Indi and Hierax sat across from each other in the busy mess hall, a Petteia board set between them, white and black stone discs resting in a grid. Hierax had won the first three games, as Indi had been learning how to play, but she’d won the next one, and now, he was taking his moves more seriously. He appeared oblivious to the Star Guardians ambling past with trays, taking second looks when they noticed him.

Indi gathered those looks were coming because Hierax rarely left engineering to eat in the mess rather than because he was sitting with a girl, but perhaps both things perplexed the crew.

Angela, Juanita, and Katie joined them, each setting down trays with the usual steaks swimming in butter-like sauce on the plates.

“I can’t wait to get back to Earth,” Katie said. “I’m dying for some chocolate and fries and chicken wings.”

“All at once?” Juanita asked.

“I’m not opposed.”

“I would happily go back to Dethocoles and eat their food,” Angela said with a wistful sigh. “Their pastries are amazing, and that thing stuffed in leaves that I ate at the space base. It was better than any gyro.”

Indi thought of the challenge she’d given Hierax and wondered if he’d had time to think about it yet. She supposed it was a moot point until they were able to fly through the gate and get back to civilization. And stop that war. Then the idea of having Earth added to the Confederation would matter.

“Svenkars are allowed on Dethocoles too,” Angela said. “I’m pretty sure they would be shot on Earth.” Her shoulders slumped.

“Are you thinking of staying there?” Katie asked. “Even if it means never seeing your family again?”

“That would be really hard. Treyjon said he’d come with me to Earth, but I can tell he doesn’t want to give up training svenkars or being a Star Guardian. Nobody there would even know what a Star Guardian is or how hard they work to protect humanity. They’ve even protected Earth—us—without anyone there knowing it. I just wish I could have both. Treyjon and the svenkars and my family.”

“I’m looking forward to going home,” Katie said. “Svenkars don’t interest me. I do have to admit I am going to be super disappointed if I don’t get to fly a spaceship before I go. I’ve been lobbying for that, you know.”

“How so?” Juanita asked.

“Every time I see Captain Sagitta in the corridor, I tell him about as much of my extensive piloting background as I can work in—which isn’t much, because he’s always oddly busy and hurries by. Did you know I’m a certified flight instructor in addition to having had my commercial pilot’s license for almost ten years? And I was a naval aviator. I’ve landed jets on aircraft carriers at night. In storms. I could totally take this ship on a tootle between planets. It’s not like you’re going to hit something out here.”

Indi remembered Katie mentioning she’d been in the military, but she hadn’t realized her experience had been that intense.

“I don’t know,” Juanita said. “I’ve seen Zakota’s console. There are a lot of buttons.”

“There are five buttons. And a flight stick. I’ve been playing with a simulator that the ship’s AI introduced me to. Most of the junk on Zakota’s console is his weird voodoo shaman stuff. He’s an odd man.”

“Kind of cute though,” Juanita said.

“You’re not supposed to notice that,” Angela said. “Or your hulking bounty hunter will get jealous.”

“Orion isn’t hulking. He’s sexy and perfectly proportioned.”

Indi gazed across the game board at Hierax, wondering if he would like it if she complimented his proportions with a bunch of women looking on.

He moved one of the discs and grinned up at her. “Victory will be mine in ten moves.”

“You’re a cocky bastard, Hierax.”

No compliments for him.

“A cocky bastard who will be victorious in ten moves.”

“Uh huh, let’s see about that.” Indi shifted her focus to the board, though she couldn’t help but listen to the conversations going on around her.

Orion ambled up behind Juanita and rested his hands on her shoulders. “Did I hear someone talking about my perfect proportions?”

Juanita tilted her head back as he bent down and kissed her from above. It wasn’t a particularly chaste kiss, and it put thoughts in Indi’s mind of dragging Hierax off to a private location for something similar. With his cabin full of tools—she’d seen it since they returned—that would probably be engineering. Were his subordinates in there working now? Where did he have his fancy cot with the drink holder set up?

Hierax cleared his throat and frowned over at them. “We’re trying to play a game here.”

Juanita lowered her head and smirked at him. “Sorry, does affection give you cooties?”

“The translation chip has no idea what cooties are. I simply don’t want my opponent being distracted. When she loses, I want her to know it was because of my genius and not because she was distracted by noisy sucking sounds.”

“They weren’t noisy,” Orion said. “They were at a perfectly normal decibel level.”

“Whatever.” Hierax wiped the side of his face. “I think you got saliva on my ear.”

Angela looked at Indi. “Is he always this grumpy?”

Juanita and Katie also looked at her. When had the other women started to consider her the expert on the ship’s engineering chief? Was it simply because she’d spent time on the planet with him? And on the Zi’i ship? Or did they suspect that she and Hierax had started relaxing together?

“He’s not grumpy; he just doesn’t take well to interruptions that keep him from focusing.”

“Interruptions such as kissing?” Angela asked. “I suppose that’s understandable.”

“Interruptions such as people in general, I believe.”

Hierax’s eyes narrowed, and she thought he would object to this deconstruction of his character, but all he said was, “Are you speaking to them to delay making the moves that will result in your inevitable defeat?”

Indi slid a disc across the board.

Hierax stroked his chin. “An unorthodox tactic.”

“Does that mean you’re no longer certain of victory?”

“It means victory may take twelve moves instead of ten.”

Treyjon walked into the mess hall with a svenkar at his side, the hulking creature’s head almost level with his. Was that Lulu? Indi couldn’t tell them apart, but that seemed to be the one most likely to be trotted out. She tried hard not to think about what Lulu had been doing the last time she had seen her.

Women scattered at the animal’s entrance, all save one. Angela jumped out of her seat and ran to Treyjon, hugging him and then, when the svenkar lifted her head, scratching her chin. That was definitely Lulu. Her leathery tail swished back and forth. Treyjon grunted a protest when it thwacked him in the back.

After receiving her scratches, Lulu strutted around the mess hall, causing women to scatter further. The svenkar didn’t make any hostile moves. If anything, she looked like she wanted people to notice and admire her. Maybe she was proud of herself for hunting down that Zi’i.

“Better hurry and finish our meals,” Juanita said, “or Lulu will come over and take them.”

“I don’t think Lulu is going to be hungry for a while,” Indi murmured.

Hierax pushed one of his black discs into a defensive position. The game wasn’t exactly like checkers, but it did have similarities. Indi made her move, sandwiching one of his pieces between two of hers so she could capture it.

“Are you still winning?” she asked, noting she had more of his pieces than he had of hers.

“Undoubtedly. I’m lulling you into believing your unorthodox Gaian tactics will work.”

“Look at the gate,” Juanita said brightly, pointing toward the view screen on the wall.

It displayed the new gate, and Indi looked in time to see the event horizon wavering as the Zi’i warship flew out.

“Lieutenant Asan made it there and back,” Hierax said. “Excellent.”

He looked like he hadn’t expected anything else, but Indi let out a relieved sigh.

The warship had been sent ahead, with only the helm officer on board, to test the new gate. Hierax had volunteered to go along with him in case anything happened, but Sagitta had shot him down, refusing to lose more than one crew member if something went wrong with the gate or the wormhole.

Even though Indi had played the notes exactly as they’d originally appeared in her mind, she hadn’t had faith that everything would work out.

“Crew and guests,” Sagitta spoke over the comm a few minutes after the warship arrived—and after Hierax’s certain victory had been extended out to fourteen moves. “Lieutenant Asan reports that the gate ride was smooth and easily navigable.”

Cheers went up around the mess hall.

“He made it to the Scyllan System, then turned around and came back before any ships could interfere with him.” Sagitta’s tone turned grim. “He reports that he arrived in time to see the last Zi’i warship heading through the gate that leads to Dethocoles. It looks like we’re going to be too late to warn our people about the invasion fleet heading their way, but we will not be too late to help defend the heart of the Confederation.”

Katie’s eyebrows rose. “Does that mean we’re on our way into a war?”

“So much for going home,” someone at another table muttered.

“At least I’ll get more fodder for the series of novels I’m working on,” Juanita said.

Orion squeezed her shoulders. “We’ll make it. I just wish I had my own ship so I could help.”

“Maybe we can capture another Zi’i warship, and you can fly it.”

“That would be a challenge after being used to piloting a two-seater.”

“I’m sure you’ll be good as long as you don’t have to parallel park.”

Orion’s brow furrowed in confusion.

Apparently, those flying auto-chariots on Dethocoles didn’t have to worry about street parking.

Indi remembered their last encounter with the Zi’i and how terrified she’d been. She’d hidden under Dr. Tala’s desk in sickbay.

Some of those feelings of fear returned, but she shoved them to the side. Since that battle, she’d outrun irritated drones, climbed down to rescue Hierax, helped interpret an alien computer system, kept the overtaxed engines from blowing up, and survived a battle with a Zi’i warrior. She didn’t yet know what she could do in a war fought in space between ships, but she decided she could help. And she would.

She would survive the battle ahead of them, and she would find a way home. At least long enough to let her friends and family know she was well—and to download all the latest episodes of Survivor. By then, Hierax should have solved the equation she’d presented him, and Earth would have contact with the rest of the Confederation. She could go off and work with him or at least work where she could see him often.

To her surprise, the idea of learning a new computer system and finding a galactic job excited her almost as much as the idea of spending more time with her geeky Star Guardian lover.

“I should probably go to engineering,” Hierax said, starting to rise. “We’re likely to have trouble traversing the Scyllan System. Also, we’ll want the ship to be in tiptop shape when we catch up with that Zi’i fleet.”

Indi caught his wrist. “You can’t leave in the middle of our game, a game in which I believe I’m less than thirteen moves from defeating you.”

“What? You’re delusional.”

“If you prove me wrong, I’ll come with you to engineering.” She didn’t wiggle her eyebrows at him, not with Katie and Juanita watching on curiously, but she pinned him with her gaze, hoping he caught the implication.

“Oh? You wish to see my cot?”

Juanita’s eyebrows flew up. So much for subtlety.

“You did promise that the upgrades would amaze me,” Indi said.

Juanita’s eyebrows rose even higher.

“Apparently, there’s a cup holder,” Indi told her.

“Crew and guests,” Sagitta said, “we are entering the gate in sixty seconds. Buckle yourselves in, and be prepared for an eventful trip home.”

“As if anything about this trip has been uneventful so far,” Katie said.

Hierax made his next move. He gave Indi a challenging look across the board, and she found herself smiling and not feeling as terrified about the future as she would have expected.

“Sometimes, events are okay,” she murmured.