Kik stretched as his ship glided into the Rymez system. He looked down at his new collection of scars. The stab wound on his arm. The graze on his leg. Each of them had been bad, but the surgery to remove the fungus spores from the injuries and their surroundings was worse. That particular quarantine had been painful.

He would rather have the scars than not, though. They would serve as a mark of his first kill. Not a memory of the struggles that he had faced, nor a mark of pride. They would be a tribute to the unknown man, whose face he had never even seen behind his mask. He had fought hard for whatever he had believed in, and Kik respected him for that. He also sympathised, hoping he wouldn’t be placed in the same position.

Unfortunately he had received no word from Olaf or Cormen, or any of the other mercenaries, while he had been resting. His day of recovery, when he had intended to wait for them, had passed before it had even started, the nurses shocked at the speed he healed.

He had brushed away their questions with misleading answers about nanomachines, but their suspicion remained even when he showed them the syringe from his medkit. It was perhaps a good thing that he had stopped them scanning his body above his neck, his excuse being the sensitive electronics behind his ears. He felt it would be bad if anyone were to learn about the alien symbiote in his back.

His ride back to space and journey between systems had been solitary. Although it had given him time to look through the things he had taken from the packages on his escape craft.

First and foremost was a projectile weapon, replacing the one that had broken on Icros. It was concealed, strapping to the underside of his arm on the outside of his void suit or beneath his clothing. He could fire it by flicking out a trigger piece into his hand. It carried a magazine of three bullets, and he had found two spare clips among the other equipment. It was the same model as the pistol the soldier he had killed had used back on Icros. Currently it was resting inside his waist pouches, too bulky to carry around during everyday activities.

Beyond that was a box full of transmission equipment, although it was incomplete. It was missing an antenna and power source, and perhaps one or two other items - abandoned in the jungle during his rush to leave.

There were a few other items, such as food and spare clothing. Kik had dropped most of the clothing already, as it was more than two sizes too large. The food had disappeared on the multi day flight back to the city, riding the warm winds from the lava vents and dodging curious or territorial insects. The other items, such as water containers, air bottles, pumps and other survival equipment, Kik had kept as spares for the ship.

Finally was a spherical safe, the size of Kik’s head. He hadn’t been able to get it open, and didn’t want to mess with it in case of booby traps. But it was heavy enough for him to be sure it was full. It sat, propped up, beneath the bridge’s monitors, the keypad /daring him to test his luck.

But instead of bothering with unknown technology, he turned his focus onwards, back to Supply Station Alpha. It hung in free fall amid the cloud of rocks, gazing out at the stars and the approaching ship.

The Benefactor landed in a bay similar to its previous berth, not two weeks back. Stepping free of the ship, Kik nodded to the few guards come to escort him. After a few perfunctory questions and inspection of the transmission equipment he was carrying, they let him move on. They were far more relaxed than the previous time, with records of him and his ship landing here before.

He arrived at Reem’s quarters before he realised he had no idea what to say to him. Cormen was missing. More importantly, Kik hadn’t tried to find him. He wouldn’t have been able to do anything for him either way, but he could have at least made the effort.

Sliding open the door in worry, he thought through his next plan, but his worries were shoved to the back of his mind when he noticed who was in the room.

“Who are you and what asscrack of the galaxy did you crawl out from?” the woman on the other side of the door asked, looking up from her perch by the corner. She continued as he scanned the rest of the empty space. “If you’re looking for Reem, he’s not here.”

“Uh… right... where do I find him then?”

“He’s off fixing something somewhere. I don’t know where, he never tells me anything. Too upright and navy precise.”

“How long until he’s back? Could I leave a message?”

She rubbed the bridge of her nose through her open suit visor. “Yeah, fine. He’ll be a few hours. It’s not like I’m doing anything else. Shoot.”

“Can you tell him that Kik is back from Icros? And he wants to know what his next mission is?”

She turned her gaze upon him, deep green eyes coming to bear. “Oh? Perhaps I can help you. You see, I’ve been waiting for you.”

Kik frowned. “And what do you need me for?”

“Well I hear you need a captain, and I happen to be between ships. My own is under repair, and my mortgage only gets more pricey as I wait.”

Now it was Kik’s turn to rub his nose. “I do pretty well on my own. Who gave you the idea I need another captain?”

She shrugged. “I hear it’s only to keep up appearances, and you would be captain in reality. But I don’t want to work under a captain I can’t respect, even if it’s only when nobody is watching. I have my own pride.”

“Well, I’m not about to step down and let another be the captain of my own ship. Why don’t we just work together and we could even become friends…”

The woman stepped in and bent towards him before he could say anything further, a finger upraised. Something about her expression drove him to silence.

“I’m not your friend, and I will not become one. Colleague, yes. Ally, perhaps. Friend? No. And before you become so adamant about it being your ship, I hear you don’t own even a part share while your guardian’s still alive.”

Kik frowned. “What do you know…”

“About your parents? One’s dead, the other’s in a coma. Why, I’m not sure. But I’m fairly confident that Erstine wants to keep things the way they are. It works so much better for him this way, after all.”

“You’ve done your research. But before you decide that I’m not worthy of being captain, don’t forget that I know my ship like my own body. Perhaps you know your own, and I wouldn’t dream of competing with you there. But you don’t know mine like I do.”

She leaned back to her full height, scowling. “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt for now. But you’ll have to prove yourself to me soon, and I’m not taking your orders until that happens. For now I’m a passenger, not a crewmember. Understand?”

“I can live with that.”

The woman held out her hand. “Good. I’m Aire. It looks like we’ll be working together for the next few months.”

“Kik. But you already know that.” They shook. “When are we leaving, and for what? I haven’t been told anything yet.”

“Good, so I’m not the only one. I do know that we’re going to need some preparation. Reem should be able to tell us whenever he chooses gets back.”

Kik sighed. “Fine. I’ll have to drop some equipment elsewhere on the station. I’ll be back within the hour.”

Aire stood and stretched. “I think I’ll take a walk. I want to get a feel for this station before I leave.”

“Then I’ll see you back here.”

The trip to Kik’s room was faster than he might have though, lugging the heavy packaging of the comms unit easy in the low gravity. Looking around the empty space, he tied the package up inside his sleeping harness. There were no other places to safely store it when it might drift around if left alone.

The room gave off an abandoned feel, and Kik glanced around with a downcast look. Perhaps that was typical of his surroundings at this point. He had always moved away too soon to develop a proper home other than the ship, and that had been remodelled so far that it no longer felt the same.

The only other place in the past few months he had felt at home at was with Vist and Pel. Cruising across the desert, laughing and panicking. The senses of danger and the thrills of overcoming it. Seeing the sights of the desert, mountains of rocks concealing crystal caves beneath. Waterfalls of sand, blown off the edge of cliffs by turbulent winds.

He closed the door on his room, immersed in memories. Introspection could wait until later, as could making himself at home. First he had a job to do.

The room was empty without Reem or Aire. He had said an hour, and it had taken him just over thirty minutes. He settled in for a wait.

Reem returned first, munching on a ration bar. He stopped in the doorway when he saw Kik, swallowing his food. “You’re back? Where’s Cormen?”

Kik’s earlier worries about what he would say flooded back. “I… uh… we were separated, and then the soldiers… I haven’t seen them since, and I didn’t think...”

Reem blew out air through his mouth. “Slow down. One thing at a time.”

“So that happened,” Reem said. It didn’t seem to be a question. “You could have handled that better. I’ll have to tell Erstine, you know.”

Kik raised his gaze from the floor. “What does that mean? Will he do anything because of it?”’

“I doubt he would. Perhaps reduce your pay, or just put a black mark next to your name on some list somewhere. As long as you complete the job there shouldn’t be a problem. Technically your job was to take Cormen to Icros and escort him to wherever you were going. So you could say you succeeded. There are the problems with an ally who may never return, but as long as it doesn’t affect Erstine directly he won’t even feel the loss. I can put in a good word as well. I wouldn’t be comfortable with something happening to Hala due to something like this.”

Kik sighed in relief. His main worry for the moment could be set aside. “Thank you.”

“But don’t pull anything like that again. A reputation for abandoning your allies is one of the things that you’ll never live down, especially since you won’t have many allies if you keep it up.”

He nodded. “I understand. I won’t try anything like that again.”

“Good to hear,” said Aire from the doorway. “I don’t want to work with anyone I can’t trust with my back.” She floated inside, her body blocking out the outside for a brief moment like a cloud shadowing the moon.

“Listening in again?” Reem asked.

“Of course. It’s not like you ever tell me anything.”

“I don’t tell you anything because you already know more than you need to. From doing things like this.”

Aire laughed. “Well you can’t shut me out now. The group is assembled. I want to hear what sort of job a planetary government would put out.”

Reem jerked. “How…”

“I have my sources. I assume it’s something to do with the fleet that left Borgeal just scant weeks ago?”

He sighed. “I give up. I’ll start from the beginning, since I don’t think Kik is as well informed as you seem to be.”

“Sure thing, sugar.”

Reem gave her a shallow glare, but didn’t hold it for long. “The planet of Halfex has recently come under blockade by a hostile fleet from Borgeal. It’s not an invasion, just an enforced embargo. Halfex is self-sufficient, too, so it’s not as if their people will starve. But it’s still an unwanted action. Their embassy on Elaris has put out a request for messages to be taken to and from the planet, in a format the blockade can’t intercept but the planet can.”

“Is there any method like that?” Kik asked. “Any signal you send from orbit can be intercepted and decrypted, even if it takes time.”

“Precisely. The blockade will get a copy of any signal transmitted towards the planet. It’s fine for personal communications, but there’s only one way to get important traffic through without it being intercepted. In person.”

“What are you so surprised about?” Aire asked, as Kik took a moment to collect his thoughts. “Hadn’t you already guessed the answer to that question the moment you asked it? It’s a good old fashioned blockade run. Although I understand your hesitation. I’m not sure your ship’s up to it.”

“My ship will be fine.” Kik scowled at her.

Aire ignored him, turning back to Reem. “What are the blockading forces like?”

“Two stormships and four cruisers for the capital ships. They also have twelve frigates and nineteen destroyers, and unknown numbers of attack craft. It’s unknown how much damage they took from the defending fleet before gaining orbital superiority, but the planetary defences wouldn’t have been able to hold them for long.”

“That’s going to be trouble in a corvette,” Aire said. “I thought Halfex had a large fleet, or at least large enough to defend against that many ships. They seem to give everyone else trouble.”

“Much of it is going through a major refitting at Rasant. Many of the other ships were patrolling fringe space, and were knocked from the fight as they jumped into the system in small groups. Almost all of their forces are out of action or missing now.”

“So what are we to do, then? It’s not like there’s some large fleet elsewhere to sweep in and save the day. What are we supposed to be delivering?”

“I don’t know. I just know that you need to…”

“Ah, these uncertain missions are the worst! If we’re carrying a time bomb, just tell me and be done with it. It’s better than all this worrying. How am I supposed to estimate the danger if I don’t know what it is I’m doing?”

“You could just do the job and stop complaining,” Kik said, still annoyed by her comments about his ship.

“Is that what you would do? Accept danger without even asking questions about it?” Aire turned her gaze upon him, and Reem followed suit.

“Well, no, but…”

“Then why would you lecture me about it?”

Kik dipped his head. “I didn’t mean…”

Reem took the opportunity to step in. “He makes a point, though, Aire. You’re not going to turn it down, so why bother complaining so much? You could ask the questions after you’ve decided you’re going, like he does. Sometimes there are questions that can’t be answered until you’ve agreed.”

Aire snorted. “Stop using this as an excuse to lecture me. You’d be asking the same things if you were in my position.”

“Whatever. Any more complaints?”

“No, I think that about covers it. What about the gritty details? Where we land, whatever?”

Reem passed Kik a datachip. “The original request and all the associated details are on there. Anything beyond that you’ll have to find on your own.”

Kik read through the data as the pair made their way to the hangars. Reem had stayed with them for a short while before turning back, quickly consoling Kik on the results of his last mission and suggesting he not get too close to Aire. Nothing that Kik couldn’t deduce on his own.

The data held four relevant pieces of information. Three detailed locations of interest. They included Halfex’s galactic coordinates, a map of the Halfex system, and the location of their target spaceport on the surface. The final piece of information was the details of their contact on the other side, a man called Elliot Torse, and his private contact details.

The datachip also held a sets of encrypted files, the message to be delivered. While he had no idea what the files were, they were large - they took up the rest of the datachip, enough space to store a map of all inhabited planets in the sector.

Kik puzzled over what the files might contain as they stepped into the Benefactor’s hangar, but he was returned to reality by Aire’s scoff. “This ship won’t do.”

“What? Why? How is it not good enough?”

“It’s too slow. This is a hauler, not a dancer. Does it have any stealth systems?”

“Stealth? What do you…”

“Wouldn’t have thought so. That’s the only way that we could sneak past a blockade with such piddling engines. Ion engines can’t handle bursts of speed well enough. If only my ship were here...”

Kik frowned. “Alright, I’ve had it about up to here with you. I promised a ship, and a ship is what I provided. If we don’t have a good enough ship, then we shouldn’t have accepted the mission. And if yours is so good, why did it get damaged in the first place? Don’t take out your frustration and need to be superior on me. I’m not going to just stand and take it.”

Aire breathed in and out, not yet ready to reply. Her squinted eyes opened, staring down the pest in front of her that she wasn’t quite able to squash. “You know, I was saying that we wouldn’t be able to do this just a little while ago, and you disagreed with me. You don’t get it both ways.”

“F- fine then. I’m sure we can manage if we try.”

“Brat, that attitude is just going to get us all killed. How do you intend to get past a fleet of ships, heavily armed and actively scanning for trespassers?”

“We could try jumping into the system close to the planet and landing…”

“Impossible. Their forces will be patrolling as far down as the upper atmosphere. We’d be going too fast to safely slow our descent.”

“Then we jump into the system far away from the planet and slowly drift in…”

“You need the proper stealth tech for that. Same problem as before, with going to fast. In addition, the radiation would cook us before we reached the planet, and the gravity signature of the jump would be easy to pick up. That’s another failed option.

Kik thought. “Then we could try and redirect then hide in the trail of an incoming comet or meteorite…”

“Any meteorite large enough to hide our craft would be an extinction-level event. How many of those do you think happen without warning? We’d be drawing more attention than if we tried to enter the system normally, and if we managed to make it far enough without the meteor being shot down there wouldn’t be much of a planet to deliver the messages to. We’d have a better success chance if we tried to bluff our way past the defending fleet, and that isn’t going to happen in the next decade.”

As Kik groaned, trying to think of possibilities, Aire moved in for the finishing blow. “All the things you can think of in a few days are all things that have been done thousands of times and any prepared fleet will be expecting. One of them might be enough to give us an edge, perhaps, but not enough to overcome our disadvantages in technology and numbers. Face reality - we just don’t have a good enough ship to make it past.”

Kik sighed. “Then how would we ideally get past?”

“Ideally? We’d have thirty or so smaller ships, all racing through a single section of their defences. They wouldn’t be able to stop all of them.”

“Isn’t that a suicide mission?”

Aire tapped the side of Kik’s helmet, the sound ringing out in the still air. “That’s pretty standard. I mean, look at the ships you’re up against. Are you really expecting to take on a battlegroup with a few corvettes or long-ranged scouts and get away intact?”

Kik tried to lean against the hangar wall, but bounced off instead. “Then how are we meant to do anything, with only one craft to our name…”

Aire grinned. “Don’t worry, it isn't over yet. I know where to go. And I know how to get us there.”

Kik stared through the radiation-proofed glass in the cargo hold as Supply Station Alpha receded in the distance, swallowed by the mass of the red sun behind it. He didn’t know how Aire had done it, but with a few words and a wave of her hand she had found them spots aboard a ship to Rasant. If he remembered Reem’s tale, that was where much of the Halfexian fleet was undergoing repairs. No doubt they’d be able to find some allies there.

Kik had heard some stories about Rasant, the shipyards in its rings churning out cruisers daily. Perhaps they’d even be able to find a ship, although he had little hope of that considering their finances. Maybe Erstine had some men there who could lend them one.

Stretching and looking around the cargo hold, he noted the contents of the crates that he could see. While many were legitimate, containers of food and water, precious metals and other standard trade goods, others were less so. At least one of the crates lying at random through the space had a rifle butt or two poking from the edge. Perhaps one day he would have been surprised, but having carried such cargo himself it was no longer even that surprising.

What he did wonder about was Aire. Who was she? Ex-navy she was not… or perhaps she had been once, quitting because of her personality. She and Reem seemed to know each other, which supported the theory, but Kik couldn’t believe someone so incapable of taking orders would have enlisted.

Perhaps she had been a trader, a more airtight theory. It would support her knowledge, but somehow she didn’t have the feeling. A willingness to bargain, for one, was characteristic of free traders. Smuggler was perhaps more of a fitting answer.

Having come up with a good enough answer, now Kik had to think about why he needed to know. Why did he care who she had been in the past? She annoyed him, true, but that wasn’t enough of a reason. So why?

His introspection was interrupted by Aire bursting through the elevator doors, carrying a flask of liquor. Light flooded in from the open elevator, blinding after the dim illumination inside.

“Kid! Come get shomething to drink! We’re having friendly chatsh upstairs!” she called out, unable to see him in the dark.

“No way in the void,” Kik said, standing and walking towards her. “I value my brain the way it is, thanks. I’m not my father.”

“Oh, you’re one of thoshe people. Fine, mish out on the double jump. You’ll regret it, bashtard.” She turned around and limped back inside the elevator, flask in hand. “The double drunkennesh ish shomething amashing. Doeshn’t even have shide effectsh, besidesh the comet vomit at the end of the jump.” She thought for a moment, then corrected herself. “Vomit comet.”

Kik sighed as the elevator doors closed. At least he wasn’t the one cleaning up afterwards. And thank the void for the navigation system, because it was doubtful that any of the crew upstairs would be capable of piloting the ship.

The first of three jumps on the way to Rasant faded out and Kik drew in a breath again. Looking to starboard as the spots across his vision faded away, they were in quite a close orbit of a gas giant. It was a green planet of immense scale, the clouds on its surface appearing to be fixed in place but in reality moving at a speed comparable to sound of their passage.

Scant minutes into his inspection of the planet’s beauty, the elevator doors swung open again. Turning around expecting Aire to be back, Kik was surprised to see a suited crewmember disembark instead.

“Get your gear and come with me,” he said from his helmet speakers. “We’ll be landing soon, and you’ll be disembarking. We need to unload the cargo as well.”

Kik nodded and pulled together the few pieces of equipment that he had brought from his ship - survival gear, a spare void suit, weaponry.

The elevator took them to just behind the bridge. The area was clean, a surprising find, although it did smell of alcohol. It was much less cramped than the Benefactor’s bridge, with seats for four people than the captain around the edges of the room. Its view screens provided far more vision, too, with even the floor beneath the chairs providing a view into the outside. Aire was out cold on the floor, her chest rising and falling as she slept.

Kik prodded her, but she kept sleeping. Instead of keeping up his futile efforts, he stepped over her sleeping body to speak to the captain. The bearded man was blinking to keep himself awake, but he kept his eyes on the monitors from his chair, ensuring that the computers were doing their jobs correctly.

“We’ll arrive at XM-180 soon,” he said, sensing Kik behind him. “We’ll let you and Aire off there as we drop our cargo.”

“Wait, weren’t we going to Rasant?” Kik asked. “And where’s this XM-180? I didn’t realise that there was anyone living in this system. Is it some small space station?”

The captain turned around and glanced at Kik. “Have you never been to XM-180, boy? Then you’re in for a treat. I’ll let you stay on the bridge for the descent, although you may want to buckle yourself in. It’ll be a rough ride. Get that drunkard into a seat too.”

Once he and Aire were strapped into their seats, their craft began its descent. They had jumped in close to the gas giant, and soon they were touching the edges of its atmosphere, rattles coming from the ship’s hull as the first fast moving particles began to strike.

The rattling grew stronger as they delved deeper into the gas giant’s atmosphere. The ship was without doubt going through a trial, bits of paint and even hull plating scratched off by the abrasive atmosphere.

“What are these clouds made up of?” Kik asked after an hour of the bombardment. “They seem to be doing a lot of damage.”

“Mostly iron and a few other materials, quartz for one. And they may be doing damage, but they’re also doing their job, which is slowing us down. It might be more violent than usual, but it works. Look out, we’re almost to our dock.”

Kik soon started to notice web-like formations spread throughout the clouds. Riding the winds with wings made of thousands of cilia-esque structures, they permeated the atmosphere. They were gone almost as soon as he spotted them, but more took their place and they gradually grew in number.

As the storm grew into a blanket beneath them, the captain dipped the ship below the cloud level. Kik could feel the ship rumbling beneath his feet. He was pulled into the straps of his chair as the ship was slowed with jerking movements.

The storm grew more and more intense until he truly believed there was no port ahead - they were just flying to their deaths. He wanted to ask that they turn back, but the captain was too focussed on the instruments, all traces of tiredness gone. If he lost focus, they may all be doomed.

The ship was jerked around. The hull screeched as it was shredded by shards of metal and crystal flung at it like bullets. The engines laboured to keep them on course, against the best efforts of the skies. And then they were free.

The eye of the storm was a mere two kilometres wide, compared to its hundreds of kilometres in depth, but it felt like an eternal land of peace. The raging clouds on all sides, even above and below, radiated a green hue, dying the inside the colour of a grassy meadow.

And inside, far below their current position, hung an impossible station, supported by millions - hundreds of millions - of elegant structures, stretching off into the clouds. Shaped like an egg, it hung like a ripe fruit beneath an array of supporting branches. Pockmarks dotted the side, marks from ages gone, but it still held its place in the sky. Nothing was below it but a fall into the abyss and, eventually, the planet’s core.

“Enjoy your first sight of XM-180,” the captain said to Kik. “Looks like we survived once again.”

“Yes, but aren’t we going a bit too fast?” Kik asked. The winds which had been holding gravity back until now had reversed, plunging them downwards at dangerous speeds.

“No worries there, I’ve done this at least a dozen times before,” the captain said. He put the spacecraft into a downwards spiral, their nose pointing to the sky. “I think I needed help on the first few tries, though.”

Kik was pressed against the back of his seat as the craft’s engines fired, counteracting their free fall. They slid back into the edge of the eyewall, using the rising winds to slow their descent.

Finally they broke free once again, level with the base of the installation. Falling into its slipstream, at the wide end of the egg shape, Kik spotted the open doors of a hangar bay.

“At least this is normal,” he breathed out in relief.

“I wouldn’t recommend attempting a landing without practice, though. Flying in over one and a half g’s is a bit disconcerting when you first try it.”

Contrary to his cautionary words, the captain performed a perfect landing, deploying his landing gear and touching down with barely a scrape of paint taken off. He managed it even without landing assistance, as would be expected from most hangars. Contrasting to its impressive outwards appearance, the inside of XM-180 were quite unimpressive. There were no deck crew watching their arrival or fuel tanks ready to top them off.

Once the hangar doors had sealed themselves, about half the lights above managed to turn on. This increase in lighting just served to further show how decrepit the station had become, roof panels falling out of place and crashing to the floor, pieces of broken ship cast away across the space.

After thanking the captain for letting him watch their descent, Kik unloaded a few crates with a pair of other crewmembers. Aire woke up as soon as they stopped moving, but claimed she needed a few minutes to deal with her headache. Naturally she showed up just as the last crate was unloaded, spry and ready to disembark.

“How do you avoid hangovers like that?” Kik asked.

She grinned. “Practice. Shall we get moving?”

Kik sighed. “May as well.” He continued talking as they strolled towards the elevator, leaving behind the two crewmen as they struggled with their cargo. “So now that you’re awake, why did we land here instead of Rasant?”

“We were never going to Rasant, our ship was. Of course I can’t publicly announce that we’re going to a station that’s not on their itinerary.”

“But why are we here in the first place?”

Aire grinned. “To find us a ship, of course. Or failing that, to find us someone who can find us one.”

“And we couldn’t have done it on Rasant?”

“Rasant’s the wrong market. Their ships fill a completely different role to what we’re looking for. They make blades, surgical and deadly. What we want is a gun which the enemy won’t even see coming.”

“And we can get something like that here?”

As the glass-walled elevator rose into the light, Aire spread her arms to encompass the view before them. “Welcome to XM-180, which officially doesn’t exist, where the only thing impossible is you having enough money to buy everything you want.”

The installation was completely hollowed out, the not completely ovaloid shape of an egg with its widest side to the bottom. Around the edges were machinery and pipes strewn across the walls, dotted with patches of light shining inwards to the centre of the space. All attention was drawn to the structure dominating the middle of the station, and its appearance did not disappoint the fanfare.

The centre was a pillar over two hundred metres wide at its base, but it was more than that. It was a city. Buildings clung to the edges, shoving their neighbours into open space in competition for a better view, clinging desperately to the walls. Narrow lanes twisted their way between habitation units, barely wide enough for a single person to walk along. Bridges stretched across gaps, ranging from maintenance walkways wide enough for a single person to bridges large enough to land a frigate on, between the pillar and the walls around it. Crenellations, archways, tiled roofs - it was a city of strange design and almost insane construction.

Awestruck, Kik tore his gaze from the architecture surrounding them and instead focussed on Aire. She had a tight look across her face, unfolding a light rifle from her kit and shouldering it.

“What are you preparing for?” Kik asked her, pulling out his own weapons. A knife and staff in his pouches and a concealed pistol against his forearm, the holster chafing against his armour as it was strapped down.

“Have you ever heard the phrase ‘concrete jungle’?”

“I can’t say I have.”

Aire gestured to the outside. “Well this is about as close as you can get. Your body could be lost in the maze of streets for weeks or months until someone willing to remove it comes along. There are many who will try and take advantage of that.”

Kik glanced over the maze of streets, alleys and platforms. “Out of the fungus and into the concrete, huh?”

“You’ll be fine,” Aire comforted him, patting down her weapons. “As long as we keep our weapons visible, and don’t piss anyone off more than necessary, we’ll get through without trouble. Robbing us wouldn’t be worth the risk, as long as we prevent it from being personal.”

The elevator ground to a halt on the edge of an open platform. Kik noted that all the buttons above their current floor were crossed off with red tape. Looking above the glass-walled capsule they had disembarked from, the rails had been crushed into the wall not ten metres above their arrival point. The wind gusted as he stood there, blowing him away from the rusted guardrail.

Aire hefted her rifle in one hand, bracking the foldout stock against her shoulder. “Let’s go, kid. We have a few levels to climb before we reach the shipyard.”

Kik looked around. “There’s a shipyard here?”

“Sure is. Why else would we come here for a ship?” She squeezed through a tiny crack between buildings, which soon widened out into an actual walkway. Kik followed through, the rough bricks scraping agains his back.

He glanced around at the rusting buildings with their tile and corrugated iron roofs. “More advanced than I expected.”

The two continued their journey through the winding streets in silence. The buildings around them forestalled all conversation, looming above like watching sentinels. Every so often a set of eyes peered from a doorway or opened window, ducking back in when they were spotted.

They wound their way through alleyways, edged across ledges and strode down walkways. Every so often Aire consulted her datapad, directing them onwards once she had located their position. The streets were quiet but echoey, their footfalls and breathing reflected back at them from a hundred different angles.

Every so often they would hear someone else moving through the streets, the echoes of their footsteps preceding them. Once or twice they saw a figure slip along a path perpendicular to theirs, jumping between rooftops or crossing a bridge beneath their own. The other parties kept to themselves, so Kik and Aire did the same.

Their next encounter, however, was not so peaceful. They stopped on a small landing halfway up a set of stairs as Aire checked her datapad again. Small windows gazed down from the buildings on each side, shuttered and boarded up. On their left the building rose far above, while to the right segments of roof sat just above head height, forming a tiered set of stairs upwards.

Their pause, however, turned out to be a mistake. One man walked up behind them from an unseen alcove to block of their retreat. Another stepped out from a doorway ahead to block their advance.

The pair strode towards them as Aire was distracted, taking the time to close the gap. Either they hadn’t seen her rifle or they just didn’t care enough about it to worry.

They were wearing a set of ‘armour’ each, their equipment matching only in its uniqueness. One had a chestplate made from a manhole, while the others’ was a scorched and battered piece of military body armour. One had chainmail decorating his arms, the other had thick industrial gloves which reached past his elbows. Beneath the exterior of both sets lay a network of power cables and pistons, powering the constructs forward with inhuman strength.

Their weapons were even more simplistic. One carried a sword, the rust along its length more intimidating than the blade itself. The other held a simple block of metal, nails and screws melted and fused into the killing end.

Kik banged on Aire’s arm to get her attention, looking for a way out. A stairway ahead and behind, both blocked by enemies. A drop behind and to the right, down into an uncertain darkness. There was a doorway to their left, but it was barred shut. There was also a tiny gap, barely a body wide, which he instead dashed for. The powered suits wouldn’t be able to fit through there.

Aire grabbed onto his shoulder before he could dive inside. “Don’t run off with no idea of where you’re going. That’s a dead end, probably where they want us to end up.” She fired a three-shot burst from her rifle at the suited thug ahead, the rounds bouncing off the manhole over his chest and rest of his armour. Meanwhile the man behind them inched closer, laboring up the stairs in his heavy suit.

“I’m not doing any damage without a lucky shot,” she remarked, firing again. “We need a way out.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to find,” Kik said, as he looked around for something. Aire shot off another few shots, all bouncing off the man’s helmet. “Over the roofs?”

“That’ll do. You hold them off, I’ll go first.”

As Aire fired off a last burst at the man on the stairs above, Kik pulled out the trigger piece of his weapon from against his arm. The unfamiliar movements cost him valuable seconds, but once it was out he was ready to go.

Straightening his arm, he lined up his forearm with the target’s body and fired. The recoil jarred against his hand and lifted up his arm, but he kept a firm grip on the trigger piece. The straps around his arm held firm.

The weapon shot a dart from its muzzle, singing as it spun through the air. His experience with the laser pistol threw his aim off, however, as he was unprepared for the recoil. It missed the target’s body, where it had been aimed. Instead it struck the chainmail on his left arm.

The force of the impact pierced through his flesh. It drove in with a brutal impact and shattered the bone within. It passed completely through, drilling a hole in the concrete on the other side. The man collapsed to the floor and screamed silently, clutching his mashed limb.

Aire took the opportunity to scramble away, using the tiered roofs beside the path as steps. However, without Aire’s covering fire, the man on the steps above was free to charge. He barelled down the steps, a rampaging juggernaut of steel and flesh.

Kik stepped out of the way of the first overhead blow, the floor cracking beneath the impact. The stairs groaned and creaked as they settled, reminding the combatants of their surroundings.

The attacking thug paid the environment no heed, however, pressing his advantage with gusto. Kik was forced back and around, dodging under and around the swings as best he could on the narrow landing between staircases.

Taking a moment to look around, he saw Aire safely out of reach, reloading her rifle. The distraction nearly cost him his life, however, a spiked fist thundering through the space where his head had been a moment ago.

Kik needed an opportunity to run, but any such attempt would be fatal. If he took his attention off the man for a second, he would be dead. But at the same time, if he could get any distance, Aire could hold the armoured figure off for long enough to Kik to make his escape.

The next blow came in, a back handed swing with a gauntlet - sloppy from impatience. Kik saw a chance and seized it.

He jumped backwards, accepting the swing instead of dodging it. The blow combined with his own momentum sent him flying backwards. For a moment he felt light, floating like a feather on the breeze. Open space stretched out under his feet, tiny lights twinkling in the darkness. Then he hit the wall.

He glanced off at an angle, his shoulder slamming into a window. Instead of stopping straight away like he hoped he would, his body spun out into open space. Pain jolted through his body, his helper driving flashes of agony through his system. He nearly blacked out. Perhaps he did for a few milliseconds.

Through sheer force of will, he managed to keep himself awake and stretch out his arms. One of them caught on something and he grabbed on, clutching it as if his life depended on it. His momentum was arrested, and he was left swaying with the remnants of his motion, hugging the pipe that supported him.

When the pain had faded enough for him to concentrate, he looked around and wished he hadn’t. It turned out his life really did depend on his grip - he was still hanging over the drop. He clutched the hanging tighter as more gunfire rang out in the background.

After a few breaths, he started to move. He reached hand over hand and pulled himself up the pipe, gripping with his legs. One handhold passed by, two, three, until the pipe disappeared back into the wall.

Looking around, he spotted his next hand and foothold - a window off to the left. Stretching his leg across, he hooked it onto the very edge of the windowsill.

With another foothold, he was more secure. Reaching up, he lifted his right leg on top of the pipe before pushing his hand up to the edge of the roof and grasping it in relief.

Pulling his body up past the eaves, he thanked his body for saving him. As much as he disliked spending a month sitting on a bed covered in needles, he would have died multiple times if he hadn’t gone through the process.

Checking the puncture wounds on his chest where the spiked glove had struck him, he grimaced at the bloody tears in his suit. They’d need some time to repair before they were space worthy. The skin beneath them had already fixed itself, but the marks of the impact remained. They still stung, too, so not all the damage was healed.

A gunshot distracted his check for injury. Aire had pinned the last attacker in a doorway, keeping his head down with the occasional shot. Once she noticed Kik was up, though, she stepped away from her vantage point and climbed up to his level.

“You alive? Ready to go?” she asked.

“Is that all? I almost died out there, you know.”

“Then good job for surviving. Life’s a struggle. Come on, let’s get out of here before he decides to collapse the building.”

Kik nodded quickly. “That would be wise. What do you think they wanted from us?”

Aire took a moment to think. She answered as they drew further from the site of the attack. “Probably our weapons, or more likely our ammunition. Physical supplies like bullets are rare out here, and their supply may have run out. Or perhaps they spent all their money on the suits and didn’t have enough to buy weapons.”

As they hurried off into the distance a roar of frustration came from behind. It was accompanied by the sound of something large and metal smashing into another object.

The final path led to a bridge to the outer shell of the station. As the pair stepped their way free of the tangled mess that was the central pillar, the wind gusted through their hair and clothing. Kik clutched the guardrail by the side of the bridge to anchor himself to the ground.

“So this is where we’re going?” Kik asked, looking across the bridge. It led to seemingly nothing, just the wall on the opposite side.

“Yes. Welcome to the end of the line,” Aire said, grinning.

Kik jumped away from the railing, pulling out his knife before he realised Aire hadn’t made any moves. “Can you not scare me like that?”

Aire stared at him in confusion for a moment before bursting out laughing. “What were you thinking? Is that how little you trust me?” Her eyes turned serious. “If I wanted you dead, I would have just run away and let that thug kill you. Or left you alone in the dark with no map. Even with the luck of the void you wouldn’t survive that.”

She waited for a moment before growing tired of the silence. “Alright, be that way. As I was saying, ahead lies the End of the Line shipyard. I believe we’ll find what we’re looking for there.”

“End of the Line…” Kik muttered to himself as they walked along the bridge. He kept a tight grip on the handrail.

A single door was set into the other side of the bridge, a narrow alcove set into the wall providing some relief from the wind. Aire banged on the door for a minute before giving up and deciding not to wait. Turning the central wheel, its hinges screamed as she forced it open.

The wind died down once the pair were through the door. Aire shut it again, the same screeching echoing out down the tunnel ahead. Small lights glimmered on the ceiling, casting a warm glow on the path ahead.

They passed a series of doors on each side, Aire whispering the numbers. The doors grew further and further apart as they continued until it took a minute to reach the next one.

Finally they arrived at one that was cracked open, an irregular light shining from inside. The sound of moving machinery stuttered and cranked beyond the doorway.

Aire pushed it open, shielding her eyes against the glare. Kik did the same. As their eyes adjusted, they were greeted by the bare hull of a frigate sized vessel, hanging against the ceiling. All of its plating had been stripped off, exposing the electronics and machinery beneath. The metal skeleton beneath had been buckled and twisted, entire segments cut free and hanging against the walls.

Surrounding the frigate, stacked from floor to ceiling, were layers upon layers of piled scaffolding. They held dozens of lights shining on the craft from various angles and a variety of terminals. On the screens were printed diagnostics about the ship, thousands of details from task completion to stress upon sections of the hull.

Beneath these stacked frames was a single workbench. It was covered in tools by the hundreds - screwdrivers, hammers, cutting lasers. More esoteric ones that Kik couldn’t name lay in clear cupboards beneath the bench’s surface.

Next to that workbench stood a frame to hold pieces to be worked on. Besides that stood a high power plasma torch, the size of the man who was using it. The brightness of the torch obscured his features and whatever he was doing, almost blinding Kik as he tried to look into it.

The light died down as the torch was flicked off. Spots danced before his vision for a moment before fading away. The figure holding it pulled up his tinted glass facemask, staring over at the new arrivals. He stepped away from the giant hull plate that he had been working on. He had been cutting out a section damaged by what looked like a laser burn.

“Little Aire?” He called out with a gruff voice. “Is that you?” He began to walk over.

Kik shot a glance sideways at Aire and she elbowed him. “Yeah, it’s me. Why aren’t you working on my ship? You could have finished it by now if you were serious.” She stepped away from Kik towards him.

“I can’t show too much favouritism, even if you are one of my favourite customers.”

“Not the only favourite? You wound me.”

They met in the middle of the space between them, clasping hands. When the old man reached his full height, he was half a head taller than Aire - more than a head above Kik. His dirty white hair sprawled from his head, matted with grease and sweat. A red bandanna splashed some colour through his appearance, lowered to cover one eye. His suit was an industrial yellow.

“So what have you come for today? You know your ship isn’t done yet, with how badly you wrecked it.”

Aire sighed. “I don’t think this is the best place to talk.”

The other man looked around and nodded. “Right. Follow me, I’ll take you somewhere we can sit down.”

He stepped away and spoke into a radio at his waist. “Rain, I’ll be stopping work for about an hour. Someone turned up. Send my crew to Victor if they arrive on time for once, and make sure he’s prepared to send them back once I’m done.”

He put his radio away and grabbed his suit’s helmet, carrying it under his arm as he led the two outside.

The man settled them down in a small storeroom converted into a mess hall. The three sat around one of the many circular tables as Aire started introductions.

“Silfon, meet Kik. Kik, meet Silfon. You can think of him as my mechanic.”

“Hey, I’m a bit more than just a mechanic.” Silfon turned to Kik. “You can call my Silf. Nice to meet you.”

Kik accepted his handshake. “Likewise.”

“So, what have you two come here for?”

Aire got down to business. “We’re looking for a ship.”

Silf sighed. “It’s some ridiculous demand, isn’t it. Wait a minute, I’ll put tea on.”

“You still drink that? How much do you pay for your hobby?”

“No more than you pay me to fix your ship.”

Aire grimaced. “Yeah, I suppose you can afford it.”

Kik and Aire sat in silence while Silf bustled around the small kitchen, preparing them drinks. Finally he sat down again, facing Aire square on. Her chair creaked as she shifted. “So what do you want me for?”

The teapot squealed as Silf cut of Aire’s description. “I think I have the gist of it. You basically need to get past a blockade with a single ship. Let me get the drink, I’ll have a think.”

He tiptoed to the kitchen and back, ferrying metal tins of boiling liquid. He placed one in front of each of the three seats. Kik expected him to start talking once he sat down, but instead he stayed there and sipped his tea in silence. The others did the same.

Finally, Silf allowed sound to escape his lips, and it was bad news. “I don’t have what you’re looking for.”

Aire followed up. “So you know someone who does?”

But he was already shaking his head. “You’re asking for the impossible. I don’t know of any ship on this station that can pull off what you’re asking for, and with so few crew. Even a leviathan would have trouble breaking through a fleet of that size.”

“But we don’t need to break through. We need a faster ship with stealth tech.”

“That sort of tech isn’t going to be enough. You’ll be shot up before you even reach the atmosphere.”

“So we just give up?”

“I didn’t say that. You could hire other crews. Nobody said you had to do this on your own.”

“Not an option. We can’t let even one copy of the data to fall to the enemy.”

“Oh, you didn’t mention that part. Yes, that makes it harder. Any ships from around here would just betray you at the first sign of danger.”

They all sipped their tea, the liquid starting to cool. It was almost tasteless, but it seemed to clear Kik’s throat, and once he had started he couldn’t seem to stop drinking it.

Silf continued. “What you need isn’t a good ship, but a legend.”

“What, some sort of ancient fleet controlled by AI to sweep our enemies before us?”

“No, not all legends are that big. Have you heard, for example, about a crew of pirates who boast that they have a ship which can appear without being detected snatch ships out of convoys? I don’t know how true the tale is, but they’ve at least been having some success recently.”

Kik looked inside his mug. It was almost finished.

“So you think we can steal the ship from them?” Aire asked. “Do you know where they dock?”

Silf scoffed. “That’s where it would be most defended. You may as well take a two-man scout craft and try to board the blockading fleet.”

“Maybe we could try to bluff our way past the blockade…”

“Don’t try it. We need to figure out where the pirates strike if we’re going to take it. It was just an example, anyway. I haven’t even heard any stories of ships vanishing from convoys, so I’m going to assume it was just…”

“I have,” Kik interrupted. “One of the ships I was once in a convoy with vanished as we were jumping.”

Silf turned to him. “How long ago was this?”

“Less than a month ago. It happened between here, Lanos and Rymez. I don’t know what system it was in.”

“Can you tell us the details?”

“Maybe? The full records are back on my ship a whole jump away. But I can remember some things. We assumed the jump had gone wrong, since the wormhole opened and closed properly, but the ship didn’t come out the other side.”

“And you were in a convoy with navigational computers synced?”

“Yes.”

Silf grinned. “I think we found a trace of our prey. What class was the ship attacked?”

“A corvette. All of us were, except for the two escorts. The one attacked was the second last ship in the convoy.”

“They mustn’t be that large a ship themselves, then. But still, the wormhole opened? So they had to have done something during the jump sequence. It’s possible that it’s an inside job but I doubt it, not with how much these pirates were gloating.”

“Where did you hear about this, by the way?” Aire asked.

“Oh, there were some odd sorts down at the bar the other day. One of them was a singer, works at small scale events and the sort, earns enough to travel around between space stations. He claimed he met some people drunk and had them brag to him about their new ship.”

“Could it be planted information?”

“I doubt it. What would they gain from the word getting out? More attention from other jealous groups and stronger military presence around the affected convoys. I’m willing to bet that even if it is planted information, there’s truth behind it somewhere.”

Kik rested his elbows on the table. “So what do we do? It’s still a surprise attack. I don’t know how we’re going to catch them in the act.”

“What kind of convoy were you on?” Aire asked.

“It was some merchant group...”

“Fringe Merchant Association?”

“That’s the one.”

“I know someone from there. I’ll have to send a message to find out where the next convoys are heading.”

Silf frowned. “Will that work?”

“Trust me, I know pirates. If they’ve struck once and gotten away with it, they’ll strike again. Their figuring out the route of a Fringe convoy means they probably have a man on the inside, but so do we.”

Kik pointed out the last issue. “So we’ve found where we’re going, but what are we going to do when we get there? There’s only two of us and we don’t even have a ship.”

Aire grinned. “Didn’t I tell you? This is XM-180, where the only thing between you and your new toy is the amount you’re willing to spend.”

“So we hire someone?”

“Right in one.”

The bar was grimy and run down, like many other buildings in the maze like city. It was situated at the very centre of the column, in the darkest areas. Columns and pipes ran from floor to ceiling around its walls, a small garden of infrastructure.

Contrasting to its grimy exterior, however, warm light shone from the boarded windows and laughing and cheering came from inside. Evidently the ship’s crew that Silf had directed them to were celebrating their imminent departure.

“Stay close. Don’t wander off,” Aire muttered to him before stepping inside.

Kik nodded and followed, but had a thought. “Wasn’t I meant to be the captain?”

But before he could vocalise his complaints to Aire, she had already pushed open the door and entered. He hurried to catch up.

The inside was warm and cosy. Benches and tables lined the walls in disordered rows, matching the building’s shape - a rectangle squashed at one end. At the far, narrow end of the room, a bartender was minding his own business, polishing a glass. A young girl, not more than two years older than Kik, was dashing around serving meals and drinks.

Aire ignored both of them. She checked her datapad then stepped towards a group of seated diners.

The other tables were crowded with men and women of all types - uniformed and not, brawny and skinny. They had one thing in common - they were all loud. The group Aire approached were the noisiest of all. They were five men, dressed in an assortment of standard clothes with what looked like rags tied around various places. One of them looked up and ogled Aire as she approached, nudging the others who joined in his stare.

“Are you the crew of the Silence?”

“And what if we are?” The one who replied had just been the loudest of the bunch, sitting at the back against the wall. He grinned at Aire.

“I have a job for you.”

“Heads up, coming through,” another man said from behind. He stepped past with a platter of glasses balanced on his head. “Drinks are here, boys.”

The other men cheered, dropping their empty glasses in favour of the new ones. Their previous interested faded as soon as it had arrived. The one who had brought the alcohol tapped Aire on the shoulder and gestured to a set of stairs in the back corner. She nodded and followed, Kik trailing behind.

The noise faded as they climbed a level, the previous racket toning down into an echoing beat. The floors and walls on this level looked like wood, but when Kik stepped on them they echoed like metal. The doors weren’t even disguised as wood, plain metal contraptions as thick as a bank vault.

One lay open for them. Aire was allowed inside, closing the door behind her. As it snapped shut, she got out a final line. “Don’t get yourself into trouble.”

Kik and the man were left standing outside the closed door. The other party spoke first. “Need a drink? Anything? We should head back to the bar and wait. They may be a while.”

Kik was about to decline, but the thought of food was appetizing. “Perhaps something to eat.”

The pair waited at a counter against the wall, sitting on stools. Kik took the moment to study the other man. He had spiky orange hair and fair skin with a few freckles. His mouth was etched in a permanent half-smile, and his eyes were squinted shut. He occasionally glanced over to the men he had served drinks to, making sure he knew where they were.

Unlike those men, however, he was dressed in uniform. It wasn’t thick enough to be a vac suit, perhaps an undersuit. A sky blue top and light grey pants meant he stood out from the otherwise vibrant colours in the tavern. It had the seals to connect to a helmet, gloves and boots, though, so perhaps it could help in emergency decompression.

The man noticed Kik’s gaze and glanced over. “So what are you doing on this station? Getting repairs like us?”

“No, we were looking for a ship. Hopefully we’ve found one, though, if Aire doesn’t mess up negotiations.”

“Aire? Oh, that woman. She’ll be fine, she knows what she’s doing.”

“You could tell that quickly?”

“I consider myself a good judge of people.”

The meal came soon after, carried by the waitress. He wasn’t sure what to expect, but actual produce was the last thing he had thought would be served. Bread and some sort of vegetable soup.

“Where was this made?” Kik asked the other man as he received his drink.

“In the kitchen at the back.”

“Not the food, the ingredients. Was it imported?”

“There are farms around. This place isn’t completely self-sufficient, but it’s close.”

Kik bit into the bread. The crust crumbled in his mouth. It didn’t even have the faint green and black tint that algae bread usually did.

“This is great.”

“It’s alright. I could do better.” The waitress heard him and snorted.

“So you’re a cook or something?”

The man turned to Kik. “Right, I haven’t introduced myself. I’m Devlin, the Silence’s first mate and temporary gunnery officer. The cooking thing is more of a hobby.”

“Kik. Looking to hire your services.”

Devlin returned to his cup.

Kik spent a moment shovelling soup into his mouth before speaking again. “So what does your ship specialise in?”

“Hunting.”

“What kind? Ambush? Tracking?”

“Deception, I suppose. The best prey is prey that walks into your jaws.”

Kik was slapped in the back, spilling a mouthful of soup. He turned around to see Aire alongside an unfamiliar woman in the same uniform as Devlin. She had the same unruly orange hair and pale skin as him, so perhaps his relative.

“We’re settled,” Aire said to Kik. “Deal’s made. There are still a few details to discuss, but we’ve agreed on the big things.”

The woman beside her spoke to Devlin. “Ready the crew. We’ve got a target.”

Devlin nodded and stood up. The inn quieted down as faces turned towards him. “Crew of the Broken Silence, hear me! Our claws have just been sharpened, yet a new prey wants to test them. Do we show them our mettle?”

Half the bar stood up and shouted out, at least twenty people. A single word echoed to the rafters, even disturbing the guests in their nearly soundproof rooms upstairs.

“Yes!”