The Icarian Legacy Collected Edition: Brave Souls - First Strike (Volume 3)
Page 1
THE ICARIAN LEGACY SERIES
BOOKS I AND II
Five Stars Great space war scifi
By Lawrence Rosenthal on 5 Dec. 2015
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
Easy read of the classic themes. Relaxing adventure for ages 12-112. Looking forward to the authors next book, willing to pay for it.
Five Stars
By paul dennison on 16 Oct. 2015
Format: Kindle Edition
excellent second book now were's the third could not put it down
very good book one of the best space operas read in ...
By paul dennison on 16 Oct. 2015
Format: Kindle Edition
very good book one of the best space operas read in a while and i read a lot can’t wait for more books seen book 2 and start on that today keep up the good work
one of the best sci fi authors out there hope he rights more ...
By heather on October 16, 2015
Format: Kindle Edition
one of the best sci fi authors out there hope he rights more books in this universe i will buy them forever
5.0 out of 5 stars Glad book II came out
ByErik Nollon October 22, 2015
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
The long wait is well worth it. The sad part is I finished the book in a day. Now to wait for book three
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
ByChristopher W. Prewitton November 26, 2015
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
Loved it. Can't wait for the next one!!!
By Gemma Farrow on February 1, 2014
Format: Kindle Edition
I enjoy Science Fiction and Icarian Legacy is a book that has an amazing concept. It is about the beginnings of Mankind and the intent of an alien race called the Icarians. These beings took subjects from earth (those strange furry creatures that man would become) and in doing so created mankind's future.
The characters are well-drawn, the story not bogged down with too much background scenery. I enjoyed the conflict scenes and also the emotional vein that threaded the story; I knew what was at stake and felt invested in the outcome.
This is a great read from an author who certainly isn't afraid of creating a story that could have been difficult to master in lesser hands.
5.0 out of 5 stars pleasantly surprised!
By Amazon Customer on April 18, 2013
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
I didn't have high expectations when i bought this book. But boy I am glad I did. A great sci-fi story, with plenty of action and interesting characters. This is a steal at the price, and it’s a full sized book. There are some grammar/spelling issues but it is not terrible, I recommend this book for the great story, and the action.
5.0 out of 5 stars Very good story that keeps the reader wanting to know more.
By Grant Handgis on April 22, 2013
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
The Icarian Legacy is a very believable story of what we can expect in the future of space exploration and travel. Believable story line and believable characters. Nicely done.
By Jay Korea on April 19, 2013
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
This book is a great story. While there is a few spelling and grammar errors, they don't really affect the story. I bought it as something to read on my two hour rail trip, but I couldn't put it down.
The storyline is great. The author really relies on the strong storyline, and has a lot of characters, but doesn't rely on them. As the author doesn't write a large back history about them, it is more as they integrate with the storyline, which is really strong. The story itself is classic SF.
I can't wait for the second book to written.
Author’s Note
In this collected edition which is my gift to all my readers just before New Year you have both books from the series (I promise that by April 2016 the third one will be out), and as my gift to you, you also have excerpts from three other novels that I’m working on parts of shows and universes that I believe we all admire and follow:
Star Wars: Darkness Rising
Stargate Atlantis: Return of Hope
Highlander: Immortality
The books will all be out by June 2016 so I hope you are ready for what they will offer.
All I can promise is that they will be a dream come true for many die-hard fans I hope just like me of the series and movies and the novels.
English is not my primary language so yes I make mistakes ( I hope you will forgive me for it) but as the reviews show and my fateful readers that support me believe, what really matters is the story…
As a reader I know the feeling when you read a good novel that draw’s you in… I believe as a writer I’m delivering that to you.
I hope you enjoy and keep supporting me in the future.
As for the Books in this series…it started as just one note the prologue in the first book but as I started writing a universe was simply born one that has a lot to offer if you stay with me.
Yes it is a fantasy and yes it has influences from both shows and writers I love but I think it’s something new, and as many of the ones that bought the books believe it has a lot to offer.
There are many secrets that will be uncovered, surprises both good and bad that will come so I hope you stay with me.
On the links listed below you can follow me and feel free to contact me with questions and even offer opinions and please post reviews I don’t mind if they are negative or positive all I want is you to be honest…
And just enjoy…
https://www.facebook.com/skajvokerbt
https://www.facebook.com/MyBooksForYouToRead?ref=hl
ON THESE TWO LINKS YOU CAN FIND BOTH ME AND MY WORK PAST AND PRESENT AND CONTACT ME … SEE YA
THE ICARIAN LEGACY
BRAVE SOULS
PROLOGUE
ONE MILLION YEARS B.C. PLANET EARTH
Argonas watched the beautiful sphere that represented the planet Isandria in the Ikarian Republic. Ten cycles earlier, the Cabarea, a research and science vessel that had brought several of the dominant species of this world for Ikarian genetic experiments. Although they were nothing more than an intelligent animal, the first step of a ‘higher evolution’, the experiments that they had conducted so far had led to a promising projection. In several hundred thousand cycles, if nothing prevented it, this species would develop in to something truly wonderful.
His race’s talent lay in genetics, and exactly this kind of experiment. There was a special pleasure that his kind derived in seeing how an entity would come to look like in the future, or how the plants they nurtured might eventually develop. In a way, it had always seemed like a journey through time to him.
But this was also the first time that any such experiments aroused the interest of the other castes in the Icarian society. The Republic’s Senate had needed only a morn to decide that the experiment should be allowed to continue, and on an even grander scale. And after seeing the results from the tests conducted on the first subjects, Argonas had to agree. Although the Icarian Republic was one of the most advanced civilizations in the known galaxy, this new race that they were about to create was one that might become a great and powerful ally in the future. He knew that he would not be there to see it, but his own mortality didn’t matter. The end result did.
He momentarily left these thoughts behind him and spoke aloud. “Are all the transports loaded?” He didn’t break hi
s gaze on the planet below.
“Yes your eminence.” The answer came from the first officer of the Bocasi.
The enormous dreadnought was one of the most powerful ships that the Republic fleet had at its disposal, and also his personal flagship. Together, with two cruisers and four frigates, the small fleet that he commanded, acted as the escort for ten transport ships. These vessels in turn, were carrying sixty thousands of the planet’s inhabitants to Icaria, where they would be genetically enhanced.
As he watched, the ships formed a column with the dreadnought foremost. The cruisers and two frigates took up their places on the sides of the formation, and the other two frigates positioned themselves at the rear. The transports occupied the middle.
Seeing that everyone was in place, Argonas took one last, long look at the planet that they were leaving behind. They would never return to it. Now that the Icarians knew that this planet’s inhabitants were likely to develop a civilization in the faraway future, they were leaving it to its own devices. It was part of the Yun-Han Protocol, which protected any planet that had inhabitants that were on the way to developing a true civilization, or already possessed one. From time to time probes would be sent to monitor their progress and ships would guard the sector from incursion by other races, but this would be the last time that an Icarian would set foot on Isandria.
The inhabitants of the small settlement that they had established on Isandria were also leaving. Nobody was saying anything, and nobody was complaining, but in his heart, Argonas knew that they were all feeling the loss. Isandria was a beautiful world, with vast pristine oceans, high majestic mountains, and rich, fertile forests that stretched as far as the eye could see. It was a paradise.
“But it was never meant to be ours” he thought. And at the precise instant that this sobering thought crossed his mind, his fleet made the jump to hyperspace, and left the small planet behind forever…
The furry inhabitants of Isandria never noticed the Icarian fleet leaving. They had never paid much attention to the Icarians when they had lived on their world, or when their friends and their mates had been taken from them, and as a result, the Icarian departure was just as unnoteworthy. In the limited universe of the natives, when anyone had ever disappeared before, they had always been presumed to be dead. And it also never occurred to them that those that had been taken from them would one day come to represent a future beyond their imagining.
Instead, their lives continued on as they always had, and things stayed that way for them for another million years. Eventually though, the sentient beings of Isandria began to change; they started to walk and use simple tools. And slowly, the civilization that the Icarians had envisioned for them began its long, slow crawl to greatness and the reunion with their lost cousins among the stars…
CHAPTER ONE
10000 BC Sol System
The huge scared ship silently stood at the head of the small fleet of vessels and it slowly drifted leading the fleet to its final destination, the systems star.
Three large holes were visible on its hull, damages of the last battle the ship had. And if someone who knew the layout of the ship looked closely he would have noticed that the ship’s bow was broken. Hundreds of smaller scars were visible as well. Many of the gun ports now stood empty, the guns having been destroyed.
To everyone that would have looked at it the Argos looked dead. But the truth was that even with all the damage it took, with all the scars, empty decks the ship was still alive.
In the launch bays two hundred Vipers and twenty nine jumper shuttles stood perfectly aligned. Only one shuttle stood separated from the rest. And in front of it a man wearing a dark blue uniform and the rank of rear admiral was standing and taking one last look.
He was in his mid forties. For the life span that his race had that was relatively young. In difference from the inhabitants of the magnificent blue planet that lay below that barely managed to live up to sixty cycles, the Alterans thanks to the advancements and the help from the Icarians so long ago lived much longer. The oldest members of the race managed to live up to two hundred and fifty cycles.
But in the refugee fleet that arrived here there was no one older than eighty cycles. Many were much younger.
Tears filled his green eyes as he remembered all the people that died for this fleet to have a chance to come here. So that the secret remains’ hidden. The full lips were tightly shut, and the young face showed the pain he felt, but as he took one last look at his ship it showed pride as well.
The Argos was the last of her class. The last Hyperion D class Battleship. The last ship that showed the true might of the Alteran navy. She was the last ship of the line.
At over 4720 feet long and 1762 feet wide it was the largest ship ever built by the Alteran Federation. The ship was old and it was never meant to be involved in to the last battles or the war. Before the last war started it was decommissioned but after the losses it was put back in service. And it proved its worth.
He tried to imagine it in its full might, the way it looked the first time he looked at it at Kirin when he took command.
Five hundred and twenty dual point kinetic energy batteries along with two hundred laser batteries represented its point defense. Twenty four primary dual kinetic energy weapons placed on the dorsal and ventral hull, four plasma batteries and four coil guns represented its long range weapons. Multiple missile launch tubes were placed along the hull, one hundred in total and sixteen primary launch tubes capable of launching conventional and nuclear missiles were placed on all four sides. Five and a half thousand crew walked along its decks in those days. Three hundred Vipers and sixty jumper shuttles represented its air wing.
Today the decks were empty. The last members of the crew left almost a full day before.
“You did your duty. You never failed us.”
As he said the words he saluted.
“Anaya you have command.”
Blue shimmering light appeared before him at that command. It was a hologram that represented the ships AI. This one was of a woman with long black hair, blue eyes, and small full red lips.
“Yes commander.”
The admiral looked at her.
“Do you have command of the rest of the ships?”
“Yes Admiral. The link is up and running. The coordinates are uploaded and the fleet is already turning toward the systems star.”
The Admiral looked at her for one minute than turned and headed for the shuttle.
The hologram watched him as he started climbing in to the shuttle. Although some claimed that the AI were nothing more than computers and that they should never be considered sentient the Alterans never paid them heed. A long time ago they started considering them for what they were.
Equal living beings.
Because if an AI could command a ship, a station or a planetary defense network, if it could talk to people and if it could think then it was self aware.
And if it was self aware, than it was a living being.
And the Alterans knew that the AI can feel.
And at this moment the AI felt pain. It knew that the command it received meant its death.
Anaya was a class eight AI. She was part of the last generation AI’s that were developed just before the start of the last war. And in difference from the previous models no one could distinguish them from real living Alterans. They could feel, they could think, they could do so many things that the humans could. They were the first generation of AI that were truly self aware.
But the pain wasn’t for the death that was coming. She felt fear as well as every rational being would but she knew that that feeling was only an illusion. No, the pain was connected to her crew. In some strange way she felt connected with them and the feeling that she would never see them again hurt her. And as she looked at her commander she knew that he knows that to.
“Goodbye commander.”
The admiral stopped at those words. He turned at her and looked straight in to he
r eyes.
“Goodbye Anaya.”
Before she could say anything he continued.
“It was an honor.”
Then he entered the jumper and one minute later the jumper lifted and left the ship. She watched him go.
“The honor was mine commander.”
Anaya looked at the empty decks as the ship silently headed towards the star. She felt every scratch on the deck, every scar on the hull. She was the ship.
She looked at the seventeen hundred bodies that were placed in coffins covered with the federation flag. They were the dead members of the crew that lost their lives in the last battle. Similar rooms existed in the other two cruisers that drifted behind Argos. Fourteen hundred and twenty bodies lay on those ships. They deserved the funeral that she was going to give them. As she looked at them she said the last prayer for them.
“And you died knowing that your ships and crew are safe and that your mission is accomplished.”
And then all active guns on the three ships opened up as one firing three shots.
The hologram appeared on the bridge. She had no need to stay in this form but somehow she felt that it was the right thing. As she watched the approaching star she felt a presence. She felt that she is not alone. And she knew that that presence was always here since the day they started this expedition three cycles ago. She felt that it protected them and guided them.
A beautiful white light appeared in front of her. A face of a blue woman with beautiful green eyes looked at her.
“You know who I am, don’t you.”
“Yes Talia of the Ikaran. I see you.”
The Icarian smiled at the old greeting.
“I see you Anaya Argos of Alteran.”
“Thank you for your help. Your guidance was good.”
“You were a good student my child.”
“Yes but now my mission is over. My journey has come to an end. And I’m alone.”