[The Finch 01] • Pledge Allegiance

Shaun Blake had once had it all. As captain of the ISS Oregon, he‘d commanded his crew in the Horde War and helped to protect Earth. It was a dream come true for a farm boy from Idaho.

But the dream shattered a year ago when a Horde ship blew the Oregon out of space, leaving Blake and a single crew member as the only survivors.

Now, Blake is a gambler and a drunk living in the slums on Iton-3. His only interest is winning money at the WarZone tables and trying to forget who he was. He blames himself for every death that occurred under his command.

When a woman named Jane Baltimore approaches Blake in a bar and says she has a job for him, he isn’t interested. Until she tells him the job is to captain a ship about to embark on a search and rescue mission.

There are more surviving crew members from the Oregon.

And they’re stuck on a planet deep in Horde space.