Gertrude and the others were glad to finally return to The Sun Dancer. Their stolen gunboat, renamed The Tiger’s Eye II by Tristan, had not taken long for the crew of pirates...

Gertrude stared at the tablet’s screen for a moment, scarcely believing that the Murovians had covered up the Emperor’s murder, or that Drusus was responsible, at least in part. Then she...

Gertrude eyed the stranger for a long time. He seemed content to watch her through the augmented vision of his mask, and was in no rush to start the hand-to-hand fight he knew was coming. His...

Night had fallen. Gertrude glanced at her half-dozen comrades, and was glad that they had embarked at once instead of waiting for daylight, and the boiling heat that would come with it. The...

The natives might be primitive, but they packed a hell of a punch. When Gertrude peeled her right eye open her head was ringing like a bell. Her artificial left eye flickered to life as she became...

“By the stars,” Nicephorus moaned. “What are we supposed to do now?”

Drusus laughed. Like everyone, except Gertrude, his voice was modulated by a filter mask. “Calm down. You sound...

Gertrude opened her eye. It was dark, and all she could hear were a few quiet groans of pain. Her head throbbed, and she felt the warmth of blood trickling down her temple. Flickering to life, her...

Coffee was not the same. It tasted just as good, but she couldn’t feel it warm her once she swallowed and it coursed down her artificial oesophagus. Brasidas and Drusus were briefing those...

The twenty hexapod robots, twin pulse cannons still trained on Gertrude, Brasidas and the others, began scuttling slowly towards the compound. The War Dogs shepherded the human pirates through the...

Brasidas was waiting for her at Nephros.

“Congratulations on your first kill for The Sun Dancer,” he told her.

She tossed him the maldrive and resisted the urge to test her...