"Ghosts," I say again. "Definitely ghosts."
Kaspar lets out a pained sigh.
"It's not ghosts, you noodle-brained idiot," Straik snaps. "Ghosts don't exist. Someone's on board that ship or it's been abandoned. Either way, I need to get there and recover her. That is my family's legacy."
"Why do you care so much about your family's legacy if they kicked you out?"
Straik glares. "No one kicked me out. We had a disagreement or two. That's all."
Kaspar coughs into his hand. "Not what I heard."
Mathiras glares at both of us.
Why does he care so much about his family's legacy? It hits me and I laugh. "You want to buy your way back into their good graces, don't you? That's what this is. You don't give a keffing flip about what's on that ship, you just want to show Mommy and Daddy that you're a good son and you can be invited back to Homeworld again."
"Someone shut him up." Straik rubs a hand over his face. "His constant nattering is giving me a headache." He gestures at the screen. "Besides, it could be a trap."
I snort. "Are you kidding? It's most LIKELY a trap." Glancing between my two brothers, I continue. "How many times have we chased a distress signal only to find that it's more pirates waiting on the other end?"
"Dozens," Kaspar admits. "But that just means more people to rob. More credits for all of us."
Mathiras gives him a dirty look. "Here's the thing. I know it seems too good to be true. After weeks of searching every nook and cranny of this keffing end of the universe, it doesn't make sense to find her just sitting so quietly out here. It sounds like a trap for sure." He glances at the map and then touches a portion of it again. "Here's the thing, though. It could very well be a distress signal. Look at how close it is to the ice belt. Now, compare this map to one that's ten years old." He flicks through a few images on the screen and then lines the two up next to one another. "The ice belt is moving in rotation, no doubt being pushed along by the force of the other planets." He gestures at a point on the map. "The distress signal is coming from here."
"Right in the path of the ice belt."
He nods, a thoughtful look on his face. "If they get swallowed up, it's going to be a constant barrage of comets and asteroids hitting the craft. It'd tear anything stationary to shreds in a short matter of time. That could be why they're sending out a distress signal instead of just leaving the area. Maybe they can't. Maybe their engines died and they're just floating and waiting for rescue." He pauses. "Or…it's a trap."
"I know which one I think it is," Kaspar says, grinning. He cracks his knuckles again. "But if it's a trap, there'll be more than just one ship. And that means more for us to take home."
"We can definitely make our fortunes," Mathiras admits, and he's got a smile on his face. At Straik's scowl, he adds, "Or at least sixty percent of a fortune."
"The Buoyant Star was the largest cargo ship of the va'Rin fleet," Lord Straik says, crossing his arms. "Whatever cargo it has on it, it should belong to my family."
"Except the laws of salvage declare that whoever finds it at this point gets to keep it," I point out. Even I know that. “You get forty percent. Not more."
The mesakkah lord turns and glares at the screen, a pensive look on his face. "We'll see."
7
JADE
I'm fast asleep in my room when Alice wakes me up, shaking my shoulder. There's a look of worry in her big eyes, and her heart-shaped face is lit up with a mixture of excitement and fear.
I know that look, and I sit up the moment I see it. "A ship?"
"A ship," she agrees. "A big one."
"I'll get dressed. Get the others and have them come to the bridge?"
"I'm on it, cap," Alice says in a jaunty voice, racing away again before I can chide her for the “cap” crack. She always calls me that and it drives me crazy. I'm the oldest of our small group, so I'm unofficially in charge. But just like Alice, I was a slave brought on ship. And just like Alice, I was a slave left behind when the others abandoned us. That doesn't make me captain of anything.
I shove my legs into a pair of pants and throw on a wrap-shirt that Ruth made out of discarded uniforms, and then I race toward the bridge to meet the others. My hair's a mess, but it can wait a little. I need to see what the situation is first. I race down the silent, empty halls of the Buoyant Star, my bare feet slapping as they hit the ground. When we were first left behind, I found the ship creepy. It was so deserted and empty it felt like a tomb. But after three years of this, it no longer bugs me.