Something is wrong. I resist the urge to grab the package hidden beneath my poncho, or hightail it back into Fortuna, or do anything else to call attention to the fact that I have something extraordinarily illegal tucked into my jumpsuit.

“Well, look at this. I had no idea we were so popular on Gaia.” I puncture the bad joke with a nervous laugh. None of the officers spare me a glance.

“Shut up, Scorpia.” I glance over my shoulder at the familiar whisper to see Lyre waiting at the edge of the ramp, her hands also held aloft. Rolling my eyes, I turn forward again.

“What’s this about, officers?” Momma asks, pretending like I never spoke. Her words come out smooth as silk, though she’s standing between a dozen armed law-enforcers and a recently crashed ship full of contraband. “We’re a registered ship who received full permission to enter your airspace.” She looks at me, awaiting confirmation.

“Oh, yeah, they waved us in. It’s all squared away,” I say, and shut my mouth before any jittery laughter can escape. My body rattles with nerves, liquor sloshing uneasily in my stomach.

“This is Fortuna, correct?” asks the officer who seems to be in charge, stepping in front of the others. She’s a tall, brown-skinned woman with hooded eyes beneath straight eyebrows. Her crisp white uniform is decorated with gold buttons and a number of metallic pins whose meaning I don’t recognize.

“That she is.”

“Hold where you are. We have a flag on that ship.” I swear under my breath as the officer pauses to say something into her comm, a sleek, chrome device much more updated than the ones we carry. “You’re Captain Auriga Kaiser?” she asks, looking up again.

“Yes, ma’am,” Momma says. “Gaian citizen.”

“And your crew?”

My mother hesitates. The officer sees it and frowns.

“They have work visas,” Momma says. Right on cue, a shadow of suspicion darkens the officer’s face. She stands up straighter, looks at us harder. None of the planets are friendly to outsiders, but Gaia has always been especially xenophobic, and it’s only gotten worse in recent years.

“Names and birth-planets,” the officer demands.

“This is Lyre Kaiser, Devan citizen,” my mother says, while the officer records the information in her comm. “The twins on the ship, Andromeda and Apollo Kaiser, are citizens on Nibiru.” The officer’s lip curls. It’s been fifty years since the Nibiran-originated plague that devastated Gaia, but Gaia hasn’t forgotten it, or the incredibly rare Interplanetary Council meeting in which all the other planets voted against their plea for reparations.

After a pause, Momma jerks her head toward me. “And our pilot, Scorpia Kaiser. Space-born.”