Showing results by author "Jason Anspach" in All Categories

A company of Army Rangers is sent on an interstellar colony ship to secure a foothold on a dangerous, alien planet through violence of action. Leaving behind a warring Earth flung headfirst into a conflict of mutual assured destruction, the Rangers and the accompanying crew of first colonists are guided on a 40-year journey by an unprecedented artificial intelligence. But when they emerge from the frigid embrace of cryosleep, they awake to a nightmare, finding themselves greeted by the same ruthless enemy that brought about the ruin of Earth.

Titus Briggs is an Earth Defense soldier, a grunt, a decorated war hero—it's all he's ever known. So when a career-ending injury leaves him lying in a hospital bed, missing both legs, he struggles to accept his new reality. He can no longer walk, which means he can no longer fight. That is until a mysterious colonel arrives and offers Titus the opportunity to step into a new kind of war, a new kind of fight. To become a new kind of soldier. Mobile Combat Suits—MOCOMS—represent the next stage in human warfare. They enable soldiers to fight like never before.

In this anthology, you'll find 17 tales of conflict and heroism, exploration and discovery, endurance and triumph. Flee the apocalypse of modern-day Earth, fly a fighter in the cold emptiness of deep space, and find new life on the distant shores of an alien world. You might even discover something about yourself as each author opens a window on the soul of mankind.

A hot, stinking, dumpster fire. And most days I don't know if the legionnaires are putting out the flames, or fanning them into an inferno. A hostile force ambushes Victory Company during a reconnaissance-in-force deep inside enemy territory. Stranded behind enemy lines, a sergeant must lead a band of survivors against merciless insurgents on a deadly alien world somewhere along the galaxy's edge. With no room for error, the Republic's elite fighting force must struggle to survive under siege while waiting on a rescue that might never come.

Legion Dark Ops calls upon Chhun, Wraith, and the survivors of Victory Company to form an elite Kill Team of legionnaires in the aftermath of the Battle of Kublar. Their mission is clear: find and eliminate those responsible for the Kublar disaster. Standing between them and their objective are a maze of corrupt Republic officials, a spy on the verge of losing himself in deep cover, and the Zhee - a murderous species that will stop at nothing. But the biggest threat of all might be the truth they seek to uncover - a truth that could ignite a revolution. And engulf the galaxy in flames.

The daughter of a Legion war hero, fighting was in Andien Broxin's blood. But the battles Republic marines face on strange and alien worlds are a far cry from the vaunted, brutal, no-holds-barred conflicts fought at the edge of the galaxy by the elite legionnaires. Until a devastating war erupts right in the Republic’s stellar backyard. Newly stationed on a mid-core planet being harassed by terrorist revolutionaries, Andien and her fellow “hullbusters” find themselves right in the middle of a desperate fight for survival.

In the wilds of a jungle planet, the Legion fights in brutal combat as Republic marines fly their SLICS from one tragedy to the next. H292, a repurposed warbot, shows the heart of a hero as he wades into the battle not to destroy - but to save.

On the edge of the galaxy, a diplomatic mission to an alien planet takes a turn when the Legionnaires, an elite special fighting force, find themselves ambushed and stranded behind enemy lines. They struggle to survive under siege, waiting on a rescue that might never come. In the seedy starport of Ackabar, a young girl searches the crime-ridden gutters to avenge her father's murder; not far away, a double-dealing legionniare-turned-smuggler hunts an epic payday; and somewhere along the outer galaxy, a mysterious bounty hunter lies in wait.

Sam Rockwell came home from the Second World War to work as a fledgling private investigator specializing in helping "Returns": recently deceased ghosts who've come back with unfinished business. Short on experience and long on the imitated swagger of the detectives found in his dog-eared collection of pulp fiction P.I. mysteries, the quick-witted Sam waits for his big break - and his chance to win the heart of Amelia, his Girl Friday. But when his no-nonsense father is murdered and becomes a Return himself, everything changes.

Years have passed since the battle of Kublar, and Wraith is in deep cover for Legion Dark Ops, living a second life on the edge as an irreverent smuggler and bounty hunter under the alias of Captain Keel. As he fights off pirates and double-crossing rebels, Keel comes to realize that the old lines between right and wrong have blurred as the Legion sinks further under the corrupting influence of the House of Reason and its points.

They were the Savages. Raiders from our distant past. Elites who left Earth to create tailor-made utopias aboard the massive lighthuggers that crawled through the darkness between the stars. But the people they left behind on a dying planet didn't perish in the dystopian nightmare the Savages had themselves created: they thrived, discovering faster-than-light technology and using it to colonize the galaxy ahead of the Savages, forming fantastic new civilizations that surpassed the wildest dreams of Old Earth.

With his team cut off from all support, Dav falls back on his Legion training to keep those around him alive. But when he forges an alliance with a stranded Legion squad and planetary natives looking to stand up to those seeking to topple their government, an opportunity to save the small planet presents itself...if Dav and his ragged team of outnumbered and outgunned warriors can survive long enough to take it.

A U.S. Army Ranger sniper finds himself on his own and on the move far downrange and beyond the wire in an epic fantasy world filled with deadly monsters and dangerous foes in a total battle royale for glory, hoard—and flat-out survival. Adrift on the Sea of Riddles and lost in a dangerous world of epic fables, Sgt. Thor and his anti-materiel sniper rifle, Mjölnir, must survive brutal pirates, the darkest sorcery, and a catastrophic shipwreck on a strange island steeped in arcane mystery and containing the remains of a lost civilization guarding an ancient artifact of great and terrible power.

As a crumbling Galactic Republic falls to the relentless assault of a merciless foe, so begins the rise of an enigmatic emperor intent on saving a corrupt galaxy-spanning civilization from itself…and from something much darker that lies beyond the reaches of the known. Just as the reins of power fall into his iron-fisted grasp, an assassination attempt by a hidden cabal within his own inner circle jeopardizes every plan he has set in motion for his Dark Legion, his Imperial Navy, and his ultimate conquest of the stars. But the assassins have no idea who they're actually dealing with.

Andien Broxin has what she wanted: an opportunity to prove her worth through the rigorous and sometimes lethal Legion Selection. The daughter of a legionnaire, she knows what to expect. Legion Selection will test every fiber of her being, heaping on endless trials of pressure, stress, and pain. Most candidates quickly find their breaking points, while others are merely broken. Only a precious few, the one percent of the one percent of the one percent, will earn their armor and become...legionnaires.

With the armies of the enemy smashed at the final battle for the desert port city, the Rangers return to their primary mission to do what they do best: eliminate a high-value target with extreme violence of action deep inside hostile territory. Failure is not an option—even if that target is a ten-thousand-year-old undead sorcerer of incredible power surrounded by dark, deadly cabals and savage monsters of myth and fable that are all too real.

Legion Dark Ops has always been a unit shrouded in secrecy. Tasked with performing covert missions, its kill teams are filled with the best warriors from within the ranks of the Legion. Kel Turner is one of the youngest legionnaires ever to be selected to its ranks. After many battles and trials, he is faced with the greatest challenge of his life - operating by himself on a remote planet at the galaxy's edge, a foot soldier for the policies of the duplicitous House of Reason, tasked with solving a crisis that would take ten kill teams to resolve.

As Chhun and his fellow Legion Adjudicators work to uncover the buried secrets of the time called the Troubles, the rest of the galaxy isn't just standing still. Organizations both inside and outside of the Republic make moves to prepare for their futures. Planets build their own independent defense forces. Power brokers and criminal cartels arise with personal armadas. The Repub Navy seeks to prove itself just as capable even without the Legion. Piracy blooms.

The Legion is the most elite direct-action force in the galaxy, hammering the enemies of the Republic...but some missions require a scalpel. When radical insurgents shoot down a covert republic flight at galaxy’s edge, a nearby Legion recovery team is sent to recover the crew and keep the flight’s VIP—a doctor overseeing clandestine research and development—from falling into enemy hands.

Tired of sitting out the war on Psydon in a mobile office lab, Legion Lieutenant Washam agrees to undertake a covert and unsanctioned mission with a band of Republic Recon Marines. Inserted deep behind enemy lines, the strike force uncovers a surprise key to ending a bitter war. Now they must navigate a hostile jungle teeming with murderous alien rebels, pushing themselves to the limits of their abilities, to get this vital intel to Legion Command - if they can survive that long.