Rust Gambit: Awakening (Junk Fleet Book 2)

By Carl Wang

She freed the ghosts. Now they're coming home.

The rust is gone. So are Cass's memories.

She traded her past to free 10,000 trapped pilots from the Junk Fleet. Now she flies a dead ship with a crew that knows her better than she knows herself. No powers. No voice in the hull. Just vacuum, debt, and questions.

The questions don't last.

The pilots are returning - and they're not the grateful ghosts she expected. Half want to build a new world. The other half want to finish the war that killed them. And they all remember Cass set them loose.

Worse, the last flake of rust still clings to the Rustbucket. It whispers secrets: Cass isn't human. Her father wasn't either. He was the First Pilot who locked them in the rust 10,000 years ago. And he's still alive inside the flake, waiting to wake up.

The Masters are hunting the pilots. The Colonial Fleet wants Cass dead or dissected. And the pilots want her to choose a side in a war she can't remember starting.

She has no memories. No ship. No allies. Just a name she chose and a war she inherited.

Eyes clear. Hands free. The war begins.

Rust Gambit: Awakening is the second book in the Junk Fleet series - a military science fiction adventure for fans of The Expanse, Battlestar Galactica, and gritty space operas.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0H5BTDMCR
• ISBN13: 9798181647503
• Release Date: June 2026
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 242 Pages
• Weight: 0.63 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.5"