Showing results by author "Kacey Ezell" in All Categories

Humans have always been fascinated by darkness. Especially the darkness of a city at night, when the black sky is made ever more inky by the pools of illumination dropped under streetlights. Whether the mean streets be in an alternate past charmed with dark magic or the dirty alleyways of futuristic crowded space stations, the city—and its darkened streets—will always fascinate us. Here then, an anthology of all new stories of science fiction and fantasy with a hardboiled noir twist that acknowledge that the city is a living, breathing entity...and it isn’t always on our side.

In a world of criminals, thugs, con artists, cheats, and swindlers, there must be a man to stand against the powers of darkness and corruption. A man not afraid to walk the mean streets—whether they be those of 1930s Los Angeles, an ancient fantasy realm, or some far-flung planet of a future star empire. He is a man who knows that a “good man” is not always a “nice guy”. But when the chips are down, he understands that a hero does the right thing, even if it means losing everything.

Thirty years ago, the world ended. Giant electrovoric ants and pterodons came through a rift in space-time, millions of humans died, and that was that. Thirty years later, humanity has rebuilt … to an extent. Human ingenuity has provided some creative solutions to life without electricity, but most folks survive at the subsistence level, farming to keep themselves and their families fed.

It's the 22nd century. Humanity has taken its first steps into the galaxy, and we've found ourselves in a vast playground of alien races and cultures. As the newest players on the universal stage, though, we're at the bottom of the food chain. Welcome back to the Four Horsemen universe, where only a willingness to fight and die for money separates humans from the majority of the other races. While some of the stories deal with mercenaries, others introduce listeners to the other guilds, organizations, and races that make up the landscape of the Four Horsemen universe.

Nigel Shirazi, the Speaker of the Merc Guild, knows that war is coming and he’s not ready. He needs to build up the mercenary forces after years of war, and he’s proclaimed the Phoenix Initiative to give people who want to start new companies the opportunity to do so. CASPers are cheaper and financed at lower rates, and the government of Earth is offering bounties to take the mercs from alien races off the planet. Now is the time!

Edited by best-selling authors and universe creators Mark Wandrey and Chris Kennedy, Tales from the Lyon’s Den includes 18 all-new stories in the Four Horsemen universe by a variety of best-selling authors - and some you may not have heard of...yet.

Fourteen outstanding authors. Fourteen worlds that never were. Throughout the human experience, historians have wondered, “What if?” What if Japan had been on the side of the U.S. in World War II? What if things had been just a little different in the Falklands? What if Russia had started World War Three?

Jim Cartwright, commander of Cartwright’s Cavaliers and Minister of War for the Terran Federation, has been struggling with all the hats he has to wear. Merc commander, minister, and leader of Earth’s Raknar forces for their allies, the Dusman. The strain’s causing him…issues, and he decides to visit the surviving human colonies to get away for a bit.

Thirteen outstanding authors. Thirteen aviation stories that never happened. Throughout the human experience, historians have wondered, “What if?” What if Americans had fought on the side of Germany in World War I? What if Germany had invested in naval aviation in World War II? What if Russia had started World War III? Wonder no more, for these questions, along with many others, are answered within this audiobook.

From the outside, The Lyon’s Den doesn’t look like much; there isn’t even a sign. But Mercs of all species know that if you head to Southwest Houston, near the Starport, there’s a particular run-down strip mall that looks like it’s been abandoned for years. The glass door second from the south end of the strip is plastered over on the inside with blue paper, and the faint golden outline of a rampant lion is the only clue.

It's the 22nd century. Humanity has taken its first steps into the galaxy, and we've found ourselves in a vast playground of alien races, environments, and cultures. As the newest players on the universal stage, though, our position is readily apparent - we're at the bottom of the food chain.

From the pulpy pages of Black Mask Magazine in the 1920s and '30s, through the film noir era of the 1940s, to today, noir fiction has lured many a reader and movie-goer away from the light and into the dark underbelly of society. Names such as Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and James M. Cain; titles like The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, The Postman Always Rings Twice...these have inhabited our collective consciousness for decades. Humanity, it seems, loves the dark. And within the dark, one figure stands out: that of the femme fatale.

Major Rodger Y. Murphy should have died when his helicopter crashed off the coast of Mogadishu in November, 1993. Instead, he woke up in August, 2125, in a binary star system 152 light years from home. Without any memory of the otherworldly abductors who spirited them away in cold sleep, Murphy and 100 other “Lost Soldiers” have been retrieved and awakened by officers of the Consolidated Terran Republic. Promising to return to the 55 Tauri B system after completing a distant mission, they leave the twentieth century castaways with a daunting objective.

After a devastating galactic war, disgraced veteran Ralston Muck ekes out a living as a bouncer at Last Stop Station’s premier nightclub, A Curtain of Stars. Night after night he listens to the club’s star performer, Siren, sing her memories and ease some of his aching loss. But when Siren goes missing, Muck finds himself drawn into a world of dirty cops, drug lords, and conspiracies that trace back to the war itself.

It’s the 22nd century. The galaxy has opened up to humanity as a hyperactive beehive of stargates and new technologies, and we suddenly find ourselves in a vast playground of different races, environments, and cultures. There’s just one catch: We are pretty much at the bottom of the food chain, and there’s only one way for humanity to move up - by becoming mercenaries. In every mercenary’s life, though, there comes a time when things go wrong and even the best laid plans go awry.

The Lunar colony is a mining colony with only internal security capabilities. Nobody had even considered that there might soon arise a need to defend the colony from the Earth! But that day has come. Something has been uncovered on the moon. Something important. Something...alien.

They have absolute power; after all, they are the ones with the weapons. The only other armed agency, the Peacemaker Guild, is far smaller and unable to bend them to their will. But absolute power has the tendency to corrupt absolutely, and this is becoming increasingly apparent as the guild’s members pursue their hidden agendas.

Fifteen outstanding authors. Fourteen extraordinary stories. One best-selling universe. It’s the 22nd century. The galaxy has opened up to humanity as a hyperactive beehive of stargates and new technologies, and we suddenly find ourselves in a vast playground of different races, environments, and cultures. Enter the Four Horsemen universe, where only a willingness to fight and die for money separates humans from the majority of the other races. Enter a galaxy not only of mercenaries, but also of aliens, hired assassins, and accountants. Accountants?

A Tortantula and a Flatar. The most enigmatic teaming in the mercenary guild, it’s also a perfect pairing, where one’s strengths cover the other’s weakness. Raised together from birth, their lives are a brutal series of tests. Azah isn’t like most other female Tortantula; she’s much smaller and made fun of. No one expects her to survive, much less succeed, but she’s still given a chance and assigned a Flatar: Sadek. The two quickly bond and find they complement each other. Against all odds, they survive the breeding dome and join the ranks of their races’ mercenaries.

In the six months since the raid that destroyed the makeshift transmitter, the Lost Soldiers have scratched out a permanent base on the world of R’Bak. But life in an often surprising and very alien binary system has not become any easier. Major Mara “Bruce” Lee’s pregnancy becomes a powerful reminder of that: without special indigenous plants, she might lose both her unborn child and her life. And, in the process of securing enough of that rare compound, her friend and crew chief Elroy Frazier will have to risk life, limb, and mind.