The recovery spacecraft requested for Adams got delayed.

Its imminent arrival loomed over their heads like a cloud. Everybody became extra cautious, especially with their words.

In fact, Blessing went mute altogether. Even her daily whining about the situation of showering ceased, or rather paused, for a few weeks. She only spoke when spoken to or when not talking was more likely to get her into trouble.

Engineer Adams was pretty much banished to the lower deck during the wait. Logan stripped him of his duties right there and then and he’d been lounging in even worse isolation ever since. It has been weeks now.

It wasn’t supposed to take this long. Recovery and Detachment Flights— that was what the company called trips such as this one —only came in case of emergencies, great risk or cases of insubordination. There was nothing else in terms of punishment the Commander could mete out for the latter.

Oppose the designated authority: you get thrown off the ship. Incite an argument: same. Violence and assault: you give up the right to be a part of not only your life’s work but the important names in history. It was in the memorandum.

Adams awaited his penalty now while Logan wondered why it was taking so long. It was supposed to be an unmanned spacecraft. One straight flight to them. Even the route chosen was usually different. Faster. Cheaper. More efficient.

The lack of weight of luggage and passengers onboard contributed to it. The anticipation did stop the mutiny though. So, there was that.

Everybody was extra cautious now. They kept whatever further complaints they had to themselves. The Inter-Galactic GG-20 was way past the altitude for fluctuating gravity so the passengers were less irritable anyway.

By the middle of June Logan and Borja had radioed Earth GSA for a total of eight times. The connection provided by the GSCOM was not very encouraging as there was interference in the air most times but they did get through. They said the same thing they said on the 17th of May, and all seven times after that.

“What exactly is the problem, AA? What’s the ETA on the GG-12-B?”

AA Langston was the Associate Administrator of the earth division of the Inter-Galactic GG-20. The general overseer of all the AAs. He supervised all flight-related activities and communicated the necessary information to spacecraft in the diaspora.

Langston paused now before answering. “The GG-12-B is on its way to you as we speak. The route that–”

“How about we skip past the rehearsed version?” Logan interrupted rudely. He has heard all of this before. “Be frank with me. What is really happening?”

He heard the man sigh over the line. Or maybe it was the static again. “We have reason to believe that the GG-12-B has gone missing, most likely after encountering some sort of complication in space. Her GIO stopped responding a few weeks ago so we suspect that it has powered down.”

“How does a whole shuttle go missing? Weren’t you reading the coordinates? What about the altimeters? Something. Anything.”

Logan knew he was starting to sound desperate. However, the GG-12-B was not only traveling to pick up Engineer Adams. It also carried food and relief packs. He was eager to get those items, if for nothing then for that to be the one thing that has gone according to plan in a while.

Perhaps the arrival would boost the morale here a bit too. The Inter-Galactic GG-20 certainly needed it. A certain lull was in the atmosphere, and it showed in the stiffness of their conversations, the silence when work hours were over and the way even Giovanni was now keeping to himself. This had to go right.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Logan waited a beat; as if that could help the status quo, as if that would somehow change the situation of things.

Langston sighed. This time Logan heard it loud and clear. “I don’t know what to tell you, Commander. I apologize but that’s the update right now. The GG-12-B is lost in orbit for now and I have the feeling that the cause is a little more sinister than space debris.”

Logan busied himself. It felt like the only way to declutter his racing mind.

His head was a jungle of thoughts, each information battling the next for the forefront. They overtook his cerebrum. His temple was starting to hurt.

Do not think. That was what he should do. Not think.

If he let in so much as half of another thought, he might spontaneously combust. So, he threw himself into work instead. What you can’t feel can’t give you a headache, right?

“Commander. Could you come take a look at this, please?”

Logan looked up and shook away his melancholy. “Is something wrong?′

Blessing was squinting hard at the dash camera by the pilots’ seats. The cam surveyed their environment from every direction. There were four of them, one facing each cardinal point. Blessing was focused on the camera facing their rear end with rapt attention.

“Dr. Oyediran?” Logan abandoned the Xianometer and walked over to her.

The dash cam could project an image with near-perfect acutance. Even zoomed in, one would still get a clear image.

Logan looked at where she was pointing at. “What the…”

“Is that a ship?” the Command Module Pilot asked.

That was enough to bring Logan’s senses back to life. All his dreary convictions evaporated in an instant. He grabbed a dash joystick and maneuvered it till it zoomed in on the object. “Starsnot!”

That was a full-fledged spaceship.

“Do you think it’s America’s?”

“I doubt it. We have a monopoly on space travel right now. Why would they send a ship after us?”

Borja rushed to the Assail Chamber as Blessing continued the tests she was running on an iPad. The AA had a million questions lined up for him. “It is still a safe distance away but shouldn’t we start strapping up? Alert the crew? But then again it might just be passing by. Should we go on the defensive instead?”

He ignored her. She was saying the right words but bombarding them as questions were not going to help anybody.

Borja was right. They could not attack yet. It will take about half an hour to get close to it; it was still distant. It would be smarter to gauge its movements first.

Logan left the cameras to join Borja at the Assail Chamber. The corner consisted of twenty knobs attached to the wall and a couple of Space Rifles. Logan hit three of those buttons before returning to the cameras.

Immediately, GIO geared up the shuttle’s exterior: a defense mechanism of cocooning the spacecraft. It would protect them should the spacecraft suddenly start firing. He doubted that it would, seeing as it was so far away, but it was better to be safe than sorry. In addition, Logan activated their own missile launchers.

“Oyediran, run a logistics test on the ship's current location. I want a precise analysis, got it?” he said to the Chief Technology Officer.

“Aye aye, captain,” Blessing replied with a mock salute. Three seconds later GIO started beeping as it projected numbers and specifics on the SmartWall.

Logan skimmed through it. “Sum it up for me, Bless.”

GIO beeped more rapidly as she kept tapping faster on the iPad. Even its AI voice seemed to read the room and spoke more quickly.

Blessing glanced at him. “According to the Radar Altimeter, that ship is–”

“Getting dangerously close, don’t you think?” somebody from behind him jumped in to say. Renée.

“You don’t say,” Blessing replied dryly. She went on to give the accurate latitudes, longitudes and horizontal accuracies necessary. One minute later, they figured out the make and details of the spacecraft.

Too bad it didn’t matter at the end of the day because it released fire at that same moment. The compartment shook but thanks to their cocoon, it was not enough to cause any real damage.

Logan struck another button. Time to go on the offensive. “Strap up, people! GIO, your aim is their fuel tank.”

The AI beeped in understanding. “Fuel tank located.”

As soon as the incoming vehicle activated countermeasures, GIO launched its own barrage of missiles into the air. Fire and gases clashed with fire and more toxic gases.

It became an intense battle of missile conflagration between the two spacecraft. The Inter-Galactic GG-20 ducked, aimed, and fired. Since only the dashboard was vulnerable, the pilot tried their darndest to keep it out of harm’s way. It was not easy.

Almost every missile launch erupted into an explosion of debris and ASATs.

But they prevailed. Despite the best efforts of the enemy crew, the Inter-Galactic GG-20 got the upper hand with its final attack.

“Get ready now!” Logan screamed at his fellow passengers. “I hope your latch is in place!”

He maneuvered the shuttle a safe distance away from the rogue ship, albeit painstakingly, while simultaneously shooting out the biggest combustion he could muster up. It seemed to travel at the speed of light as it raced through and buried itself right in the center of the other craft.

Logan’s heart was pounding heavily when he finally looked up to see the damage. The spacecraft was engulfed in flames.