Floating unidentified alien cylinders abandoned in space. Shape shifters that can’t be killed when they change their forms. Greedy companies that want it all no matter who they have to hurt; it seems that anything can happen in the future.
Brenna and her dad face all of this and more as they chase down the greedy, the thieves, and the kidnappers as part of their job whether they wear spacesuits or run on faraway planets.
Who would guess that the bad guys might be the good ones and the good guys had put a price on their heads. Worst of all, the price for Brenna is her heart.
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When she was nine, Brenna Gunva shot a reindeer by herself with a bow and arrow, and then finally killed it by slicing its throat. Her father was a harsh teacher who only gave her a nod at her deed.
When she was twelve, her father moved them from Russia to Alaska. She saw no difference in their life as her father continued to force her to live off the land. Coming to the new area, she was tested to learn the tracks of the animals that lived in Alaska. It meant she found a track, followed it to the animal that left the trail and killed that animal. She then matched the paws on the bottom of the dead beast to the prints she had followed and remembered. If possible, they ate the animal. If the animal was inedible, they used it as bait. Nothing was wasted.
Her father taught her the hard way as to how to track across the land that did not accept prints. If she lost a track completely, she got no meal. She learned about bent grass, broken leaves, and bits of fur on briars. There were other lessons, like smells. She had to eat her meals blindfolded and would have items taken away that she couldn't identify from the smell.
As a child, Brenna missed out on a lot of desserts. Her dad would mix fruit on purpose to confuse her nose. He explained that anything she tracked would try to find ways to change or hide their scent to make it hard for a tracker to stay on their trail.
Brenna's father never hit her, but he never saved her from the injuries she endured during her hunts. The first time a buck speared her with its lowered horns, it took her hours to crawl home. Her father ignored her, as she lay on the floor of their cabin.
Eventually, she got up and took off her clothes to clean up the deep gouge on her ribs. Her dad did give her advice on how to clean the wound and wrap it to help it heal. That was the way it went with each of her injuries, so she learned to avoid lacerations to her body.
Getting hurt while out on a hunt was not the worst part of her solitary life with her father. There was a devil's process created by a twisted mind called Online Schooling. Regardless if her father was home, or on one of his own strange hunts that took him away from her, she had to spend several hours on the computer or doing the assigned homework every day.
There were only two days a year that she was allowed to stay in and rest away from her latest computer or out on a hunt. One was her birthday, and the other was her father's birthday.
From reading and from the computer connected to a satellite, through a special device hidden in a marked tree trunk outside their home, she knew about several other holidays. It seemed that in some parts of the world, businesses also closed and people didn't work on certain holidays. The special holidays were different depending on the country.
Her father insisted her education be broad, so she learned about a lot of religions and what countries they were tied to, and how far back they went in history. Basically, she decided the human race was totally screwed when it came to their beliefs in religions.
Modern politics were learned, with space travel being an important factor, since there were now people who had developed on other worlds. The commonality was that there were many things that she saw in most of them. She saw greed, a divine presence to blame, and a need for power.
The animals she hunted had a better way to handle the situation. They proved that they were the better beast. They didn't use subterfuge, and they didn't lie or set up traps or try bribes. They just proved they were the better beast until a better beast came along to lead the pack.
Seventeen years of harsh living and being brainwashed by a severe father had turned Brenna Gunva into something other than a pretty teen. Her father had created a tracker.
At that age, he took the teen with him on a contract.
Brenna did not understand this country called Texas. The weather was so different from where she had spent her entire life with the need for heavy clothes, it was a surprise to her and was uncomfortable. She would not complain. It was a test.
The one hour trip from Alaska to Texas by air was different than the boat trip from Russia to Alaska, but it still let her know they were going into a different country.
Her Online Schooling gave her credit for being at third level college, so she was well aware of America, and how far it now reached. She also knew that Texas was one of the original 50 states, and had an obnoxious pride in its position.
Keeping her mouth shut and her eyes open, Brenna took in the tall buildings they passed to go out to the dry, hot rolling country.
She listened to the conversation her father had with his employer, while a lot of other armed men stood around a small building. Brenna discovered this was called an outbuilding on a large ranch that belonged to a man who had nothing to do with the problem, or the man that they needed to find in the hills. His location was convenient as he allowed its use by Federal Police.
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