Alexander was notified of the arrival of the new ship. Due to their uplink to the satellites being offli wasn’t clear who they were until they started firing on the pirates in orbit. If it wasn’t for the facility's sensors, which were desigo monitor the local star, they may not have even known another ship arrived. Evehe sensus lit on it being someoo help, or another fa of pirates.

  He was gd to see it was a friendly face. “While I’m gd to have the Hawks’ assistance again, why are you back?”

  “You’ll o speak with Captain Matthews about that. All I know is I was ordered to clear the facility of hostiles and the ships sitting on the nding pads. If you’re saying the facility is clear, I think it's time to clear some ships.”

  It took less than two hours for the Hawks’ ground teams to clear the vessels. There were not many surviving pirates, and the ones who had survived were certainly not equal to the Hawks.

  Alexaood o Travers as they watched a single drop ship touch down. Out stepped a man he had only seen and spoken to over video s.

  “Mr. Kane,” Captain Matthews offered his hand and Alexander shook it. “I make it a rule not to step off of the Talon during operations but with your unications being out and the sensitive nature of this discussion, I decided to e speak with you myself.”

  “…That wasn’t really necessary Captain.”

  “I felt that it was. Is there a pce eak quietly, Mr. Kane?”

  “Yes, follow me.”

  Normally he would have simply headed to his shop or his apartment. The shop was a mess thanks to the firefight. It wasly private at the momeher. He had hired a group of locals to the pce up and watch over the one w printer as rept pos were built. His apartment was currently occupied by a little girl who was grounded for not following the evacuation pn.

  At the time of the attack, Alexander was just relieved to see Yulia and Markus were safe. That didn’t excuse his daughter's reckless as. He khat being a pare punishing a child iain circumstances but that didn’t make him feel aer about having to do it. Yulia o learn that certain as have sequehough.

  To be ho, the girl looked relieved to be home. And it wasn’t like Alexander had simply abandoned her at home alone while he worked to fix all the damage from the attack. One of the tutors who helped with her nguage lessons agreed to watch her. It was the woman’s way of thanking him for driving off the pirates and saving her husband. Alexander didn’t know the woman’s husband, but he thanked her for her assistanyway.

  The tutor wasn’t the only person who tried to thank him. He didn’t think he did all that much, but it was clear the battle had shifted seowards him quite drastically. Whe out the request for people to help up his shop, he got more people than he bargained for. Not wanting to send anyone away, he assigwenty to his shop and split the eighty others into four separate groups to help remove the bodies and up elsewhere. The dead citizens of Eden’s End would get proper burials, whereas the pirates were going to be tossed into a waste fur was a fitting end for the vile bastards.

  “We talk in here,” Alexayped in the code to his ste room.

  Matthews stepped i Travers simply took up a position outside the door. Alexander would have shaken his head if his holo-projector was w. Instead, he simply stepped into the room filled with crates and closed the door.

  “I’m afraid we don’t have any ferens. At least hat are in any dition to be used for such.”

  “This is fine. I’m not the type of man to beat around the bush, so I’m going to be blunt. The Hawks fucked up.”

  “…Um….”

  Matthews lifted his hand. “Please, let me finish.” When Alexander didn’t say anything else, the man tinued. “It was our job to ehe safety of this facility. As we were returning to STO space, our Sam discovered someone was sending coded messages through our scouting ships to pirates. When I learned of this, we turned around immediately to warn you. Unfortunately, we were too te.” Alexander had suspected there y, but he had no evideo even start to figure out who had sold them out. That all ged now.

  “You have a name?” was all Alexander could ask while his anger simmered restlessly.

  The he man gave was not one Alexander knew. It was a minor relief that it wasn’t ah any real security here, but that fact barely kept him from st out of the room to personally punish this individual.

  As his rational mind reasserted itself, he spoke up. “Please have your people work with Damien Laront. We his man alive to answer questions.”

  Matthews nodded. “I was hoping you would say that.” The Captain pressed a little badge on his flight suit’s arm. “Travers, work with Eden’s End’s security to apprehend a man by the name of Draven Holstein. And keep it quiet.”

  “Copy that, Captain.”

  “So, that’s it then?” Alexander asked. He khe Hawks couldn’t stay, they had itments ba their home system.

  “Normally, yes. You know we ’t stick around for more than a few days, right?”

  “I figured as much. You ing back at all probably saved a lot of lives. Thank you for that.”

  “Like I said, we screwed up, so we o correct that issue. And from what I saw, you did a pretty good job of taking on the pirates all by yourself.”

  “Not good enough,” Alexaated bitterly. He would have frowned if he could. “The defenses I set up were pletely overwhelmed by oack. If I hadn’t mao get that one gun baline, we would have been at the pirates' mercy.”

  “There is no such thing as a perfect defense,” Matthews sighed. “I would have reended spreading your defenses out into orbit, but you simply didn’t have the capability to build anything iimeframe you had avaible. Yuns should have been more than suffit to deal with a normal attack. …That’s ahing. Fifteen pirate ships don’t just attae location without reason. Do you have any idea why they were here?”

  “For me. They tried to take my daughter hostage.”

  “Is she ok?”

  “She is uninjured, but I’m not sure if she will sleep well after what happened.”

  Matthews nodded. “sidering what I’ve seen you do in such a short time, it makes sehe pirates are ied in you. The Talon will be leaving once ture and question the spy. But I’ve been authorized to leave one of the gunships for you to use for ahree months. It’s the best I could do.”

  “Thank you, that’s more than generous. But I ask why?”

  “I would think that is obvious, Alexander.” He was taken aback by the man using his first he Hawks’ leadership sees a retionship with you and Blue Star Enterprises as an important asset. A mutually beneficial one.”

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  The reserved Captain chuckled. “Don’t say anythi, her one of us has seen any be from this retionship. Ohat happens though, I suspect both of us will be happy to have each other.”

  Alexander extended his hand. “I guess that makes The Hawks of Ganos, Blue Star Enterprises' first official er.”

  The man accepted the gesture with a grin. “I guess it does.”

  Matthews beeped and Travers spoke. “Captain, we have him.”

  “That didn’t take very long. Well, now that we are done here, let's go have a discussion with this bottom feeder and find out why he sold out everyoo pirates.”

  “But they were only after me,” Alexander remihe man as they exited the room.

  Matthews shook his head. “You don’t it that many forces for one person. Every man woman and child here would have ended up dead or as a prisoner.”

  Alexander didn’t want to think about that so he ged the subject. “Do you know if Captain Na survived?”

  “The Destiny is fihey were ier belt on the far side of the system whetle kicked off. Ohey realized it irates, they did the only thing they could and made for a jump point. They didn’t jump though, they waited to see what the pirates were doing. Ohey saw us attag the pirates, they started to head ba. His ship should arrive in another day with a load of ore. The station was unharmed in the fighting, and it must have been far enough away that the EMP didn’t knock its systems out. That reminds me.” The man reached into a pocket on his vac suit and pulled out three crystal cards. He hahem to Alexander.

  “What are these?”

  “Those are the fusion activation crystals for your new ships.”

  “My new what?”

  “There were three surviving pirate ships. They’re yours now. They are a bit banged up, but they should be serviceable. You also have the surviving shuttles on the ground and twe piles of debris that roughly resemble shuttles. You do with them as you see fit. I suggest refitting at least one as soon as you to run shipments to and from the surface.”

  “But you disabled them, shouldn’t the Hawks be g them or something?”

  “That’s not how it works. Since we are still teically tracted to you until we return to STO space, everything we do is for your be. Even if we had returo STO spad came back, we wouldn’t cim these ships. Their transponders have been disabled or removed, meaning we could only use them for scrap. You, however, could use them as picket ships ihe system. I wouldn’t use them to patrol between here and STO spatil you get a legal transponder code for them though. The STO would shoot on sight.”

  As they he fi cells, Alexander heard yelling. “Ahe damion! Who did you sell us out to you useless sack of shit!” The yelling was followed by a wet thudding sound and they both picked up their pace.

  The se that greeted them was about what Alexander expected to see. Damien urple with rage and practically vibrating with barely strained violence. sidering the dition of the prisoner, it wasn’t as strained as maybe he wa to be. The man strapped to the chair had one eye swollen shut and a pretty badly cut-up lip. Blood dripped from Damien’s fist which was ched so tight it had turned white.

  “Damien!” Alexander yelled.

  The man whirled on him and looked like he was ready to throw pu Alexao his credit, he didn’t. “This piece of garbage nearly got everyone here killed. Are you going to stop me?”

  “How do you expect to get answers from him if you knock him senseless?” Alexander asked instead of answering the angry man’s question.

  “We should just put a bullet through his head and toss him with the rest of the trash.”

  “What would that aplish?” Matthews asked as he stepped around Alexander, earning Damien’s gre as well.

  “It would be one less piece of shit, wasting air.”

  “And we would be clueless if more pirates were on their way, wouldn’t we?” Alexander asked pointedly.

  The man ground his teeth together. “This bastard isn’t going to talk, but if you wanna waste your time, be my guest.”

  Alexander had been hoping to vince Mr. Holstein that they would let him go after he answered their questions. It was a long shot, and he k, but Damien’s words made that tactic impossible. He sighed internally aally prepared for what came .

  He walked over and crouched dowhan an inch from the bruised man’s face. Despite his predit, the man still flinched back at his approach. Alexander didn’t enjoy using his appearance like this, but he would use it to his advantage if he had to.

  Alexander used the little trick he learo warm up his exterior to keep Yulia fortable while in his arms. Only this time he sucked all the heat out of his hand, making it unfortably cold to the touch. Then he ran it along the man’s leg and up his side like he was iing a piece of beef at a market. The man yelped at the freezing cold toud tried to move away, but Alexander didn’t let him. Toug the individual responsible for so mahs made him feel disgusted. There was an urge to just smash the man’s fa and be doh it. He suppressed the urge, barely.

  He could uand how Damie. If they hadn’t threatened Yulia, he probably wouldn’t do something like this, but his anger hadn’t fully subsided after the attack. He was struggling to get a grasp on the first fully realized emotion he had felt since waking up. He didn’t t the blind rage he fell into back when Yulia was injured mostly because he lost plete trol back then.

  In the calmest, most emotionless voice Alexander could e up with, he spoke to the man. “You have two choices, Draveher of them is good. But one will end your suffering far faster thaher. Who did you sell us out to and why did you do it?”