“Boss, you remember the job we did on Bezi?”

  “The optics job?”

  “Yeah,” Pilo chuckled, holding back a larger laugh, “We were doing laser alignment for a deep-space remote beam,”

  Riza also giggled as the memory resurfaced, “The time Duncan thought he saw a UFO during an alignment test?”

  Pilo burst out laughing, “He freaked the fuck out!” Tears swelled in his eyes as Riza belted in laughter too.

  “Oh my god! He screamed over the comms– ‘Guys, what the fuck is that?’” She mimicked Duncan's panicked voice.

  “He said, ‘That’s no one of ours’,” Pilo chuckled.

  “Just because it didn’t show up on the radar,”

  “He literally ran from the site he was posted at! He legit thought we were going to die,”

  Riza hunched over, laughing as she recalled Duncan’s heavy breathing over the comms as he ran from his post.

  “Stop stop,” She exhaled heavily as tears fell from her eyes, “I can’t” She waved her hand.

  “And then–” Pilo tried to catch his breath, “And then Violet identified it,”

  “And it was a bug on the lens,” Riza bellowed.

  “Duncan had already ran two kilometres from the sight,”

  “He ran, Pilo! Two Kilometres, in fear, when he had a buggy the whole time,”

  They both paused their work installing the AG Drive into the cargo ship, both of them occupied by the memory of Duncan. The job on Bezi was the second job they’d ever done as a crew. From Riza’s memory, it was the first time they’d all really bonded over something unserious as a crew and it was the first time she’d noticed they all got along.

  “Violet never let him hear the end of it,” Pilo added.

  “Anytime there was a bug in the skipper, she’d tell him to get down,”

  “Oh, shit,” Pilo wiped his eye, “She was so fucking funny,”

  “I’d rather get spaced suitless than get caught embarrassing myself by Violet,”

  “She’d never let it go,”

  The laughter slowly shifted from a joyful memory and to a mournful pain. It was sudden, and Riza felt it in her chest. Not like heart pain, but something deeper. Ethereal. She picked the drill up off the trolley and smiled through the shortened breaths that now leaned further towards anxiety than laughter.

  “God… I miss them,” Riza said, as a tear fell down her cheek.

  “Yeah…” Pilo sighed, pausing. “Me too…” He then smiled and sealed one of the electrical panels he was working on.

  Riza hadn’t felt this way in a long time. This mournful sorrow that sat deep in her soul was accompanied by knowing she’ll never see them again. The last time she felt this was when Kaal died– she didn’t know it at the time, but her hopes of returning home died with him. At some point, she lost sight of the idea that she could find the anomaly, and it got lost in the work she did with her crew… But maybe that’s why she’d lost sight of it. For the longest time, she wanted to return home because that’s where her family was but that day on Bezi wasn’t just when she’d realized they got along; it’s when she’d found a new family. Maybe that’s why she stopped searching with the vigour she once did.

  “You got that wiring in?” Pilo asked.

  “Got it,” Riza said as she finished soldering the electrics of the drive to the ships controls.

  “Then we should be up and running,” Pilo said as he did a few more checks.

  “Should we test it out?”

  “Well, we can test the wiring,” He chuckled, “But we should probably wait till we’re in space to test it.”

  “Yeah,” She smiled as she made her way out of the engine room, “That’s probably better.”

  The hallway from the engine room also had the meditation garden, and when she took a glance in the room, she was glad to see the plants had returned to their green, vibrant state. The extra bit of attention she’d paid them, watering every few days, had paid of,f and she figured she should make an automated sprinkler so it didn’t rely on her remembering to water them. The thought of it excited her; it had been a while since she’d actually made something that solved a problem she had.

  _INCOMING TRANSMISSION: PILO_

  “Hey, Boss?” His voice appeared in her mind.

  “Yeah?”

  “We’re doing this to clear our names… and theirs… I get that. But, it won’t bring them back,”

  “Pilo… I–”

  “I’m just saying… They wouldn’t want us to die for this.”

  Riza went quiet and considered that she may have been overly committed to it. Just a few days ago, the thought of Duncan and Violet would stir a rage within her that she wanted to unleash on whoever was behind the incident. She hadn’t realised that in the swell of those emotions, she’d have been prepared to do just that, and die for it all. Would that not be worth it? As long as all of their names were cleared? Is dying a fond memory better than living a lie?

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Yeah. You’re right.” She answered.

  As she arrived in the cockpit, she sat in the pilot's seat and started operating the computers.

  _CARGO SHIP K-C-V-928_

  _INITIATING…

  _USER DETECTED: CAPTAIN RIZA BELEKE

  _ACCESS GRANTED

  _AUGMENTATION DETECTED_

  _MONTOYA DRIVE AG-001 [EXPERIMENTAL]

  _INSTALLING DEPENDENCIES…

  “Looks like it's reading,” Riza said.

  “Whew, Not gonna lie, if it didn’t, I’d have no idea what’s wrong,”

  Riza smiled, both at Pilo’s lightheartedness and at being one step closer to finding out what happened.

  “Room for one more?” Another voice entered comms.

  “Huh?” Riza muttered.

  “Izzy?” Pilo asked.

  “That’s my name,” Her energy cut through the downtrodden atmosphere.

  “Don’t you have a race in the morning?” Riza asked.

  “Yeah… I wasn’t exactly planning on winning the race”

  “Hmph,” Riza murmured, “That’s a first.”

  “If you win tomorrow, you get your eighth championship title,” Pilo added, “That’s twice as many as the second-best racer in history.”

  _DEPENDENCIES INSTALLED…

  _COOLING SYSTEM GO

  _DRIVE BATTERY GO

  _GRAVITY MANIPULATOR GO

  _JUMPS AVAILABLE [1/2]

  _READY TO ENGAGE_

  “You get cold feet?” Riza asked rather snarkily.

  “I was gonna do a whole last stand thing, keep first position for the entire race and then crash out right before the finish line. Blue ball the entire galaxy before leaving, never to be seen again.”

  “Sounds entertaining,” Riza responded.

  “Gotta go out with a bang,”

  “What changed?” Pilo searched deeper.

  “I don’t know… Just doesn’t feel right.”

  “Well, good thing you came now,” Riza smiled, “We just got the drive installed. The sooner we leave, the sooner we arrive in Silic.”

  Izzy arrived in the cockpit, looking around with a content grin on her face as she took in the details and layout of the cargo ship. With her, she had two suitcases that she left out in the hallway.

  “Not bad,” She said as she approached the pilot's seat.

  “You know this isn’t a vacation, right?” Riza raised an eyebrow as she noticed the suitcases.

  “Not all of us wear cargo pants and hoods,” She rebutted.

  “You gonna be able to handle this thing?” Riza asked, knowing that she may push a button.

  Izzy sat in the pilot's seat, scanning the panels and screens ahead of her.

  “Wanna find out?” She said excitedly as she tried to engage the ship's engines.

  _ACCESS DENIED

  “Here,” Riza said as she gave Izzy access to the ship.

  _USER DETECTED: PILOT IZZY MONTOYA

  _ACCESS GRANTED_

  _SHIELDS ENABLED

  _SHIELD STRENGTH: 100%

  _BURNERS: ENGAGED

  The ship roared to life as the burners engaged, and Izzy sat back as the memory of her toy cargo ships came to mind. In a strange, ironic way, she was excited to pilot something other than a drop ship, and a part of her was anxious at the idea that she might not be able to.

  “All set, Pilo?” Riza asked.

  “Copy, on my way up,”

  “So the takeoff is kinda slow, generally I start burn to get it warmed up, which you’ve already done,” Riza said as she pointed to the console, “It gets a little wobbly on takeoff and doesn’t manoeuvre very well,” She continued.

  “Copy that, Cap,” Izzy said with a grin still plastered on her face.

  “What’s got you so excited?”

  “No idea,” She shrugged, knowing that wasn’t true.

  _AUGMENTATION LIST:

  MONTOYA AG DRIVE

  PEBBLE GUNNER

  “Bare bones set up,” She added after checking the augmentation list.

  “That AG Drive is probably more valuable than the entire ship,” Pilo commented as he entered.

  “Could use a G-chair,” Izzy commented as she began flipping dials.

  “G-chair?” Riza asked.

  “Connects to my spine. I’ve got a G-force regulator that works best with a chair I can plug into,”

  “We’ll add it to the shopping list,” Riza responded.

  “You don’t have one here that we can just take with us?” Pilo asked.

  “Nah, we don’t make them at the lab. That’s ATUM tech,”

  The ship slowly took off, rising from the ship lot in the Montoya labs as Izzy gripped the yoke, feeling the subtle adjustments of the ship as she rotated it on exit. Riza sat in the co-pilot's seat, and Pilo was behind them in an engineer's seat, watching a screen with all of the ship's data.

  _INCOMING TRANSMISSION: MOTHER_

  The notification blinked in Izzy’s vision, and she watched it, knowing that the race would be starting in a few hours and her family would be looking for her. Pearl usually arrived around now to make sure Izzy was up and getting ready. Everything within her wanted to answer the call so that she could explain where she was and what she was doing. But, the part of her that knew her Mother knew the life she’d lived up until now also knew that there would be no sympathy. The acceptance that she sought would have to come from herself from now on. She muted the transmission, unable to bring herself to reject or accept it.

  _INCOMING TRANSMISSION: FATHER_

  One after another, the calls kept coming in, and she kept muting. Pearl called next, and they continued rotating for longer than she could bear. Noticing the notification before muting again, and again, and again. As the ship completed its takeoff from the Montoya facility, she set the thrusters to one hundred percent charge–

  “Everybody strapped in?” She asked.

  “Yup,” Pilo nodded excitedly.

  Riza chuckled, “Yeah, but the ship isn’t that fas–”

  Izzy engaged the burner, like releasing the clutch with a maxed out RPM, and the ship thrust off into the distance. Everyone’s heads smacked against their seats as they immediately underwent three G’s. Riza groaned as she’d never felt three G’s so suddenly before, and Pilo cheered out as though he was at a theme park.

  _G-FORCE: 3.214

  “Holy shit,” Riza muttered under her breath.

  “Take short, deep breaths,” Izzy said. “And tense your leg muscles,”

  Riza followed suit and felt a subtle bit of relief as she did so, but the immense pressure on her eyes and chest persisted. Her eyes wandered to the G-force reading, which continued to climb as the ship ascended. She’d only ever experienced four G’s briefly upon reentry a few times in transport vessels, but this was the longest she’d been subjected to a consistent three G’s.

  _G-FORCE: 3.791

  She had no idea the ship could move this quickly, and realised in that moment that she was barely even an amateur pilot. Her vision began to tunnel around her as the ship crossed Four G’s, and she tried her best to hold onto consciousness, but as the ship continued to rise, she couldn’t maintain the blood flow from her legs any longer. Her vision faded to black, and her body went limp.

  _G-FORCE: 4.356