The Lost Voyager: A Space Opera Novel Read Online Free Page A

Mach said.
    “So,” Sanchez said, “you’ve taken on this job for us to go find out what happened?”
    “Exactly like that. I thought you’d enjoy the hunt for the ship,” Mach said.  
    The older hunter shrugged noncommittally. “Depends.”
    “On what the payment is,” Tulula, the vestan engineer, said, finally speaking up. The rest of the crew turned to face her, seemingly oblivious to her prior presence.  
    “Two million each,” Mach said. “If we wipe the data and locate the ship.”
    Adira made a low whistling noise. She looked up at Mach and fixed him with her glacial stare that he was never able to look away from. “That sounds like danger money,” the assassin said.  
    “Exactly that,” Mach agreed. “It’s a complete gamble, this one. We don’t know what happened to Voyager , but OreCorp is insanely rich and wants its toys back. So that’s what we’re going to do. Lassea, plot a course for the Noven system. Tulula, Babcock, Squid Two, I want you in engineering, preparing for a weeklong LightDrive jump.
    “What about us?” Sanchez said, pointing to himself then Adira with his thumb.
    “Weapons check; both ship-installed and personal. Whatever’s out there, it’s managed to maim an OreCorp exploration craft: that means it’s tough, and we’ll need to be on our toes.”
    With a series of shuffling chairs, salutes, and whispered gossip, the crew set about their orders. When Adira and Mach were left alone in the mess, Adira closed the door and pressed herself against him. “How dangerous is it?” she asked, whispering into his ear, her hot breath making his skin tingle.
    “Very,” he replied, wrapping his arms around her waist, pulling her closer to him so they were facing each other, their eyes just a few inches apart.  
    “So this might be the only chance we get,” Adira said.  
    “Better make the most of it.”
    “Exactly what I was thinking. Now shut the hell up, Captain, and kiss me.”
    That was one order Mach didn’t mind following.
    He was honest when he spoke about the danger levels. No one truly knew what was out there in deep space beyond the safety zone of the Salus Sphere. Mach didn’t relay OreCorp’s fear to the crew of what might have happened to Voyager , but whatever it was, Mach and his friends were going to have to face the same thing—and survive long enough to find the exploration craft.

Chapter Three

    Mach checked his smart-screen. It had been six days since they had left Fides Prime. They were just a single day’s L-jump away from hitting the Noven system and he’d still not told the crew their full mission.  
    They thought it was just a routine find-and-rescue job with a bit of data destruction bolted to the side. Easy in, easy out, everyone gets paid and a few months off. It’s not like he enjoyed withholding information from them; he’d rather tell them straight what they were expected to do, but he knew if he did that, there’d be squabbling over what they would do with the cargo once they had secured it from Voyager .  
    He stepped across his plush accommodation berth that also doubled as the captain’s operations room. He had smart-screens on three of the four walls, all sending him data and metrics about their journey and Intrepid ’s operational capacities.  
    Sitting on a stool, he yawned and stretched his arms above his head. A bone clicked in his neck, reminding him of an old injury he had suffered while fighting alongside Sanchez on a barren ice planet.  
    If it wasn’t for his old friend, Mach would have frozen to death and his body would have been a chewy snack to that particular world’s carnivorous flying lizards. Great things they were, with feathered wings and pointed snouts that carried teeth sharp and strong enough to strip flesh and tendon clean off the bone with the barest of efforts.  
    Through each screen he watched the video feeds sending him back images of the crew going about their business. It no longer felt