The Long Game

How you can have a decent space opera if you can't travel faster than the speed of light: Stay in the spaceport, everything will come to you.

Alex has come to the spaceport on Minos following the trail of his long-lost grandfather - who hasn't been heard from for more than 100 years. His family runs a vast interstellar business empire, made possible by the soliton drive. The drive lets you leap across space and time. To you it only seems like an instant, but to everyone else the years go by, as the interest on your investments accumulates.

When Alex's father died and his estate had to be settled, one question needed to be answered: What was the fate of his grandfather. He left on a mission to outer worlds more than fifty light years away and never returned. But that doesn't mean he isn't still out there somewhere, lost in space or time.

Meanwhile, a Zorgon battle fleet is expected to arrive at Minos any day now, forcing Alex to move quickly to find out what happened to his grandfather, while avoiding whatever fate had befallen him.

Part of this novel first appeared in Analog.