Arkadian Skies: Fallen Empire, Book 6 Read Online Free Page A

a bodyguard-like manner.
    An android in a white uniform that Alisa did not recognize walked in, followed by two men and a woman in similar attire, each carrying various inspection tools. One man also held a triangular drone bedecked in sensing equipment. The patrollers appeared less intimidating than soldiers, with the men possessing potbellies and unshaven jaws. The woman’s hair was down in a loose braid. Definitely not regulation, at least for the Alliance army, but Alisa did not know the rules for the planet patrol. All four of the agents wore recent-model white earstars.
    “Your uniforms have changed since the last time I saw them,” Alisa said by way of greeting, assuming the leader was the bland-faced Delta Five.
    The android was looking Leonidas over. Alisa wished he had done as she asked and hidden. She tried not to fidget, but she couldn’t help but worry that Delta Five had already seen through his disguise and identified him. An android would have a brain full of storage drives and databases rather than measly cells capable of forgetting things. And since Leonidas had changed out of his combat armor, he would have a harder time battling one, if it came to that.
    “The Arkadius Planet Patrol has been outsourced to a civilian security corporation,” Delta Five informed her, taking in Abelardus without comment, then finally facing Alisa. “You are the captain? Captain… Stokes?”
    “I am,” Alisa said, trying to decide if that pause indicated disbelief. Did androids pause for dramatic effect? “You have my permission to begin your search.”
    “Ah,” the android said, and she doubted he had been worried about receiving her permission.
    Delta Five waved for the team to spread out. The woman strode toward engineering with some kind of detector on a telescoping stick. One man walked around the cargo hold and the other headed toward the steps. Before he reached them, he tapped a button on the drone and tossed it into the air. It hovered for a moment, then buzzed off, zipping from strut to post to bulkhead like a sugar-filled toddler on a playground.
    Alisa avoided glancing toward the cubby. The space was designed to look like there wasn’t anything there, and the door had elements in it that were supposed to interfere with sensors, but it had also been created back when her mother had captained the ship, perhaps long before. Who knew how well it held up to modern equipment?
    “Abelardus,” Alisa murmured once the android walked up the stairs to join his other man and ought to be out of earshot, even enhanced earshot. “Why don’t you follow the woman with the detector and see if you can convince her that her readouts are extremely boring?”
    “What if she finds me fascinating?” He wriggled his eyebrows, as if Alisa might be bothered by the idea of some other woman being interested in him.
    “So long as she’s not paying attention to those readouts,” she said. Having him use his abilities to mentally coerce people to do things bothered her, but it seemed wise in this case.
    As Abelardus turned toward engineering, a new idea popped into Alisa’s head.
    “Wait,” she added, “can you tell me if anyone else is aboard their ship? Or did they bring everyone except the pilot over to search?”
    He tilted his head, squinting toward the bulkhead. “Actually, there’s not even a pilot there. Looks like an automated system.”
    Alisa usually would have curled her lip at such a thought, even if there was no reason an automated system wasn’t fine for orbital flight, but in this case, she found the news good.
    “No other androids?” she asked.
    “I don’t think so. Those are harder to detect.”
    “All right, good. Thank you.” She waved for Abelardus to continue to engineering. “Leonidas—”
    He lifted his chin. “I will stay with you.”
    “I may have something more interesting for you to do. I’m going to follow them up top to monitor the android and see who he questions.” Alisa