations and no expiry date.

Terrorists working for traitors intent on transforming the Commonwealth into a brutal empire are preparing to spread mayhem across the vulnerable and increasingly unstable Rim Sector. Their aim: replace sovereign star system governments with satraps under the direct control of Earth, thereby undoing generations of civil peace between humanity's many fractious branches.During an operation to eliminate a radical revolutionary movement on one of the Rim Sector's most important colonies, Major Decker and Commander Talyn stumble across evidence pointing at a threat more significant than any they've encountered so far, evidence suppressed by Black Sword's remaining moles in Naval Intelligence.With countless lives on the line, Decker and Talyn race against time and enemies ensconced in high places to undo a conspiracy aimed at reshaping an entire sector before irreversible damage propels the Commonwealth down a dark path which can only end in one last, murderous civil war killing billions.This time, they must strike fast, strike hard and strike without orders from Fleet HQ. But Decker is tired of fighting the same battles over and over again. He wants this mission to be the last one and is willing to do whatever it takes. After all, Decker is not only among Naval Intelligence's deadliest operatives, he's also one of the Few...

Wanted by their enemies for exposing the Black Sword cabal and faced with the difficult task of rebuilding the Special Operations Division while treason remains rampant, Major Zack Decker and Commander Hera Talyn are stuck in desk jobs. Until, that is, the Coalition and its minions decide to make things very personal. Forced back into the role of field operatives, they discover a plot to destabilize an entire sector and bring it under the iron-fisted control of a Commonwealth government eager to abandon democracy in favor of imperial dreams. Racing against time and soulless foes, they have one chance to prevent a civil war and rescue someone more precious to Zack Decker than any other living thing in the entire universe: the daughter he hasn't seen for twenty years. Not even the threat of disgrace and imminent death are enough to deter Decker because, as his foes will find out once again, he's still one of the Few...

Covert missions are failing, Fleet officers are vanishing, and Naval Intelligence is losing its eyes, ears, and the ability to strike at its foes. After Zack Decker and Hera Talyn, the Special Operations Section's deadliest agents, narrowly escape betrayal for the third time in a row, the Marine suspects something more than bad luck is in play. For years, the Fleet has been fighting a shadowy cold war against factions in the Commonwealth determined to strangle democracy and give birth to an empire. Has that war turned hot without warning? In a quest for answers, Zack Decker volunteers to undertake his riskiest mission yet. With treason rampant at the heart of the Fleet, perhaps even within Naval Intelligence itself, he and Talyn must disappear until they discover the identity of their unseen enemies. Along the way, Decker will come face to face with humanity's worst impulses and its noblest spirits. And though he can't trust his colleagues and superiors, other than his partner Hera, he knows he can always trust his Pathfinder comrades to stand tall against disloyalty. The Marine Corps' elite will gladly join him in teaching traitors the real meaning of unrestrained covert warfare. After all, spy or not, Zack Decker is still one of the Few.

Someone was setting fire to the Commonwealth Rim, nurturing a storm to drag humanity through the horrors of colonial warfare and thereby hasten the rise of Empire. Their plan had just one fatal flaw: it didn't count on an ex-Marine pathfinder with a grudge, a dagger and a deadly partner. Zack Decker had seen enough of war to know this one had to be stopped before it turned into an all-out bloodbath, even if that meant ignoring orders and risking his mission as well as his life. After all, he was still one of the Few...

Investigating war crimes isn't Assistant Commissioner Caelin Morrow's usual sort of case. She normally hunts down corrupt Commonwealth officials. But with the reorganization of the Professional Compliance Bureau's Anti-Corruption Division, Morrow inherits primary responsibility for military crimes requiring outside scrutiny. And for her first case as the new head of Anti-Corruption Unit 12 (Military Crimes), she's heading for the Novaya Sibir star system with her team to look into allegations the elite 212th Pathfinder Squadron committed atrocities on a Protectorate Zone rogue colony. But all is not as it seems, and dirty politics soon rear their ugly head. Unfortunately for those who play fast and loose with the truth, Caelin Morrow is not only a superb investigator. She'll also do whatever is necessary to take out the garbage.

Some people never learn that it's a really bad idea to mess with a Marine Pathfinder, even one who has been forced into early retirement. Zack Decker just wanted to be left alone so he could live a quiet life with the woman he loved and make up for lost time, but his enemies simply couldn't resist the temptation to pursue their vendetta. One moment, he was hauling cargo across the depths of interstellar space, the next he was in the hands of pirates and headed for the barbaric worlds beyond the Coalsack nebula, to be sold into captivity. Marines don't make good slaves and Zack was more than happy to show everyone why he should have been killed straight away, because he was coming back, looking for blood. Revenge might be cold comfort, but he would remind them once again that he was still one of the Few...

Zack Decker wanted only one thing in life: to fight as a Marine Pathfinder. But his temper and his loathing for careerist officers cost him dearly. Forced into early retirement, with a wife who left him long ago, no job, no friends and no future, the former sergeant crawled into a bottle and stayed there, moving from planet to planet, looking for some reason to keep on living. Until, that is, he wandered into a bar owned by an old Marine buddy who offered to help. On the run after killing a corrupt cop, and nowhere to hide, he accepted. Decker would have done better to head for the hills, or surrender to the militia, however old friends could be persuasive and he soon found himself signing on as security officer of a starship with dubious owners and a dubious crew, doing things for his new employer that tested the old saying 'Once a Marine, always a Marine.' Curiosity was Decker's other major failing and in short order he was on the run, hunted by a shadowy government organisation, and in possession of a secret that could destroy the Commonwealth. It was a secret to die for, and the people on his trail wanted to make sure he did. Along the way, they forgot that he could still fight like one of the Few...

History has a habit of reaching out from the grave and reminding us of our species' greatest failings.Humanity's Migration Wars which birthed the Commonwealth of Sovereign Star Systems were the deadliest and most destructive in history. But not everyone draws the same lessons from past atrocities that were burned into the human psyche. For some, our species must do anything to avoid another murderous civil war, including the overthrow of the current political system. For others, a rerun, minus the mistakes made the last time, would once more consolidate power in the hands of the central government on Earth.When a reconnaissance droid uncovers a lost munitions bunker from the Second Migration War containing the most horrific biological and chemical warheads ever invented, Rear Admiral Hera Talyn of Naval Intelligence immediately grasps the deadly ramifications. She quickly dispatches Ghost Squadron's Erinye Company to guard the discovery on Keros, an airless, dead planet with nothing more than a mining outpost, until the deadly payloads can be retrieved. However, those who would use the forbidden weapons to achieve their own goals still have spies inside Fleet Headquarters and are also moving fast. But Major Curtis Delgado, Erinye Company's commanding officer, uncovers deeper mysteries on Keros than just weapons of mass destruction and must race against time and secret enemies to prepare for an all-out assault. Because he knows that if the warheads fall into the wrong hands, history could repeat itself, this time as an even greater tragedy.

Chaos, created by factions determined to end the centuries-old accord between human settled worlds and Earth, is spreading at an alarming rate.Centralists, aided and abetted by their corporate paymasters, are working hard to destabilize sovereign star systems and strip them of independence. Only the Fleet's hard-pressed Special Forces can stop those who would foment a series of violent revolutions and trigger a bloody civil conflict capable of destroying humanity's interstellar civilization. And that means the best of those Special Forces units, Ghost Squadron, doesn't lack for missions.Disrupting riots aimed at toppling star system governments, seeking out and destroying the Centralist-owned security and intelligence agency's assets, eradicating cartels used as Centralist cat's-paws - no operation is too complex. However, each mission takes them deeper into the heart of darkness, and before the Fleet can declare victory, Ghost Squadron may come to resemble the enemies it fights. Yet not using all the means at its disposal could result in the deaths of billions.But will the Special Forces' legendary prowess and valor suffice, both to save humanity and Ghost Squadron's soul? Or will the Commonwealth experience the horrors of an existential war before the Fleet can arrest the spiral into madness?

The Marines of Ghost Squadron are humanity's foremost black ops specialists who strike without warning and vanish without a trace. They will do whatever is necessary to protect humanity anywhere in the known galaxy. With the Commonwealth increasingly unstable thanks to venal politicians, greedy financiers, and power-hungry revolutionaries, they don't lack for missions.When an undercover Constabulary officer vanishes after uncovering a massive cartel-run human trafficking operation, the Commonwealth's interstellar police force calls for help from Naval Intelligence. Because the cartel's operations could upend the delicate political balance between the older core worlds and the more recently colonized outer star systems, Ghost Squadron gets the job. Its mission: find the missing Constabulary officer and choke off the growing slave trade bedeviling humanity's perilous galactic frontier.Ghost Squadron's commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Zachary Thomas Decker, spent the last ten years as a Naval Intelligence agent. His job was thwarting plots and terminating the Commonwealth's internal enemies alongside his partner, a trained assassin. Now, with several hundred of the deadliest Marines ever fielded at his back, Zack Decker will change the course of history and usher in a new era.Humanity's interstellar empire ended in "Ashes of Empire." Witness its birth a thousand years earlier in Eric Thomson's new series "Ghost Squadron."

The collapse of humanity's first interstellar empire is passing into legend, perhaps even myth, now that the ones who could remember those tumultuous years have merged with the Infinite Void. Tiny Lyonesse, the self-appointed guardian of all human knowledge tucked away in its wormhole cul-de-sac, has spent generations preparing to carry out Jonas Morane's plan of reuniting humanity. Unbeknown to citizens of a republic cut off from the rest of the galaxy, four star systems at the former empire's core also survived to preserve that which existed before the Great Scouring. Yet they took a darker path after witnessing firsthand the empire's demise in a bloodletting without precedent, which left them fearful about the future of what little remained.An uncompromising, hidebound military dictatorship, the Wyvern Hegemony is everything Lyonesse avoided becoming. Backed by a State Security Commission that uses the Void Sisters' abilities to root out the regime's enemies, its rule is absolute. Yet the Hegemony also harbors ambitions of reuniting humanity under its own banner, though the government has done little to advance its cause.Neither Lyonesse nor the Hegemony knows about each other. However, thanks to a twist of fate that leads State Security Colonel Crevan Torma and his assigned Void Sister on a voyage of discovery, this will soon change. But can the vanished empire's heirs meet in peace or will they continue the civil war that almost eradicated humanity across the stars?

Humanity's interstellar empire died in fire and blood, leaving wrecked star systems to face the long night of barbarism.One tiny spark of civilization remains: The Republic of Lyonesse, tucked away at the end of a wormhole cul-de-sac. Yet that last bastion could suffer the same dire fate.When the late empress unleashed the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse on her crumbling realm, Lyonesse escaped War and Famine. However, the Pale Rider, carrying pestilence and death, still roams the wormhole network, seeking to finish off what the Imperial Retribution Fleet missed decades earlier, and he has finally found the entrance to the Lyonesse branch. What about the White Rider who brings deceit and the worship of false prophets? Perhaps he is already on Lyonesse, undermining what Jonas Morane so laboriously created.Will the Navy's tiny, decrepit fleet stop plague ships from reaching Lyonesse while Morane and his ally Sister Gwenneth keep the fledgling republic from turning on itself?Or will Lyonesse join the rest of humanity in a long imperial night, one which might never end?

The most powerful empire in human history is rushing headlong toward destruction, ending our species' supremacy in the known galaxy.Two men with widely divergent visions are on a mission to save civilization in at least one sector, far from the imperial capital where a demented ruler holds sway. The first, Jonas Morane, wants to create an impregnable vault containing humanity's accumulated knowledge so those who survive the coming darkness can rebuild in decades instead of millennia. The other, Devy Custis, seeks to fend off collapse by founding a new empire in the Coalsack Sector, one free of the madness that caused this civil war. But will either resist the ravages of a genocidal empress, blood-maddened barbarians, and scheming admirals?Unfortunately, the vicissitudes of fate, abetted by greed and lust for power, could destroy both before they make their dreams a reality.Imperial Twilight is the second installment in Eric Thomson's saga Ashes of Empire, the story of a desperate attempt to preserve one last spark of civilization so that humanity does not vanish from the galaxy.