"When Unit Four, a biological soft robot built and stored high above the Jovian atmosphere is activated for the first time...Aliens are attacking the Helium-3 mine it was created to oversee, and now its sole purpose is to defend Earth's largest energy resource from the invaders in ship-to-ship combat...Unit Four launches its ship and goes on the attack, but it has no idea it's about to get caught in a downward spiral of misinformation, reprogramming,...

With nods to Arthur C. Clarke's Rama series and the real science of Neal Stephenson's Seveneves, a touch of Hugh Howey's Wool, and echoes of Octavia Butler's voice, a powerful tale of space travel, adventure, discovery, and humanity that unfolds through a series of generational vignettes. In 2088, humankind is at last ready to explore beyond Earth's solar system. But one uncertainty remains: Where do we go? Astrophysicist Reggie Straifer has an idea....

"Generations ago, Convoy Seven and the AI known as I.C.C. left Earth on a mission that would take them far beyond our solar system. Launched by the Planet United Consortium, a global group formed to pursue cooperative Earth-wide interests in deep space, nine ships headed into the unknown to explore a distant star called LQ Pyx. Eons later, the convoy has returned to LQ Pyx to begin work on the Web, the alien megastructure that covers the star. Is...