Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Nissa gunned the aquabike the last few meters across the lake and nosed it onto the shore.
Dare stood ahead of them on the sand, with his arms crossed, and a scowl on his face.
“What the fuck is going on?” he demanded.
Justyn squeezed Nissa’s waist, then swung a leg off the back of the bike. No way in hell he was going to tell her he let her win the race to the bike just so he could sit with her ass nestled against him.
Besides, watching her handle the bike was sexy as hell.
Justyn faced his brother. “Someone took shots at us outside the Memory Keeper’s residence.”
Dare’s face darkened. “Someone really wants to stop you finding this artifact.”
“It has to be the mole on board the Nomad.” Justyn wanted to join Rynan and his security team and find this bastard. “Where’s Ry?”
“On his way back from the village. The Memory Keeper called us, said you were under fire. Last I heard, Ry caught our mole.”
Savage satisfaction flooded Justyn. “Good.”
The three of them were standing in the shadow of the Sky Nomad when Ry pulled up on an anti-grav bike, followed by three of his team.
Rynan jumped off the bike, then hauled the body draped on the back of it off and dumped it on the ground.
“You killed him?” Justyn said.
“Nope. He shot himself.”
Nissa crouched and turned the body over. She gasped. “One of the monks!”
“I doubt he was really a monk,” Justyn said.
“Correct.” Ry’s voice was dark. “I suspect we’ll find he’s a recent convert. He was working for someone else.”
Who? Justyn didn’t like not knowing who else was out there gunning for them.
“I have more bad news,” Rynan said.
Justyn’s gut cramped.
“I just received a long-range transmission from a friend at Galaxy’s Edge.
Word’s out that the US Constitution was a fake.
The…criminal element of the galaxy is using it as an excuse to ignore the law.
Prisoners are appealing their sentences.
The GSS has its hands full quelling uprisings on about a dozen planets and stations. ”
“Goddess,” Nissa breathed.
“It gets worse. A small fleet of starships passed through the Edge. They asked questions about us, the convoy’s route, and about Nissa.”
She cursed. “So we’re going to have company soon?”
“Yes. Of the unwelcome kind. The convoy is being led by a treasure hunter called Alexei Gunn. I contacted Dathan and apparently this Gunn is a bad guy. Likes to tail other hunters, steal their research so they can find the treasure, and then kill them.”
“Nice,” Justyn mumbled.
“Did you find out anything to help you find the Constitution?” Dare asked.
“Yes,” Justyn said. “The Memory Keeper showed us some artwork by a Nero crewmember’s descendant, and Nissa put it together with info from the diary.”
She stepped forward. “We think something happened to the Nero near a gas giant.”
Dare frowned. “A gas giant? But if the Nero had gotten too close, there’d be nothing left.”
“Not if it crashed on the planet’s moon. A freighter rescued some of the Nero’s crew, so it can’t have been in the gas giant at the time. There’s a chance—a slim one—that the wreckage still exists.”
Ry’s eyes narrowed. “So we need to find all gas giants within range of here?”
“It’s a green gas giant, if that helps,” Nissa added.
Dare and Ry traded a look. Justyn straightened. He knew that look. “You know where it is.”
Dare nodded. “It’s called Sargasso. It’s thirty-six hours from here.”
Rynan continued. “We avoid it, as do most convoys. In the past, many ships were destroyed there or barely escaped, usually with massive damage. Old convoy crews talked about strange forces, mysterious lights, and giant creatures that attacked ships.” He shook his head.
“Old space tales but there’s usually a seed of truth in there somewhere. ”
Justyn and Nissa stared at each other. “The diary talked about space monsters.”
Rynan shrugged. “We’ve heard it all before and not once on a convoy have we seen a space monster. More likely some strange anomaly took out the ship.”
“You said most convoys avoid Sargasso?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“So, if the wreckage of the Nero still exists, there’s a good chance it hasn’t been disturbed.”
Justyn slung an arm over Nissa’s shoulders and looked at Dare and Rynan. “Nissa and I could take the Pathfinder and?—”
Dare snorted. “And let us miss out on all the fun?”
“And let you go off and get into trouble again?” Rynan added.
God, he loved his brothers. “What are you going to do about the convoy?”
Dare glanced at the ships sitting behind the Nomad. “They can stay here for a few extra days and wait for us to get back. None of them are in a huge rush. I’ll leave Aurina in charge to keep an eye on them. We’ll take the Nomad with crew only.”
“We need a few provisions.” Rynan pulled out his Sync. “We can be ready to leave in two hours.”
Justyn nodded. “Make it one hour, bro. I think we’d like to stay well ahead of Gunn.”
Nissa stood with her hands clamped on the back of the co-pilot’s chair on the bridge of the Sky Nomad, her gaze glued to the viewscreen.
Justyn’s big body was sprawled in the chair in front of her like he didn’t have a care in the galaxy, but she saw that his gaze was focused intensely on the screen as well.
Sargasso had started out as a small green dot in the black vastness.
Now it filled the screen with a bright green that almost hurt the eyes. She knew that inside there, somewhere, was a small, rocky core. The rest of the planet consisted of gases—mainly hydrogen and helium.
“Running scans now,” Rynan said.
She squeezed the chair again and this time, Justyn’s hand covered hers. “Deep breath, sweetheart.”
“I’m fine.” They had to find something. It had to be there. This was no longer just an adventure, or about saving her father’s commendation. It was about the stability of the galaxy, about the truth behind a priceless piece of history, and about a long-ago space farer named Anderson Chan.
Rynan tapped at his screens, then began cursing steadily under his breath.
“What?” Justyn demanded.
“Radiation. It’s screwing up the scans. Sargasso has an extremely strong magnetic field and it produces really intense radiation belts around the planet.”
“Might be the reason so many ships were lost around here.” Nissa frowned. “Can you see anything on the scans?”
“Some echoes and shadows. Nothing’s clear.” Rynan tapped the screen in a rapid sequence. “But one thing is certain. There’s a moon.”
“Any sign of wreckage on its surface?” Dare asked. He was leaning against the wall, a frown on his face.
“I just can’t tell. The moon doesn’t have much of an atmosphere, it has very low gravity, and the surface is smooth and covered in cracks. My best guess is it’s covered by a frozen ocean.”
“Shit,” Justyn said. “Even if the Nero crashed on the moon, it might be buried who knows how far down.”
Nissa wanted to scream. To get this close and still not find the ship…her hands curled into fists.
“Wait, I have an idea.” Rynan pressed a button and activated the comm system. “Elana, you able to tear yourself away from the medbay to come to the bridge?”
A feminine snort. “I live to obey your commands, boss. What do you need? Someone hurt?”
“No. I need your expertise reading old scans.”
A pause. “Hmm. Now I’m intrigued. I’ll be up in a minute.”
“Elana’s your medic, right?” Nissa asked. “How come you want her to read messed-up scans?”
“She was raised on an ice-mining ship in the Scandia quadrant. Her family’s been ice mining for centuries.
They scan suitable frozen moons and planets for mineral-packed ice, and apparently older scanners show the minerals better, if you know what you’re looking for.
If anyone can tell us what’s on Sargasso’s moon, it’s Elana. ”
Elana strode onto the bridge. She was small, slim through the hips, but her fitted, navy-blue medic jumpsuit left no doubt that she kept in shape. She swaggered like she was six feet tall, her black hair swinging in a ponytail behind her.
“Okay, let’s see these scans,” she said.
Rynan pulled out a chair for her. “We’re looking for anything that could be a starship wreck.”
Nissa watched the woman settle in beside Rynan. It was clear the two had an easy camaraderie. Nissa leaned in close to Justyn’s ear and lowered her voice.
“Are they…?” She nodded her head toward the couple.
“Nah. Best friends. Thick as thieves since Elana joined the crew. Ry would never, ever sleep with her. He never shares his bed with the same woman more than once, and he’d never jeopardize his friendship with Elana.”
Nissa watched the way their heads were close together, saw Elana elbow Rynan out of her way in a practiced way that said she did it daily. Rynan flicked her ear in retaliation, then pointed to something on the screen.
Hmm. Rynan might keep women at arm’s length, but this one was so far under his skin, he hadn’t even noticed. Nissa smiled. It might be fun to watch the fireworks when he realized that fact.
“There’s definitely something here on the surface.
” Elana tapped the screen where a vaguely rectangular blob appeared on the moon’s striated surface.
“It shows a few features you’d find with a ship’s wreckage.
” She zoomed in on another part of the scan.
“This area is promising too. The contrast with the surface really stands out, but it’s more broken up.
” She frowned peering in closer. “Hang on. There’s something moving!
It’s really large…no, wait…it’s gone.” Her frown deepened.
“That’s strange. Must be a radiation artifact.
But the other two are definitely targets I’d check out. ”
“Okay.” Dare moved forward. “We need visual confirmation next.”
“The broken mass is close to the equator,” Rynan said. “We’ll be in visual range in another few minutes. The other is close to the moon’s northern pole. I’ll send in a recon probe and see if it can survive the radiation long enough to get any clear images.”
They waited. Nissa tapped her fingers against Justyn’s chair until he grabbed her hand and twined it with his.
“Coming into view now,” Rynan said.
At first, Nissa couldn’t detect anything in the shades of gray, then she saw a darkened area. She squinted. It still didn’t look like much.
“Running ship recognition software now.”
“Recognition software?” Nissa asked.
Justyn squeezed her hand. “Ry put it together. It’s a database of all known ship designs in the galaxy and what we’ve come across in uncharted space. He can run scans and it checks against the database.”
Patrol had simple databases, but it still required technicians to run the comparison. She thought of all the applications of Rynan’s software. “He could make a fortune selling it.”
Justyn grinned. “Ry doesn’t like sharing his toys.”
The console chimed.
“Damn.” Rynan shook his head. “It is a ship, but it’s the remains of a modern runnership.”
Justyn huffed out a breath. “Probably a pirate ship.”
“Or a smuggler,” she said.
He pressed a kiss to her knuckles and winked.
Okay, one down one to go. Her heart thudded hard in her chest. It had to be the Nero. It had to be.
“Probe launched,” Elana said. For a medic, she seemed very at home at the bridge controls.
“Give it a few minutes and it’ll start sending back images.” Rynan leaned over to look at another screen. “Probe hull integrity is holding.”
Elana tapped her screen. “Radiation is affecting it though. It’ll probably only last ten minutes, max.”
“Let’s hope we get what we need then.” Rynan straightened. “Put the images on the viewscreen. First image coming through.”
Nissa saw an icy surface, then what looked like…a dark-gray box. She tried to make sense of what she was seeing. The image was far from clear. “That software tell you anything?”
“It’s working on it.”
“It’s definitely a ship,” Elana said.
Suddenly Justyn leaned forward. “You won’t need the software. Look.” He pointed to something.
Nissa leaned forward, too. It was the remains of an engine. And all engines were stamped with a maker’s plate containing the ship’s name. “Can you zoom in? Find the plate?” Excitement was lightning in her blood.
The image zoomed in.
A square plate etched with writing came into view.
Engine Maker: Rolls-Royce Aero
Starship: The Nero.
Justyn laughed. He reached around and tugged Nissa into his lap. Without a care about Elana and his brothers watching, he kissed her silly.
With a laugh, she gripped his cheeks and kissed him back.
“If you two are done—” there was a smile in Dare’s voice “—you’d better suit up and get over to investigate that ship before Gunn tracks us down.”
Elana stood. “Before you do that, come down to the medbay. You’ll need some anti-radiation injections.”
Nissa smiled, giddy with excitement. Right now, neither Gunn nor the deadly radiation bothered her one bit. “Let’s go find our treasure, Phoenix.”