Vaughn Heppner
LOST STARSHIP SERIES
The Lost Starship (Book 1)
Ten thousand years ago, a single alien super-ship survived a desperate battle. The vessel's dying crew set the AI on automatic to defend the smashed rubble of their planet. Legend has it the faithful ship continues to patrol the empty battlefield, obeying its last order throughout the lonely centuries.
In the here and now, Earth needs a miracle. Out of the Beyond invade the New Men, stronger, faster and smarter than the old. Their superior warships and advanced technology destroy every fleet sent to stop them. Their spies have infiltrated the government and traitors plague Earth’s military.
Captain Maddox of Star Watch Intelligence wonders if the ancient legend could be true. Would such an old starship be able to face the technology of the New Men?
On the run from killers, Maddox searches for a group of talented misfits. He seeks Keith Maker, a drunken ex-strikefighter ace, Doctor Dana Rich the clone thief stuck on a prison planet and Lieutenant Valerie Noonan, the only person to have faced the New Men in battle and survived to tell about it.
Maddox has to find a place hidden in the Beyond and bring back a ship no one can enter. If he fails, the New Men will replace the old. If he succeeds, humanity might just have a fighting chance…
The Lost Command (Book 2)
Starship Victory—a faithful alien spacecraft guarding its shattered system for ten thousand years—agreed to come to Earth. Now, Captain Maddox and his crew have a new assignment. They must find Professor Ludendorff before the New Men do. The New Men need Ludendorff’s help so they can capture the alien starship. Maddox needs the neglected super-weapons repaired so he can rescue a Star Watch fleet trapped deep in enemy territory.
But time is running out for the stranded, battered fleet. They’re low on food, fuel and missiles. Worse for Maddox, Meta is missing, kidnapped by the enemy, while the alien personality in the AI struggles to adjust to this new era. Can Maddox pull everyone together or will the brilliant New Men win yet another stunning victory?
The Lost Destroyer (Book 3)
A silver pyramid in space ten thousand years old…
The secrets of the mysterious New Men…
A war like no other…
Starship Victory—Earth’s ancient, alien spacecraft—has won a smashing victory against the New Men, driving them from “C” Quadrant. On their way home, Captain Maddox and his crew run into a vast machine trapped inside an ion storm. Maddox doesn’t know it yet, but the meeting isn’t an accident. There’s a traitor aboard ship, implementing a secret plan, threatening to destroy everything Star Watch has achieved against the New Men.
Now begins a deadly race as Captain Maddox, the crew and Galyan are pitted against the masters of a centuries-old conspiracy. Human existence lies in the balance.
The Lost Colony (Book 4)
We fought the invading New Men to a standstill and defeated the alien Destroyer sent to obliterate Earth.
The worst should be over, but it’s not.
Perfect android replicas are impersonating high-level officials so trust is failing. Worse, the New Men have found allies with an impenetrable stealth technology.
This time, however, Earth is going on the offensive. Admiral Fletcher is headed to “C” Quadrant with a Grand Fleet. He’s to liberate the captured planets and find the enemy homeworld. What he isn’t supposed to do is die.
The only one who can save humanity has been grounded. Captain Maddox is under suspicion because he’s half New Man. But he’s not going to stop. He’s found something unbelievable. Now, he needs Starship Victory—an ancient, alien spacecraft—the AI Galyan, Meta, Sergeant Riker and the others to help him tear the greatest secret of all from the enemy.
Maddox and his crew must succeed or humanity will drown in a sea of human extinction.
The Lost Patrol (Book 5)
We learned a terrible secret last voyage, the Swarm exists. It has a monstrous imperium, expanding, evolving and receiving incredible Builder tech.
Captain Maddox heads into the Deep Beyond to find the Swarm Imperium. We must know the worst so we can prepare against the deadliest species in the galaxy.
The captain and his crew battle loneliness and the terror of the unknown as they hunt through the stellar darkness. They’re thousands of light-years from home, from any help. What they find threatens their sanity and unity. It’s going to take the best Maddox and the ancient AI Galyan has to offer to pull the crew together. They have to save the starship from what waits in the galactic darkness or the human race will die.
The Lost Planet (Book 6)
Last voyage, Captain Maddox entered a distant star system with a Swarm fleet. The sheer numbers were staggering, a 100-1 advantage against all human spacecraft. If the highly aggressive, racist insects gained hyper-spatial tube technology—allowing them to cross a thousand light-years in seconds—it would mean Armageddon for Earth.
Star Watch desperately needs something powerful to offset the annihilating Swarm numbers. As if on cue, Professor Ludendorff declares he has discovered the whereabouts of ancient Builder technology, a tech so potent it could defeat the Swarm.
Star Watch takes the bait, ordering Captain Maddox to find the lost planet holding the ancient technology.
Ludendorff has a plan involving androids to lure his arch rival—Methuselah Man Strand—to his doom.
The crew of Starship Victory knows nothing of this and thus blindly enters a web of intrigue and danger. The captain will need the AI Galyan, Valerie and Riker like never before. Humanity’s hope against the coming Swarm holocaust rests on the outcome.
The Lost Earth (Book 7)
It finally happened. Commander Thrax Ti Ix created a hyper-spatial tube for the Swarm Imperium. Across thousands of light-years, a vast armada of warships is heading for Earth to burn the homeworld down to its bedrock as the Swarm begins its genocidal campaign against the human race.
No one—not the New Men, the Spacers, the Wahhabi Caliphate or Star Watch—has faced such staggering odds. Alone or united, it makes no difference.
Captain Maddox has a last-ditch plan. He’s returning to the null region of last voyage to grab the ancient Destroyers hidden there. But an immortal entity of evil cunning haunts the vessels. If it escapes its prison…Maddox will have made things infinitely worse.
This time, mankind needs a miracle.
The Lost Artifact (Book 8)
Star Watch defeated the Swarm Invasion Fleet, but at a terrible cost in destroyed star systems, smashed battleships and billions of dead. In the aftermath of the costly victory, chaos threatens as worlds leave the Commonwealth of Planets, face mass starvation or succumb to increased piracy.
The war against the Swarm Imperium has just begun. Humanity needs unity or each planet will fall alone.
Brigadier O’Hara of Star Watch Intelligence stumbles onto a secret conspiracy. Someone is trying to destroy the Commonwealth from within, and they have an alien artifact of incredible power.
O’Hara summons Captain Maddox. Although she fears to lose him, she knows that Maddox and his crew have the best chance of finding the hidden enemy. If the captain fails, the Commonwealth will be powerless to stop its destruction. What O’Hara doesn’t know—it would probably break her heart if she did—is that she has just sent Maddox into the most harrowing battle of his career.
The Lost Star Gate (Book 9)
The Swarm is coming!
This time, enemy science vessels study us as Hive Masters gather hundreds of thousands of starships for an avalanche invasion.
Instead of facing massed bug fleets in hopeless battle, we have a desperate plan: use a Builder nexus, create a hyper-spatial tube and send suicide-ships thousands of light-years into Swarm territory. There, our ships must find and destroy the nexuses that are the only way back home, all in order to stop the bugs from using the nexuses to reach Human Space.
Despite the grim mission, Captain Maddox is determined to bring his people back. But deep in the Sagittarius Spiral Arm, disaster strikes. All alone in the stellar night, the crew must face a primordial alien that even the Builders feared and the Swarm avoids.
Now begins a deadly battle as Maddox, the crew and Galyan are pitted against a horror of legendary evil as a Swarm battle fleet waits to annihilate the victor.
THE LOST STAR GATE is the ninth and longest book, so far, in the LOST STARSHIP SERIES.
The Lost Supernova (Book 10)
Androids used to mingle among us, pretending to be human. Then an alien puppet-master altered their programming. Unknown to us, androids began leaving human society, burning their clothes and peeling off their skin to reveal the chrome-colored bodies underneath.
They gathered in a system were a star had exploded, blowing away the atmosphere of a Jupiter-like planet. The supernova had hurled heavy metals against the remaining core. The androids are mining supermetals that can turn ordinary ship weapons and shields into invincible armaments.
The altered programming includes human genocide, which will start with a murderous attack on Earth.
Luckily, Captain Maddox finds the enemy system. But during a space battle, something happens to hurl Victory thousands of light-years away into the Scutum-Centaurus Spiral Arm. The crippled starship will take years to reach home again. Long before that, Earth will be a radioactive ruin.
Now begins a desperate journey in hostile space that will stretch everyone as Maddox strains to reach the Lord High Admiral in time with knowledge about the coming android attack.
THE LOST SUPERNOVA is the tenth book in the LOST STARSHIP SERIES.
The Lost Swarm (Book 11)
Star Watch stands guard over the Commonwealth, having defeated New Men, massed Swarm fleets and android attackers. The victories have cost lost ships, slain crews and smashed star systems. The accumulated damage means that Star Watch now strains to keep order as political instability, increased space piracy and rebellions stretch the stellar organization to the limit.
Humanity desperately needs peace so Star Watch can rebuild and regroup.
Unfortunately, Lord Drakos is searching the Beyond for a splinter Swarm colony world. The New Man believes he is a Napoleon of the stars. But he needs a fleet to prove it. Intelligence thinks Drakos hopes to make a pact with Thrax Ti Ix, assembling a fleet of renegade New Men and hybrid Swarm creatures, a fleet that will attack humanity.
Plan A has Captain Maddox capturing Drakos before he can find Thrax. Plan B means Star Watch will have to risk sending a fleet into the Beyond.
For Maddox this is also a voyage of discovery, as he learns the identities of his mother and father.
THE LOST SWARM is the eleventh book in the LOST STARSHIP SERIES.
The Lost Intelligence (Book 12)
His code name is Nostradamus, and he’s an ancient alien super-intelligence awakened by pesky humans crawling upon his planet. He decides to use these low-grade morons, testing some, making the special ones his agents and sending them into Star Watch to make the military organization his own.
It’s an insidious assault from within, run by a creature with fantastic predictive powers against what he considers an infantile species.
Captain Maddox and the crew of Victory catch a glimpse of the secret menace in the Tau Ceti System. They race back to Earth to report. But Nostradamus’s web is already closing in. It may already be too late.
Except…Maddox, Galyan, Valerie and Professor Ludendorff refuse to give up on those they love. The secret war against humanity has a new set of champions, hardened veterans willing to challenge an alien that can predict their every move.
Do Maddox and his crew stand a chance against the super-alien and the full weight of Star Watch turned against them? Find out in THE LOST INTELLIGENCE, the twelfth book in the Lost Starship Series.
The Lost Tech (Book 13)
In the stillness of space, several asteroids disappear in the 82 G. Eridani System. Time passes and space wavers, and the missing asteroids reappear. They’re traveling at near-light-speed for the single populated planet. Nuclear-tipped missiles from the lone battleship fail to stop the asteroids, which crash against the planet, turning it into rubble and killing the 650 million inhabitants.
Someone has found and now tested the perfect planet killer, an ancient device that turns asteroids and icy planetesimals into world-destroying projectiles. Earth is a mere twenty light-years away. But who’s to say the hidden weapon will head there next? It can go anywhere in the Commonwealth and destroy any world.
Star Watch is desperate, employing every ship, every scientist and everyone, including the crew of Victory, to defend the planets.
Captain Maddox, Professor Ludendorff and others must put aside every difference and concentrate on finding a weakness in the ultimate weapon, one they can exploit. Otherwise—the alternative is too stark to contemplate. It is time to pull together and think and fight like never before.
THE LOST TECH is the thirteenth book in the Lost Starship Series.
The Lost Secret (Book 14)
Long ago, the Builders ruled the stars, using a unique super-science to create marvels and wonders. But the Builders vanished—no one knows why—leaving many of their treasures hidden throughout the galaxy.
Now, Captain Maddox and arrogant New Men learn about the fabled Library Planet. Legend holds it’s an ancient repository of Builder knowledge. The side that plunders the planetary vaults first will surely become the premier power in the Orion Spiral Arm.
The race is on, but with many unforeseen dangers including deadly ghost-ships, possible time-travelers and cunning spies—others desire what lies inside the Library Planet.
This will prove a desperate struggle as puny humans led by Captain Maddox try to wrench an advantage for Star Watch, and as a grim menace of unparalleled horror slowly unfolds before them.
THE LOST SECRET is the fourteenth book in the Lost Starship Series.
The Lost Barrier (Book 15)
At Omicron 9, Professor Ludendorff unearthed artifacts of the fabled Old Ones. During a meeting in a subterranean chamber, a portal appeared and aliens attacked, perhaps to kidnap the professor or grab the artifacts. Maddox’s new intuitive sense gave him just enough warning. He saved Ludendorff and rushed into the portal to forestall any more assaults—and thus began his lonely odyssey from one strange place to another.
Maddox eventually found a Builder potential unit, and they resolved to work together. But the unit betrayed him and then Victory, taking them to a system where Maddox had already been, one behind an impenetrable barrier and possessing an ancient power.
Maddox and Victory were outmatched and outgunned, facing aliens wielding super-science weapons. But if the captain ever wanted to see his wife and daughter again, and stop Lisa Meyers from her ongoing genocidal plans against humanity, he was going to have to solve an eon-old mystery and defeat every extraterrestrial bastard that got in his way.
THE LOST BARRIER is the fifteenth book in the Lost Starship Series.
The Lost Relic (Book 17)
Captain Maddox is marooned on a harsh alien planet 6000 light years from Earth. He struggles alone, desperate to survive, knowing that failure will forever cost him his wife and daughter.
But there’s more at stake than Maddox’s life. In the planet is a relic of unimaginable power and the secret to the Builders’ demise. The Mastermind has sent Iris, his human lover, and a team of intelligent canine killers, to retrieve the relic for his greatness.
Here, in a strangely dampened star system, the crew of Victory faces its cruelest challenge, battling entities thousands of years old to end a war begun long ago.
THE LOST RELIC is book 17 in the Lost Starship series, a star-spanning saga of deadly space war and planetary struggles as told by millions-bestselling author Vaughn Heppner.
The Lost Clone (Book 19)
Across the lonely depths of space from their spiral arm, Leviathan has begun infiltrating agents into Star Watch as a prelude to invasion.
One team has cloned a kidnapped Captain Maddox, intending for the clone to take his place on Victory.
The first Maddox learns of this is when his clone unfreezes him on a spaceliner. Maddox and his clone decide to team up. They’re 8000 light years from Earth, forced to play a desperate game of survival while hunted by the cybernetic Soldiers of Leviathan.
Maddox is determined to warn Star Watch about the coming invasion.
THE LOST CLONE is book 19 in the Lost Starship series, a star-spanning saga of deadly space war and planetary struggles as told by millions-bestselling author Vaughn Heppner.
The Lost Nebula (Book 16)
This may be Victory’s eeriest voyage yet as the starship plunges into a bizarre nebula of weird compacted gases. They’re hunting for Valerie Noonan, last seen at the destroyed Adok homeworld searching for survivors.
The nebula holds dark secrets, ones that fight back with mass hypnosis and heavy lasers, seeking the crew’s enslavement and worse. Maddox desperately needs his new intuitive sense and fighting skills as he negotiates the treacherous space reefs, alien deceit and sinister technology. And he risks everything for what his AI companion Galyan desires most.
THE LOST NEBULA is book 16 in the Lost Starship series, a star-spanning saga of deadly space war and planetary battles as told by millions-bestselling author Vaughn Heppner.
The Lost Task Force (Book 18)
Task Force 3 is Star Watch’s elite deployment unit against any surprise threats to the Commonwealth.
A mysterious enemy appears 40.7 light years from Earth. Task Force 3 deploys but fails to defend a populated planet against a massive alien Annihilator. Then the task force is sucked through a rip in the space-time continuum, disappearing with the enemy.
This is a nightmare situation. How do you defend against an evil that can appear anywhere and uses technologies beyond our comprehension?
The crew of Victory is ordered to find the answers, and if possible rescue the lost task force.
Captain Maddox, Valerie and Galyan face their most horrific and mind-numbing challenge yet, crossing boundaries they didn’t know existed.
THE LOST TASK FORCE is book 18 in the Lost Starship series, a multiverse-spanning saga of deadly space war and planetary struggles as told by millions-bestselling author Vaughn Heppner.
The Lost Portal (Book 20)
The strategists of Leviathan are cunning and devious. They also fear Captain Maddox because of his unusual luck, his ability to turn sure odds into a disaster for them. Before Leviathan begins its invasion of the Commonwealth, they want Maddox neutralized.
Thus, using elaborate deception, the strategists convince Star Watch that ancient doomsday weapons lie in the Aquila Rift. It’s a region of space 700 light years from Earth. Thick molecular clouds and dense gases hide its stars and planets.
As expected, Star Watch sends Victory and Maddox into the rift. There, the trap springs, and Maddox finds himself battling ancient entities, while the crew faces interment that could last until the universe itself runs down.
Leviathan has stirred dreadful forces in its effort to kill Maddox, forces that could mean the end of everything if Maddox and his crew fail to survive a lonely and haunted ordeal in underspace.
THE LOST PORTAL is book 20 in the Lost Starship series, a star-spanning saga of deadly space war and planetary struggles as told by millions-bestselling author Vaughn Heppner.
The Lost Cyborg (Book 21)
