Page 3 of Fought and Found

A beat. Then, because Morrison is Morrison: "He's large, even for a Xarthian. I'm mentioning it so you're not surprised."

The name sits in the cockpit like a dropped blade. I don't know this operative. I know the species — Xarthians are predatory, pack-bonded, volcanic-homeworld stock, built for pursuit and combat, and the ones who end up at SRS are the worst of a dangerous lot. Tier 1 means the company's sharpest weapon. Ninety-eight percent means there's almost nothing he hasn't been willing to do.

Something flickers in my sternum. Not the notebook feeling. Something different — more alert, more awake. I push it aside before I can look at it directly.

My hand finds Betsy in her holster. The blaster's grip is warm and familiar, the daisy sticker slightly peeling at one corner.

"Don't play hero, Knight. Just fly the route, drop the cargo, and come home."

There's something in that last word. Home. Morrison doesn't use it lightly. Junction One isn't sentimental for her — it's operational, functional, the center of a dispatch network she's held together with sheer competence and an apparent immunity to sleep. But she sayscome home like she means it, and the formless thing in my sternum tightens.

"Will do, Morrison. Straight there and back. No heroics."

"Deliver the cargo. Don't die. Morrison out."

The transmission cuts. The Petal hums. The fairy lights I strung along the cockpit ceiling last year — tiny, warm, the color of candle flame — cast soft shadows across the navigation display and make everything feel gentler than it is.

"Sprout."

"Already running the name." The orb's glow has become sharp-edged. Not quite battle mode, but watching. "Xor Xax. Xarthian male. SRS Tier 1, assigned nine years ago by Director Trell. Specializes in high-value interception. His operational record is —" A pause. "Extensive."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning I would prefer you did not encounter this individual, and I would like to register that preference formally, for the record, in capital letters."

I should be scared. I am scared, somewhere under the competence, in the place where Morrison's training sits alongside twelve years of knowing that the Outer Rim doesn't send you warnings it doesn't mean. A Tier 1 Xarthian with a near-perfect compliance rate. Coming for my container. Somewhere between here and Velar Prime.

The empty co-pilot's seat catches the fairy light. The tea ring stain. The pristine cushion.

I set down the mug. Pull up the nav charts. Check my route, check my shields, check the container seals on the cargo bay monitor — green, green, green. I pat Betsy good morning in her holster, run myfingers along Harold's barrel, check on Gertrude in the ankle sheath because Gertrude gets lonely if you ignore her.

Morrison once told me that naming weapons was "a psychological coping mechanism for chronic isolation" and I told her that was a funny way to say "charming" and she hung up on me.

Three hours pass without incident, which is three hours more than I expected. I've eaten a protein bar that tasted like ambition and cardboard, beaten Sprout at two games of tactical chess — "I allowed you to win for morale purposes," it insists, which is what it says every time — and checked the scanner for Xarthian engine signatures four times. Not because I'm worried. Because I'm thorough.

Sprout logs something at 0214 that I almost miss — an unclassified signal, faint, no matching transponder in the database. There for eleven seconds. Then gone. "Source?" I ask. "Unknown," Sprout says, which Sprout never says. The orb pulses once, tight and uncertain. Then it logs: Classification: Unassigned. I do not like it. Neither do I, I think. Neither do I.

The route is smooth. Clean. Quiet in a way that should be reassuring and instead makes the back of my neck itch, because twelve years in the Outer Rim teaches you that quiet is just noise that hasn't happened yet.

I’m considering a nap when the proximity alert chimes.

Not chirps. Not chimes. Screams.

"Contact." Sprout's glow goes white. Sharp. Battle mode. "Single vessel. Bearing zero-four-seven mark twelve. Closing fast."

I'm out of the chair and at the tactical display before the second ping. Hands steady. No tremor. Morrison's training — let the fear sit, then decide what to do anyway.

"Configuration?"

"Running identification now. Transponder reads as independent freight, but the engine signature is —" A pause. In twelve years, I have never heard Sprout hesitate. "Consistent with SRS fleet configuration. Modified for pursuit. They are not broadcasting standard hailing frequencies."

My hand finds Betsy before I've finished processing the words. The grip is warm and familiar. Morning, Bets. We've got company.

"Time to intercept?"

"At current velocity, fourteen minutes. They have not attempted communication." Another white-sharp pause. "Flossie. Their engine class outmatches ours by a factor of three. We are not outrunning this."

Xor Xax. Coming for my container with an engine that makes the Petal look like a bathtub with ambitions.