Cystum Beta (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798231725472)

In 2010, Earth is caught in the middle of a war between two mysterious alien races. Orbital bombardments leveled many of humanity's cities, extraterrestrial chemicals and pathogens decimated ecosystems, global commerced and international coordination ceased... it's an event that would later be known as the Crossfire.

99 years later, ecosystems are still recovering, large tribes and ambitious nation states rise and fall. Though one of the two alien species has long been forced off of the Earth and mostly forgotten by humanity, the prevailing race has been the Cyst: a bizarre, indifferent, mysterious insect-like species that only utilizes technology of biological origin. Their ever-growing numbers, rapid movement, durable construction, and psychic powers have kept humanity from being able to fully bring back civilization in any meaningful capacity. Thankfully, the damage their worldship sustained during the Crossfire left it fractured and unable to give the Earth a proper, full-forced blitzkrieg invasion; leading to a slow, very gradual process that has dragged on for close to a century.

Now, in 2109, a nineteen year old drug addict named Bevel is trying to eke out a living any way she can, floating around different gangs of raiders who make their living by killing people they come across and taking what they have. However, after she's approached with the opportunity to work for a corporation that has existed since long before the Crossfire, she begins to wonder if this new line of work will force her to renounce her ways of marauding and pillaging, or if they'll want to harness that darkness for the company's own profit.