This was one of the Priminae’s outer colony worlds, and one of the first hit by the Drasin, so the scanners quickly found minor anomalies that brought their focus to the fourth world in the system. It was now a dead and crumbling mass of former Drasin drones, but none of them were remotely active, so the teams in charge of the system evaluation tagged the world’s orbit and moved on.

Other than that one world, the system was largely unimpressive. The star was a red giant, and most of the planets were barren or gas giants, though there were hints of organic chemicals in the atmosphere of the fifth world. This was tagged as an item of interest and set aside.

Hyperspectral scanners were useful for long-range analysis of such things, basically breaking down the incoming light that had passed through a planet’s atmosphere, or reflected off an interesting surface, and working out what wavelengths had been absorbed. Certain compounds absorbed very specific wavelengths of light, and so from light-minutes—or even light-years—away, it was possible to very neatly identify what exactly you were looking at on a molecular level, if nothing else.

After three hours of skirting the system, nothing unexpected came back. The Odysseus came down from general quarters and settled in to complete the survey in a more relaxed manner.

►►►

► Milla Chans stepped up the plank into the large shuttle, tapping on the aluminum ribbing. “Stephan? Are you in here?”

Steph appeared from the front lock. “Hey Milla. I see you got the word.”

“The system has been cleared, yes?”

“That’s what the official card said,” Steph told her. “Captain cleared us for a test flight, so we’re going to drop deeper into the system, sling around the fifth planet, and meet the Odysseus around the elliptic in two days. Works?”

“Yes. Works.”

“Good. Preflight.”

Milla nodded and moved forward, slipping past Steph and through the lock into the forward cockpit. He had signed out a Marine shuttle for the test flight, unarmed and stripped down for fast landing and even faster dustoff.

He would have preferred one of the armed versions, just as a matter of principal, but Major McAllistair had something to say about that. The Marine in charge of the Odysseus’ contingent was as much a stickler for procedure as Eric had ever been at his worst, and while he might have to sign out a shuttle at the request of the ship’s chief helmsman, giving a Navy flyboy weapons wasn’t something the major was willing to do.

Steph ducked back through the lock, watching as Milla slipped into the pilot’s seat with just a little trepidation. He sealed and dogged the hatch, securing the cockpit before he dropped into the copilot’s seat and pulled the straps down over his shoulders.

“So, checklist?” he asked, glancing over.