“We’re all set here, Captain. All aboard who’s coming aboard.”

  Jason nodded toward McBride at the helm. “Phase-shift when ready.”

  A white flash and they phase-shifted into Her Majesty. The Lilly shuddered and then everything outside her hull shifted—the sound of metal twisting and scraping came from all directions. The three hundred and sixty degree display above showed Her Majesty’s exposed crossbeams and bulkheads—metal was twisted in some places and completely sheared clean where The Lilly’s hull had displaced overlapping matter. Jason turned clockwise on his heels, studying Her Majesty’s mangled, internal skeleton. He wondered if there was adequate structural strength left, or would the big ship implode at the slightest nudge.

  Both Jason and Rizzo used their battle suits’ belts to phase-shift onto Her Majesty’s bridge. Startled, Brian’s hopper clicked and hissed until it recognized Jason’s face behind his visor.

  “You’re all going to need battle suits.”

  “Yeah? And what about him?” Brian asked, pointing to the hopper.

  “I’d suggest we move him to The Lilly temporarily. There’s a really good chance this ship will breach at some point.”

  Brian, who hadn’t yet looked up from the console he was working at, glanced over to the hopper. “I don’t tell him what to do.”

  “That’s fine. I don’t have a problem telling him,” Jason said. “Does he understand what we say?”

  Brian shrugged. “I suppose. When he’s interested in what’s being said.”

  Jason approached the hopper. “We need to move you to a safe place. It’s only temporary. I promise, we’ll bring you back to Brian as soon as possible. Gunny, phase-shift with him into one of The Lilly’s holds.”

  Orion gave Jason a sideways glance and stepped up to the hopper, tentatively placing a hand on its arm. The hopper’s black forked tongue flicked in and out and the clicking sound grew louder.

  “My guess, he’s not warming to that idea much,” Brian said, a bemused expression on his face.

  “Best make it quick, Gunny,” Jason said.

  “On it, Cap. Just need to set my HUD phase-shift location to Hold 2.” In a flash they were both gone.

  Within two minutes Orion was back on the bridge—lying on her back. She got to her feet and said, “Hopper wasn’t very happy with your decision. Came right at me with those claws flexing, knocked me on my ass, and tried to bite me through my visor.”

  Jason turned to Brian. “This is your ship, Captain. Take us into the maze.”

  Chapter 20

  Betty was at the helm of Her Majesty. With her extensive time on board numerous large freighters, she had the most experience piloting big, lumbering vessels. Actually, space travel was virtually all computer or AI controlled, though a ship’s pilot constantly oversaw pre-plotted course data and, if necessary, overrode those plot computations—sometimes at the very last second, if time permitted.

  The large, cloaked, luxury liner turned warship entered the maze of parked, mile-long dreadnaughts.

  “Crap!” Betty said.

  “Well, slow us down,” Brian barked.

  “Obviously,” Betty snapped back. “AI, compensate for all drones and other small vessels within the plot route. Add them to the display.”

  The live video feed with plot-line overlay was refreshed with hundreds of tiny new icons moving like insects back and forth between the dreadnaughts. Jason watched in silence. It wasn’t the AI’s fault; Brian had only specified that dreadnaughts be logged and plotted.

  Brian glanced at Jason. “Relax. We got this.”

  Jason nodded. “I know you do.” The view on the display reminded Jason of driving through Manhattan, with its high-rise buildings. Although here the buildings, as such, were above and below them, not merely on the sides—a three-dimensional maze that, from their bridge perspective, looked impossible to traverse. At no point were the dreadnaughts closer to each other than five hundred yards, but Her Majesty was almost that long herself—so a constant pitch, yaw, and roll action was necessary to maintain adequate clearance. Jason caught himself looking up only to remind himself there was no three hundred and sixty degree view from here as there was on The Lilly.

  “We’re coming up to our first course change,” Betty said.

  “I understand we’re visually cloaked. But you’re sure we won’t be picked up on any proximity sensors?” Jason asked.

  This time it was Bristol who spoke. “What do you think cloaked means? It’s not singularly based on aspects of the spectrum of light, or visual information.”

  Jason chewed the inside of his lip, but didn’t say anything. There was a total disregard by crewmembers to exhibit proper military respect and conduct on this bridge. It was bringing up his ire, and it took more than a little self control not to publicly reprimand and discipline Bristol. Truth was, it was up to Brian to set a higher standard of command.

  An alarm sounded from the helm console. The display showed Her Majesty making the course change, while pitching at a thirty degree angle and rolling ten degrees starboard. The maneuver put Her Majesty between the aft and forward corners of three massive dreadnaughts.

  “It’s okay, Captain Reynolds,” Betty said with a confident smile. “As long as we don’t get ourselves into a pinched span that’s less than four hundred thirty yards, we should be fine.”

  She entered something at her console and a dynamic proximity counter displayed. The numbers made no sense to Jason. Before he could comment, she said, “Oops,” and the numbers changed to yardage measurements. The readout was hovering between five hundred, and five hundred ten yards. From Jason’s perspective they could be moving along at too rapid a clip—not allowing for the possibility of necessary, but unexpected, course changes. But this was Brian’s bridge—his call, though it was still taking longer than he’d earlier imagined it would. He looked at the overall distance they’d need to traverse within the maze before getting close enough to phase-shift The Lilly. He wondered if Ricket would be able to hold off the emperor’s security forces that long.

  Jason hailed Ricket.

  “Go for Ricket.”

  “What’s your status?”

  “Granger is working at an outer hull access panel. Normally it would allow him to open the forward starboard hatch. I’m doing my best to jam the control logic, while building an AI subroutine that will do this automatically.”

  Jason was amazed at Ricket’s ability to multitask. Even now, he was writing code while they conversed back and forth.

  “It’s a temporary measure, though, Captain. Eventually, he’ll access that or another hatchway into the ship. I suggest you hurry.”

  “Doing our best. What’s the status on bringing up the Minian’s systems?”

  “Not good. Although the AI is indeed operational, many of the various access terminals that control or even monitor ship functions have been disconnected.”

  “What are you telling me? She can’t move under her own power?”

  “Neither move nor navigate. As we discussed, phase-shifting via The Lilly will be our only option.” Ricket then added, “I’m looking for a suitable hold location and a way to interface the power couplings between the two ships. There are problems doing that as well.”

  “What kind of problems?” Jason asked.

  “The Lilly is several technological generations behind the Minian. I’ll need to manufacture a new anti-matter power coupling.”

  “I’m guessing for that you’ll need the Minian’s phase-synthesizer to be operational.”

  “… and that’s another problem. I haven’t had time to check, but it seems to be disconnected,” Ricket replied.

  “Then we’re screwed,” Jason said with resignation.

  “Maybe not … I could use the phase-synthesizer on board The Lilly. I’ll have everything ready, but it will still take time once you phase-shift her on board.”

  “This is becoming a cluster fuck,” Jason said, more to himself than to Ricket.

  “One more thing, Captain. Both Crystal City ships have left Craing space.”

  Jason’s attention was brought back to Her Majesty’s bridge—a second, even louder, alarm was sounding. The dynamic proximity counter was flashing, with the readout wavering between four hundred fifty and four hundred seventy yards. In the midst of the new course change, there were now four dreadnaughts to navigate through.

  “What’s the problem?” Jason asked.

  Betty looked irritated, glancing at the display. “That!”

  “What the hell is that?” Brian and Jason asked together.

  “It’s another delivery drone. But this one’s bigger and it’s sitting right inside our plot path.”

  Jason looked at Orion, who had sidled over to the tactical console. “Cap, I’ve got a lock on it. Give me the word and I’ll make it disappear.”

  “Do that and you may awaken the beast,” Brian said.

  “Can we back off, try a different plot path?”

  All eyes went to Betty as she did the calculations. “Sure,” she said, tilting her head and pursing her lips. “But you’ll add forty minutes to the timetable.” She looked over to Brian. “What do you want to do, Captain?”

  The seconds ticked by while Brian watched the display and the bulbous, beetle-shaped drone sitting several hundred yards off Her Majesty’s bow. Jason asked, “As far as they’re concerned, we’re not even here. Is there any chance they’ll conclude it malfunctioned?”

  “No chance in hell,” Bristol said. “Plasma firing signatures are distinct. They’ll know in an instant what has happened and every dreadnaught will awaken into full battle-station mode.”

  Jason heard Ricket talking; he’d forgotten to cut his NanoCom connection. Holding two fingers to his ear, he said, “Can you repeat that, Ricket?”

  “Captain, I suggest someone board the drone and phase-shift it out into open space.”

  “Orion, what’s that drone’s mass?”

  “Not much, maybe eight hundred pounds. Added to that, three hundred pounds of freight, so let’s say eleven hundred pounds, give or take.”

  * * *

  After a quick phase-shift to The Lilly’s armory, Jason hailed Orion. “You got those coordinates for me?”

  Jason saw his HUD’s instant update. “Okay, got ’em.”

  “Use the same coordinates in reverse for the way back … except for the last one, which will be here, on the Minian. Good luck, Captain. You sure you don’t want me—”

  “No, Gunny, I’ve got this. Anyway … seems pretty straight forward, so what can go wrong?” Jason didn’t wait for an answer and phase-shifted away, using the first coordinates provided by Orion.

  He reappeared, standing on the back of what looked like a giant deer tick. Having seen them countless times as a kid growing up in San Bernardino, Jason hesitated at the uncanny resemblance.

  “You need to move it along, Captain,” Orion urged into his NanoCom. “Remember your life signs are no longer cloaked.”

  “Copy that,” Jason said. Immediately he felt he was being watched—scanned by countless sensors, his life form targeted by any number of dreadnaught plasma cannons. He angled his visor to look over his shoulder, and took in the closest of the cube-shaped behemoth warships. Its sheer size was overwhelming. Everything—including himself—seemed insignificant in comparison. Jason consciously slowed his breathing—taking deep breaths.

  He slid the oversized rhino-warrior phase-shift belt he’d brought along from around his shoulder and looked for a place to attach it. There were nothing but arcing, gentle curves. Looking over the side of the drone, Jason lost contact and started to float off into open space. His fingers grasped for a handhold, but everything was smooth. He held his breath as he drifted out of reach. At ten feet out, Jason phase-shifted again, only this time he changed the coordinates to reach the bottom side of the drone. Here there was a more angular surface. He pulled himself along the hull and eventually located a protruding C-shaped flange that he could place the rhino belt around. The multiple phase-shift coordinates had already been programed into it—all he had to do was press the Activate button on the belt’s corresponding wristband display. He’d attached the rhino wristband around his thigh since it was far too large to fit around his own wrist. He took one last look around before tapping the button.

  In a series of flashes, Jason experienced incremental phase-shifts along the same plot path Her Majesty had recently navigated. Even the larger rhino belt didn’t have anywhere near the same phase-shift distance capabilities as a full-sized ship, and soon Jason felt disoriented. It was like watching rapid, stop-go film edits; he closed his eyes until he felt stable again. Sure enough, he and the tick-shaped drone were now floating somewhere in deep space—many thousands of miles from Her Majesty.

  Technology he didn’t want lying around in open space to be found by the Craing or anyone else, he replaced the large rhino belt around his shoulder. Without the added mass of the drone, Jason would use his own HUD-controlled belt for the return trip. He double-checked the coordinates and prepared himself for another sickening ride back.

  He was being hailed.

  “Go for Captain.”

  Ricket’s voice sounded far away and only a few words were intelligible: “Captain … Minian … being breached … hurry.”

  Chapter 21

  Jason stared at the distant planet and imagined the scores of dreadnaughts surrounding her. He needed to change things up. He hailed Orion.

  “Go for Gunny.”

  “Ricket’s in trouble and we’re about to lose that ship for good.”

  “He hailed me after you, Cap, and we’re still an hour away from being close enough to phase-shift The Lilly. From what Ricket said, Granger’s seconds from getting that hatch open.”

  “Let me ask you, Gunny—was there any indication my presence was detected when I was out there?”

  “Not that I can see. Things still seem pretty dead as far as the dreadnaughts are concerned. Guess a single, momentary, life form in space was too inconsequential to attract much attention.”

  “Good. Let’s hope five more of us are just as inconsequential.”

  “I’m not following, Cap.”

  “Have Billy and a small team suit up. They’ll need to bring along big rhino belts for extended phase-shifts.”

  Orion was silent for a moment. “That’s a long way to go and a whole lot of phase-shifting. I’m not real sure anyone can withstand that kind of—”

  Jason cut her off: “We’re out of time. Pre-program all the belts, including the rhino belt I have with me. I’ll meet them on board the Minian, in her corridor outside the bridge. Let me know when I’m good to go.”

  Jason cut the connection and waited for Orion to update the belts with the new multiple phase-shift coordinates. The belt display was refreshed and ready for him to press Activate. He took a deep breath, tapped the button, and closed his eyes.

  * * *

  Their updated belt configurations were capable of only so many phase-shifts before needing them to stop and wait for the belts to recharge several moments. Jason eventually remembered his standard battle suit belt was still around his waist, so he continued to make shorter distance phase-shifts in between recharge times. He’d already thrown up in his helmet twice and was at the point where non-stop dry heaves were ravaging his gut. Tears obscured his vision. He heard a voice in his NanoCom—someone speaking to him in an excited voice, but he was incapable of making any sense of what was said.

  On the verge of blacking out, Jason tumbled into the corridor outside the Minian’s bridge—gravity abruptly bringing his nightmarish ride to a halt.

  He unclasped his helmet, pulled it from his head, and dropped it on the deck. He inhaled fresh air and realized he wasn’t alone.

  Ricket stood before him, holding a piece of equipment that Jason didn’t recognize. Ricket looked at Jason’s messy helmet on the deck and made a face. “Captain, are you all right?”

  “Don’t ask. What’s the situation here?”

  “I take it you didn’t hear my last transmission. The ship’s been boarded. I’ve got the DeckPorts disabled but it’s a temporary fix at best.”

  “Where’s Gaddy?”

  “I have her running around looking for things I’ll need. She’s helping me bring crucial systems back online.” Ricket looked more distraught than Jason had ever seen him. “Captain, there’s something else. The Minian’s phase-synthesizer—it’s gone.”

  “What do you mean gone? That thing’s huge … took up a whole compartment.”

  “It must have been taken off-ship in large segments, then phase-shifted close by—heavy as it is.”

  “We have one on The Lilly, we can leave it.”

  “No. In some ways it’s more important than the Minian herself. There’s virtually nothing it cannot synthesize … including another ship. Don’t forget how we completely rebuilt the Minian’s bridge, not so long ago.”

  Jason stared down at Ricket, feeling a bad situation was getting worse—much worse.

  There was a flash and Billy appeared sixty feet down the corridor. “Best we get out of the way, Ricket. There’s a few more coming,” Jason said, and he and Ricket stepped back in the direction of the bridge as two more of the team arrived.

  Rizzo looked annoyed and a pale shade of green. “Thanks for the heads up this was going to be a puke-ride, Billy.”

  Three more team members showed up simultaneously. With the exception of Billy’s, all visors were clouded with vomit. Their helmets came off, followed by gasps for fresh air. Jason was surprised to see Dira among the arrivals, as well as two of the new Delta Force guys.

  Dira joined Jason and Ricket. “I know you didn’t ask for me to be here. But the sooner we complete this mission, the sooner I can get home. I’m also looking for a little payback.”

  Ricket took Dira’s helmet from her, reached inside, and within several seconds the visor started to clear. “Instigated a nanite cleanse.” He handed it back to her and then did the same thing to Jason’s helmet.