Murphy's Lawless Series

Taken from their planet and their century,they are…the Lost Soldiers.   Diagnosed with MS, Major Rodger Murphy was stateside-bound on a Blackhawk from Mogadishu when it was hit by a surface-to-air missile. Somehow, however, he didn't die, nor did the others in the helicopter with him on that fateful day in the 1990's. Instead, they were captured by an almost-alien race and put into cold storage.   Recovered over a hundred years later, Murphy and his compatriots wake to find themselves rescued by the officers—and truly alien allies—of the Consolidated Terran Republic. But Murphy and the other refugees from the Twentieth Century—the so-called "Lost Soldiers"—are now untold light years from Earth, where everything and everyone they once knew are long gone.   Granted, the friendly forces who've rescued them will retrieve them on their way back to Earth as soon as they complete an ongoing mission. But in the meantime, Murphy and Company need to accomplish a small task of their own: seize a planet and establish a base of operations. They will have to recruit allies and capture enemy equipment to sustain them until the main force returns, and Murphy's troops have to do it with little support and fewer resources.   As if that isn't enough of a challenge, it's just Murphy's luck to also be the victim of Murphy's Law: the only Lost Soldiers who could be spared for the job were the losers and ne'er-do-wells who weren't considered useful enough to take on the main mission. Defiant and determined to prove that assessment wrong, they gave themselves a different, more suitable name:   Murphy's Lawless.

Taken from their planet and their century, they are…the Lost Soldiers.   The hijacked Twentieth Century troops known as Murphy's Lawless have made planetfall on the planet R'Bak and accomplished their first main objective. Led by Lieutenant Harold Tapper and some of the Lost Soldiers, a clan of proudly independent nomads successfully attacked a unit of the J'Stull Satrapy and made off with a number of much-needed combat vehicles. But the J'Stull won't—can't—let that defeat go unanswered. They are the servitors of the overlords of Kulsis: outsystem autocrats whose forces shall soon return to take whatever resources—and vengeance—they wish. And the J'Stull can't afford to be the objects of their wrath.    Captain Bo Moorfield—a dishonored US mechanized cavalry officer before waking up in this strange future—now has to shepherd the convoy of armored cars, APCs, and other all-terrain vehicles—back to the Lost Soldier's base high in the forbidding desert terrain. Unfortunately, the stolen vehicles aren't at the peak of performance, and Lieutenant Tapper is barely able to keep ahead of the J'Stull force racing after him.   But Moorfield has two things the J'Stull don't: training as a professional cavalry officer and a force of half-trained troopers mounted on whinnies. If he's able to get his own forces into the right position, maybe—just maybe—he will be able to snatch victory from the jaws of almost-certain defeat. If not, the J'Stull will roll up Moorefield's small unit and push straight on through to the Lost Soldiers' makeshift base, killing them all.   And if that happens, the future for the rest of Murphy's Lawless isn't merely bleak: it's nonexistent.

Taken from their planet and their century, they are…the Lost Soldiers.   Some of the hijacked Twentieth Century troops known as the Lost Soldiers have made planetfall on the planet R'Bak and accomplished their first main objective: capturing much-needed combat vehicles. Now reinforced by the nomadic locals, this rump company—known as Murphy's Lawless—are moving to prevent the local J'Stull aristocrats from calling their off-world overlords to take care of the "unidentified invaders." The J'Stull plan: use spies and call in favors to find the vehicles and camp from which the "Terran" invaders plan to mount their offensive. The only countermove that Murphy's Lawless can make in time is to identify—and eliminate—the spies.   Fortunately, orbital SIGINT has intercepted a radio transmission from a J'Stull agent near the village of Clarthu, and it's up to Warrant Officer Horace Chalmers—a disgraced Criminal Investigation Division officer—and his partner Sergeant Jackson to find and eliminate the spy. With extreme prejudice.   But Chalmers is trying to achieve yet another goal on this operation: redemption. To start being a better human than the one who got shot down in a helicopter off Mogadishu on his way to Fort Leavenworth: a dirty cop whose misdeeds guaranteed that his partner Jackson would be on that chopper, too—and so lose everything and everyone he ever loved.    But Chalmers has never been very good at turning over a new leaf, and he knows nothing of the indigenous tribes. To make matters worse, there's no room for failure; Murphy's Lawless are already on the move. Their attack force will soon roll past Clarthu and be reported—and targeted—by the spy there. If Chalmers and Jackson can't identify and eliminate that menace, the convoy will not only be prevented from completing its mission, but might be wiped out entirely.   And with it, every other time-stranded soldier in Murphy's Lawless.

Taken from their planet and their century,they are…the Lost Soldiers.   Some of the hijacked Twentieth Century troops known as the Lost Soldiers have made planetfall on R'Bak and are working to establish their base there. If they are to be successful, though, Murphy knows they will need the continued support and cooperation of the SpinDogs and, more importantly, their trust. One way to build a bridge to them is to provide the SpinDogs with something they don't have—rotary wing aviation.   Captain Mara "Bruce" Lee was a Huey helicopter pilot back on Earth, and was often called in to help foreign students learn to fly the venerable Huey. But when Ozendi, her first SpinDog student, reminds her strikingly of her ex-husband, her skills and professionalism will be tested as they war against her most primal aspect—her heart.   Murphy is counting on Bruce to train the pilot and develop a helicopter pilot school for the SpinDogs, and she can't afford to fall in love with her student. As he grows closer and closer to her, though, she can't see any way for it not to happen. After all, is it so wrong to want a little love when you're so far from everything you've ever known?   But Ozendi is her student and forbidden to her, and she can't afford to destroy the Lost Soldiers' relations with the SpinDogs. If she breaks their trust, it will be all over for both her and every other time-stranded soldier in Murphy's Lawless.

Taken from their planet and their century, they are…the Lost Soldiers.   Some of the hijacked Twentieth Century troops known as the Lost Soldiers have made planetfall on R'Bak and are working to establish their base there, racing against time to find key weapons and equipment caches before the local satraps can activate them. But time is not on the side of the small isolated unit known as Murphy's Lawless: the local indigenous forces are building an inter-system transmitter that will let them call the nearby planet of Kulsis for high-tech reinforcements. The Lost Soldiers have to scrape together enough equipment and allies to stop the J'Stull satraps from contracting their off-world overlords.   Lieutenant Kevin Bowden was headed home from Somalia after a bombing flight that went wrong—destroying a church full of innocent women and children—when he was hijacked by the mysterious Ktor. A broken man, Bowden never wanted to fly again, much less run another bombing mission, but Major Rodger Murphy needs someone to oversee the transition of the SpinDogs interface craft into combat aircraft, and Bowden is the only one with the requisite skills and background to do it.   Can Bowden reach back to the time before that day and reengineer three interface spacecraft to be serviceable in-atmo bombers—and train their crews—in just a few weeks? He's going to have to, because the transmitter is nearing completion, and if the J'Stull are able to get a call off to Kulsis, all of Murphy's Lawless may go off the air…permanently.

Taken from their planet and their century, they are…the Lost Soldiers.   Some of the hijacked Twentieth Century troops known as the Lost Soldiers have made planetfall on R'Bak and are working to establish their base there, but their commander, Major Murphy, has a problem. He knows there are weapons and equipment caches that haven't been activated yet by their immediate enemies—the Satraps—although they are moving as quickly as they can to get to the caches so they can turn those weapons upon their new off-world foes.   Victor Allen Thomas—"Vat" to his friends—was escaping an arms deal gone bad when the helicopter carrying him crashed and he was hijacked by the mysterious Ktor. While he had military experience, he had left the military years before under suspicious circumstances. With a general discharge in his past, he shouldn't even have been in Somalia to begin with.   As an arms dealer, Vat has plenty of experience learning new languages and cultures, and he is used to cutting risky deals and making unusual alliances. Murphy is counting on Vat to find the equipment caches—his 'pearls of great price'—before the Satraps can use the weapons against the Lost Soldiers.   But Vat has never been good at forming relationships. He's going to have to overcome that failing, because there are only two possible outcomes for his mission. Either he finds the pearls of great price that will allow the Terrans to securely establish themselves on R'Bak, or—if he doesn't—the future of Murphy's Lawless isn't merely bleak; it's likely to be nonexistent.