2
I believe it holds up well.
If you enjoy this story I hope you'll check out www.freewebs.com/lindsaybrambles for information on In Darkness Bound. The latter is set in the same universe and once again involves Fleet. It's a war novel of the future and Lhara Jhordel figures prominently in it. Within the context of that story you get to see how she became the officer she is in this one.
This story and others, as well as several novels in various stages of completion (the sequel to In Darkness Bound is all but finished) are intended to create a sort of 'future history,' hence the Chronicles of the Earth Empire heading above. Whether they will see completion and publication will essentially be up to you, the paying public. It takes a lot of time and effort to write books, and though I get immense pleasure out of doing so, that does not, unfortunately, pay the bills. So I encourage you to read this story and hope you'll be encouraged to seek out and buy In Darkness Bound. If I can sell enough copies of that book I may be able to push on with getting out the next one—providing my publisher considers it worthy of publication.
And now I leave you to Zero-Option. Happy reading.
Lindsay H.F. Brambles, Ottawa, 2007
1.
He realized he'd made an error in assuming the holos he'd seen of her were old recordings. An understandable mistake, given that the woman seated at the desk in the office seemed far too young to be the notorious Captain Jhordel. He stepped back a pace and re-examined the ID plate beside the hatch, then looked again at the woman who was engrossed in the contents of a com-link file. He would have believed her a junior officer but for the braid on each of her epaulettes: four silver bands on each shoulder to mark her rank as ship's master.
She was slight, to the point of almost seeming delicate, and looked as though she could not have been more than thirty. But rejuv could make a woman of sixty look half those years. Often there were telltale signs