The Alpha Enigma

A thrilling new science fiction mystery from the New York Times bestselling author of the Donovan novels

Dr. Timothy Ryan, head of the military psychiatric unit at Grantham Barracks, is meeting a new patient, a woman known as "Prisoner Alpha." As she is being transferred, they are attacked by assassins, barely escaping with their lives. One shooter vanishes, leaving behind a dead companion unlike anyone Ryan has ever seen.

But even more baffling is the puzzle of Alpha herself. She speaks in a strange tongue, and doodles in bars, dots, and little pictures like nothing Ryan has ever seen. Is she some sort of savant, or the most cunning spy he's ever met?

Meanwhile, in Egypt, archaeologist Reid Farmer uncovers an 18th-Dynasty tomb that shouldn't exist, filled with Mayan epigraphy, mathematics, and materials that didn't exist 3,000 years ago. As a result of this discovery, Reid and forensic anthropologist Kilgore France along with the sarcophagus they have found are snatched away to a hidden lab to solve the enigma of a man lost in time.

As dark forces gather, Alpha makes an impossible escape from Grantham. Ryan quickly becomes the prime suspect in her disappearance, but with a team of unique allies, sets out to prove his innocence. Together, they must find Alpha and save Ryan before it is too late.

Autorentext

W. Michael Gear

Klappentext

Now in paperback, a thrilling new science fiction mystery from the New York Times bestselling author of the Donovan novels.

Dr. Timothy Ryan, head of the military psychiatric unit at Grantham Barracks, is meeting a new patient, a woman known as "Prisoner Alpha." As she is being transferred, they are attacked by assassins, barely escaping with their lives. One shooter vanishes, leaving behind a dead companion unlike anyone Ryan has ever seen.

But even more baffling is the puzzle of Alpha herself. She speaks in a strange tongue, and doodles in bars, dots, and little pictures like nothing Ryan has ever seen. Is she some sort of savant, or the most cunning spy he's ever met?

Meanwhile, in Egypt, archaeologist Reid Farmer uncovers an 18th-Dynasty tomb that shouldn't exist, filled with Mayan epigraphy, mathematics, and materials that didn't exist 3,000 years ago. As a result of this discovery, Reid and forensic anthropologist Kilgore France-along with the sarcophagus they have found-are snatched away to a hidden lab to solve the enigma of a man lost in time.

As dark forces gather, Alpha makes an impossible escape from Grantham. Ryan quickly becomes the prime suspect in her disappearance, but with a team of unique allies, sets out to prove his innocence. Together, they must find Alpha and save Ryan before it is too late.

Story Locale: Contemporary USA and Egypt

Series Overview: This thrilling science fiction mystery from the New York Times bestselling author of the Donovan novels explores the clues of the past to unravel the mysteries of the present as experts race to uncover the identity of a mysterious woman known as Prisoner Alpha.

Zusammenfassung
Praise for W. Michael Gear

What a ride! Excitement, adventure, and intrigue, all told in W. Michael Gear's vivid, compulsively readable prose. A terrific new science-fiction series; Gear hits a home run right out of the park and all the way to Capella. Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo Award-winning author of Quantum Night

A marginal colony on a living world where human life and human will are tested to the limits. An intriguing and inventive new work from Michael Gear, first of a trilogy. Recommended! C. J. Cherryh, Hugo Award-winning author of Downbelow Station

Gear kicks off a new sf series by weaving a number of compelling characters into the narrative, including bold heroine Talina Perez and Donovan itself, a planet teeming with danger and delights in turn.... Fans of epic space opera, like Rachel Bach s Fortune s Pawn (2013), will happily lose themselves in Donovan s orbit. Booklist

W. Michael Gear creates a fun and colorful setting on a planet full of interesting fauna and cunning, deadly animals. RT Reviews

Dark and gritty, this book shows both the best and worst sides of humanity, all while being emotional and thought-provoking. It Starts at Midnight

It's not easy to create an entire new planet setting and to immediately ground the reader in that world, but Gear makes it look easy.... He strikes an impressive balance between only telling us what we need to know when we need to know it and making this feel like a fully-realized place from the get-go. Den of Geek

The novel's prose is as razor-sharp as Donovan's toothy beasts, its characters deftly defined. The enveloping narrative gallops along at a fierce pace and will make Outpost one of the must-read sci-fi releases of 2018 when it arrives on February 20 from DAW Books. SyFy Wire

A thrilling tale of high-stakes survival on an alien planet. Dread Central

Leseprobe

1

Grantham Barracks.

Gray came to us without a name. She arrived at Grantham Barracks riding in the back seat of a nondescript black Lincoln Continental. Her car was the second, or "principal" vehicle, in a three-car security detail. I watched it enter our underground parking lot accompanied by the whisper of engines and the shish of tires. A gleaming black Chevy Suburban had the blocking position in front; the chase vehicle, a Tahoe, followed close enough behind to have nursed on the principal's bumper.

I stood outside Grantham's underground entrance with a team of orderlies, Gray's admission papers and commitment orders in hand.

The vehicles rolled to a stop; armed agents wearing black tactical gear burst from the doors. After they established a defensive perimeter, a uniformed captain stepped out from the Lincoln's passenger door. He looked around warily before opening the sedan's rear coach door.

I thought it all a bit overly dramatic for a patient transfer.

The way the tall woman swung her legs out and emerged from the back seat, she might have been some exotic lotus. She wore a blaze-orange jumpsuit and white athletic shoes. Her wrists were manacled and chained, as were her ankles. The baggy prison garb barely disguised her supple body, high bust, and broad shoulders.

I'd never seen a woman with such presence. Reaching her full height, she shook her tawny hair back. The effect was electric. She paused-a queen casting her curious gaze about a new but unbecoming kingdom. Then she fixed the most incredible eyes on mine: a piercing laser-blue like I'd never seen.

Rather than beautiful, I would have called her mesmerizing. She looked patrician, with a high brow, straight and proportioned nose, sculpted cheeks, and delicate jaw. The slight crow's-feet at the corners of her eyes didn't match the youthful tone of her bronzed skin; the lushness in her lips contrasted with the maturity in her gaze. My guess placed her around thirty.

Ignoring the captain, she walked toward me with a dancer's practiced grace. Each step measured precisely to the length of the confining chain at her ankles.

She stopped a pace short and fixed me with an imperious gaze.

The captain offered me a clipboard. Disturbed by the woman's magnetism, I concentrated on the paperwork. Age, date of birth, and place of birth had "unknown" written in each box. Then I glanced at the line where it said "Name." Her identity seemed to be "Prisoner Alpha."

The way my orderlies were gaping, Aphrodite might have sprung magically to life before their very eyes. I glanced sidelong at the woman, the skin on that side of my body almost prickling from her curious aura. "Do you have a name?"

She was studyin…