Ah. Great.
The overly chipper oshota had been Kira’s training partner recently. The man was so damn smiley all the time. That, if nothing else, put her on guard against him.
Nobody deserved to be that happy outwardly. Nobody.
Raider’s grin said he was enjoying her reaction. “Sorry, Nixxy. You’ll just have to get along with him for the duration of this ride.”
Not if Kira had anything to say about it. The Wanderer was equipped with several handy air locks. Perfect for tossing an overgrown male behemoth out of them.
The only trick was getting him there.
“Remember, Phoenix,” Jin crowed. “We arrive with the same number we departed with. Your rules.”
Damn it. This was the drawback of traveling with people who knew you so well. They could tell when you were plotting.
Kira switched to manual control with a little more force than was necessary. The Wanderer purred as the engines cycled. They lifted smoothly off the platform, hovering in place as Kira pointed the nose of the ship at the view of space.
“Wait a minute, Kira.” Jin sounded distracted as he zoomed toward Kira, stopping next to her head. “Something is strange.”
Seconds later, the wail of the proximity alerts interrupted.
Raider stopped what he was doing to look up. “That doesn’t mean what I think it means, does it?”
“If that something is an object hitting the ship, then yes, it’s exactly what you think,” Jin returned.
The alerts continued to sound as Finn and the emperor moved closer.
The monitor next to Kira looked like it was having an epileptic seizure as streams of data ran across it, too fast to decipher what was appearing until it stopped on a diagram of the Wanderer. Red marks highlighted the belly of the ship.
“That’s the problem,” Jin said as the red marks flashed.
“Finn, head to the lower decks to check that out,” Kira ordered.
Finn sent her a serious nod before disappearing through the hatch.
“It’s probably nothing,” Raider said.
Kira nodded. “Let’s not take chances though.”
The two shared a look of mutual understanding.
Raider threaded his hands behind his head as he stretched out in his chair. “Fair enough. It’s not like your paranoia hasn’t saved us in the past.”
The proximity alerts hit a new pitch as a shape blocked out the stars, sliding over the topside of the Wanderer and out into space.
“Son of a—“ Raider started as his hands dropped from behind his head and he sat forward.
“Here comes another,” Jin warned.
A second ship followed the first, cutting over in a narrow miss.
“These people are idiots,” Jin hissed, sounding enraged.
Kira yanked back on her throttle, sending the Wanderer roaring forward as she threatened to ram the other ship.
The Tuann vessel veered, listing to the side in its hurry to avoid them.
“You’re so mean.” Jin couldn’t hide his delight at that fact.
