The year is 2251. Humanity sprawls across the stars—and is quietly unravelling at the seams.
Quinn Drummond is a battle-hardened ex-Marine scraping by as a freelance cargo runner. He pilots a battered transport ship that holds a few secrets most vessels don't, owning little else but the ship itself, his sidearm, and a mountain of debt—along with the unwavering company of his copilot and closest friend, DeeDee.
When a routine salvage job goes sideways, Quinn recovers a single impossible artifact: a component from the UENV Achilles, the United Earth Navy cruiser that vanished sixteen years ago—along with his brother and the entire crew.
What begins as a search for answers pulls him into a chase across known space, pitting him against mercenaries, a ruthless collector, and a revolutionary movement that has waited in the dark for two decades to settle its score.
Interwoven with Quinn's journey are the journals and fractured memories of Commander Thomas Wren, former executive officer of the Achilles. Once a decorated, principled officer, Thomas's writings trace his slow, inexorable transformation into a true believer—charting the events that justified his cause, the compromises that corroded his soul, and the choices that made betrayal feel like the only remaining path.
In the Shadow of Achilles is a sweeping space opera about loyalty, grief, and the treacherous line between righteous anger and the horrors it can justify. It asks what we owe the dead, what we owe one another, and whether any cause can survive the sins committed in its name.