Unified under the flag of science and reason, humanity has enjoyed peace for the last two hundred years. But when the colonies of Alpha Centauri fall to a spiritual leader, this peace is history and Sol sends the Second Fleet to rescue a system that not only hosts the most livable planet but also a dark secret. In a world where you live as a brain and your thoughts command swarms of machines, war is brutal and mistakes fatal. What starts as a battle of two sides soon becomes a complex conflict. Follow the queens and pawns of this epic story in their struggle for power, revenge, justice and survival. Some of the chess pieces will find themselves in the wrong game entirely.