I stared at the windshield, looking at Vysanthe in the distance, feeling like the rug had been pulled out from under me. My heart sank, my eyes blinking slowly in disbelief. Queen Brisha was dead, and that could only spell disaster for the rest of the coldblood planet.

“No…” Lauren gasped, tears glittering in her eyes. The two of them had been closer than the rest of us, spending evenings in Brisha’s library, talking like two ordinary young women—despite the fact that they came from opposite ends of the universe and led vastly different lives. I could see the pain on her face, knowing that Brisha was gone.

Stone put a comforting arm around her. “Sorry ‘bout that, Ren. I know the pair of ye was tight.”

Xiphio eyed the action with disdain, but he didn’t say anything, evidently realizing that now was not the time or place to squabble over Lauren’s affections. She was cut up about it. We all were. An air of utter shock had settled over our group.

“I can’t believe she’s dead,” Bashrik murmured.

“I didn’t like either of them much, but Brisha wasn’t a bad egg,” Angie added, nestling into her boyfriend, her face sad.

“Does that mean… Gianne won?” Ronad wondered, narrowing his eyes at the planet, which was just visible beyond the windshield.

I looked up at Navan, who had yet to say anything. A muscle twitched in his jaw, his slate eyes growing steely. Although he’d been a Southern Vysanthean for most of his life, I knew his thoughts on Gianne—we shared the same ones. She was an insane tyrant with an enormous amount of power, and now that she had nobody standing in her way, she could seize total control of the planet.

“The battle is not won, however,” the newscaster said, distracting us from the shock of Brisha’s assassination. “The usurper’s forces are still at large, battling to retain control of the North. They do not see the one true queen as their queen and would seek to defy our armies. We shall not allow them to disobey the might of Queen Gianne. We will continue to fight until not a single one is left standing, if that is what it takes—these are the words of our fearless leader.”

It appeared that Queen Brisha’s military was still fighting back against Gianne’s army, despite their leader being dead. I couldn’t blame them. If I had a choice between battling for my independence or bowing down to the whims and wishes of a madwoman, I knew where my loyalty would lead.

“They will not triumph,” the newscaster continued. “Our queen shall be queen of all Vysanthe soon enough. We must remain strong and defeat these usurping hordes who would refuse Queen Gianne her right to their throne.”

I wasn’t sure what state Gianne’s armies were in, but that didn’t change the fact that there was only so much the North could do to retaliate and keep hold of their lands. We had seen them depleted with our own eyes, thanks to the Titans, and I knew things could only have gotten worse from there. They were likely dangling by a thread, clawing at any hope they could muster, but it would only be a matter of time before Gianne got what she wanted and took control over everything. They couldn’t fight forever.

Unfortunately for us, that meant Gianne’s distractions would soon be over, too. As soon as the war was officially won, and the Northern forces had been vanquished by the remainder of her army, she would undoubtedly resume all the projects she had been developing prior to the war. I sensed, deep down in my heart, that she would jump straight back into it the moment she took both thrones. She would go back to building the deep-space technology that had so nearly been thwarted and would set her sights on completing the immortality elixir. Once that was done, there would be nothing we could do to stop her from doing whatever she wanted, wherever she wanted, in all the universe.

“What do we do?” Angie asked, lifting her head.

“What can we do?” Ronad replied. “It’s not like we can swoop down there and save the day. They’ve already lost.”

Navan grimaced. “And we’ll lose, too, if we don’t get a move on.”

“Navan?” Bashrik said, concerned.

“We have to get out of here. There’s nothing we can do about Vysanthe now, but we can do something about the rebels,” he urged. “As soon as they find out what’s happened here, they’ll be slaughtering humans for blood and pushing harder for the elixir, especially now that they have the notebook. Then they’ll be pouring that elixir down the throat of every rebel soldier and making their plans to return. This won’t be the last conflict Vysanthe sees.”

I nodded. “We need to press on to Glossa.”

“What about everyone down there?” Xiphio protested. “I have no love for the coldbloods, but there must be countless innocents in need of some reassurance. Perhaps we can pause a moment, to see if we can arrest Gianne?”

“And do what with her?” Navan shot back. “The Fed won’t come near this place—you know that as well as I do. I hate to say it, but the Vysantheans are on their own.”

“For now,” I added, feeling a twist of guilt.

Lauren nodded. “We have to deal with one thing at a time, and Vysanthe will have to wait its turn. The rebels have to be stopped first. We can’t let them make that elixir. If they manage it, it’s game over for everyone.”

“I’ll see that don’t happen, but I need me crew first,” Stone reassured us, his arm still around Lauren.

“If anyone can help stop them, it’s Stone,” Lauren agreed.

“I suppose you have to think like a criminal to be able to vanquish a criminal,” Xiphio mumbled, clearly feeling put out by the bond between Lauren and Stone. Regardless, I hoped Lauren was right. We were wasting valuable time going to pick them up from Glossa, but if that’s what it took to gain Stone’s cooperation, then so be it.

“Continuing our course to Glossa,” Bashrik said, his hands moving across the control panel.

Three more days passed in the blink of an eye, with us running way behind schedule. It seemed the navigation system had been wrong in predicting it would take us four days to reach Glossa. The system was glitching every couple of hours and pointing us in a different direction. Fortunately, Bashrik had caught the error before it could cause us too much trouble, diving down under the controls and restarting the navigation system manually. Afterward, he’d claimed he couldn’t find any problem with the wiring, which worried me.

First, there’d been an unexplained crash. Now, there were unexplained glitches going on with the ship’s systems. Either someone was trying to sabotage us, or this ship was falling to pieces and we didn’t know it. I wasn’t sure which was worse.

And so, three days off course thanks to the navigation problems and still despondent over the loss of Brisha, we were finally headed back in the right direction. All of us were gathered in the cockpit, with Bashrik and Ronad on the controls, while Angie and I sat together to one side and Navan was in the armchair next to me, drifting in and out of sleep. Lauren was on the opposite side of the room, playing a board game with Xiphio and Stone, who seemed intent on outdoing one another.

“How long until we reach Glossa?” I asked, staring through the windshield at the endless darkness of space. I was starting to get sick of the sight of it, which was something I’d never thought possible. Now, I was starting to understand why Pandora had never bothered to venture onto the observation deck—there just wasn’t anything new to see.

“Four days or so,” Bashrik replied.

I grimaced. “Won’t your crew be worried about you by now, Stone? What if they’ve already left because they think you’re dead?”

Stone smirked. “They won’t.”

“And you’re not going to run off as soon as you have your crew back?”

“We’ve been over this. I ain’t going nowhere,” he insisted. “I made an oath to ye, and I don’t break oaths.”

I frowned at him. “And you’re really going to help us?”

We’d discussed the situation at length, but I couldn’t help asking again and again. As soon as he had his crew back, as promised, he’d agreed to use his powers to help us defeat the rebels, with all of them returning with us to Earth to fulfill that part of the bargain. After that, we’d have to find a more permanent way to protect Earth from the perils of intergalactic beings, but that discussion would have to wait until we’d actually defeated the rebels—I just hoped Xiphio would make good on his promise to ask the Fed for further help. Right now, however, there was no point in running before we could walk.

Stone nodded. “I told ye, I made me promise and I’ll stick to it. Ain’t that right, Ren? I’m a man of me word, right?” he said, looking to Lauren for approval.

She and Xiphio had been spending a lot more time together lately, which had had a peculiar effect on Stone. He’d started acting weird around her, almost trying to imitate Xiphio’s chivalrous mannerisms. It was funny to watch, considering Stone had all the manners of a scavenger, but I felt bad for him. He clearly adored Lauren, not realizing his own feelings until he’d almost lost her to Xiphio. Now, he was trying to make up for lost time, with hilarious consequences.

“You are a man of your word, Stone. I don’t know anyone more honest,” Lauren replied, smiling.

“I been meaning to say, Ren, yer face looks weird today,” he said unexpectedly, his cheeks flushing. “Have ye done somethin’ to it?”

Lauren frowned. “No, I don’t think so. What do you mean, weird?”

“Like, all glowing and stuff,” he muttered. “Yer radiant… or something, like one of them stars out there.”

“Are you feeling okay, Stone?”

“I’m fine, just wanted to… say ye looked decent today. Yer clothes are nice and that,” he murmured. “Ah, forget it.” He wandered over to the controls, where Bashrik was looking up at him with doe eyes.

I’d expected Xiphio to look pleased, considering Stone had just embarrassed himself in front of Lauren, but he didn’t seem particularly victorious. Instead, he looked sympathetic, as though he understood the difficulties of courtship. It didn’t stop him from resuming his conversation with Lauren. They’d been talking about books she liked, and he had been describing some of his favorites to her.

“What’re ye doing over here?” Stone asked, plonking himself down in one of the chairs closest to the controls. He kept casting glances at Lauren and Xiphio, who were chuckling together, enveloped in their own little world.

“We’ve been running some diagnostics through the system to find out what happened to the navigation program. I’ve been running every possible scenario, if you want to come and have a look,” Bashrik replied eagerly, gesturing at the monitor. “I know you’re great with ships of all kinds, so we could definitely do with your input.”

Stone leaned forward in his chair. “What kind o’ diagnostics you runnin’?”

“General sweeps of the system.”

Stone shook his head. “Nah, ye need to be more specific. Ye’ll not get anywhere with general sweeps. Ye gotta go to the root of the problem.” He moved closer, with Bashrik shifting to the side so Stone could get at the controls. His hands moved effortlessly across the panel, his eyes focused on the monitor.

I stole a look at Lauren, to see if she was paying him any attention. Xiphio was talking to her about a fairytale from back on his home world, but her eyes kept drifting across to Stone, watching him at work. There was something magnetic about him when he was focused, making everyone in the room take note of what he was doing.

The most enraptured person, however, wasn’t Lauren. Bashrik gazed at Stone with such intensity it was almost comical, his eyes following Stone’s every move, his head nodding at everything that Stone suggested.

“Have you seen him?” Angie whispered, stifling a giggle. “I keep expecting him to ask Stone to show him how to do it, Ghost-style.”

I smirked, feeling a giggle rise up. “I think he likes Stone more than Lauren does.”

“I know! I think he’d start sulking if she openly flirted with him,” she murmured, grinning. “Do you think he’s going to ask Stone to inspect his wiring?”

Just then, Bashrik turned to Stone and nudged him in the arm, gesturing down at the cabinets beneath the panel. “Stone, would you mind coming under the panel to check the wiring with me?”

The two of us collapsed into a fit of hysterics, drawing funny looks from the others in the room. I knew I could rely on Angie to bring a bit of levity back, given the somber atmosphere that had permeated the ship since hearing about Brisha’s assassination.

My good humor didn’t last long, however, as I turned to look at Navan. He was curled up in the armchair beside me, muttering in his sleep, his eyes blinking awake every couple of minutes, before sleep forced them down again. There were dark circles under his eyes and his face looked haggard.

I didn’t understand what was going on with him, but his nighttime excursions had only gotten worse. Evidently, they’d left him in a state of sleep deprivation. One evening, I’d woken up an hour after we’d gone to bed, only to find him already absent. I’d tried to find him in the ship, but he’d poked his head out of the kitchen door and told me to go back to sleep. I hadn’t felt like arguing about it, hoping he’d tell me what was going on when he was ready to.

“Hey, sleepyhead,” I murmured as his eyes blinked open. “You okay?”

He nodded, stretching out with a loud yawn. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look too good. Do you want me to put you to bed? I can heat up some blood for you, if that’ll help.”

“Honestly, I’m fine, just a little tired.”

I sensed there was more to his daily decline in energy, but he looked too exhausted to press the matter further. After all, if there was something major going on with him, I would get to the bottom of it sooner or later. This ship was small, and he wouldn’t be able to evade me forever.

“How about if I come to bed with you?” I suggested, offering a seductive smile.

“Not right now,” he murmured, sleep trying to claim him once again. “I just need a little nap and I’ll be all yours.”

I very much doubted he’d be up to anything, even after a nap. Angie seemed concerned, too, as I turned back to see her watching us, her brow furrowed. I flashed her a look that said, “What can I do?” and she nodded in understanding.

“You want to get something to eat?” she asked, with a knowing look. It was code for, “Let’s get out of here and talk about what’s bothering you.”

I was about to answer when a loud sizzle ricocheted through the ship, followed by the crackling pop of fizzing electricals. Outside, in the main space, the lights flickered before plunging the room into darkness. The cockpit lights remained on, though they dimmed for a moment, and I could still see the dull glow of the hallway lights beyond the main space.

“What the hell was that?” Angie spluttered from where she’d dived under her chair.

“Electrical outage,” Ronad replied. “Looks like Bonnie and Clyde managed to hit something important.”

Bashrik flashed him a warning look. “We weren’t even touching the wiring; we were closing the box back up. Whatever that was, it had nothing to do with us.”

Stone nodded at the darkened outer room. “Yer man’s right. Nought in that box could’ve done that. That had to have come from the mainframe.”

“Yeah, exactly—the mainframe,” Bashrik repeated defiantly.

“Where’s that?” Lauren asked, looking worried.

Stone shrugged. “Engine room, I ‘spect. I’d have to check yer blueprints to find it.”

Xiphio stepped in, waggling his hand at Stone. “Actually, no, you do not. This is a merevin ship, and I know precisely where the engines are. Miss Riley and I have already visited them. You, sir, do not need to get your hands on any kind of blueprint.”

“As yer please. Was just tryna help.”

“Thank you, Stone. I think we’re all a little tense, that’s all. Electrical outages always do that,” Lauren said, her tone comforting. “Although, usually, it’s the thunderstorm that comes with the outages that gets me!” A forced laugh left her lips, but I could tell she really was frightened. I felt it, too. There was something amiss here—something that left an eerie feeling in the pit of my stomach.

“Why don’t you go and check it out, Riley?” Navan suggested suddenly, as he sat up in his chair. “You’ve got the engineering skills; you can probably fix it a whole lot quicker than any of us can.”

“What about Bashrik?” I replied, a little sad that Navan was so eager to get rid of me.

“I’ve got to stay here and make sure none of the other systems go down,” Bashrik said, with a hint of apology in his voice. “Navan’s right. You’re probably the best one for the job.”

I glanced around the room, feeling weirdly distant. “Fine. It’s probably a blown fuse or something. Shouldn’t take me long.”

“You want some company?” Angie asked. “I can’t help, but I’ll stand nearby and hand you all the wrong tools.”

I smiled at her, grateful for the offer. “Nah, it’ll be a quick fix. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Besides, I wanted a moment to myself to clear my head. Navan’s behavior was bothering me more and more. I didn’t know what I’d done to deserve his distant manner, but if I didn’t leave the room right now I knew I’d end up snapping at him, demanding an answer. With his eyes drooping shut again, I guessed now wouldn’t be a good time. No, it was better that I kept busy. Sighing, I snatched up one of the guns that had been left on the cockpit dashboard. If I was going down to the engine room alone, I wasn’t going unarmed.

“Whaddya you need a gun fer?” Stone asked, curious.

I shrugged. “Just in case.”

“In case a wire jumps out at ye?” Stone laughed, turning subtly toward Lauren to see if she was laughing, too. To his obvious disappointment, she wasn’t even listening to him.

“Okay, well, if I’m not back in twenty minutes, send out a search party,” I joked, steeling myself. “I might have tripped in the dark and smacked my head on something sharp.”

“Be careful… Watch out for the goblins,” Navan murmured, the dimmed light sending him off to sleep again. He was so delirious from lack of rest that I doubted he’d even be able to remember sending me off to the engine room. He probably hadn’t meant to do it in the first place, his fevered mind making him say things he didn’t want to say.

Shoving the gun into the waistband of my pants, I headed out of the cockpit and crept through the main space of the ship, checking for any sign of hidden monsters. For a moment, I wondered if Mort might be responsible for all of this. Perhaps he’d snuck back on board and tucked himself away in the deepest, darkest crevice of the vessel, just waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Here, out in space, we were at our most vulnerable, and someone like Mort would definitely have played on that.

Shaking off the weird feeling bristling through me, I pressed on down the right-hand hallway until I reached the hatch that dropped down into the engine room. Clambering down the steps, I was surprised to find that the room was lit. Emergency bulbs had come on, filling the place with an unsettling green glow, which made me feel like I was in a haunted house at a funfair. At any moment, I thought a sheet on a coat hanger was going to come flying out at me, followed by a dime-store Frankenstein’s monster.

Using the strange green light, I found my way to the electrical mainframe at the far side of the engine room. It was tucked away in a large metal cabinet, underneath the bedroom Navan and I shared. Here, there were no weird symbols to decipher or control panels to understand, just straightforward, good old-fashioned wires, fuses, and circuits.

“Let’s see what we can do with you, eh?” I said, speaking aloud to calm my nerves. I opened the cabinet door and peered inside, startled by the sight before me. Although there were reams upon reams of neatly tied cables, one section seemed to have been tampered with, the cables pulled out and cut, severing the circuit altogether.

I followed the thick cable up through the cabinet, using my eyes once the wire went too high for my fingers. It snaked up the wall and across the top of the engine room ceiling, before disappearing out into the main body of the ship, where it was no doubt hidden behind the wall paneling.

It really was concerning, but the severed cable itself was an easy fix. I just had to use connecters on either end of the cut pieces and reattach them. Some connectors were already tucked away on a ledge at the bottom of the cabinet, but I first needed to find out how lively the cable was. Scanning the room for anything I could use, I settled for a scrap piece of metal with a rubber end. Holding the rubber end tight, I approached the severed section of the cable and touched the piece of metal to it.

A bright blue light surged up the top end of the cable, racing along the line like a greyhound on a racetrack. I followed it intently, knowing I was going to need to switch off the main electrical systems before I did anything, unless I wanted to be blown halfway across the room.

As I followed the blue light, I froze. My eyes were drawn to something overhead, clinging to the power cables. At first, I wasn’t sure if it was my eyes playing tricks on me, but then it flickered again, a clear shape emerging. A dark figure lingered above me, fazing in and out of sight.

It seemed we had a stowaway… and they were wearing an invisibility suit.