Excerpt
PROLOGUE
Let it be known to you that it is the Fourth Age of the recorded history of the Andromeda galaxy. Millions of years have come and gone since the last light in the old Milky Way galaxy winked out. There was a time long ago when the astronomers of the old races, the Ceti, the Amaurot, the Iss and the Hibagons in the Andromeda galaxy gazed at that distant spiral web of stars and dust in their telescopes. They looked and wondered if any intelligent life similar to their own lived there.
Now, they can do so no longer.
Tucked away in a far corner of the Andromeda galaxy, undiscovered yet by any other race, the Hominids live and die as all creatures do. As the centuries pass, the collective memory of the Hominids fade away.
Some recall the old legends of an original home world in that now dead galaxy. Depending on the storyteller that imaginary world was called Earth while others call it Eden. No matter the name, they do agree on one vital point: It was a paradise. It had been peopled by a race that had ascended to such glorious heights that they made perfection seem like a tarnished pot discarded into the refuse dump by comparison.
Then came the Dark Evil, they lament, as their story takes an ominous turn. This dark force that roamed the universe, an ever-dying force that devoured every star, every planet that it came into contact with. Wherever this force passed, it left no life behind to tell its story, or to raise an alarm to warn the next victim.
In the chaotic final years, so the story goes, two forces arose to oppose the darkness. One, its name still unknown to this day, gathered up the inhabitants of the surviving worlds and bore them here to safety in Andromeda. The second formed a line in the space between the stars and held the darkness at bay just long enough for the migration to be completed.
These were the Rangers, the Galactic Knights of the Milky Way. They were sworn to uphold justice and to battle evil wherever they may encounter it. "Might for Right", a way of life born uncountable centuries before any of them had first drawn breath, was their holy credo.
By the hundreds of thousands, these brave men and women held that line. Led by the greatest Ranger of them all, Galen Underwood , who stood bravest and tallest of them all at the forefront of that line and refused to yield even one inch of space to the dark force.
Wave after wave of Rangers fell. Wave after wave of Rangers rising to take their place just as quickly until only one Ranger remained. Galen Underwood died spitting challenge as he charged alone at the darkness.
The precious time the Rangers had bought was enough. By the time the evil force had reached the furthest outposts of humanity in the Milky Way, its planets no longer held any form of life upon their respective surfaces. Every man, women, child and living creature had all been carried away to safety.
Now, in this Fourth Age, many believe these stories of the Dark Force, the Rangers and their heroic stand and the great migration to Andromeda are nothing more than a myth. They look into the night sky where this Murky Way, as it is now called, is supposed to be and see nothing but the cold black of space. That galaxy, and the supposed lost birth world of the Hominids are nothing more to them than bedtime stories told to frighten recalcitrant children.
"Behave," they are told. "Or the Dark Force will eat you like it did the Murky Way!"
But a few actually remember, and they believe the stories. They believe them and they pass them on to those who are willing to listen.
Because, they say, should that darkness ever again find the descendants of the Murky Way, there should be those ready to stand against it once more. The Andromeda galaxy will need sons and daughters willing to become a new breed of Rangers. To be the Knights of the Andromeda Galaxy, ready to battle the darkness that lay beyond the stars. And, until that day, be ready to battle the darkness that lay within the hearts of any given Hominid male or female.
And to do so in the old way.
Galen's Way.
