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  “And, Ricky Bobby, you’re certain that it was a Starboards Corporation ship?” Jack asked.

  “When the ship was approaching to dock, it had the tags to resemble that of Phoenix Tech,” Ricky Bobby began. “But when I dove into the network, I found that there was nothing to connect it to Phoenix Tech.”

  Jack pulled his hand away from his head. “Why didn’t we see this coming?”

  “I don’t understand,” Bailey said. “Why would a Starboards Corp ship impersonate Phoenix Tech?”

  Jack cleared his throat. “Because Phoenix Tech is a small mining company with interests in resources for small colonies.”

  “And Starboards Corp is the big bad wolf,” Lewis guessed.

  “So you’ve read this chapter, I see,” Jack said, tapping his fingers nervously on the desk.

  “What’s the significance of Starboards Corp?” Bailey asked.

  “Ghost Squadron recently found a lead tied to the corporation,” Jack explained. “We weren’t after them for any other reason than they had dealings with a man by the name of Solomon Vance. His company acquires assets like Starboards, then uses them up and tosses them to the side. Ghost Squadron was trying to track him down.”

  “And Ghost Squadron was getting close?” Lewis asked.

  Jack shook his head. “I didn’t think so.”

  “What’s his background?” Bailey asked.

  Jack stood, pinning his hands behind his back, seeming to suddenly vibrate with anxiety. “He was a Federation scientist who stole a piece of bio-synthetic material his team had created.”

  “Biotech?” Lewis asked, his tone heavy.

  His uncle nodded darkly. “We knew whatever he was up to with the technology was dangerous, but we never—”

  “The monster, that was the material he stole,” Bailey realized.

  “It would have been the early beginnings of it,” Jack qualified. “This was a long time ago and, honestly, we were really after Vance because, before leaving the Federation, he took out his entire team, leaving no evidence of what the experiment included.”

  “That’s repulsive,” Bailey exclaimed.

  Jack agreed with a nod. “We’ve been cleaning up Vance’s messes on the frontier for a while, but we’re always too far behind him. That is, until we got a lead that directed us straight to Starboards Corp. That was the best clue we’ve had in…well, ever.”

  “So Ghost Squadron starts snooping into Starboards Corp, and then randomly gets a distress call from Phoenix Tech,” Lewis summated.

  “And as usual, you answered it,” Bailey said, completing his thoughts.

  Jack nodded, bitterness written on his face.

  “What if Ghost Squadron was getting too close?” she asked.

  “Too close to what, though?” Lewis countered.

  “That’s what we have to find out,” Jack said decidedly.

  “I’ve found something of interest, after scanning through the records in the shuttle—though most were encrypted and destroyed upon access,” Ricky Bobby reported.

  “Go ahead,” Jack urged.

  “Phoenix Tech had recently been a subsidiary of Starboards Corp,” Ricky Bobby explained. “However, it appears that the mining company hasn’t been operational for a while.”

  “I wonder if this could be another instance of Vance’s main corporation using someone up and tossing them aside,” Jack mused.

  “There’s only one way to find out,” Lewis stated. “Can we travel to Phoenix Tech? If we can determine what took them out, then we might know what we’re dealing with.”

  “And more importantly, we might learn what Starboards Corp is trying to hide,” Bailey added.

  “That corporation is only one of the many faces of Vance’s main operation,” Jack admitted.

  “What’s Vance’s company called?” Lewis asked.

  Jack laughed, but it lacked any humor. “Seems ridiculous now. A sick joke. Solomon Vance’s elusive organization is called ‘Monstre Corp’.”

  Chapter Nine

  Loading Bay, Ricky Bobby, Tangki System

  Bailey tried to keep the apprehension off her face as she followed Hatch around the Q-Ship. The transport ship was larger than anything she had ever flown in any of the simulations, and was designed to intimidate. Hatch had perfected the patented design over time, and there was nothing quite like it, inside or outside Federation territory.

  “The armor of the Q-Ship can take quite a beating, but I don’t think that will matter for this mission,” Hatch stated, halting beside the bow of the ship. “Although the ship has incredible handling and speed in its current form, it can lose its armor in a pinch for enhanced maneuverability.”

  “Wow, that’s impressive,” Bailey said, trying to swallow past the tension in her throat.

  “It’s practical is what it is.” Hatch shrugged modestly. “The ship also has cloaking technology, reinforced shields, and a gate drive.”

  “Wait, this transport ship can jump?” Bailey asked, her head spinning. “I thought only battlecruisers like Ricky Bobby could do that.”

  “Forget what you know about most ships,” Hatch said. “I don’t work inside the parameters of what most can do or even expect. I have a simple rule I apply to every one of my projects.”

  “What’s that?” she asked, intrigued.

  “There are no limits,” Hatch stated. “Belief is the key to everything, Lieutenant.”

  Bailey nodded, filing away his sage words. They resonated with her.

  She remembered the first time she took her combat training exams, how she took down every single target within one minute: all twenty-seven of them. Her technical sergeant was shocked, telling her most only knock out a few. The point of the setup was to have as many enemies as possible to test the soldier’s reaction. Bailey remembered blinking back at him, confused. She said, “No one told me I couldn’t take them all out, so I did.”

  “The controls are similar to the Black Eagle, but the Q-Ship is much smoother to fly,” Hatch continued. “Hell, after you fly this, those single flyers will seem like a beat-up Volkswagen bug.”

  Bailey tried to nod again, but choked on her breath. A cough sputtered out of her mouth. “I’m still in flight training,” she began, her voice shaky. “I’m not sure I’m ready to fly this.”

  Hatch dismissed her with a wave of one of his tentacles. “That’s nonsense. I saw your tests scores. You’re ready to fly.”

  “But I haven’t technically flown! Simulations don’t really count,” Bailey argued.

  Hatch didn’t look deterred. “Simulations are a whole lot different than the real thing, but the only way to learn is by doing. Besides, I got the chance to interface Pip with this Q-Ship. He can copilot for you.”

  That made Bailey feel marginally better. “Right,” she said, trying to inject confidence into her voice.

  “The Q-Ship is fully stocked with cannons, missiles, and rail guns—not that you’ll need them for this mission,” Hatch stated, continuing to waddle around the spacecraft. “It’s always good to be prepared, though, and you’re headed straight into an asteroid belt.”

  Asteroid belt, of course, Bailey thought. The look on her face betrayed the confidence she was pretending to have.

  “Look, kid,” Hatch began, looking around. “Do you see anyone else, besides me, who can fly this ship?”

  “Well, no, but—”

  “That’s right, because the crew of this battlecruiser has disappeared. All three hundred of them,” Hatch said, his voice growing dark. He turned around and looked at Bailey, a flicker of emotion behind his eyes. “I’ve got more important things to attend to than to fly around on missions. You can do this. And you’re going to do this, because you’ve never quit anything. Yes, I’m throwing you into the deep end, but my instinct tells me you are going to swim.”

  Bailey smiled, and not just because of the vote of confidence. It was amusing to her that Hatch, a Londil, was making swimming references.

  She inherently
liked Hatch. He was real; what you saw was what you got. It was rare to meet someone not hiding behind pretenses.

  “Okay, I’ll do my best,” Bailey promised, holding her chin up high.

  “I have no doubt that you will.”

  Hatch continued walking around the ship, seeming to inspect it. He stopped suddenly and spun back around to face Bailey. “You know, I could have picked an experienced pilot for this mission, but I chose you; yes, because you’re smart, and bad habits aren’t ingrained in you, but also because you remind me of someone. The commander of this ship is one of the very best I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with. She has a work ethic that blows most out of the water. When I was looking for the right candidate for this investigation, I told myself, ‘I need someone like Julianna in order to find Julianna’. You remind me of her, and that gives me hope. If Julie was on this case, it would get solved without a doubt. I have similar confidence in you.”

  Bailey didn’t know what to say.

  She’d spent the night studying the crew’s files; Commander Fregin was incredibly accomplished, a soldier for the Federation for almost two centuries. Her file read like a fictional novel about a superhero.

  Hatch cleared his throat. “Anyway, as I mentioned, Pip is there to assist you. I apologize in advance for his bad jokes.”

  “Hey, now! My jokes are fantastic!” Pip’s voice echoed from the open hatch door of the ship.

  Hatch sort of smiled. “I hope he does try to unload some material on you. It will be good for him to get out and get his mind off things. Morale is everything, and right now, it’s at an all-time low.”

  Bailey agreed with a nod. It was hard to keep things light when so much tragedy had happened, but she knew it was important not to give into despair.

  “Speaking of morale, here comes our cruise director,” Hatch grumbled.

  Liesel was approaching, the ferret a short distance behind her.

  “Cruise director?” Bailey asked, confused.

  “Liesel, or ‘Liesel Diesel’, as the crew called her, runs yoga retreats in the evening, and lame craft projects in between missions,” Hatch said, his voice low.

  Bailey suppressed her laughter. Sounds like the chief engineer is already trying to boost morale.

  “Good morning to you both,” Liesel said, holding out a device for Hatch.

  He took it, pulling it to his face for inspection.

  “Morning, Liesel,” Bailey said.

  “Did you have any good dreams last night?” Liesel asked her. She was wearing yoga pants and a light sweater covered in black grease marks.

  “Ummm…I don’t really remember,” Bailey asked, taken aback by the strange questions.

  Liesel gave her a look of disbelief. “That’s too bad.”

  “How about you?” Bailey asked, trying to be polite.

  “Oh yes,” Liesel said, pausing to watch Sebastian trail off to the other side of the loading bay. “I dreamed that I was at a beach. Some dolphins came up and invited me to swim with them. I was going to take a picture, but decided to live in the moment. We swam, and it was wonderful.”

  “Wow, that’s a nice dream,” Bailey said.

  “Yes, I looked up the meaning, and it says that I’m in touch with my mind and also my other mind,” Liesel said, touching the top of her head and then the back of it.

  “That makes zero sense,” Hatch grumbled, handing the device back. “We need to make modifications on this before they leave for the asteroid belt. Less sleeping and more engineering, okay?”

  Liesel smiled and took the device back. “Okey dokey.” She half skipped over to where Sebastian had disappeared, earning a contemptuous glance from Hatch.

  “That one has a brilliant mind with solutions to impress, but she’s also as nutty as a fruitcake,” he said, shaking his head.

  “The best tend to be a little eccentric.” Bailey snickered.

  “Yes, this crew is more of a circus,” Hatch stated.

  Bailey recalled the different files she’d reviewed the night before. There were multiple aliens on the crew, including a Saverus who could shapeshift into any person or animal.

  “Anyway, the device I have Liesel working on should help you take different readings when in the asteroid belt,” Hatch explained. “The monster has a certain chemical makeup that I haven’t been able to deduce. I want you to take samples from Phoenix Tech—maybe something there will give us insight into this thing.”

  Lewis strode into the loading bay wearing the same long maroon coat as before. Bailey suspected that he wouldn’t be putting the jeans and boots back on. The coat did make him look like a flasher.

  “Wow, that’s one beautiful ship,” he commented, looking the Q-Ship over.

  “The AI on the ship is even more handsome,” Pip’s voice echoed from inside the spacecraft.

  Lewis laughed, his green eyes brightening.

  Hatch’s cheeks puffed up. “See, that’s the humor you’ll have to endure.”

  “I think you meant ‘enjoy’,” Pip said.

  “When do we take off?” Lewis asked.

  “As soon as Liesel makes some device modifications,” Hatch said, his eyes flicking to the back where the chief engineer had disappeared. “Where is that hippie, anyway? Liesel?”

  “I’m over here,” she sang. “I think I found something.”

  “Over where?” Hatch asked, waddling in the direction of Liesel’s voice.

  Bailey and Lewis followed.

  A row of Black Eagles sat regally at the back, and Liesel was peering through the viewing window of one, trying to look into the cockpit.

  “What are you doing? I asked you to make modifications,” Hatch mumbled.

  “I know, but Sebastian might have found something,” Liesel said, indicating the ferret, who was scurrying over the top of one of the other Black Eagles to peer inside.

  “What do you mean he’s found something?” the Londil asked.

  The ferret let out a series of squeaky noises, his dark eyes centered on the ship under him.

  Liesel hurried over. “In there?” she asked.

  Sebastian excitedly ran in a circle on the top of the ship and lifted up on his hind legs.

  Liesel eyed the ship. “I think the shields are still up on this one, for some reason.”

  “Why would the shields be up on a stationary Black Eagle?” Hatch asked.

  “That’s what I’m wondering,” she said. A sharp hissing sound reverberated from the ship when she lifted the hatch.

  Sebastian scurried straight into the cockpit, disappearing from view.

  Liesel let out a startled gasp of surprise, followed by a delighted laugh. “Oh, this is wonderful!” she exclaimed.

  “What’s wonderful?” Hatched asked, hurrying over.

  The ferret’s head materialized, peeking up over the side of the single flyer, followed by a second head.

  This one was larger and belonged to a beautiful dog.

  “Harley!” Hatch exclaimed, his face brightening.

  Chapter Ten

  Loading Bay, Ricky Bobby, Tangki System

  “That dog is pretty damn lucky,” Lewis said, strapping himself into the copilot’s seat.

  “Well, I think you mean pretty damn smart,” Bailey said, running her preflight checks, her mind buzzing with adrenaline.

  “Well, yes,” Lewis said, watching her. “A sentient dog who understands ship controls and was practicing at the time of the upload. That’s absolutely impressive.”

  “And yes, he was pretty lucky to have been checking the ship’s shields when everything happened. That definitely saved him,” Bailey said.

  Harley had hopped down out of the cockpit, his brown eyes shining, upon being found. Apparently, he’d passed out from whatever happened during the upload and had awoken when Sebastian found him. Lewis had never spoken to a dog before, but that was on the long lists of new experiences since taking on this case. He’d also never seen a ferret with such good investigating skills. Maybe he nee
ded an animal sidekick, like a fox or a parrot.

  “Harley was Julianna’s dog. Well, he was the ship’s dog, but mostly endeared to the commander,” Pip informed them overhead.

  “Wow, a dog and an AI. The woman who has it all,” Lewis said, watching Bailey. She’d already run the system’s checks but appeared to be stalling, rechecking her instruments.

  “Well, and she also has the captain, but I don’t like to gossip so you didn’t hear that from me,” Pip said.

  “I’m sure you miss her very much,” Bailey said, her eyes intently studying the various gauges.

  “I really do, but we’re going to find her and everyone else,” Pip said, his voice hopeful. “I’m an optimist at heart…and an old soul.”

  Bailey gave Lewis an amused look. “Pip, I like that you describe yourself as an old soul.”

  “You don’t think it makes me sound pretentious?” Pip asked.

  Bailey flipped a series of switches on the console, making them light up. “No, I think as an old soul you’re allowed to describe yourself however you like.”

  “Then it’s settled, I’m putting that on my dating profile,” Pip said.

  An abrupt laugh popped out of Lewis’s mouth. “You have a dating profile?”

  “I’m going to, once Hatch makes me a body,” Pip informed them.

  “You’re an interesting AI,” Lewis stated, thoroughly amused.

  “You have no idea, but you will,” Pip said, a warning in his tone.

  Lewis watched Bailey still studying the controls. “So it’s your first time flying this ship,” he stated, rather than asked.

  She ignited the boosters, gradually pressing on the control. The Q-Ship started to pick up speed. Lewis felt his body weight push back into the seat.

  “It’s actually her first time flying any ship,” Pip informed overhead.

  Lewis spun to face Bailey, suddenly frantic. “What? You’ve never flown before?”

  The ship hurtled through the tube and shot out into the blackness soaring through space. Bailey pushed back into her seat, a relaxed look on her face as she flipped levers overhead. “There has to be a first time for everything, right?” She said confidently.