"The ceedrive went back offline. Thermionic conduits rejected the hand-off. Again," reported Davidson with a weary fry. "Bastards. I could get out and push, be faster at this point?"

  Rorik flashed an absent smile, but hadn't yet chosen to meet the man's eye. Far too preoccupied with a speedy, admittedly childish twirl in the captain's tall throne—as he'd come to call it. The entire bridge was a blur of motion, chairs, and coppery metal in his eyes.

  "Careful. Might take you up on that." He huffed, barely able to see Davidson's fuzzy outline at the rightmost arc of the bridge. "Anything else from the engine room?"

  "Nothing. Let you know the microsecond anything changes, sir."

  Rorik abruptly planted his feet and reclined, dizzy as he stared lazily out the viewport. At the cold, star-studded void beyond.

  The captain's throne was a wonderfully plush cloud of heaven. Treacherously comfortable. He was a mile past rested, despite Cassandra's salacious efforts to the contrary, but his body was still greedy for sleep. Hungry for every morsel after so many restless nights.

  The dim, humming icteric lights didn't help either.

  Rank had its privileges, and no one could deny him a little shuteye. But napping during even a micro-crisis wasn't a good look, and he had to draw the line somewhere. Plus, his agitation probably wouldn't let him anyhow.

  Their latest bout with ceespace had left them dead in the water, so to speak. The Gizotso had run afoul of an unexpected storm, Type-3, one angry son of a bitch. A cosmic tempest filled with thermionic lightning and plumes of green gravelight radiation.

  They were nearly clear when the storm spanked them, nullifying their drive's charge and bitch-slapping them back to realspace.

  Damaged, and in the middle of Scrapper territory, no less. Amongst a graveyard of colorful vessels slowly adrift in the dark. More ghosts than ships. A broken and frosty fleet of mechanical tombs.

  The Pynon Corridor was one of the quickest ways around the Mother Storm at the Heartland's center. Decently well-traveled despite the potential dangers that lurked along its route.

  Mostly because the storms were typically predictable, and far too big for anyone to miss on a scanner. And not to mention, they were usually much, much too slow.

  Just not the one they'd crossed...

  Rorik studied the dead ships with something cousin to contempt, then pinched himself. A reminder to be grateful that his ship was still in one piece. No other systems had suffered, and no one had been sucked out into space. A paramount danger for people that could heal most wounds.

  But even still.

  Only three measly days had passed since Azrhar, and already they'd needed a retrofit. Kinda sad.

  The engineers had claimed it was an easy fix, but they were exposed out here. Like a nerve, waiting for some schmuck to stroll along and prod them with a stick.

  The Giztoso had big guns, but Scrappers tended to roll heavy. In shitty, recycled rust buckets more than not, but a whole lot-of-bunch of 'em. It didn't help that repairs required they stay at full power, something even basic scanners could easily detect at distance.

  "Stupid, motherfucking, piece of wet dogshit!"

  Rorik didn't bother to glance back, unlike the rest of the mildly, but visibly concerned bridge crew. The Gizotso's co-Chief Engineer's voice was unmistakable. Irate. Caustic. Like a collision between two freighters loaded with absinthe and nitroglycerin.

  He sipped at the soda in the cup-holder, ready for more bad news. The tingly mango-cherry fluid cascaded down into his peckish stomach. Cold, delicious, and incredibly refreshing.

  "Can you believe what just happened to me down there?"

  "Will when you talk about it," Rorik retorted, eyes forward, wooden voice coated with a jocular finish. "That's usually how information's exchanged between people."

  Kara stormed by with a breeze, part sweat, vanilla-cocoa, and coolant—mad as high hell. She turned into a wide, circular pace, and the other officers’ curious glances fell away out of caution. Blotches of runny, brownish grease covered her from head to toe. Boots. Uniform. Hair. And the entire right side of her pale face.

  "Whoever cleaned the ceedrive last is a dead man! Those telethimizers were filthy! When I find him, I'm gonna ball'em into a knuckle’s worth of well-seasoned fuckmeat! It'll take days to get this gunk out of my hair!"

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  "Least it matches your carpet now."

  "Oh, hardy-har-har! A few lucky lightning bolts can do some damage, we all know that. But the storm barely even grazed us! Doesn't make any sense. And where the hell does all the coffee keep disappearing to?"

  Rorik let her simmer a little longer, equally curious about the absence of coffee on Deck-1. A dastardly fiend, with either a vendetta or an addiction had snatched some of the deck's allotted supply. Localized near the engine room for some reason. Petty, but something that needed to be addressed eventually.

  Another problem for another day...

  After Kara's fifth irate circuit around his self-proclaimed throne, he grabbed her arm, lest she wear a hole in the deck.

  "Alright, alright. I get it. Situation sucks. But is it really that bad down there? The boys back home usually swear by their work?"

  Kara sighed, and most of her tension dissipated like smoke. "Not quite that bad, it's just an uphill battle. Having to retrofit with custom cut pieces eats up time."

  "I can tell. But better than it not being fixable at all. Just cross your fingers that we don't run into more storms." Rorik chuckled softly, more at the absurdity of life than amusement. "How much time until we can—"

  "I, have some experience repairing ceedrives, sir—and ma'am. Not just another pretty face."

  Davidson had his hand raised like it was Sunday school. A stubby, genuinely young wolf with short ginger-hair. All smiles, freckles, and eagerness.

  Kara held Rorik's eye, then about-faced to the junior ceenav officer with a low huff. Not annoyed, simply tired. She'd put more effort into integrating with the crew than Cassandra, or even he'd expected. Almost gentle with them, actually. Sorta, mostly.

  "Thanks David. But we know what we're doing. Better that you stay here with your foot ready to hit the gas."

  “Copy that. But it’s actually son, ma’am—Davi—”

  “My mistake, Son.”

  “No, I'm Davidson.”

  “So you’re David’s kid?”

  “No. It's—who's David?”

  “You literally just said—”

  "We all have nametags! Just look down at his chest, you mother—no, not doing this." Rorik barely caught himself, half-amused, and fully irritated that he'd taken the now obvious bait. "We’re not doing this Abbott-and-fucking-Costello shit right now."

  Kara had always harbored a passion for instigation. Simply for the love of the game. A masterbaiter, of sorts.

  "Just, give me an estimate so you can take your ass back downstairs. You're a migraine on two legs some days."

  Kara flashed a sly, satisfied grin, then clasped her hips with a long exhale. "For sustained ceespace? Good chunk of hours, probably closer to a day. A short jump or two? I think we could manage something in like...fifteen minutes? Now that the telethimizers are purged and all pretty like."

  "I'll take it. Better than being here. Davidson? Find us a nice little moon or an asteroid field close by. We can put them between us and the rest of—"

  Beep—beep—beep—beep—beep—beep—beep—beep!

  "Vessel on long-range scanners, sir. Low resolution, bearing Mark-286. They're in ceespace and aimed our way," announced the scanner officer, a dark-skinned woman with short braids.

  Rorik keyed the specialized infopad socketed in the armrest, not panicked, but not at all happy. The pad had been wired to the bridge's myriad consoles, and was not only useful for the consolidation of datasets, but even some limited control of key systems too.

  His fingers sifted through overlays, until he saw the blip that represented the incoming ship. Sizable. And quick as the devil. But whether they were Scrappers, or good Samaritans out to lend a hand, unfortunately remained to be seen.

  "Any additional info on it? How long until arrival?"

  "With the resolution it's difficult to estimate their class and capabilities, sir. But at current speed they're ten minutes out."

  "I'll be on Deck-1!" Kara yelled, already headed down the rustic corridor at a full-sprint. "See if we can figure—out of my way, clown!—something clever out!"

  "Wait!" Rorik twirled around, nearly spilling the soda. "Don't bother."

  Kara skidded to a stop with a squeak. "Don't bother? What? Why?"

  "One more person isn't going to help them pull a Houdini. Don't even have time to implement that shortcut before they get here."

  She jogged calmly back and halted a meter short, brow creased with an unspoken question.

  "Just trust me. Helm, resume course, maximum drivefire. It'll buy us a few seconds. Might need them. Comms, tell the engine room to start on that shortcut, and that it's an emergency. If we can buy a few minutes talking to our mystery ship even a short jump could help. Then, ping Lieutenant Zervas to meet us in the command alcove. Fast."

  Rorik looked around as they carried out the orders, only to again rest on the co-Chief Engineer. Stubborn tenacity arced through the air between them. Familiar, quiet, and electric. A stare that said they had each other’s backs, no matter what.

  The outcome of the next few minutes was a bona fide mystery, but damn if he wouldn't give his all. Them his all. Crew, ship, and then himself.

  In that exact order of importance until he offloaded them back on Azrhar.

  "Let's go Kara, window's closing and all that." Rorik stood, steady and ready, then downed the soda with a parched gulp. "We gotta figure out what to do if we can't outrun or outgun them."