The Vanguard Incident

A secret mission. A deadly contagion. A team that never came home the same. When six Delta Force operators are HALO-dropped into the mountains of Afghanistan under the callsign Voodoo One, their objective is simple: infiltrate a hidden bioweapons facility, eliminate the threat, and vanish before dawn. But inside the lab, they uncover something far worse than enemy science—a gas, a mist, a living weapon that doesn't just kill. It adapts. The extraction goes to hell. The team returns changed—stronger, faster, unbreakable… and uncontrollably violent. By the time they reach the carrier USS Vanguard, it's already too late. The virus isn't contained. The warship becomes a floating nightmare. What begins as a classified mission turns into the first stage of humanity's next evolution—or extinction. One by one, the soldiers of Voodoo One succumb to the transformation, becoming berserker-grade monsters driven by primal rage and the last fragments of their training. As the infection spreads through steel corridors and fire-lit decks, brothers-in-arms must face each other in close-quarters combat for control of the ship, and maybe the world itself. From the snow-black peaks of the Hindu Kush to the burning decks of the Vanguard and deep into the underground command centers of Echo Division, The Vanguard Incidentblends real-world special-operations authenticity with hard-science plausibility and the relentless pacing of an apocalyptic techno-thriller. As global powers race to contain what they can't understand, one truth becomes impossible to ignore: the contagion is learning. It remembers voices. It calls names in the dark. And it knows the rhythm of the human heart. Fans of Matthew Reilly, Tom Clancy, Michael Crichton, and James Rollins will be hooked by Joey Stardust's explosive mix of military realism, genetic horror, and high-concept science fiction. Every chapter hits like a shockwave—tactical, emotional, and terrifyingly plausible. When the mission ends, the signal begins. The world's next war isn't fought for territory or power. It's fought for control of the frequency that defines life itself. The Vanguard Incident is the first novel in the Voodoo One Chronicles, a saga that pushes modern warfare past the edge of human evolution—and asks what happens when the perfect soldiers become something even more unstoppable.