Tom Fleet was a bit of a misfit as the second son of a minor English noble in the 1880s. Once he finished his schooling he had little to do. His grandfathers had left him adequate finances for his needs and with his elder brother set to take the title, he gave in to his fascination with gadgets and began to tinker and invent. His goal was to create a sky craft to go to the moon. Surely if Jules Verne’s characters could go there and many other places, he could do as well.<br><br>Rowan Farrell followed in his Uncle Gordon’s footsteps, joining the UniFleet, but went a step farther and became an officer. Assigned to his first command level post, he takes a small patrol ship out to scout a region of interest to the Council and report if any signs of the enemy Angevirian Empire in the area. When one of his crew spots a strange, tiny craft, he decides to capture and study it. After all it could be an Angevirian Trojan horse. But the odd cylindrical vessel holds only one man, unconscious and suffering from hypothermia and lack of oxygen. When the man comes to, he claims to come from the earth ... five centuries in the past!

Tom Fleet’s Machine

Several more times, their ship pitched, yawed, dropped, or rose abruptly, while Rowan’s hands flew over a series of buttons and levers.


What I’d give to be able to go over a schematic of this amazing ship and the way it works!


Another thought came on the heels of that one—how wonderful it would be for those hands to play over his body with similar nimble skill. Would that chance possibly come?


The dark man, who he’d heard Rowan call Jost, stood then and crossed to Tom’s seat. “I don’t trust you,” he said, “but the commander does, so pay attention. We need every cannon shooting back at the attackers. Watch me closely.”


Chapter 10