Critical Mass

By Craig Alanson

The tenth entry in Expeditionary Force finds the pirate crew's two ships crippled at once: aboard the newly self-aware AI Valkyrie, a hidden Maxolhx kill switch cuts all power just as it commits to helping Simms's crew, while a worm Valkyrie had planted earlier turns the Flying Dutchman's systems against itself, forcing Captain Chang to abandon ship. Separated from Skippy's connection and from each other, both crews fight to keep their people alive on failing life support, with Simms preparing a nuclear self-destruct rather than risk capture. Meanwhile Joe Bishop wakes disoriented and a prisoner in a Kristang facility with no memory of how he was taken; as Thuranin interrogators move to open his skull for study, Skippy makes contact through nanomachines implanted in Joe's brain and begins a desperate effort to get him out alive.

Description community-written - CC BY-SA 4.0.

Series

• Expeditionary Force - book 10

Guides

• Chapter-by-chapter recap of Critical Mass
• Critical Mass character guide

Genres: action-adventure, military-science-fiction, science-fiction, space-opera

Recordings