He thought Hell was the worst they could throw at him.He was wrong.Back from tangling with the Hammer of Kraa, the most brutal, trigger-happy tyrants in humanspace, Junior Lieutenant Michael Helfort is assigned to the Federated Worlds heavy cruiser Ishaq, which is struggling to rise to the threat posed by a newly resurgent Hammer. Aboard the floundering ship, Helfort is coming to grips with a painful injury and the unpleasant truth that nobody likes a young hero-least of all senior officers.Without warning, the Ishaq and twenty-seven Fed merchant ships are blown apart in a horrific ambush, the first step in the Hammers master strategy to destroy the hated Federated Worlds. Michael and a pitiful remnant of the Ishaqs crew escape the inferno. The Feds have no idea whos behind the heinous attack, and the Hammer are determined to keep it that way, consigning the Ishaqs survivors to a prison camp deep in the wilderness of the Hammers home planet.No ones getting out alive to derail the Hammers lethal master plan-especially not the FedWorlds hero who so humiliated them on the battlefield. Its payback time, and the Hammers intend to throw their entire space fleet into destroying Michael Helfort and the Federated Worlds.Too bad it wont be enough.