Chapter 13

“Alexa,” Kayden said, sitting in the captains chair, with Rina in the pilot seat, Ayumi in the co-pilot seat, and the rest of his crew standing behind him. “Please go over everything that has happened. We need to make sure we all are on the same page. Start from the beginning.”

“Affirmative, Captain,” Alexa’s calm voice filled the bridge. “Mission log, Stardust Drifter, Captain Kayden. It began on Neo-Olamen. An SGC operative named ‘Kimmy’ embedded herself in your life for a period of three months, during which she engaged in a sexual relationship with you in order to gain your trust. Her objective was the retrieval of your medallion, which she successfully stole before revealing herself and severing contact. This event served as the catalyst for our current trajectory. Your first actionable lead was Ayumi. You located her at a brothel in the Neo-Olamen underlevels, owned by a man named Silus. She had been a trained SGC asset, recruited on her eighteenth birthday, who was discarded and sold after a mission went wrong and left her physically scarred. You purchased her freedom, and she agreed to help you track the SGC in exchange for a chance at revenge. She is, by your own designation, our intelligence officer, and the most important person on this ship besides yourself. I was recovered from a storage unit belonging to Ayumi’s father shortly after. My origins remain somewhat unclear, though I have speculated that her father may have purchased me as a surrogate for purposes I will not elaborate on again, as Ayumi found my initial analysis distressing.”

“Thank you, Alexa.” Ayumi said softly.

“You then assembled the crew.” Alexa continued. “Zlara, your longtime confidante from the Dark Nebula Bar, joined as our medic and chef. Clessa was recruited from a junkyard on Neo-Olamen, where she had been surviving alone with her rat, Rusty. Rina was recruited as our pilot, though she initially refused until circumstances changed. Zynphoria, a Phanso, essentially a ghost, was taken on as our ship sensor and advisor. You purchased the Stardust Drifter from Jelicia, spending nearly all of your remaining credits in the process. Our method of tracking the SGC has been unconventional. Ayumi’s only navigational data consisted of her memories of planets she observed through a viewport while being transported to Neo-Olamen aboard an SGC vessel called the Obsidian Serpent. She recalled a sequence of visually distinct planets: a deep blue one, an orange one, a green one, a crimson red one, and finally a pink one. We followed these waypoints in reverse, retracing the Obsidian Serpent’s route. The trail led us to two pink planets: Peptos 3, an industrial mining colony, and Rosalia, a tropical pleasure planet. On Peptos 3, we accessed Port Authority records with the assistance of a clerk and confirmed that the Obsidian Serpent, registered to SGC Inc., had docked there during the same window Ayumi was transported. The data also revealed that the ship had previously stopped on Rosalia, though the full flight records had been partially corrupted, as if someone attempted to delete them. We then traveled to Rosalia. Upon arrival, we discovered the Port Authority was closed for a three-day weekend. We were offered complimentary resort passes to the Pink Pearl Resort during the wait. During this time, you made contact with a girl named Lira, who subsequently revealed herself to be SGC Agent-46, assigned to monitor you. She confirmed that no other SGC operatives were present on Rosalia and chose not to report our presence, though her motivations remain questionable. I assessed the probability of her sincerity at twenty-three point seven percent, though your gut instinct has a historical accuracy rate of sixty-eight point four percent. When the weekend concluded, the information and orientation robot designated 2102 delivered the Port Authority log data to us on a portable data slate. The records indicated that the Obsidian Serpent had landed on Rosalia after experiencing a gas leak on board, which rendered the crew unconscious. The ship auto-piloted to Rosalia, where the crew was revived and the faulty valve was repaired before they continued on their way. This explains both the unplanned stop on Rosalia and the subsequent need to refuel on Peptos 3 before continuing to Neo-Olamen. It also likely explains the chemical sedation of Ayumi and her missing memories of the planet, the gas leak affecting her as well. This data has led us to our current heading: Sloo-gata. The Obsidian Serpent’s flight logs confirmed that Sloo-gata was the first location the ship visited before arriving on Rosalia. Sloo-gata is, to put it in clinical terms, one large planet comprised almost entirely of dance clubs and brothels. It is a lawless world with no background checks, no identification required, no questions asked. It is the ideal environment for an organization like the SGC to operate a recruitment pipeline, targeting vulnerable young girls like Ayumi and Lira. Ayumi herself confirmed that after her parents removed her from their lives, she worked at a dance club on Neo-Olamen called the Satin Pocket, where a man eventually offered her a higher-paying opportunity on another planet. That planet was Sloo-gata, where she danced and performed sexual services before an SGC recruiter identified and recruited her. If the SGC has a base of operations in this sector, Sloo-gata is the most logical location. Rina has expressed a desire to, and I quote, ‘burn the whole damn planet to the ground.’ While I do not endorse indiscriminate planetary destruction, I do concur that dismantling Sloo-gata’s infrastructure would likely disrupt a significant portion of the SGC’s local recruitment pipeline for the next five to seven years. To summarize our current mission status: we are searching for the SGC’s base of operations, the whereabouts of the Obsidian Serpent, and your stolen medallion. We have successfully retraced five planetary waypoints from Ayumi’s memory. We have identified the SGC vessel by name. We have made contact with one active SGC agent who chose to let us pass. And you have spent approximately fourteen percent of your waking hours having sex, compared to two point one percent on mission-related activities.”

“Thank you Alexa. Though we didn’t need to include that last part.” Kayden said, rubbing the back of his neck, while Clessa giggled behind him.

“My apologies, Captain. I have concluded my report.” Alexa stated.

“So, Sloo-gata.” Rina said, her fingers flying across the pilot’s console. “ETA is twenty-six hours. I can’t wait to see what this dump has in store for us.”

“I bet the planet use to be wonderful before the SGC moved in.” Clessa added.

“They likely moved in because it was already a lawless cesspit, which allowed them to operate with minimal interference.” Zlara stated.

“The SGC doesn’t move in, they become the law. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” Kayden said. “Our job is to get in, gather information, and get done what we need to without being detected. We’ll be outnumbered and outgunned if we try to start a war. We are tourists here.” He added. “And we’re going to find that base, we’re going to find that ship, and we’re going to find Kimmy. Then we’re going to burn it all to the ground.”

“Aye-aye, Captain,” Clessa chirped, her amber eyes gleaming with excitement.

“I’ll start prepping the med-bay for whatever we run into,” Zlara said. “And the kitchen. You lot fight better when you’re fed, and I’m not letting anyone go into that shithole on an empty stomach.”

“I will begin compiling a comprehensive file on all known SGC operatives, their known associates, and their preferred operating procedures on worlds similar to Sloo-gata.” Alexa said, her already processing the request. “I will also begin a deep scan of all public and private networks for any chatter or mentions of the Obsidian Serpent.”