Unobtainable Earth was a bright beacon of blues and greens in the distance. That wasn’t what Thrym was talking about, however. He was referring to the debris littering the area where their space station coasted in Earth’s orbit.

“Really. Again? We were on it two days ago.” Elara threw herself back onto the narrow white bunk, one of five beds in the bare white unit.

Five bunks for the five members of their team. The room possessed all essentials, few inessentials, and was identical to the hundred other units on board which housed the other teams.

“Yes, really,” he replied. “Last night’s battle left a whole heap of junk. It’s clean or collide.”

Romy knew about the small skirmish with the Critamal that Thrym spoke of. Unfortunately, it only took one exploding spacecraft to provide Knot 27 with days of clean-up. And because all space stations sat right where the debris liked to gather, four hundred kilometres above Earth’s sea level, Thrym was right: it was clean or collide.

Elara sat up, slouching dramatically. Her brown hair was short and choppy, and a few adorable freckles dotted her nose. Soft hazel eyes blazed from her delicately featured face. “I know, but can’t someone else do it?” She snapped . . . the delicate part was misleading.

The pixie-like girl was the laziest person Romy knew. Elara must be what humans were like 150 years ago. Ironic, considering the space soldier’s genetic engineering was supposed to eliminate faults such as fear, idleness, and curiosity. Somehow the scientists must have screwed it up in Elara’s case because she possessed laziness in copious amounts.

Thrym glanced Romy’s way, his blue eyes dancing from beneath his professional mask. If Romy didn’t know to look, his amusement would’ve passed unseen.

“ETA for the first of it to arrive is thirty-four minutes. We need to move,” he said.

“I’ll alert Deimos and Phobos,” Romy replied.

She lifted her wristwatch and pushed the square button on the side three times. Scrolling through the locations stored on the device, Romy selected “Earth Dock” to send an urgent alert to the entire team to gather there. Elara and Thrym silenced their own beeping devices without looking.

Wordlessly, the three began preparations.

Romy tied back her chin-length white-blonde hair as best as she could—though it was almost certain the fine strands would escape within minutes. She reached for her spandex suit next. Each space soldier was trained to get the orange spandex ventilation garments on in sixty-five seconds. Elara took three minutes on average. According to Deimos, her fastest time was 153 seconds.

The entrance to their tight quarters swept upwards at their approach and the trio began to move at a fast clip down the clinical white, pressurised hallways of their home: Orbito One.