“Seriously. Focus,” Frank said.
I settled back in my seat. “Just blowing off steam.” It was better than flipping out, which half of me still wanted to do as a traffic controller pointed us toward Landing Pad 28 with a flashing wand, backing up as we approached. Her Dark Watch uniform flapped hard against her body until Shade shut down the propulsion system and powered off. She pushed back her short blonde hair, turning to her next job without sparing us another glance.
I unbuckled my harness and stood. Unlike Frank, I was a firm believer that sometimes the only way to move forward was with a smile.NowI would focus.
Shade reached over and gave my wrist a quick squeeze. The faint ink still on my arm with theQueen Bee’s ignition codes disappeared under his big hand. I’d memorized the numbers now, along with the Nickleback coordinates. He looked at me hard before letting go. I nodded a silent promise to be careful. He nodded back the same vow and then popped the locks, exhaling a long steadying stream of air.
I did the same and hopped down, trying to release tension and move in the loose, relaxed way of a person who had every right to be here. I wasn’t sure I succeeded. The stolen uniform felt slippery and weird, and these boots were heavy and a size too big for my feet. Moreover, I’d never be comfortable with a gun openly strapped to my side. I hoped we wouldn’t have to use our Grayhawks, but we sure as hell weren’t leaving them behind.
The others poured out after me, but Shade slipped into the back. A moment later, he emerged with a steel-gray oblong toolbox. We really were a Dark Watch maintenance team of five.
I glanced from side to side as Shade closed the cruiser, hoping we could walk straight to the lifts and disappear. My eyes snagged on a woman staring out at us from a glassed-in side office, a frown making her squint through the window. I let my gaze skate away but kept her in my peripheral vision as we started moving.
Uh-oh. She left the office and strode over to intercept us at a rapid, boot-pounding pace.
I tried not to panic as she planted herself in front of us halfway to the elevator block and swept a quick inspection over the whole group. Her stark black uniform matched everyone else’s here, including ours, except for the red stripe across her chest pocket. She was a team captain of some sort. Landing dock security? Chief of Platform 9? Her scowl sent a wary vibration tingling up my spine.
“Crew 32?” Blue eyes narrowed under thick blunt bangs that partially hid an amoeba-shaped birthmark sliding down her temple.
“That’s right,” I answered.
She looked beyond us toward theQueen Bee. “Where’s Bob?” Suspicion scrolled across her face like a computerized warning.
Bob? How the hell should I know?“Grounded. Whole crew’s in the hospital.” I forced a twang into my voice to match the nasally thing I’d heard coming from Sector-7-born kids at the orphanage, some of them from Ewelock. “Food poisoning. Can you believe that? Bad luck. Anyhow, Bob sent us instead. Knew it was urgent to fix those LZL phasers. Gotta keep your bottoms up.”
And that was that. We weren’t impersonating the maintenance crew anymore; we were replacing them. Adapt. Move forward. Don’t get caught.
My fingernails bit into my palm, and I uncurled my fist, letting my hand dangle.
“The phasers went out earlier.” She frowned. “No explanation for it.”
“We’ll figure it out.” I gave a short nod, trying to end the conversation and hoping she might not pay attention if we went up the spacedock instead of down.
The Ewelock security hub followed the same architectural pattern as any spacedock the Dark Watch had built during the last twenty-five years. Just more proof that the Overseer had zero imagination and that once he found a system that worked, he poured it in concrete across the galaxy. Or in this case, reinforced metal, huge clear panels, and massive firepower. Upper A to Z. Middle A to Z. Lower A to Z. Seventy-eight levels. Food storage units were always attached to Upper Levels A to O.
I didn’t know Bob, but I knew how to pretend to fit in here, thanks to time spent on Starbase 12—the original three-tiered alphabet-model spacedock. The Overseer had required “his daughter” for plenty of official functions and paraded Mom and me out when it was convenient. On the starbase, it was Uncle Nate who’d shown me around, and I’d been granted a certain amount of freedom because of the secure location. Otherwise, Mom and I were only allowed some fancy shopping trips here and there on Alpha Sambian, mainly to show our faces in public—a reminder to the galaxy that the Overseer was a generous family man, a model for everyone.
A model who didn’t even let his kid go to school. People assumed I had a home tutor, but I didn’t. Mom taught me to read and write, and Uncle Nate brought us books. I didn’t set foot in a classroom or interact with other children until Starway 8 became my home.
“But Bob…” The team captain’s eyes strayed to the entrance with the long line of waiting ships.
“He’ll be up when he’s feeling better. Won’t be long now.”
Her expression cleared somewhat. I must have been convincing.
She glanced at Shade’s toolbox and waved us forward. “Follow me.” She walked us to the lifts, waited for one to open, and pushed the button to the bottom level herself. “You know the way once you’re down there?”
“Yeah. Not our first DWALSH.” Hopefully, no one but me noticed the irritation in my voice. No choice now: we were going in the wrong direction first.
She stepped back, letting us go. I couldn’t tell if she was still suspicious. I wasn’t using a secret language or anything, but most people didn’t say things like LZL, keep your bottoms up, or DWALSH if they didn’t frequently live or work on Dark Watch alphabet-level security hubs.
The doors closed, leaving us in the silent lift, although it seemed to me that I could hear every single one of our pulses beating frantically.
“We have to go all the way down now, don’t we?” Caeryssa muttered.
“It’s safest,” I answered, hoping there wasn’t a microphone in here. Even the all-controlling Dark Watch didn’t want to hear everyone’s random conversation in an elevator. The little camera in the back corner needed to keep seeing the tops of our heads until we got off where we were supposed to, though. “Bob’s friend with the bangs could be monitoring our progress from her office. And we should walk back up. Get between the inner and outer shells of the station.” The elevators would be pandemonium today, slow and crowded, but hardly anyone would actually be working or needing access to the cargo attachments.
Frank groaned. “That’s a hell of a workout.”
