“I’m pretty sure I got it, Commander Fritz. It was hiding deep in the aft cooling complex, but I finally tracked it down.” Sam Carson looked tired. His sleeves were rolled up, and his arms were covered with bruises. Crawling around in Dauntless’s bowels was hard work, and sometimes painful too. The deeply buried conduits of the reactor cooling system were not designed for human access—at least not easy access. But the maintenance bots hadn’t been able to target the problem…and everyone in Dauntless’s engineering team knew how vital if was to restore power. If the battleship was facing its equal—or something more powerful—Captain Barron was going to need every gun operational. And the freak damage to the cooling lines had effectively knocked out half of the battleship’s primaries.

“I’m going to miss you, Sam, I really am. I’m glad we still have you for this mission.” Anya Fritz was an engineer’s engineer, the range of her thoughts rarely extending beyond the confines of the ship’s guts and beating heart. But Carson could hear the tension even in her even tone. Everyone on Dauntless was on edge. They’d been apprehensive on the Union border during their long, lonely patrol there, but they’d known what they were facing then. As massive as a Union invasion was expected to be, it was a known quantity. Now they were facing a mystery, staring off into the darkness.

“I’ll miss you too, Commander. I’ll miss everyone on Dauntless.”

Carson had served on a few ships in his career, and he’d always gotten along with his crewmates. But there’d been something special about his short time on Dauntless. The ship felt like home, and the thought of leaving was a painful one. He couldn’t turn down the chance to transfer to Archellia, to be with Lise and his child—but part of him grieved at the thought of his new brothers and sisters going to war without him.

He was glad, at least, that he was with them now. Lise had practically begged him not to go, and he carried the guilt of refusing her. But he couldn’t stay behind, not now. He loved his wife, but he had to be able to face himself in the mirror…and the thought of allowing his crewmates to face whatever danger was out there alone made him sick to his stomach.

Besides, if this is a real danger, Archellia is the first major world in its path. Whatever we face out here, we have to win. If we don’t…