Elusive Steps

 A family intent on changing the world by way of an expanding empire, born out in a garage. An empire that has dared reach for the stars.

 A family, whose father is faced with the prospect of growing old and retiring, and the ongoing rivalry set between two sisters.

 The West family is on a collision course with an unstoppable force that they themselves helped to unleash. And like the moves on a chess board, the pieces are repositioning, to the point of inevitable encounter.

 An encounter that demands an outcome; ‘Win, Lose, or Draw.’

 

 The first installment of the series wrestles with the concept of ‘settled science’. When we look to the past for answers about how we got to where we are as a species, a significant amount of data is missing or misinterpreted. We are taught that the universe has an age, and that age is undisputed. We accept that hypothesized physics is fact and to question the underlying data makes one a heretic. But the past presents so many puzzles to our modern understanding, that to discount the evidence as trivial, or resolved, is to judge a major pillar of our existence as passé.

 This is the dilemma that John West faces, as he struggles with the concept of the Electric Universe Theory and his realization the Gravity Centric model of the universe, is flawed to the point of absurdity. For most scholars, there will be no going back to locate the fork in the road that has led to this path of minimum resistance and maximum guesswork.

 John’s invention of the Step Drive is upsetting the standards of the day and his concern for the misuse of his invention will not be tolerated by the elite. Only by separating the lock from the key, can John ensure that the door to cataclysmic danger remains closed. He plans to move the testing of his invention to a location in space where the investigation into the potential for his device will not result in the Earth suffering from its failures or abuse. This is not viewed as prudent and the powers that be, are intent on capturing an example of the device for their own study and refinement.

 By now, John and the Earth’s manufacturing abilities are wed at the hip, and his fear is slowly replaced by the excitement of exploration which leads to a crippled alien ship, an obvious trap, a rescue mission and Earth’s first true encounter with an alien species. This diversion also initiates a plan to steal several Step Drives by the government.

 The rescue reveals that large numbers of this alien species are being kidnapped for reasons unknown, along with a second alien species whose abilities far surpass the humans. The encounter is also the reason that John West is found dead, amongst a field of debris, and the recovery of evidence that proves Earth appears to be in trouble, and no one knows what to do about it.