A Dark and Hungry God Arises
Categories: [ Books/The Gap Cycle ]
Morn has prevented her son Davies from being delivered to the Amnion by Nick, but Davies is now a prisoner of the Bill, the ruler of Billingate, a station in forbidden space that caters to the needs of illegals. Nick needs his ship repaired but has no money and resorts to selling Morn to the Amnion who have an outpost in Billingate. Morn has however stolen Nick's anti-mutagen drug, so she is not affected by the Amnion's experiments to transform her into a human-looking Amnion. Some of Nick's crew has been kicked out after opposing selling Davies to the Amnion and are now stranded on Billingate. Angus, now a cyborg forced to work for UMCP is sent to Billingate to rescue Morn. The Amnion still demand Davies from Nick as they want to study him, so he deals with Angus, promising him Morn (whom Angus does not know is already in the hands of the Amnion) in exchange for Davies. Angus manages to rescue Davies' from the Bill's prison, but Nick then admit now having Morn anymore. Angus then meets with with Nick's former crew members; together they enter the Amnion's outpost and rescue Morn. Angus, Nick and his former crew then escape in the nick of time, thanks to Nick's remaining crew sacrificing his ship. Billingate is destroyed by Angus having tampered with its fusion reactor. Meanwhile, Warden Dios, director of UMC Police, is scheming against his boss, Holt Fasner, CEO of the UMC, to make UMCP independent from UMC and put it at the service of all people in space and not only serving Fasner's greed. He publicly admits having used Nick's pirates for covert work in the past and having used Morn as a payment to Nick. UMCP sent Nick to Billingate to start a rumor about an anti-mutagen drug that would render the Amnion suspicious of the Bill and render Billingate less useful to them. The revelation is followed by an attack on the ruling council of Earth and a freeze of its communication with the UMC.