Page 21 of Alien Devil's Prey
I could see the fury and something that looked like disappointment warring in my commander's face. He saw this as a weakness, an emotional attachment compromising my judgment. He couldn't see that she was the key to the entire plan.
"Then you are operating without official sanction," he said finally, his voice cold and final. "This is your operation now, not mine. Do not expect extraction if this goes sideways."
"Understood."
The connection terminated, leaving his face frozen on the screen for a moment before dissolving into static. The rift was created. I was off the books.
"You didn't have to do that," Tamsin said softly.
"Yes, I did." I turned my full attention to the controls, guiding the ship into the swirling chaos of the nebula. "Some things are more important than a perfect plan."
The ship shuddered as we entered the interference field, cutting us off from the rest of the galaxy. We were committed. We were alone. A proximity alert chimed, and a Syndicate patrol ship ghosted out of the glowing gas, its weapon ports visible and active.
"Syndicate patrol to unidentified freighter," a bored voice crackled over the comm. "State your designation and purpose."
"I've got this," Tamsin murmured, her hands already flying over her console. She keyed the comm. "This is the merchant vesselWandering Star, registry alpha-niner-seven. We're on an emergency run, carrying medical supplies to the mining colonies in the Paxseru system. We have priority clearance." Her voice was flawless—calm, professional, with just the right touch of weary irritation.
There was a long pause. "We weren't notified of any priority shipments. Your manifest shows a high-energy power signature inconsistent with medical equipment. Explain."
My blood went cold. The sensor masker and other gear I'd bought on The Rustbucket. Shielded, but still emitting a faint signature.
"That would be the cryo-stasis unit for the tissue samples," Tamsin said without missing a beat. "It's an older model, drawsa lot of power. The colonies are having a real problem with that nerve plague, and they need uncontaminated cultures. You can check our clearance with the sector medical authority."
It was a brilliant lie, a perfect piece of misdirection that would tie them up in bureaucratic red tape if they pursued it.
Another silence stretched, longer this time. "Your story is thin,Wandering Star. Hold your position. We'll escort you to a sensor checkpoint. Any deviation from our course will be met with lethal force."
"Here it comes," I muttered.
The patrol ship pulled alongside us, its hull close enough that I could make out the scorch marks around its weapon emplacements. It was a brutal, efficient-looking vessel, and it boxed us in. My hands tightened on the controls. My job was to fly like a bored cargo pilot, not a trained combatant about to have his ship dissected. Every instinct screamed at me to take evasive action. I forced my muscles to relax, to fly a perfectly smooth, unremarkable course.
"Red scanner sweep initiating," I said, my voice low. "They're starting with the hull."
"I see it." Tamsin's voice was tight, her eyes locked on her screen. "They're looking for hidden compartments, weapon ports... anything that doesn't match a standard freighter schematic."
For several tense minutes, we flew in formation. I could feel the invasive scans washing over us. My focus narrowed to the controls, to keeping the ship perfectly level, perfectly boring. A single unexpected maneuver, and they would open fire.
"They're not finding anything on the hull," Tamsin reported, her voice a strained whisper. "Now they're going for the systems. Data probe incoming."
I watched her work, her fingers a blur across the holographic interface. Lines of code scrolled past. She was building firewallson the fly, rerouting their intrusion attempts into useless data loops.
"They're persistent," she grunted, her knuckles white where she gripped the console. "They're trying to brute-force the cargo manifest's encryption."
"Can they break it?" I asked. We were outgunned and exposed.
"Rina's work is good, but it won't hold up to a sustained military assault." She typed a rapid string of commands. "I'm not letting them. I'm giving them a ghost. A false data trail that leads to a corrupted file. It's risky. If their slicer is any good, he'll spot it."
The seconds stretched into an eternity. The patrol ship stayed with us, its presence a constant, suffocating threat. I could feel the sweat trickling down my spine, but my hands remained steady. I was a cargo pilot. I was bored. I was hauling medicine.
Then, the comm crackled again. The voice was the same, but the bored tone was gone, replaced by grudging annoyance.
"Your credentials check out," the voice grunted. "Proceed to docking bay nine. And try not to hit anything."
The patrol ship broke off its escort, peeling away and disappearing back into the glowing clouds. I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. Tamsin slumped back in her chair, a sheen of sweat on her forehead, her hands trembling slightly.
The shared danger, the sight of her competence under fire—it solidified something in my chest. She wasn't an asset. She was a partner.
We had passed the first test.
