The Lost Ship of the Tucker Rebellion - Marie Sexton

Chapter One

Floating in a forgotten pocket of space, Denver Clayborne crawled carefully over the drifting, abandoned hull of a gutted Li’Vin destroyer and marveled for the thousandth time that working in the vast coldness of space could be so unbearably bloody hot. It was one of the more annoying ironies of his job. Outside of his suit, a vacuum that could freeze him in an instant. Inside his suit, his own body heat was his worst enemy.

He had only himself to blame. His suit came equipped with a cooling system, but the low-battery warning had forced him to switch it off; he hadn’t had time for a full solar recharge in weeks. And the work itself only made matters worse. Making his way inch by inch in near darkness over shards of metal sharp enough to pierce his suit kept his heart rate and blood pressure a bit higher than normal, both of which served to keep his body temperature up, thereby making him miserable.

He stopped, clinging with aching fingers to a torn scrap of metal where the hull had breached. He wished he could wipe the sweat from his eyes. He settled for shaking his head like a dog in one of the old films from Earth. It didn’t do much good.

“Denver.” Marit’s voice cut through the speaker next to his right ear. “Why are you stopping now? You don’t have much air left.”

Like he needed her to tell him that. He was aware of the gauge in the lower-right corner of his field of vision, telling him how much oxygen he had left in his tank, just like he was aware of how badly they needed this haul. They were low on fuel, low on food, low on the drugs needed for his brother Laramie’s treatment, and so they’d come here, to the wreckage of one of the first battles in an ancient war, in search of something they could salvage. The ships themselves were worthless. The metal alloy used by the Li’Vin was abundant, but annoyingly hard to work with, which was why nobody had picked these over yet. But for a man with patience, and the right tools—or, for somebody who was truly desperate—there were still little bits of treasure to be found. Denver pried open hatches and control panels, picking the bones bare. A half inch of copper wire here, a bit of gold or platinum plating there, counting the credits in his head as he went, trying to decide how much more he needed to keep his brother alive one more month.

“Denver,” Marit said again. “Either come back to the ship, or get moving.”

He resisted the urge to sigh. It would only fog up his faceplate. “I hope you’re enjoying yourself, sitting in the cockpit, drinking moonshine.”

“It’s coffee. And it’s delicious.”

“Don’t rub it in.” Denver looked around, judging how much farther he could get on his oxygen. The distant sunlight reflecting off Saturn’s rings barely illuminated the ship’s hull. Up ahead, the robotic spider controlled by OPAL picked its way almost daintily across jagged, charred metal. In theory, she was filling her storage compartment with tradable goods. In reality, Denver never knew what he’d find when he got her back to the Jiminy. Once, she’d picked up nothing but a cache of space dust.

“OPAL’s already covered most of the top,” Marit said, her voice riddled with static. “Swing around that corner on your left. I think I see a hatch there. You should have enough air left to clean that out before heading back.”

“Roger that.”

He did as he was told, moving slowly, making sure the magnetic toes of his boots had a good grip on the hull before moving, checking for razor-sharp protrusions along the way. The hatch was there, just as Marit said it would be—a square of metal approximately ten centimeters on each side.

“See it?” Marit asked.

“Yep,” he said. “No problem.” He reached for his screwdriver to pry it open. “Just give me a minute to—”

“Oh shit.”

Denver froze. He could tell by her voice something was wrong. “What?” He whipped his head around, looking for whatever it was that had alarmed her. Another ship? Maybe pirates, or a galactic patrol?

“Tracers.”

His heart slammed into high gear. This was far worse than being short on air. “Where?”

“Coming around the hull below you. They’re heading right at you. Move, move, move!”

“Where the hell am I supposed to go?” But even as he asked it, he was climbing the only way he could—up and forward, going as