Book excerpt: A new novel set in the world of the popular science fiction online role playing game, EVE. We all crave a purpose. A fire to spark our lives into action. It's this burning life within that drives us to our destinies. But when it burns too deep, or goes unchecked, it can shatter innocent lives in its wake. A vicious attack on a deep-space mining colony rains death and destruction on nearly all its inhabitants. Only a handful survive. Among the shattered survivors is a young man, hell-bent on an impossible revenge. In another part of the universe, a wealthy agent of death finds her tenuous grip on sanity slipping, and is forced to leave everything she's come to know and love. But her last chance at redemption lies in the last place she ever thought to look. Their respective paths take them through the vast universe of EVE, to galactic empires built on faith, hedonism, discipline, and rebellion. Their fates plunge them into the darkest parts of this galaxy, to encounters with denizens of the chaotic and dangerous pirate kingdoms. And all the while, as each draws closer to what they seek, they begin to realize that the only stakes worth playing for are the ones from which they've run so far away. . . . At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.