To be or not to be. For Senator Mbayo and 11 billion Areans, the question is literal.When a single warship annihilates the International Space Station in minutes, thebalance of power across the Helion system collapses overnight. At its centre standsGeneral Shade, a brilliant, ruthless commander leading the breakaway ProximianNavy, and a man driven as much by vengeance as by ideology. As Tellus scramblesto respond, Mbayo finds herself caught between a collapsing Union, moralcompromise and a future she did not bargain for. Nes Vilsak, heir to the Union'spolitical machinery, is forced to choose between loyalty and conscience when thecost of inaction becomes impossible to ignore. What begins as a territorial conflictrapidly spirals into something far more dangerous: a reckoning with the Union's past, its abuses of power, and the crimes buried beneath its veneer of stability. Spanningplanetary invasions, covert negotiations and the intimate consequences of politicalviolence, Vestibules: False Axis is an epic science fiction novel about empire, inheritance and the dangers of blind vengeance.A life for a life.An eye for an eye.Welcome, to the world of the blind.