13 Changed
Ava woke with a smile and stretched, taking in the view of the cargo bay. She was momentarily confused by her surroundings. She faintly remembered that she had been in the cargo bay with the artifact and had been leaning against it. She must have fallen asleep, which made sense to her, as the warmth had been overpowering.
She was confused because she was now lying on top of the artifact, several feet above the deck.
The retracting catwalk was a solid ten or more feet from her position. She had heard of people wandering around in their sleep or even performing familiar tasks, but Ava had no history of doing so. As far as she knew, she didn’t even snore.
She sat up and moved her feet beneath herself to stand. She braced against the expected stiffness of her muscles and pushed herself up with her hands on her knees.
To her surprise, she didn’t feel the idle protests of healing muscles. Instead, she felt strong and fresh. Other than her underclothes being liberally soaked with sweat, she felt better than she had before her injury.
She swung her arms experimentally and rotated her hands this way and that.
No pain.
No hindrance at all.
Ava’s heart swelled, shaking off the unspoken fear that she would never recover, that there would be more setbacks, or that she would remain permanently less than she had been.
Ava let out a shout of joy that reverberated through the empty, cold metal room. She quickly turned off her suit’s external speakers.
Then she yelled again.
She squatted for a moment and burst upward in a jump that carried her five feet into the air, assisted by the suit’s synthetic muscle fibers. She landed gracefully and laughed.
She must have climbed up here in some fit of exhausted delirium, she reasoned, but she was so ecstatic over her newfound mobility that she hardly cared.
She stepped to the edge of the block and looked down.
She was twelve feet above the deck, which was nothing for Ava. She had made jumps like this and worse. At least here she knew the deck wouldn’t cave in when she landed.
She pushed off from the artifact in a forward leap. She dropped toward the floor, and as she made contact with the grating, she carried her forward momentum into a roll and came out of it on her feet.
She straightened and lifted her arms as though celebrating a performance.
There was no one there to share in her triumph.
She didn’t care.
She was positively giddy.
All positivity left her when she noticed the time indicator on her HUD.
She still had three more hours before she was free to wander away from her vigil.
With a strained sigh, she turned back toward the artifact, moving until she was within the ten-point-nine-something perimeter that Curry had painstakingly marked off with an overabundance of reflective tape.
Ava moved toward the chair that sat forgotten nearby and started to sit before changing her mind.
With a rush, she sprinted toward the block, jumped, and planted her leading foot against the artifact. She used her momentum and the artifact’s heavily textured surface to propel herself higher. She stretched her arms above her head and just barely managed to grasp the top edge.
She pulled herself up and clambered over the ledge.
Ava sat with her legs hanging over the edge of the biggest payload the
9Lives
had ever procured.
She breathed, allowing herself to calm and wait out the rest of her time.
“Ava?” called a voice, startling her from her thoughts.
It was Isaac, the chief engineer.
Ava focused and saw him approaching from the lower Main door. He was already most of the way to her and must have seen her climb onto the artifact.
He looked perplexed and perhaps worried. His normally tidy shirt was partially unbuttoned, and his tie had been loosened. He looked like he had been working double shifts and substituting stims for sleep. His hair, a thick mop of curls, seemed to be standing more on end than usual.
The lower Main door opened again, and before Curry could force himself through, Isaac turned and shouted, “I said I would handle this! Back, foul creature!”
Curry stood there, dejected, as the lower Main door slid closed.
“Ava?” Isaac said again as he turned back toward her. “Are you feeling alright?”
Ava almost scoffed at the question.
She had never felt better, as far as she was concerned.
She activated her external speakers. “Never better. Why do you ask?”
Isaac slowed to a stop just outside the perimeter and looked up at her.
“Maybe come down from there, and we can talk,” he said.
Ava tilted her helmeted head.
She was fine with cutting this experiment short, provided she wasn’t going to have to make up the time later.
“Sure.”
She slid off the ledge, turning midway to catch the edge before dropping the remaining distance from a hang. She landed and allowed her knees and the built-in shock absorption of her suit to bear the brunt of the impact.
She turned toward the engineer and stepped in his direction.
Isaac watched her with wide eyes but managed a calm smile. A bead of sweat ran down his forehead.
That was odd, Ava thought.
He was being very odd.
Odd even for an engineer.
“What are we talking about?” Ava asked as she approached him, stopping just outside the perimeter.
Isaac wasn’t looking at Ava.
He was staring at the artifact.
“Mr. Buseman?” Ava chided him. “You disturbed my rest. What did you need to talk to me about?”
Isaac blinked and turned toward her.
“Perhaps it would be best to have this discussion somewhere else.” He gestured vaguely. “Prying eyes and all.”
He turned suddenly and strode briskly toward the service elevator.
Ava followed on his heels but said nothing as they stepped inside and rode it to the upper Main.
Isaac fidgeted with his collar during the ride. When the elevator settled into place and the door opened, he almost bolted down the hall.
Perplexed, Ava pursued.
She caught up as he turned into the briefing room. The room was rarely used, but when it was, it was generally for a private dressing-down or the discussion of sensitive topics Kane did not want widely known.
Kane was there, pacing back and forth as Ava and Isaac entered.
When Kane saw Ava, he turned and moved toward her, pulling her into a tight hug before pushing her out to arm’s length and inspecting her.
“Are you alright?” he asked, concern etched into every line of his face.
Ava couldn’t remember a time when he had looked so old and worn.
“What?” she stammered, shocked by the greeting.
“Are you hurt? Can you take off the helmet?” Kane asked.
Without waiting for an answer, his hands shot up and began working the clasps to pry the helmet free. It clicked and released, and Kane pulled it away.
Ava gave him a bewildered look.
“What’s going on? Why are you two acting like this? Why are you asking if I’m alright?” Ava asked, panic creeping into her voice.
She looked from Isaac to Kane.
Isaac seemed tired and confused but was trying to force himself to remain calm. Kane was boiling over with worry as he dropped Ava’s helmet to the floor and pulled her into another tight hug.
“I’m just glad I have you back safe,” Kane said.
He pulled away and looked her over again.
“Do you remember anything?”
“I… I fell asleep. I was sitting next to the artifact, and I fell asleep,” Ava stammered.
She was shocked by Kane’s implication that something more had happened, although she knew there had to be more.
How had she woken up on top of the artifact?
She had been so ready to gloss over that little mystery in light of how she felt when she woke. She simply hadn’t cared about the circumstances.
Kane regarded her for a moment, judging whether there was anything else she wasn’t telling them. He seemed to reach a decision and took her hand.
The room was roughly the size of the bridge but lacked the various stations. It had a large table with a holo projector linked to the data core and the ship’s AI. Around the table were several rotatable, padded chairs with high backs.
Kane led her to one and motioned for her to sit.
The door opened, and Hailey rushed inside. She hurried to Ava and began examining her, shining a light into her eyes, ears, and mouth.
Ava, who had grown accustomed to the process, turned her head with each stage of the examination in practiced order, fully compliant.
“You don’t seem any worse for wear,” Hailey said as she finished her quick spot check and pulled up Ava’s suit diagnostics on her personal data pad.
“Can someone please fill me in? You’re freaking me out here,” Ava exclaimed, clearly on edge and fighting the urge to bolt for her cabin.
She had felt perfectly fine until everyone started asking if she was alright.
Now she felt exactly not alright.
“Better if we show you,” Isaac said as he began pressing buttons on the holo projector. “Captain?”
He looked toward Kane.
“Okay,” Kane said. “Yes. Do it.”
Kane took a seat beside Ava. He was still holding her hand.
Normally, he sat in the one chair that did not match the others: his captain’s chair.
Ava had made fun of how pretentious it was. The other chairs were plain charcoal black, but the captain’s chair was gold-inlaid, with thicker padding made from a different material. The colors were largely charcoal with accents of deep purple, and an emblem of a cat’s head glaring outward with golden eyes was embroidered into the headrest.
Of all the indignities aboard Kane’s vessel, this chair bothered him the most.
The captain’s chair sat forgotten across the table beside where Isaac now stood.
The holo projector blinked to life, and the room was briefly awash in blue light. The machine adjusted, and the illumination became largely confined to the walls.
Above the table, a faded blue-green 3D model of the cargo bay was traced into existence and slowly filled out. Walls that would obstruct the viewers’ field of vision were removed. The AI generated the representation in real time using compiled recordings and scans.
Ava could see herself in the room beside the artifact. Thermal readings were indicated by a faint red glow forming a general outline around her avatar and a small red spot on the artifact oriented toward her.
Another figure approached and stood before her.
It was the lanky figure of Peters.
Ava started to blush, not wanting to hear the recording of their conversation.
Thankfully, no audio played.
Ava knew the audio must exist somewhere in the ship’s data core and errantly thought how she wished some conversations could be completely private.
Peters’s avatar left, leaving only hers.
She watched herself stand and walk around the artifact. Reach out and touch it. Sit against it.
The 3D image was obviously speeding through the footage.
She saw herself slump, her arm falling from her lap.
This was when she must have fallen asleep.
Another avatar entered the bay.
She had no memory of this, but she recognized the shape of his shoulders and the familiar gait of his walk.
Ethan.
She watched him approach.
Pause.
Crouch.
Pause.
Reach out.
Pause.
Then leave.
“Can we rewatch that portion with audio?” Ava asked.
Hailey smiled and almost laughed. Kane rolled his eyes.
“He doesn’t say anything. Now this part, pay attention,” Kane said, putting a puzzling amount of emphasis on
he.
Her avatar continued sleeping, her head leaning to one side. The section of the artifact she touched was already glowing red, but the area of warmth began to expand.
Ava realized with a start that her avatar was leaning backward through the artifact.
She was sinking into it.
Within moments, her entire upper body had disappeared, and her legs were being pulled inside.
It was as though the artifact were slowly swallowing her.
Four avatars appeared near where the stairs would have been if they hadn’t been removed from the projection to avoid obstructing Ava and Kane’s view.
Ethan again, Ava recognized.
Then he was grabbed by two others.
Peering closely, Ava could see Juarez holding one of Ethan’s arms while Kane circled in front of him and shoved a stiff arm into Ethan’s chest, forcing him back a step.
Ethan tried to swing at Kane, but another avatar stepped forward and caught his arm.
Ava didn’t recognize the avatar immediately.
It was a woman. Small but obviously strong in her full salvage suit. The suit naturally gave her an advantage over the unsuited Ethan, but she also showed herself to be quite skilled.
The woman caught Ethan’s arm in the crook of her own, using her full body to slow the punch and stop it. She snapped a kick into the back of Ethan’s leg, and he buckled to the ground.
She was quick to capitalize, pulling a small tool from her belt and pressing it against Ethan’s neck.
He had been on one knee but was already trying to rise.
When the tool touched him, he fell face-first onto the deck, dragging Juarez down with him.
The woman, having lost interest in the fallen Ethan and entangled Juarez, stood in front of Kane. She said something, and Kane’s avatar turned back toward the artifact as Ava’s legs disappeared from view.
The woman—Alex, Ava realized—turned and heaved Ethan’s prone form over her shoulder in a fireman’s carry before walking out of the projection.
Presumably, she was taking him to the med bay.
Juarez scrambled to his feet and exchanged words with Kane before being clapped on the back and sent away.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Kane stayed.
Stock-still.
Watching the artifact.
Three more avatars entered the scene, these from the lower Main entrance. One approached and spoke with Kane.
Isaac.
Curry rushed around excitedly with his instruments while the other, a young man named Brodie UmWrey who had been aboard the
9Lives
for a scant four months, stood back with an oversized data slate.
The 3D projection began to distort and fade, but Ava could clearly make out the blurred avatars running for the doors.
The holo went blank.
Then it repopulated, starting again with tracings of the most basic details of the cargo bay.
The artifact formed.
It seemed wider and shorter than before.
Not by much. Perhaps a few inches shorter and three or so inches wider in the holo projection. In reality, it would represent a difference of a foot or two.
Ava couldn’t understand why the holo projector would get its dimensions wrong, but she braced for what the distorted image of her own avatar would look like if the artifact appeared that squat.
She needn’t have worried.
Her avatar blinked into existence, recovering from a forward tumble after jumping from the top of the artifact to the deck.
She watched herself stand and pose like an idiot before running and leaping upward to climb back onto the artifact.
Isaac paused the projection as his own avatar reentered the scene.
Ava sat with her mouth half-open and eyes wide.
Kane squeezed her hand.
“What the hell happened?” Ava asked.
“That is precisely what we want to figure out,” Isaac said. “Just as you were pulled into the artifact, we lost all readings. When it happened—right where the recording went faint—it doesn’t show this, but the alarm for the airlock opening sounded. Not one of us had thought to suit up before running in there.
“The readings were spiking. Your vitals were accelerated. The artifact’s heat signature was nearing a thousand degrees, and it was exerting a small gravity well and magnetic field that had not been present before.”
Isaac rewound the projection to just before Ava began sinking into the artifact’s side.
He pointed toward the surface surrounding her.
“Here, the readings show the surface temperature at about 108 degrees. Very warm, but not immediately damaging. Here—”
He pointed a scant quarter inch away on the projection.
“—the surface temperature begins rising significantly, by hundreds of degrees, peaking at 999 degrees Fahrenheit.”
“When the instruments alerted Brodie that there was anomalous behavior coming from the artifact, he ran up to get a visual and saw you sinking into it,” Kane explained, his grip still firm but gentle. “He commed for help and, unfortunately, used an open channel. I got down there as quickly as I could, but Ethan pushed through me and intended to pull you free. Isaac instructed me to keep everyone back and for us to observe from a distance because we had absolutely no idea what was happening.”
Ava heard everything Kane said but struggled to make sense of it.
Had they presumed she was dead?
Or soon to be dead?
Unsavable?
Was Ethan the only person on the ship who had even thought to try to save her?
“Ava,” Hailey said. “The gravity field they detected at the time would have pulled anyone within a few feet of the artifact directly into it, likely into the high-temperature areas. There was nothing we could safely do. The captain listened to his chief engineer and followed his advice. It was the right call.”
Ava nodded, but at the same time, however illogically, she recognized that it hurt to know she had metaphorically been left for dead.
Kane looked toward Ava, his eyes seeming to plead with her to forgive him.
“Okay,” Ava said. “But what happened? What did it do?”
“I’m sorry, Ava. We were somewhat hoping you could tell us what happened to you. If you remembered anything more. You just fell asleep and then woke up. What did you feel when you woke up? Where did it put you? Anything. Think,” Isaac implored.
“I remember feeling the warmth on my back, and I just started getting tired. Then I woke up. I was on top of the artifact. All of my pain was gone. My body felt strong. I felt great,” Ava rambled, spilling out everything she could remember.
“I felt good enough that I wanted to do a practice roll. I jumped off and rolled into the landing. Then I climbed back up. It was like I just wanted to see what my body could do. I don’t know. Like I was almost high or drunk on how good my body felt.”
“Still?” Hailey asked.
Ava thought briefly.
“No and yes. My pain is still gone, and I still feel good, but current circumstances have deadened my spirit considerably.”
“After we are done here, I would like to inspect your bandages,” Hailey added.
Ava gave her an incredulous look.
“I need to see whether you are actually healed or if there is simply something in your system making you
feel
repaired.”
“Fine,” Ava said, with no fight left in her. “But what do we do now? Do I have to go back down there?”
“Absolutely not,” Kane said before anyone else could respond.
He looked at Ava and then Isaac.
“It let her go this time. It may not the next.”
“Dad, it fixed me,” Ava said quietly.
“Ava, you can’t be serious. You disappeared for over a week!” Kane said. “We are not risking it again. This is beyond us. We don’t understand it, and we won’t be able to with what we have.”
Ava was taken aback.
Her eyes darted toward the timestamp floating above the holo projection.
Thursday, March 29, 1498 Human Galactic Standard.
The last she had known, it had been Thursday.
But not the twenty-ninth.
It had been the twenty-second.
Ava looked around the room but settled on Isaac, who pursed his lips and nodded.
She had thought she had slept for hours.
Not days.
Maybe the artifact had nothing to do with her recovery. Maybe she had simply healed after seven days of uninterrupted rest.
She voiced the thought aloud.
“No, I think it has to be more than rest,” Hailey said. “Considering the state your body was in, you should still feel stiffness and pain. Whatever this thing has done, it has influenced your biology.”
“Okay, but that isn’t a bad thing if it sped up my recovery. It shows that it has some sort of medical purpose. And we learned that it can generate a gravity field and emit high temperatures… and mess with magnetic fields,” Ava rambled.
“Right,” Isaac said. “But we don’t understand its purpose, what triggers it, or why it does the things it does. It is clear that it is reacting to you, but the thermal imaging—”
Isaac adjusted some settings, and the holo projection blinked back to the scene with Ethan standing before Ava as she slept.
“Except here. Here it is clearly reacting to both you and Ethan.”
The projection showed that the warm patch of surface behind Ava had expanded upward, roughly matching Ethan’s height, shrinking as he crouched and expanding again as he stood to leave.
“No one else has received such a reaction,” Isaac explained.
“Could we ask Ethan to spend time with the artifact? See if—” Ava began.
“No,” Kane interrupted. “We have all the data we are going to collect on this thing. I want it off my ship as soon as possible.”
His jaw set.
“We have a buyer, and we are already heading to make the drop.”
“What?” Ava asked, startled. “We haven’t made port yet.”
Then, after a moment, she added, “Did we make port already?”
“No. We have the fuel to make the jump and back comfortably, and we have more than enough provisions. Water rations are topped off thanks to the asteroid salvage from earlier,” Kane said.
Ava blinked.
She had been looking forward to stepping off the ship and breathing the industrially filtered air of her home.
She also felt a pang of loss as she realized the artifact was now so much closer to becoming someone else’s problem. The mystery of the artifact was about to be closed but would remain unsolved to Ava forever.
That didn’t sit well with her, but she also knew it was inevitable and quietly accepted it.
“Can I have a sit-rep? Catch me up,” Ava requested, realizing she was missing a week’s worth of small details that were probably unimportant individually but had piled up.
Kane quickly caught her up.
The
9Lives
had arrived in the Astrid System as intended. They traveled around the outskirts, which was common for ships merely passing through and taking advantage of the protection the system provided.
They had been ready to begin their next leap within the first two days and should already have arrived at port in the Antola System.
But Kane had kept them circling Astrid.
He didn’t want to draw attention to their cargo, but he had still reached out to contacts within the system. He was looking for anyone who might understand Old Earth technology.
Anyone who might help him get his daughter back.
Several contacts had given him the same name: Connor Dane.
Dane had a reputation for bidding on Old Earth artifacts of all kinds, from art to weapons to tools. As far as Kane knew, Dane had never encountered anything like what they were bringing him, but he was their best chance of finding someone who could possibly help.
Kane had paid a fee to the Astrid Communication Bureau to send a data burst to the contact information he had received for Dane.
He was surprised to receive an almost immediate response.
Coordinates.
And an offer higher than Kane had expected.
Kane was uneasy about the figure, seeing it as too good to be true, but also recognizing that this might be their only chance to get his daughter back. He consulted with Isaac and Hailey before briefing the rest of the ship.
Not a single person balked at the possible danger of dealing with an unknown Old Earth procurer making big promises.
Everyone understood that Ava might be in danger and that this was the only resource available.
Kane stressed that the buyer had a substantial reputation, as far as he could determine, but that they would still take every necessary precaution.
There had been some debate about whether they could extract Ava without hurting her and still salvage a sale. Kane calmly explained that even damaged technology could sell, but any attempt to crack open the artifact without understanding it could prove immediately fatal.
The only voice of dissent was Curry, who complained that his time to analyze the data and run more tests was being cut short.
Ava rolled her eyes as though to say,
Of course he would.
They made the leap and set out as soon as the crew had been briefed and assented to the inherent risk.
The coordinates were for a system not far from Astrid.
A small system with a dead star called the Hanssen System.
Ava had never heard of it. Kane had, though he had never had reason to travel there.
He explained that the system was largely unlivable.
The star was not entirely dead, per se. Kane explained that it was what was called a black dwarf. The amount of light it emitted was negligible and certainly not enough to power solar collectors or provide enough illumination to navigate by.
Their ships would be entirely dependent on sensor readings to gauge proximity to asteroids and other debris.
The system was another remnant of ancient wars.
Something had been done to artificially leach power from the system’s sun, reducing its mass. The celestial bodies of the system had their orbits destabilized, causing planets to collide and form massive debris fields, with large, dense remnants settling into new orbits.
Some planets and planetoids had drifted free to be intercepted by other systems, enormous dark masses rocketing through the void.
A large object like that was easy to spot on a ship’s sensors. It would register as a massive gravitational anomaly.
Of course, there was always a chance a ship could exit leap directly in the path of such a planet.
Ava felt apprehensive about exiting leap into a destabilized system. For all she knew, they could be the unlucky ones to emerge only to collide with a remnant chunk of a planet.
She voiced her concern.
“That is always a concern, even if the risk is negligible. This system does present a challenge. The coordinates we were given were precise and indicated a pocket free of possible collisions, but that is not where we will be translating into realspace,” Kane said.
“Because you smell a trap?” Ava asked.
“Because I smell a trap,” he agreed.
“We will translate just outside the system and deploy both the
Cat’s Paw
and
Cat’s Eye
. The
Eye
will transport the artifact to the nav point and meet with the client. The
Paw
will shadow the sale and be ready to offer support as needed. Engineering pulled one of the ship’s spare cannons out of storage and will fix it to the
Paw
in case we go hot.”
Ava registered that last statement with a sense of wonder and curiosity.
The cannons in the cargo hold had been part of a deal that fell through. The buyer backed out, leaving the
9Lives
stuck with the cargo. Luckily, there was plenty of room in the hold, and Kane was willing to wait to offload them until he found the right buyer.
He had toyed with the idea of affixing them to the shuttles in case they needed to remove an obstacle or defend themselves from a raid.
The cannons were too large to serve as permanent emplacements on either shuttle. The ships had only so much power output, and the added weight would make them unwieldy to pilot.
“The shuttles are also being stripped of anything unnecessary for the operation,” Kane continued.
Ava ran through a mental checklist: mining lasers, grappling arms, industrial winch, welding arms, cargo clamps—to name a few shuttle attachments that would be removed.
“When are we projected to translate in?” Ava asked.
“Within the hour. We will fall out of leap and deploy shortly afterward. The
9Lives
will go dark and move around the system to a point that will be displayed in each shuttle’s nav system. For this operation, Team A will take the
Eye
in. B Team will shadow in the
Paw
,” Kane said as he leaned across the table and flicked off the holo projector.
Ava stood to protest.
She had no problem leading the team for the drop.
But she wanted to be in her ship.
“Captain,” Ava remembered to say, “my ship is the
Cat’s Paw
. You can’t hand that off to Alex. I am more than competent enough—”
“No, Ava,” Kane interrupted as he stood. “Alex will be best in this role. This is why she is here—for moments like this. Her record is extensive, and there is no one save Windsor better suited for it. Unfortunately, he is needed to pilot the
9Lives
, so Alex is going to play the role of fighter support.
“You and your team will make the drop. Isaac and I will accompany you for the transaction.”
“Sir, Isaac?” Ava asked.
“Yes. He is providing the research we have gathered. That data is part of the sale. The buyer was clear that he wanted everything we had on the artifact. Isaac will be present to explain the data and sign off on its wipe and transfer. The AI core is scrubbing everything regarding the artifact so that the only copy will be on the data pads we hand over.”
The process of making a signatured copy was common practice in the sale of patented materials or confidential data transfers. It was difficult to fake, and when performed by a shipboard AI, it was treated with high confidence.
A corporation would have demanded to be present to witness the purge of data from the core. In most other cases, the AI core aboard the shuttle could verify for the buyer that the purge had been carried out to completion.
“Sir, if this drop sounds so sketchy, why not just abort?” Ava asked, still sore about being relegated to the
Cat’s Eye
. “We can find a different buyer. We could come out of leap early and mill about until we can make another leap out of the system.”
Isaac answered.
“Because if we hadn’t been in a hurry to offload this thing, Connor Dane would still have been the buyer we settled on. We gathered as much information as we could and spoke with people who had dealt with him in the past. People who didn’t deliver exactly what was offered and still received payment. He has paid for failed ventures too. It speaks to someone who does honest business but also has deep pockets. A person like that is…”
“Too good to be true,” Kane finished.
He sighed.
“But it was the best chance we had. We made the leap, and once started, it can’t be altered much. If they did look for us, they could find us, and now we aren’t suppliers but loiterers in their system. I have heard flimsier reasons to accost a ship. This could be fine, but just in case, we are taking every precaution we can.”
Ava let that sink in, pushing her mood aside to focus on what needed to be done.
“Understood, sir,” Ava said. “Am I dismissed?”
Kane sighed. “Yes. See to your team. Isaac, can you check in with Curry on the wipe and transfer?”
Ava stepped around the chair and left the room without waiting for further orders.
She entered the upper Main and moved toward the nearest ladder well. She peered down to make sure it was clear and, seeing that it was, stepped lightly onto the ladder and slid down at a controlled speed.
She turned toward the equipment locker and headed in that direction.
Inside, the room was full of people and movement.
Team A and B Team were suiting up, checking gear and weapons. It was rare for them to go through the effort of arming themselves, but given the nature of the transaction, everyone wanted to be ready.
Ava knew everyone aboard was rated for small arms and some medium weapons, but it still made her uneasy to see pistols and rifles secured to their suits.
“Ethan, what is our status?” she asked as the large man stood to face her.
“Green, Ava. All suits are topped off. All equipment is in working order,” he said.
Ethan had his service pistol holstered at his side and a bullpup rifle hanging from a sling on the other. He looked like a mercenary, Ava thought.
Several demo charges were attached to the belt around his waist. They were small black discs roughly the size of minced-meat tins.
“Peters, Juarez?” Ava asked.
“Green,” Juarez said.
“Golden,” Peters said.
Ethan glared at him.
“Green,” Peters corrected.
“I checked yours over as well, and there is a spare power cell for your suit, which it probably needs,” Ethan said.
“Thank you.”
Ava hadn’t even thought of that.
If she had been in the suit for an entire week, even under low usage, its power cell should have been running low.
She pulled her helmet from her waist and put it on, pushing her hair up as she did. She pulled the helmet down and locked it into place.
The HUD blinked on.
She checked the power indicator.
Just under full charge.
“I guess the spare power cell is unnecessary,” Ava said.
She stepped toward her locker, put on her holster, and slung her rifle. She initially intended to bring nothing else but, after a moment’s thought, equipped her normal kit and attached demo charges to her belt.
Ava turned and inspected her team.
They had all done the same.
Better to be fully prepared than assume they wouldn’t need something and be left wanting.
This operation could go poorly.
They needed to be ready.
Ava went through a quick briefing with her team. They had already been briefed, but again, she wanted to be certain.
Once she completed one final inspection of everyone’s gear, she gave a curt nod, and they moved toward the shuttle.
They walked single file out of the locker room and down the Main toward the shuttle ports.
Peters led the group and turned toward the port for the
Cat’s Paw
.
Ethan grabbed him by the shoulders and physically turned him toward the correct shuttle port.
“Right, sorry. Just got turned around, is all,” Peters said.
Ava was fairly certain he had already forgotten that they were assigned to the other shuttle.
The shuttle-port hatch opened, and Peters crouched to enter the fifteen-foot tube connecting the ship to the shuttle.
Ethan started to follow, but Ava grabbed him and indicated that he should hold back.
Juarez gave them a look but stepped around them and followed Peters into the tube.
“I’m sorry we didn’t get to talk, but I need you at one hundred percent for this. I promise we will talk afterward. Okay?” she asked over a private comm.
Ethan had put on his helmet with the rest of the team. She couldn’t see his face now.
She was torn about that.
“Understood. And I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… I shouldn’t have kissed you. It was wrong,” Ethan said over the comm.
“It’s okay. I’m not mad. If I’m being honest, I’m just confused, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot. I think I need more time, but we should have had this talk already. There is just so much going on,” Ava said.
Ethan reached down and took her hand in his.
Ava let him.
“I know. Let me clear the air. No sense letting this sit and cloud things. We can talk more afterward, but with what happened back on the relic ship… I followed orders, and things went bad. I thought you had died. It scared me. It got me thinking, and I couldn’t stop.
“I was losing sleep. I wasn’t eating. I really was wasting away. The longer it went on, the worse it became. Does that make sense?” Ethan asked.
Yes,
Ava thought as she nodded and looked into his opaque faceplate.
“I think I was going crazy, but Hailey says it was because of the lack of rest. I just couldn’t sleep. My mind was always going. Then you got sucked into that thing, and I tried to get to you. I wasn’t thinking. Everyone was yelling, and the next thing I knew, I was in the med bay, strapped to a table.
“They told me Alex knocked me out. That I was trying to swing on the captain,” he continued in a rush, trying to get it all out.
Ava had seen what happened in the holo projection.
She had seen his desperate attempt to get past everyone. She remembered him pulling back an arm to make a wild, full-body swing at her father—their captain.
Alex had deftly stopped the movement and put him down.
“How long were you out?” Ava asked.
“Two days. Hailey gave me something that kept me out. Said I needed the rest. Cap confined me to quarters for two more days for my outburst. On a different ship, they could have airlocked me. I was out of control.
“Hailey checked in on me and gave me something to help me sleep more. I feel rested for the first time in weeks, but I am still… scared, maybe,” Ethan continued.
“Scared? You? I find that hard to believe,” Ava teased, giving his hand a reassuring squeeze.
“I am, though. I was scared I lost you, and I’m scared I will lose you. Scared I ruined our friendship with that kiss, but also scared that we will only ever be friends.
“That is what is bothering me. All of it. I can focus on the task at hand, get this sorted out, but I need to face things,” he said.
“Face things?” she asked, feeling his fear begin to creep into her—the doubt, the tumult of emotions.
“Yes. Between us. I want you as more than a friend or crewmember or team leader. I want to be with you, and I am sure now that this feeling is not just going to go away.”
His posture was rigid and set.
Ava pulled her hand from his strong but gentle grip.
“Okay. We will sort it out,” she said, then added, “Together. Once we get back in one piece.”
He nodded and looked at her for a long moment in silence before turning and entering the tube.
Ava switched off her comms.
“GOD DAMN IT, ETHAN! AFTER THE MISSION! WHY WOULD YOU START THIS BEFORE?! WHY?!”
Fortunately, the helmet of her suit largely succeeded in muffling the outburst.