THE DIVIDE RECAPS
Short summaries of the first two books,
The Last Watch and The Exiled Fleet
AUTHOR'S NOTE!
Throughout The Relentless Legion, reminders of key information have been layered in, but to avoid repetition and not weigh down the experience, I tried to keep them relatively lightweight.
These recaps are meant to provide a general plot summary for those who have already read the first two books — they are not adequate as replacements for reading them.
These summaries have very little worldbuilding or backstory (and even less character development) — I'd definitely recommend a re-read/listen for the optimal experience, but these will provide a high-level to help jog your memory!
WARNING: Spoilers Ahead
Do not proceed if you haven't read The Last Watch and The Exiled Fleet!
LAST TIME ON...
THE LAST WATCH
The Divide #1
Millions of years ago, the universe stopped expanding. Along its edge is the Divide, an invisible barrier beyond which lies nothing. Scanners can’t see past it, and ships that pass through never return.
The Sentinels’ duty is to watch over the Divide, a two-hundred-year tradition meant to protect mankind from another near-extinction at the hands of the Viators, a warfaring alien species fabled to have first crossed over from the Divide millennia ago.
When his power-hungry grandfather rejects him as a royal heir, the well-educated but relentlessly snarky CAVALON MERCER is forced to join the Sentinels aboard the SCS Argus, one of hundreds of ships stationed at the Divide. The dreadnaught-turned-watchtower is commanded by ADEQUIN RAKE, a decorated war hero and former member of the Legion’s foremost elite special operations squad, the Titans.
Shortly after Cavalon’s arrival, Adequin discovers the edge of the universe has begun to collapse toward them — and quickly. Billions of lightyears from civilization, they’re stranded with dysfunctional comms and no access to faster-than-light travel. Aware of Cavalon’s extensive scientific background, Adequin enlists his aid to creatively refuel their only warp core.
She sends her second-in-command JACKIN NORTH along with Cavalon and a small crew to the closest relay gate to get aid from the Legion and bring back escape vessels. However upon arrival, they find the gate abandoned and inoperative. Alien raiders arrive — a hostile species known as Drudgers, a genetic mashup of Viators and humans. They board the gate and the Sentinels are forced to make a fighting retreat back to their ship.
They flee the gate and return to find the Divide about to consume the Argus. Most of the personnel are lost as the Divide destroys the ship, but Adequin, Cavalon, Jackin, and a few others manage to flee in an escape vessel. They’re able to outrun the Divide for now, but the collapse is accelerating and they won’t remain safe for long.
Back at the relay gate, Adequin and Cavalon board the Drudger raiders’ ship and eliminate the threat. Along the way, they discover a rare Viator artifact, the atlas, which leads them to a massive, ancient space station. They learn the defunct station is a generator that creates dark energy — the fundamental force which caused the original accelerated expansion of the universe. The generators were built eons ago by the Viators to counteract the collapse, but in the two hundred years since their extinction, the stations have fallen into disrepair, and the Divide is no longer being held at bay.
They finish restarting the relay gate just as they’re finally able to connect with Legion command over the radio. Adequin speaks with RENETH LUGEN, her former commander and one of the preeminent generals of the Legion. He’s shocked by what he hears, but orders Adequin to return safely now and not risk more lives.
With hundreds of Sentinel ships and thousands of lives at stake, Adequin defies orders to take a chance at repairing the dark energy generator. Cavalon and a small crew restart the power source — a small, contained fusion reaction in the form of a mini-star. But the station’s still not turning on, and they discover the hull must be repaired before it will function.
As the Divide closes in, Adequin and Cavalon suit up and head into space to make the repair. They’re successful, but unable to get back inside before the station turns on. They’re caught in the opposing forces of the collapsing Divide and the dark energy being generated. Finally, the station wins and the Divide is pushed back, but Adequin’s harness breaks and she’s pulled away from the hull without a tether — into the Divide. Cavalon musters the courage to leap after her, catching her before his tether runs out.
Back inside, Adequin confirms the Divide is at a safe distance, and that the other Sentinels are out of harm’s way — for now. She finally recognizes the extent of the Legion’s negligence, and fully accepts operating outside their confines, even if it means mutiny. Cavalon has finally found a place where he’s valued, and he wants to help Adequin and the others save the rest of the Sentinels.
WARNING: Spoilers Ahead
Do not proceed if you haven't read The Exiled Fleet!
LAST TIME ON...
THE EXILED FLEET
The Divide #2
Six months have passed since the crew of the Argus restarted the dark energy generator and forestalled the collapsing Divide. They’ve settled aboard the Sentinel vessel the Typhos (later renamed the Lodestar) where the survivors of the collapse have gathered. Jackin is in command, managing thousands of unruly soldiers and a dwindling food supply. Cavalon works tirelessly to reverse-engineer one of the Viators’ mini-star reactors, which will allow them to power their jump drive and escape the Divide. Meanwhile, Adequin and a small crew have been traveling the Divide, restarting dozens of dark energy generators to continue to hold back the collapse.
Cavalon and his team successfully power up their mini-star reactor, however the ancient drive fails after only one jump. To fix it, they’re going to need a supply of metamaterial only available back at the Core, the hub of human civilization.
Adequin, Cavalon, Jackin, and a small team must leave the Divide to find what they need — and return before those aboard the Lodestar starve. They take one of their few viable ships, the Synthesis, along with the ancient Viator atlas device which will help them lay low during their travels.
They’re not far into their search when an enemy vessel gets the drop on them. Adequin, Cavalon, and Jackin vanish from the ship. They rematerialize aboard a mysterious vessel, where they realize they just experienced teleportation. They’re brought before KAIZE, a Viator leader and the very breeder Adequin let go at the end of the Resurgence War. The Drudgers they fought at the Divide six months ago were there under orders from Kaize to restart dark energy generators.
Kaize is appreciative of Adequin taking on the task of restarting the generators and lets them go along with their upgraded atlas. Jackin was gravely wounded during the teleportation, and in order to save his life he was given a set of Imprint tattoos, a rare Viator technology of neurally-linked nanites which grant the host increased strength, speed, and healing — the same as Cavalon has (from his royal lineage) and Adequin (from her time as a Titan.)
They reunite with their crew on the Synthesis. Jackin reluctantly reveals that he has contacts in the Core who can help them find the metamaterial. They travel inward and make contact with a powerful smuggling organization, the Corsairs, where Jackin has deep ties leading back to childhood. The Corsairs inform them that there’s only one place that manufactures the metamaterial: a moon in the Elyseia star system — Cavalon’s former home. For the journey, they’re lent a cutting-edge stealth ship, the Wakeless.
Adequin and Cavalon leave Jackin with the Corsairs so he can continue to heal while they take the Wakeless to Elyseia. They discover the factory is biometrically sealed by none other than Cavalon’s diabolical grandfather and monarch of Elyseia, AUGUSTUS MERCER.
Adequin and Cavalon must infiltrate Cavalon’s former home and steal a device that will mimic Augustus’s biometrics and grant them access. At the manor, locked away in Augustus’s secret lab, they find a six-year-old boy. He’s a clone of Augustus — and not the first attempt. Cavalon learns both he and his “father” were the first two attempts, and that he’s a clone of the man he despises more than anything in this universe.
Augustus detects their infiltration and sends Guardians — a mind-controlled variant of Drudgers — to capture them. Adequin and Cavalon flee the manor, but on the way out, they’re separated. Cavalon is wounded but picked up by the Synthesis; Adequin is captured.
Out of their depth, Cavalon and crew summon Jackin, who arrives weary but functional thanks to his new Imprints' healing abilities. He insists they first complete the mission, then deal with Rake. They infiltrate the factory and steal the metamaterial. Meanwhile, Adequin is taken to speak with Augustus, who proves to be just as diabolical as Cavalon promised.
Adequin is mysteriously set free, then reunites with the crew, however Jackin is conspicuously absent. She learns he turned himself in to Augustus in exchange for her life. Through a recorded message, Jackin admits he was the pilot who took Cavalon’s grandmother into protective custody nearly fifteen years ago. Augustus had captured and tortured him to reveal the location, but Jackin held out and was eventually rescued by Praetor Lugen. He was given a new identity, but Augustus didn’t give up looking. After several near-misses, Jackin went to ground at the Divide.
Though crushed by the loss, Adequin makes the difficult decision to not attempt a rescue and instead return to save the Sentinels. While traveling, Cavalon studies data stolen from the manor. He learns Augustus intends to eliminate anyone with DNA “contaminated” by the Viator mutagen, something that affects nearly half of the population. Augustus is developing a bioweapon to counter it, which would result in the death of millions.
Weeks later the crew returns to the Lodestar with the metamaterial. They’re losing more people to starvation every day, so they waste no time repairing the jump drive and fleeing the Divide. They use a route Jackin had provided, which they believe will lead to a secluded planet where they can regroup and put down roots.
The Lodestar makes it through the relay gate, where they’re met by Augustus’s Guardian forces. They jump away but after a short delay, the Guardians trace them and continue to follow along their jump route, picking away at their shields over time.
After several jumps, the Sentinels are contacted by a mysterious pilot claiming to know Jackin and Lugen. Adequin realizes the route Jackin gave them doesn’t lead to some random planet, but instead the place he’d taken Cavalon’s grandmother — a safe haven established by Lugen, who has been covertly opposing Augustus for decades.
The location must remain a secret, so to ensure Guardians can’t follow them there, they must be eliminated. Lacking adequate firepower, they devise a plan to turn their new power source into a weapon. They’ll remove the restrictions on the mini-star reactor, causing it to essentially supernova.
Their new allies pack large cargo ships full of thousands of Sentinels and escort them away in the brief down time between jumps. Eventually, unbeknownst to the Guardians, the Lodestar is all but empty, with only Adequin, Cavalon, and a few others remaining.
Cavalon reveals a last-minute caveat — someone must stay behind to trigger the reaction. Adequin and Cavalon physically fight over who will do it; Adequin wins. She puts an unconscious Cavalon aboard the last away ship, and once they’re clear she goes to the reactor and triggers it.
But just as the supernova activates, Adequin wakes up aboard the Viators’ ship. Kaize explains that Cavalon sent an urgent plea via the atlas to come use their remote teleporter to rescue her. After what Adequin did for Kaize at the end of the war, Kaize felt compelled to repay the debt.
Kaize reveals that the Viators didn’t originate from this galaxy, but settled here after fleeing the collapsing universe. They developed the dark energy generator technology while traveling for generations, then were finally able to stop here, where they set up a network of protective generators. Those generators now encircle the entire galaxy, though on the opposite side of the galactic core the collapse hasn’t yet arrived. Kaize warns that many spacefaring species will soon come seeking refuge from the collapse, much like the Viators did millennia ago, and they may not all be friendly. Humanity needs to be standing together as one before that happens.
Kaize teleports Adequin to the last away ship, where she reunites with Cavalon. Though shocked by the truths Kaize just laid on her, she keeps them to herself — she won’t burden anyone else with it yet; the threat they need to focus on first is Augustus.
They arrive at the planet Akhet, where a small but thriving community of exiles has taken refuge in an ancient alien stronghold. They are soldiers, scientists, politicians, and citizens of all kinds that Lugen rescued, who would have otherwise lost their lives to Augustus’s machinations.
Cavalon reunites with his grandmother while still grappling with his discovery of being an Augustus clone. Adequin radios Lugen, who admits he’d sent her to the Divide to keep her safe. He’d planned all along to bring her and Jackin to Akhet, but couldn’t have anticipated the collapsing universe hastening his timeline. He asks her to lead the rebellion and stop Augustus’s bioweapon and genetic cleansing, and she accepts.
Next up...
The Sentinels have rallied under the leadership of Adequin Rake, and Cavalon Mercer has uncovered the horrifying genetic solution his grandfather is about to unleash on the unsuspecting outer colonies.
Both Rake and Cavalon race against time to save the universe once again. They'll need every resource, every ally who might answer the call.
It might not be enough.