The Line of Duty — Rick Partlow

It's four years since the events of Honor Bound, and everything has changed. The jumpgates have opened the stars to everyone and independent colonies are springing up everywhere, but they are being preyed upon by ruthless raiders who seem to kill and destroy indiscriminately. The use of biomech technology for cheap labor has ended the economic crisis, but tensions are high in lesser developed parts of the Republic and terrorist strikes are on the rise. The Republic military know the location of the Protectorate homeworld, but the Jameson administration, elected in a landslide after Greg Jameson killed Protectorate General Antonov, is not interested in invading Novoye Rodina because they don't want the public to think the Russian Protectorate is still a threat. Then the unthinkable happens: Houston is struck by a devastating terror attack that leaves thousands of innocents dead. Conventional law enforcement can't find those responsible, so Jason McKay's Fleet Intelligence is called on to investigate and McKay puts Captain Drew Franks in charge, backed up by Master Sergeant Tanya Manning of the First Special Operations Group. When an independent colony world is attacked by the raiders, all of its inhabitants killed by a mysterious nano-virus, there doesn't seem to be a connection...until a broadcast comes through claiming responsibility for both attacks. The man in the broadcast is none other than Protectorate General Antonov, thought dead these last four years. But is everything as it seems? McKay and Stark have their doubts, and the hunt for the truth ranges from the wilds of Alaska, to the streets of Trans-Angeles, to the very heart of the Protectorate. The search will not be without cost, and where it leads them will force everyone involved to decide where they draw the line of duty.