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duties.”
    â€œSo, you believe us now?” said Amira. “Now that Ash has confirmed what we’re saying?”
    â€œI believe we’ve got a remarkable coincidence here,” growled Commander Ferguson.
    â€œHow do you mean?” said George. He thought he saw what the Commander was getting at, but even thinking about it made his stomach do somersaults.
    â€œI mean,” said the Commander, looming over the three students, “that every last member of my crew was selected for duty by me, personally. Every last member of my crew is a highly trained expert in their field, loyal to me and to MegaZone Corporation. I cannot and will not believe that one of them would not only destroy our work here but also cause the deaths of many of their fellow scientists. If there is a saboteur loose on this station, then they’re an outsider. And guess what? I have three outsiders standing right in front of me now.”
    â€œYou can’t think one of us did it?” gasped Josh.
    â€œWhy not?” said the Commander. “You’re all top of the class in Science, aren’t you? You’ve all studied how this station works. The three of you could easily have set that reactor to overload.”
    â€œBut why?” cried Amira. “What possible reason could we have?”
    â€œOh, I think there’s a very obvious reason,” said the Commander in a low voice. “I’ve already had to question your loyalty once today.”
    Ash took a step forward. “Those caps,” he said. “MaxiBoost baseball caps. Could these kids be spies for MaxiBoost?”
    â€œWhat?” cried George. “Spies who wear the logo of who they’re spying for? Don’t be daft!”
    â€œIt could be some sort of bluff,” said the Commander. “A feeble attempt to divert suspicion. Here’s that remarkable coincidence I mentioned: Fact one, outsiders arrive; fact two, only outsiders would sabotage this station; fact three, within a couple of hours of outsiders arriving, this station has been sabotaged. Do you follow my logic?”
    â€œY-yes,” stammered George, a feeling of terror sending icy shivers up his spine. “But we didn’t do it! Why would we sabotage the station and then tell you about it?”
    Ash ignored him and turned to the Commander. “It would make sense for them to be spies, sir,” he said. “MaxiBoost tried all kinds of underhand tricks during the company wars. They certainly wouldn’t hesitate to use kids as spies. They could send them on board, undercover, posing as school trippers. Then they could secretly sabotage the station and we’d be forced to call in a rescue shuttle. A MaxiBoostrescue shuttle. The station would be disabled, and MegaZone Corporation would get blamed for running things badly, maybe even lose the contract to build in space. Meanwhile, the undetected saboteurs could simply sneak away on the rescue shuttle along with the remains of the station crew.”
    â€œThat’s not how it is!” cried Amira. “We’re not spies for anyone!”
    The Commander loomed over them. “Are you trying to ruin me? Were you sent here to wreck my career? Were you?”
    â€œNo, we swear!” said Josh.
    â€œWell, there’s a sure way to find out,” said Ash. “I can run a DNA spectrum test on the reactor’s control panels. That’ll tell us exactly who’s been near those controls in the last twenty-four hours.”
    â€œGet to it, Ash,” barked the Commander.
    â€œHow can they tell that?” hissed Josh to George and Amira.
    Amira leaned towards him to whisper her answer. “DNA is your genes, the biological recipe that’s in every cell of your body. If someone handles something, or even stands beside it, microscopic bits of skin, and hair, and stuff from your hands, all kindsof things, end up on and around where you’ve been. Using the right