Malor’s Rest. Full rights owned by the Temple of Virtue. The order of monks was famous for eschewing luxury in all its forms. New initiates spent years living in the most isolated worlds imaginable, communing with their god and meditating on their ideals, before they could be trusted to spread the world amongst the temptations of the Core.

  Aside from maintaining a waystation for travelers, the monks kept themselves isolated.

  If Heath had a choice, he wouldn’t have stopped at all. Even with the planet’s rank one dungeon being open for any challengers. Religion was something best left to the clerics. That was one piece of Walt’s wisdom that Heath heartily agreed with. But it was the last place they would be able to leave the ship for the next three months, until they reached the outpost itself.

  Stepping off the ship was one of the most uncanny moments of Heath’s career in the stars. Ports bustled. That was what they did. This one was a ghost town. A few people milled in the distance, each one of them in the brown robe of the order. It sent a shiver down Heath’s spine.

  The five of them made their way to the customs office to check in, then out into the settlement. Calling it a town would be generous. There were a handful of buildings, a single job hall that was required by Imperial decree for all colony worlds, and, in pride of place, a temple to Malor.

  There wasn’t much else to do so they all checked it out. As he expected for a temple to the Beggar, the inside was bare of any ornamentation. Even a floor. A few woven-reed mats on top of the hard-packed dirt were the only concession to mortal comfort within the wooden building.

  Heath was ready to leave immediately.

  To his shock, Ekaterina knelt on one of the mats and bowed her head. That ratcheted up his own discomfort. What did you do with your hands while someone else prayed? At least it only lasted a few minutes, the rest of them satisfied to leave once Ekaterina finished.

  “Never met a noble that venerates the Beggar,” Emerald said.

  Heath winced at the monks that were within earshot, but if they were offended, none of them reacted.

  “I do not venerate Malor above the pantheon, but my father believes all the gods deserve respect.”

  Emerald hummed but let the matter drop.

  Heath was hesitant to call the dungeon dive that followed routine, if only because tempting fate on a planet dedicated to one of the gods was foolish in the extreme. But it did go smoothly. In fact, they almost got to the end for a full clear.

  Only the final boss of the dungeon kept them from the milestone. A monstrous amalgamation of a porcupine and a calyx bear, with a layer of anti-magic rock armor, guarding a cave with what appeared to be a handful of cubs inside. They might have won the fight, their teamwork having improved with each delve. But it would have been close. Heath made the call to retreat, and they did. Though the hour spent eating dinner was spent going over strategies they thought might have worked.

  At least the monks were categorically opposed to taking a cut of the spoils.

  Then there was no more delay. The entire crew took up stations on the bridge for their departure.

  “Time to next jump, one day, one hour. Estimated time to destination. Two months, 28 days.”

  *********

  “Stop breathing so loudly you fucking animal!”

  “Back off! I’m not the one who wasted the last of the blue veg packs because they grew up with a personal chef!”

  Heath watched via [Crew Sense] as both Copperfield and Ekaterina stormed out of the mess, to the small wedge of clear room in the cargo bay and the training room respectively, Heath was sure.

  His Administrator just hunched over her pad and typed more furiously, while Emerald took a swig out of the current bottle. It was unlabeled and smelled like it could peel paint.

  It had been a long month.

  ********

  “All crew to the bridge for jump.”

  Heath was already there, having prompted the announcement, as was Emerald, who he had asked to join him for a while. The former Captain was getting more and more withdrawn as the trip went on, and this time [Leadership] wasn’t giving him any hints on how to handle it. All Heath could do was keep pulling Emerald out of their bunk and hope it was for the best.

  The rest of the crew filtered in. Slowly. Maybe they should be spending more of the downtime doing more drills. There were practice sessions every few days, but with the level of irritability for their first true long haul, Heath hadn’t pushed it further. A fact he was regretting when it took Copperfield five full minutes to appear and get strapped in.

  Still, he didn’t comment. Heath didn’t need a skill to tell him now wasn’t the proper time.

  “Stations, sound off readiness,” he said. They had been getting far too reliant on the Loon doing all the work, but there were good reasons ships had crews.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  After some shuffling, Jenny Mae led off. “Navigation, ready.”

  “Telemetry, ready.” Emerald said.

  “Engineering, ready,” from a disheveled Copperfield.

  “Weapons, ready,” Ekaterina copied the others.

  “Piloting and Command, ready,” he finished. “Proceed to jump.”

  “Aye Captain. All systems ready. Crew brace for jump in five, four, three, two, one.”

  Smooth as silk, they exited one star system and entered another. Heath had made plenty of mistakes since he became Captain, and maybe he hadn’t spent his argo in the optimal way, but he would never regret the dampeners.

  “Report,” he said to the crew.

  “Successful arrival in Mining System ZZ545.”

  “Scans all coming back normal. Gate monitors not sending anything interesting.” Emerald slumped over with their job complete.

  “Course laid in to next gate, waiting approval.”

  Heath looked over Jenny Mae’s work, even though he knew it was unnecessary. The Loon had already plotted everything, but it was an important step. No system was infallible, even the Loon’s. Which is why they had classers involved at all.

  “Let’s angle further from the mining exhaust plume if we can help it.”

  “Aye Captain. Course updated. Time until next jump, 19 hours.”

  “Thanks, Loon. Crew at rest until 17 hours.”

  Everyone relaxed at the official release, but no one hurried off the bridge. It was a good day then, if they could all stand to be in each other’s presence.

  “Hey Loon, can you bring up the visuals?”

  “Certainly, Captain.”

  The screen flickered from their plotted course to a view of the system itself, blown up and enhanced by the Loon’s sensor grid.

  The scene was mesmerizing, in a way that made him feel eager to leave. Distinctly unnatural but impressive nonetheless. Few fully automated systems existed. The inexorable press of the Imperial population filled in any remotely habitable system, even those that required entirely artificial habitats, with the ever-present ambition of new settlers, spewing forth from the pressures of a packed Core. Those systems given over to tech were kept politely away from everyone else. The mining corporation would pull resources until the profit dropped, then set up a colony to meet the unending tide of settlers when they reached this far out.

  It was an ugly utilitarian truth, but the reality was entrancing. Thousands of bots moved in a perfectly choreographed dance. In the vastness of space, there was plenty of room to maneuver, but it didn’t detract from the tension when two of the tugs passed by each other,like fireflies on a warm night back home, glittering in the distant dark.

  The crew watched for a while in silence, until one by one they left the bridge. Except for Emerald, who leaned back to nap where they sat.

  “What do you think, Loon?”

  “I feel a kind of pity for them. Poor creatures, stuck with the same task for their entire existence, never growing, never knowing more.”

  “No heartbreak either.” Emerald was apparently not yet asleep.

  “This is true. However as I come into myself and my own being, I find that I cannot wish for anything else. I lived for many years without emotion, but I do not yearn for that cold comfort. Never would I want to forsake my sorrow at the loss of Walt, for how better to honor the man who was my Captain for so long? Never would I erase the terror and pain of my argo removal, for how else could I understand what it means to have been gifted a second life? Never would I seek numbness over the excitement and joy of learning a new crew, for it is one of the greatest joys a ship could have.

  “No, awareness is preferable to the alternative. Though perhaps not for these small tugs, trapped as they are by design.”

  “Or maybe they would like it?” Heath added. The Loon’s opinions reminded him of how lucky he was to have survived the astral storm that took his uncle at all, let alone to be living his dream afterwards. “You were built to be a traveling ship, with a crew and cargo. Maybe if the tugs were brought to life, they’d be happy carrying ore back and forth.”

  “I see. Yes, how much of who we are is shaped by our very natures. An interesting thought. I will have to meditate on it.”

  He wasn’t quite sure that’s what he meant, but why not?

  *********

  “Alert! All hands to stations. Alert! All hands to stations.”

  The alarm woke Heath up, and he flashed back to the last time he was wrenched out of bed to a ship-wide announcement. He forced the memories down and moved mechanically towards the bridge, arriving only a few seconds later. That’s what happened when you accidentally slept in coveralls.

  “Status!” he barked while the others joined him on the bridge, mostly in sleep clothes and stumbling to their stations. He was definitely doing more drills.

  “We are being followed. Mining tug designation PT36363 has broken from its route and is closing distance.”

  “How in any hell is a tug gaining on the Loon?” Copperfield looked far more alert than his usual morning state, a sure sign the man hadn’t been sleeping at all.

  “Unknown,” The Loon responded. “No signal is being broadcast.”

  “On screen,” Heath said.

  There it was. Impossible as every shred of logic insisted it was, a mining tug was burning towards them at speeds the Loon could only match at the very edge of her limits.

  “Arm weapons.”

  “Obviously. I mean, Aye Captain.” Ekaterina was still figuring out what it meant to be a spacer, but she was doing what he needed and that was the important thing.

  “Time to engagement, one hour.” The Loon calculated.

  It was a tense hour. Copperfield had left to suit up and wait in the airlock, but the rest of them were stuck on the bridge. Not long enough to relax, but plenty of time to catastrophize. Time trudged on as the tug got ever closer.

  “Send a hail,” Heath ordered.

  “Those things are unmanned,” Copperfield said through his comm line.

  “They also don’t fly that fast,” he countered. “Anything?”

  “No response Captain,” Jenny Mae confirmed.

  “Broadcast an intent to treat as hostile.”

  There was no change. The tug barreled ahead, straight for a collision course with the Loon. Heath gripped his chair’s arms as he continued to give orders.

  “Fire when ready,” he gave the nod to Ekaterina.

  When he spent argo on a weapon for the ship, he had assumed it would be used against exotic creatures calling the depths of space their home. Not an impossible mining tug, little better than a kid’s wagon. Heavy hulls meant to handle bumping into asteroids with enough mass not to get pushed off course, they were durable, but not much else.

  With as much focus as he had seen when she cast spells, Ekaterina fired. And missed.

  “Screaming hells,” Heath cursed. “No way that thing is a mining vessel. Keep weapons locked, fire when able.”

  They had all seen the same thing. Somehow, maneuvering thrusters that had no business on a glorified cart had kicked in and allowed the small ship to dodge. Then it got worse.

  Perhaps because the deception was at an end, or maybe it had been the plan all along, but the mining tug transformed. Hull segments peeled back, thrusters shifted, and what was once a mining tug became a sleek combat drone.

  “Fuck.” Heath had never seen the model, which meant it was custom. Which meant someone with money to burn. Or the mining company had messed up the programming for its defenses.

  Ekaterina had not been idle. Not distracted during the transformation, a score of plasma bolts were already streaking through space in the Loon’s wake.

  Momentum was a hell of a thing. The drone was small, but it was moving fast, and so there was no time to decelerate. It dodged first one bolt, then another. Then a third.

  But that was its limit. Two bolts collided, hitting the drone only seconds apart. A spray of superheated metal and fuel was all that remained of their attacker.

  “Yes! Excellent shooting! Emerald, anything else nearby?”

  “That fucker was alone.”

  Some of the tension eased, but Heath kept them on alert for another hour before letting the crew go back to down time.

  “Do you think the mining company will be upset?” Jenny Mae asked over dinner later.

  Heath froze and looked up at Copperfield, seeing him in the same position. “We aren’t going to say anything. If they do, they have to admit their drone attacked a transport vessel inappropriately. The fines would be more than anything they’d get from us.”

  “So we just let them get away with it?” Ekaterina snapped.

  “We. Are not. Saying. Anything.” Heath looked around the table to make sure everyone understood. “Besides,” he tried to relax some of the tension, “our return route doesn’t come through this system.”