Not Without Honor: The MacCollie Series, Book One

Naomi Bricklin is a MacCollie scout, tasked with visiting unexplored solar systems in hope of finding uninhabited, earthlike planets that can be colonized by the Fellowship of Humanity. As she is passing through an ordinary star system, her ship is suddenly attacked and destroyed. Naomi is lucky to escape with her life, taking the single lifeboat to the surface of the planet she had been approaching. Upon landing, she finds a planet that is anything but uninhabited.

When the MacCollie Company learns that one of their ships has been destroyed, they ask Fleet to investigate. Fleet Cruiser DeBellevue, Captained by Commander MacMillan wing is dispatched with a mandate to return with the scout pilot, if she survived, along with all intelligence that had been gathered.

On the way to the rescue attempt, DeBellevue is met by another starship, and military personnel from the Directorate of Special Operations board the starship to provide additional security. Commander Wing isn't happy—particularly when the leader of the extra unit of Marines is an old nemesis—but orders are orders.

While DeBellevue travels toward her destination, Naomi Bricklin is learning the ways of a very different human society—if, indeed, the society is human. As she gets acquainted with new characters, all of whom have similar appearances, she begins to sort them into two categories—human and non-human. One of those she sees as non-human, a male named Kanayo, becomes her mentor and companion without either of them wishing it so.

Upon arrival at the planet, Commander Wing deploys his forces in an attempt to find the missing scout. His efforts are frustrated by the surplus Marines and their commander, Colonel Kiddeman. In short order, Kiddeman takes her entire complement of Blackjacket Marines to the planet's surface, along with three containers that Wing later learns contain planet-busting nuclear devices.

Through electronic contact with Naomi Bricklin, and good intelligence-gathering on the part of his people, Wing begins to understand Kiddeman's mission. She has been assigned to destroy all life on the planet, and then kill Wing and his entire crew. Wing needs an ally, and finds it in the society on the planet below. During the final encounter, Wing's people are being overrun by Kiddeman's Marines until those fighting for the survival of their planet intervene in Wing's favor and destroy Kiddeman's force.

When the battle is over, and the dead have been buried, Wing talks with a representative of those who live on the planet, Madame Chen. She explains the existence of those who don't quite look human, and tells Wing that for two hundred years, elements of the Fellowship of Humanity have wanted to destroy them. To prevent that, she and the rest of her society are going to board star ships and travel to a very distant new world, where they hope to remain unmolested for hundreds, if not thousands of years. Wing takes the scout pilot and the remainder of his forces up to DeBellevue, and heads for home port.