Dalted the struggling girl out of the cargo area and sealed the door behind him. Ideally, he would keep the girl with him in the cockpit, but she seemed like the sort that would do something stupid the momeook his eyes off her. He o trate on flying and keeping his eyes on Kane. So he dragged her to one of the rooms and threw her inside before log the door behind him. The lights flickered as he smmed the door. He frow that, he would o get that looked at whe back, small problems could quickly grow into big ones.

  With her locked up, he moved to the cockpit and checked the camera to make sure Kane ying he robot was seated oasis pod and looked to be in the same spot he had been when Dalto him.

  Seeing as his captive was behaving himself, he slid the log pin out of his pocket and pced it into the detonator. He tucked the devito a nearby holder for easy read started bringing the ship online.

  The shuttle trails likely meant Kane’s people were prepping the twates to follow him. Not that they could do anything uhey wao kill their meal ticket. And he already had a few random jumps plotted in case they tried following him out of the system.

  As the ship was ing online, Dalton pulled up his identifier program. When he had first id eyes on the girl, he thought she looked familiar. She could be reted to someohin the Anazi , she certainly had a simir look and he knew she was an orphan. He didn’t care if she was someone's lost kid or anything, but you never knew if there might be a reward for returning someone.

  The ser came up with a match before he evehe ground. Dalton ughed when he saw who the girl was reted to. The girl had ay pert match to a pirate crew he dealt with five or so years ago. They were skimming off the top and not paying their dues to Papa Anazi. The man didn’t like getting cheated and put out a hit on them.

  Dalton took the job, but the small reward wasn’t worth his normal effort. Sihe w of that traly required proof of death, he simply provided their location to the STO. The bad recorded their demise.

  The big man wasn’t happy with the liberties Dalton had taken with the job but he still paid out. “To think the STO got cold feet at killing the kid,” he smiled wryly.

  Well, the girl wasn’t worth anything, a pity. He would deliver Kane, and then sell her off to the sve market. At least then he could recoup a few credits.

  The ship shook as it exited the atmosphere. His sensors immediately picked up the twates. They were ing around from the North and heading his way. Going by the fshing warning in his dispy, both vessels had him locked.

  Dalton ighe warning and cut south of the ecliptic. He wouldn’t be able to outrun the ships, but if they were going to shoot at him, they would have done so by now. It was clear they weren’t sure what to do in this situation. Too bad for them, Dalton kly what to do.

  ***

  Alexander did his best to push down the rage and anger he felt. It wasn’t going to help him save Yulia ure out how to get out of this mess.

  Not long after the door closed, he came up with an idea. It wasn’t a very good idea, but it was the only one he could think of at the moment.

  It was easy to see the cameras in the cargo hold. Alexander did his best to hide his hands out of sight before he went to work. The tips of his fingers slid down the back of the stasis pod and trailed the cord. Power systems of the future were heavily ied with ma systems so they could alrovide and effit power for the very expensive systems that still o be plugged in. The one he plugged the pod into was no exception.

  His firailed into the e and soon an interface windoeared inside Alexander’s mindspace. He let out a small mental sigh of relief.

  He was banking on the fact that the ship's systems were all ied for his pn to work. If they were disected, he was going to o find another way to free Yulia. He quickly ran into a firewall with active defehat wasn’t something you would normally find on an ied power circuit. It did give him hope that he was on the right track though.

  Normally you want to deal with defensive systems as gently as possible to prevent them from going off. At least in his limited experience, and from what Lucas had told him, that seemed to be the case. Alexander wasn’t here to py hough. He shoved through the defenses and strahem before they could report their failure. The brute force method worked, but the power flickered ever so slightly. He froze, fearing he would hear a bang.

  He waited a full minute, but nothing happened, and nobody came to iigate. That didn’t mean he was out of the woods yet, though.

  Beyond the power system firewall were the ship's systems. He breathed an internal sigh of relief. His pn would work, but it would take time.

  He o split his focus as well. Alexaarted pulling in the camera feeds from throughout the ship. There were dozens of the damn things. It seemed like every inch of the ship was covered in cameras. He quickly found the ones for the bridge and the room Yulia had been locked inside.

  Yulia looked shaken up, but otherwise unhurt. She was screaming and throwing stuff around the room while trying to find anything that would help her get free but otherwise fine. While he appreciated her tenacity, he would have preferred her not to provoke the man with the detonator.

  The bastard that had taken her was watg a view of the hold, and running some sort of facial reition sear Yulia. When a opped up looking like an older version of Yulia, the man ughed.

  For the sed time today, Alexander pushed his mental processing speed up and the world slowed to a crawl. He used this time to s the ship for any traps as well as s all of Dalton’s archives. There were certainly some suspicious things in the ship's systems but he couldn’t tell what they were, only that they were ected to the ship's puter through some sort of outside link ihe ship that was separated from the puter work.

  Not wanting to risk whatever was at the end of those unknown es, Alexander used a portion of his mind to bloy signals to those es, effectively cutting them off. He used the rest of his enhanced processing time to s through that entire archive that Dalton seemed so amused about. What he saw disgusted him. It also firmed what he had feared when he saw the woman’s image through the camera feed. That was indeed Yulia’s mother, and Dalton had some hand in her death.

  He let his miurn to normal, his body putting off enough heat to waver the air around him just from the short time he used the ability. While this man’s crimes were many, he couldn’t focus on that at the moment though, he o save Yulia first, then deal with their captor.

  With another effort of will, Alexander modified the video output on the bridge camera, just to see if it ossible. It wasn’t easy but he was able to ge what was dispyed on the s.

  Smiling internally at that, Alexander made Yulia’s camera just show her sitting on the bed, gl at the door. Her antics were making it much more difficult to doctor the video, but he ma. It was just in time too. Their kidnapper switched the camera feed to her room.

  The man chuckled at the girl's mood before switg the camera back to the cargo bay.

  That was when Alexander cut in the loop for his video. He quickly looped the rest of the cameras before retrag his fingers and standing up. He somehow still had a e to view the feeds, but he couldn’t modify them anymore. He didn’t know how long his ges would st so he o hurry.

  He slid the mental windows off to the side and quietly made his way to the sealed hatch. The eleic lock had already been released before Alexander pulled out of the ship’s systems. He simply slid the door open and quietly made his way down the corridor.

  The man had closed the cockpit door but Alexander could hear Yulia screaming from ihe room. He really hoped that opening the door didn’t give them away.

  He waited a moment for her to quiet slightly before sliding open the door. She immediately turoward the door and threw something at him. Alexander caught the item and she squeaked in surprise but Alexander put his finger up in front of his avatar’s mouth before she mao call his name.

  She tried to run over and hug him but Alexander caught her. “We don’t have much time. Hold still while I see how to remove this device.”

  Yulia nodded and stood still.

  Alexander ied the thin colr. It looked like a simple device, but he could quickly tell that it had fail-safes to prevent its removal. Because of the simplicity of its design, he knew he could remove it.

  He slipped his fingers into the magiion. Once ected, he found the device required a stant radio signal or it would detonate. Alexander was gd nobody in the facility had tried disrupting the signal, it would have immediately set off the explosive. The signal wasn’t anything plicated, he could probably mimic it while toug the device. Despite the fact that Alexander’s body seemed to be able to ect to eleics remotely, as proven by the video feeds still active in his mind-space, Alexander didn’t want to mimic the signal, he wao remove the devid get Yulia to safety.

  He couldn’t simply pull the e apart either. The colr would detonate if the magiion was separated. It seemed more and more like the colr was never desigo be taken off o ut on someo was a barbaric piece of teology and spoke volumes for the type of people this kidnapper worked for.

  “Close your eyes,” he said quietly to Yulia.

  The girl nodded and closed her eyes. Not wasting a moment, Alexander magized his fingers as he pushed them iween the e. The e separated and he pulled the band off her neck before sliding the parts back together.

  He threw the colr across the room and hugged Yulia, who had opened her eyes halfway through him removing the colr. She seemed to uand the danger of the colr and her eyes were wide and filling with tears as she hugged him bad shook quietly.

  “Follow me, but stay quiet. I’m taking you to the cargo bay for safety.”

  Yulia nodded and Alexander led her to the cargo bay. He opened up the stasis pod a her inside. “I’m going to seal you in here. It will keep you safe. Whatever you do, don’t try to leave. I’ll be back before you know it.”

  She looked skeptically down at the box but gave a meek nod before lying down i. He sealed the stasis pod and tur on. There would be no attempt to get out of the box. For Yulia, it would seem like a quick dreamless sleep. Assuming the bastard who kidhem didn’t have the ship rigged to blow.

  He double-checked the straps that held the pod ihen stood. His friendly holographic face flickered off and Alexaormed toward the cockpit, letting the simmering rage he had been taining bubble over.

  ***

  Dalton was nearing his jump point when he realized the ship had gone quiet. He quickly checked the two cameras but found both of his visitors hadn’t moved. Something was off. The robot he could uand, but there was no ce the little girl had remained fuming in the same position for so long.

  He immediately reached for the detonator and jumped out of the seat just as the cockpit door flicked open as if it had never been locked. Without hesitation, he pressed his thumb ba the devid yahe pin out of the detonator. “If you take aep, I’ll blow her little head off, don’t think I won’t.”

  Dalton had maneuvered to the far side of the cockpit, keeping the chair and sole between him and the door.

  “I’ve already removed the device from around her neck. Your threat is meaningless,” the robot took aep into the room.

  “We’ll see if that’s true then I guess.” He released the detonator and there was a muffled whomp from somewhere in the ship. A depressurization arm went off shortly after that, but Dalton wasn't finished. “Let's see how long she survives without air.” He flicked a small button hidden behind the sole and the entire ship started to depressurize.

  Dalton’s hope was the robot would run to save his daughter instead to kill him and he could either lock them both in whatever room they were in or somehow recover this situation.

  The robot standing in the doorway didn’t even flinch at the venting atmosphere. It simply stormed into the small spad Dalton was forced to draw his ser pistol. The highly illegal on had cost him nearly as much as the optical array on his ship, but it was worth every credit because the beam was strong enough to punch through any armor short of a military ship. The shot would sg the on but his life was worth the one-off expense.

  The red beam glittered as it crossed the short space between him and the robot. It impacted the bck material, causing it to glow white hot. The point started to distort a before the trated heat caused by the beam seemed to dissipate harmlessly across the surface of the robot’s torso. As the battery pack began to spark ominously, Dalton knew he was a dead man. The beam had barely left a small melted pit in the robot.

  I desperate move, he threw the sparking aing on at the robot and tried dashing past its form. He had two more of the sers hidden in the ship, if he could just get to one, he might have a fighting ce.

  The robot snatched the pistol out of the air and used it as a club to bad him across the face.

  Dalton screamed as the hot metal hit his skin but he didn’t stop. He used the momentum to bounce off the wall and tinue his run down the corridor. If he couldn’t kill the robot, he could kill Kane.

  He only made it two more steps before a loal arm yanked him to a stop.

  Dalton gagged as his suit c into his throat. He could already feel himself getting lightheaded as the oxygen escaped the ship, but he simply hadn’t had the opportunity to seal his helmet.

  Before he could wonder what was going on, the visor slid closed on his helmet and his internal oxygen system kicked in.

  He sucked in air as he was lifted off the ground with ptuous ease. Kaurned him around. “Do you know why I didn’t run to save my daughter when you vehe ship? It’s because I already ensured she was safe and sound ihe stasis pod.” the bnk-faced robot said coldly.

  Dalton gave the robot a bnk look, not uanding at first. Then he realized what had happened. “You tricked me, you’re in a different stasis pod.”

  “No,” the robot said as it began carrying him down the corridor. “I’m very mu this ship.”

  “How?” Dalton demarying to uand how he had been duped. “A stasis pod only handle a single person at a time.” He khat from past experiences to shove more than one person in the devices to maximize spa trade runs. It never worked.

  The robot didn’t answer, and Dalton got a sinking suspi in his gut. “You’re in the robot!”

  The robot or he supposed, Kane, didn’t answer, but it did turn to him. “Tell me who hired you.”

  Dalton ughed. “It doesn’t matter. You’re a dead man even if I fail. The sooner you realize that, the better. Let me go, and e quietly or I promise you the attempt won’t be nearly as nice.”

  Kane used his free hand to grab into his arm and Dalton screamed as his bone shattered uhe powerful grip.

  “WHO HIRED YOU!”

  Dalton knew he was dead, and he didn’t much care about his employer. He already had a tingen pce to go to Harlow in case of his death. Let the two bastards slug it out, maybe they would kill each other. “Harlow Anazi. Now kill me and be doh it,” he spat inside his helmet.

  “You think you deserve a quick death after what you put my daughter through? I don’t think so.” The horrible robot broke Dalton’s other arm, before yanking him around and disabling his gas jets.

  Dalton screamed as he was dragged to the cargo bay. The robot opehe ramp and carried him to the edge. Through their physical e, Dalton could hear the robot's words. “I had time to review some of your footage. This seems like a fitting end for someone like you. What was it you liked saying? Oh yeah. You’ll have plenty of time to refle your as.” With a toss, Dalton was thrown free of the ship.

  He switched between mad ughter and cursing Kah every breath as he tumbled farther and farther from his ship. With any luck, he would use up his oxygen faster this way.

  It wouldn’t matter, he would still get the st ugh when his ship exploded after it could no longer detect his life signs. This was another little tingency he had io screw anyone who tried to screw him over.

  He waited, and waited, the ship getting further and further away. When it was no more than a tiny spec as he rotated around, he realized his retribution had been deo him. For the first time since he could remember, Dalto an actual emotion.