“Thanks for doing that,” Sierra said from where she sat crouched on the floor beside the nav station.
Jeth cleared his throat. “No problem.”
Flynn crawled out from underneath the nav station. “You did a good job, Boss. You voiced the fairy godmother perfectly. Sounded just like I always imagined she would.” Flynn batted his eyelashes.
Jeth glared, but before he could say something back, Lizzie shouted, “Done!”
Jeth gave Cora an encouraging push and she slid off his lap, her attention once more centering on Viggo, who was rolling a screw across the floor with his paws.
Jeth stood up from the comm station chair and stretched. “About time. So, we good to dock now?”
“Uh-huh. I’ll head over and start working on detaching the Donerail’s nav,” said Lizzie.
“And I’m coming with you,” said Jeth.
Sierra fixed her gaze on him. “So am I.”
Of course you are. Jeth did an inward eye roll. He wondered if she suspected his motives for wanting to go over there. He had a feeling she was one of those people who were super smart and clever. Shame. Super smart and gullible would’ve worked out a lot better for him.
“It’s not necessary,” he said. “Lizzie and I can manage.”
Sierra shot him a skeptical look. “Maybe so, but I’m more familiar with the ship and will probably be of more help.”
“She’s got a point, Jeth,” Lizzie said, grinning. “You’re better at breaking things than fixing them.”
Jeth glared at her. Not helping, he tried to say with his eyes, but Lizzie failed to notice.
Flynn raised his hand. “I second that motion. It’s important to do the thing right and with no breakage.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Jeth muttered.
“You’re the one who divvied up the work assignments,” said Flynn, his tone scathing.
Jeth ignored the comment. Flynn was just irritated that Jeth had insisted Lizzie handle the job of unhooking the Donerail’s nav system. He’d wanted to do it himself. Jeth had his reasons though. Lizzie knew enough about wiring and hardware to manage it, and of the two of them, she was less likely to be rattled by the body stuck in the wall. Or at least, he could count on her to keep quiet about it and not upset the rest of the crew.
“I’ll ask Vince to come up and take over for me,” Sierra said to Flynn. “He’s not doing anything important right now anyway.”
No, he wasn’t. Last time Jeth checked, he, Shady, and Celeste were playing Robot Revenge 7 on the gaming console in the common room. Must be nice sometimes not to be in charge.
“Better him than Shady,” Flynn said, then disappeared underneath the station again.
Jeth flashed an appreciative grin at Sierra. She had a knack for smoothing things over.
Sierra smiled back, once again stunning him with the way it transformed her face from pretty to beautiful. “Come on, Cora,” Sierra said, holding out her hand. “Let’s go find Vince.”
“Meet us down in the common room,” Lizzie said. “I’m going to throw on some warmer clothes before we go.”
Relieved the time had finally come, Jeth waited a moment after the others had left before heading down to the passenger deck himself. He double-checked no one was watching and then slipped into Lizzie’s cabin.
“Hey!” she shouted, as she struggled to pull down a heavy shirt over the rest of her clothes. “How about knocking next time?”
Jeth shrugged. “Why? Not like you might have a boy in here.” He frowned, realizing the joke wasn’t as funny as he’d intended. If she ever did have a boy in here, Jeth would have to kill him.
Lizzie stuck out her tongue. “No, but I might’ve been naked. Ever think of that?”
Jeth scrunched up his nose. There were some topics you should never discuss with your older brother.
“So what do you want, anyways?” Lizzie said, hurrying on.
He stepped closer to her, lowering his voice. “This data cell that Sierra’s got hidden, how difficult do you think it would be to make a copy?”
“Well, it depends. If it’s encrypted it could take me an hour just to access the data. If it’s not, shouldn’t be more than a couple minutes.”
“So we have the equipment on board to do it?”
“Sure.” Lizzie walked over to the desk in the corner and opened a drawer. She pulled out a small rectangular object that Jeth vaguely recognized. She handed it to him. “That cell there should be big enough to hold all the data, and Avalon’s got a couple programs for running a copy.”
Jeth shook his head, amazed by Lizzie’s resourcefulness.
“So, whatcha planning?”
“I want to make a copy of the Aether Project.”
She gave him a withering look. “Put that one together for myself, thanks. But why?”
“To use as leverage.”
She frowned. “On who?”
“Hammer. You heard what that guy Renford said. Hammer might not go through with selling me Avalon. Not if he thinks we’re too important to him.”
A knowing expression crossed Lizzie’s face, and she nodded. So she had thought about it, too. Jeth wasn’t surprised. She might be an optimist at heart, but she’d grown up the same way he had, in a world with few illusions of safety or a certain future.
“I take it you want to make this copy without Sierra knowing about it?”
Jeth ran a hand through his hair, not meeting his sister’s eyes. “Don’t see any way around it.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right.” She sighed. “Still, I hate deceiving her. She and Vince seem really nice. And Cora’s a sweetie.”
“Yeah, she is,” Jeth said, guilt making him antsy. It had to be done, though. He had to do what was best for him and his crew. Taking care of them was his job. His life. “Anyway, do you have any tools or equipment that might help me figure out where Sierra’s got it hidden?”
Lizzie snorted. “You’re kidding, right?”
“What?”
“It’s a data cell, Jeth. You know, just like that one. All it does is hold data. It doesn’t emit any kind of signal or pulse.”
Jeth huffed, disappointed. This was going to be a lot harder than he thought.
“No worries,” Lizzie said, winking. “We’ll just have to steal the data cell once she shows it to us. She’s going to have to sooner or later. Fortunately, we are the best gang of thieves in the galaxy. Should be easy, right?”
“Right.” Jeth’s heartbeat quickened, his grip on the empty data cell tightening. One last con. That was all. Then he would finally be free.
CHAPTER
16
TEN MINUTES LATER, JETH PARKED SPARKY INSIDE THE Donerail’s narrow shuttle compartment, and he, Lizzie, and Sierra stepped out into the cargo bay.
Lizzie whistled, surveying the damage. “You weren’t kidding.”
“Not at all,” Sierra said, leading the way across the room to the ladder.
“And you’ve no idea what caused this?” Lizzie said as she followed after her.
“Nope. Happened here just like it did on Avalon.”
“Yeah, only worse.”
They headed out of the cargo bay and down the passenger deck. Fortunately, Lizzie didn’t say anything as they passed the body stuck in the wall. Jeth had warned her about it beforehand, but he guessed her lack of comment was because it genuinely frightened her. The only time Lizzie ever got quiet was when she was scared. But, as predicted, she didn’t freak out.
When they arrived on the bridge, Lizzie let out a sigh. For the most part, the place looked normal, albeit in disarray, with holes scattered through most of the chairs and several of the control panels torn in half, but no random body parts.