A Cauldron of Stars

Independent freighter captain Mike Starrunner has seen it all, but when someone freezes his weapons officer into a six-foot cube of cryonite, even Mike is stumped. Who would have done this and why? And what happened to good old carbonite? On skanky, sweltering hub world Ponce de Leon, there’s no shortage of suspects. Fortunately, Mike is a Shifter - genetically gifted with the ability to shift into animal form. Unfortunately, so are the other guys.

Legendary space trucker and freighter captain Mike Starrunner travels from planet to planet with his interstellar crew. But now they‘re in big trouble—they know too much about a criminal group called the Travelers. These murderous miscreants leave a trail of death wherever they go, and they want Mike’s head. When his efforts to shake them fail, Mike and the crew’s survival is at stake. They’re outnumbered, outgunned, and outmaneuvered, and an ugly end seems certain.

In search of Pippa, an exiled teenage heiress, independent space freighter captain Mike Starrunner accepts a cargo for the Hurtworlds, the most hellish planets in the Cluster. The cargo is dirty, and could land the crew in jail...but that's never stopped Mike before. This time, the prize is not just money, but the truth about the Traveller plot that's turned Mike's life upside-down.

Racing against spooks and space pirates, freighter captain Mike Starrunner embarks on a do-or-die mission to prevent interstellar war. After the failure of the Fleet's containment operations, the disruptive gene-mod known as the Transcendence is about to fall into the hands of criminals who'll use it to conquer the Cluster. Mike and his crew are the only ones with a chance of catching them in time. Out on their own without backup, they chase the Travelers to a dead planet where a shocking discovery awaits.