They made their way back into the embarkation lounge, which now was significantly emptier. The bulkhead was also closed. Miles raised his camera to get a few more snaps. Grace slapped it back down. It balanced precariously on the end of its strap. Miles looked taken aback.

“Cut that out, unless you want to spend the next four weeks onboard, with no berth and no luggage,” she said.

He didn’t object. Grace ran up to the crewman, who was disconnecting the docking ramp at a wall terminal.

“Hi, I’m Grace Dakota. You might have heard of me.” She smiled. Sure, none of the discoveries she had uncovered in the Pulsar Sky system had gone public yet, but if this midshipman assumed he was supposed to have heard of her, he might be more compliant. It was worth a go.

“Who?” he asked, crashing that line entirely.

She looked at his name badge. “Mercado, is it?” she said, looking him straight in the eye. She smiled her best smile. “There’s been a miscommunication. Me and my colleague here were told to come on board, and we’re supposed to be over on...” Her mind went blank. She had no idea what the other liner in the dock was.

“Right,” Mercado said dismissively. “You have a booking on a ship you don’t know the name of, going to the same destination as this one?”

“Just let me off the ship, Mercado!” she snapped.

Mercado stepped away from the panel and looked at her, confused. “How are you the only two people in this cluster that aren’t trying to leave? Look, I’m sorry. The ship has been set to disembark. The moorings have been cleared. I don’t have the authority to reverse that.”

“Well, get someone who does,” said Miles, confused.

“Yeah, right,” Mercado said, “you’ve seen how shaken the people on board are. If I thought for one moment we were getting out of here as fast as possible, then we’d be seeing a riot on our hands.”

Grace ran over and tried the doors.

“Don’t do that,” said Mercado. “We’ve disembarked. They won’t open. If they did, it you’d be sucking vacuum.”

Grace turned and headed out and down the narrow corridors, barging past people still trying to find their cabins. Miles was behind her, trying to keep up and not quite managing. She looked at a wall screen and found the in-flight safety notice. A pre-recorded video started playing back, indicating where to go in case of various disaster scenarios. Scrolling forward, Grace found the location of the nearest escape pods. They were on this deck. She was closest to the starboard pods.

“Come on,” she told Miles, and continued down a narrow corridor. This one was empty of other passengers, and the walls were blank bulkheads without the faux styling of the hotel. The door at the far end opened, and Grace stepped through. She found what she was looking for—a long list of the escape pods. To access any, she would have to smash an emergency panel that would set alarms off. If she was lucky, on the bridge or if not, across the whole ship. She didn’t particularly care.

“You can’t just do that,” said Miles.

“Watch me,” said Grace. She took Miles’ camera, intending to use it as a hammer, when they were joined by Mercado and two members of the ship’s security team.

“That’s them!’ Mercado pointed at them.

One of the security men, something of a giant with a shaved head, reached for a weapon.

“I can’t allow you to use one of these pods. It is a crime in both the jurisdictions of the Cluster and the Sol Interstellar Flight Authority.”

Grace rolled her eyes.

“Mercado, you really think they are enforcing any such laws right now?” Grace spat back.

“Actually, it’s pretty likely they’re going to be enforcing every law as a capital crime in lieu of available law enforcement,” Mercado retorted.

“Is that what the Earth press is saying? I know it’s bad out here, but it’s not apocalyptic yet,” Grace replied.

Grace looked along the wall display. There was a panel that she tapped. Filtering through the options, she found the fire suppression system and tapped it on.

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“Didn’t want to get in another escape pod, anyway…” said Grace.

An alert sounded, and the security men and Mercado found themselves behind a narrow force field that gently buzzed with a glow of blue light. She threw an arm under Miles’ elbow and dragged him as she ran along the corridor. Looking back, Mercado beat the force field with his fist and then recoil in pain as it shocked him. One guard was already at another wall panel, desperately trying to get it deactivated.

Grace came to the end of the corridor and passed through another door, where they found themselves at an airlock.

“Is this another docking station?” asked Miles.

“No,” said Grace. “This is if anyone ever needs to nip outside to carry out repairs, which means there will be...” Grace spun around and pointed at a small door. She yanked on the handle, pulling it open, where she found, to her delight, two EVA suits.

“Perfect,” she said with a grin. “Put this on,” she added, throwing one at Miles, who looked at it. The middle-aged man was slightly portly around the midsection.

“This won’t fit me,” he said in a worried voice.

“That sounds like a you problem, Miles,” said Grace, already putting the suit on over her clothes.

Miles stood looking panicked in the corridor, his head turning over his shoulder. “I think they’re coming,” he said.

Grace ditched her shoes and added on the EVA boots.

“Then be quicker,” Grace said firmly.

She heard the sound of her breath inside the suit’s helmet. It had taken minutes, and she was running the suit’s checks on the helmet’s HUD. A series of green lights on her wrist plate confirmed that her seals were all intact, and she was ready for depressurization.

Miles was still fiddling with his boots, trying to get them on.

“I’ll go without you,” she said firmly. She checked the fuel cells; they should be fine for a short time in the black. Miles managed to get the boots secure and clicked on the helmet, and two of the wrist lights flicked green. The third still showed red. He checked the seal on his helmet, now green, and the guards had their weapons drawn as Grace stepped into the large airlock and pulled him in with her.

She took a moment to study the control panel, accessing the exterior doors access. The airlock began its cycle. Mercado furiously tried to get it to open, but it was already depressurizing. Grace watched the countdown timer display on the airlock wall. A circle slowly increased until it was only a thin slice and then nothing. The airlock clicked over to indicate that pressure had now completely dropped to match the exterior of the ship. She saw one guard raised his weapon. The other one was talking to him. The lack of air meant she couldn’t hear what was being said, but one of them was probably the basic science of what happens if someone tries to shoot a depressurised airlock and the impact that would have on the rest of a crowded vessel. She threw them both a wave, flicking each finger as she did so, smiling as she tapped gently on the airlock controls. The external door slid open and she and Miles took the few steps backwards before they floated out into the vacuum.

She used the suit’s thrusters to turn around. They were still not far from Junction Station, but that could be an issue. The Normandie’s engines were firing. The ship wouldn’t be able to stop and come back for them even if they’d wanted to. Grace took a moment and just took in the view. The Starliner moving away from them, the station just hanging in front of them, and the stars brighter than they ever appeared from a planet’s surface.

She looked over at Miles. He didn’t seem to enjoy himself, but nor did he appear to be in any real danger. She clicked open a comm channel. They were going to need a ride. She tapped her the communications button on her wrist controls.

“Junction Station, little help here. Man overboard,” said Grace.