“Aye, ma’am,” the lieutenant, junior grade said from the tactical station. Celesta made a mental note to ask where Lieutenant Commander Adler was since it was still in the middle of first watch. As her crew busied themselves with her orders, she pulled up all the ship’s logs for the time she was on the New Sierra Platform and began reading through all the entries Commander Barrett had submitted. It didn’t take her long to see that not only had Barrett performed well in her absence but the crew had been steadily increasing the readiness of the ship, not just sitting idle in orbit. After reading one of the last entries regarding the reintegration of the reactionless drive system she debated back and forth in her head for a moment before issuing her next order.

“OPS, inform Engineering we’ll be switching over to the RDS,” she said. “Helm, secure main engines from flight mode but do not purge the plasma chambers, just lower the pressure to twenty percent above minimum.”

“Securing main engines, aye,” the helmswoman said. “Purging the plasma overcharge once the RDS comes up green, Captain.”

Celesta felt a twinge of nerves as she watched her ship switch over to the new prototype drive system, but she had complete faith in Commander Graham and his team. If they said they had a way to mitigate the risk from employing the RDS then she would take that as absolute truth.

Now all she had to look forward to was the most despised and inevitable part of space warfare: the interminable waiting.

Chapter 9

“Have you located the Icarus yet?” Admiral Marcum asked as he paced the bridge like a caged animal. He’d tried to locate Celesta Wright when the Ushin showed up, intent on having her with him on the bridge of the Amsterdam to observe Captain Everett and advise him at the unexpected appearance of their new … friends … though he supposed that friendship was tenuous at best.

He wasn’t sure what pissed him off more: the fact he couldn’t find her or the fact he was actually surprised when he’d been told the Icarus was last spotted moving out of orbit and thrusting hard towards the outer system. Marcum wasn’t sure how she’d gotten off New Sierra during the lockdown, but he was certain that little shit, Pike, was instrumental in helping. When he’d confronted the damn spook the man had the gall to stay in character as Wellington’s aide and act like he had no idea what he was talking about, sneering at the admiral in front of the entire staff as he did so. Marcum made a vow to make the weasel pay dearly for that when he had the opportunity.

“No, Admiral,” one of the sensor operators on the big battleship said, almost fearfully. “She’s running dark and the—”