The Reluctant Ranger

Five years ago, humanity learned they weren’t alone in the universe.  Hopelessly outmatched, the Earth’s armies fell to the unending onslaught of the machine menace, The Sylan Empire.   When all hope seemed lost, a group of brave warriors emerged and fought back, holding the line against the coming doom.  Teams of these warriors began to appear across the globe, fighting off the Sylan at every turn.  They were not invincible and many of these Rangers lost their lives defending humanity from the invaders.  Minneapolis had no Ranger team despite many incursions by the Sylan.  Nicole Hayes struggled to find her way after losing her parents in the last incursion, but a chance meeting at the annual Renaissance Faire set her on a different course.   One she didn’t want, but would take up anyway, because if nothing else, it would give her inevitable death meaning.  She is The Reluctant Ranger. What to expect:  Lots of sentai inspired action and a fair bit of violence and gore.  The Rangers don't always have clean wins and sometimes innocents pay the price for it.  Nicole is an openly gay woman so expect a WLW romance subplot. The characters drive the story, so I try to give them time to shine outside their uniforms as well as within. Nicole is not in a good place mentally at the start, give her time to find her footing. Posting Schedule:  Every Monday at 3pm Central Time I have over 70 chapters drafted at the time chapter 1 is going live and I am doing a thorough edit pass before posting each of them.  I plan to drop the first ten chapters fairly quickly, then scale back to ensure I can maintain the same level of quality hopefully though the end of the story.  (Which I'm not even going to attempt to estimate, scope creep is already getting to me)  I intend to keep a minimum of a ten chapter lead for those that support me on Patreon.  (Though those chapters won't be as heavily edited as those going live for the public) Cover art provided by the absolutely adorable Pennytail!  [participant in the Royal Road Writathon challenge]