9
Mia, Battleship Resolution, Personal Quarters
I was expected to sleep.It was actually required. I agreed, in theory. But the mission had been laid out and they expected us to just shut off all the plans, all the anxiety that went with something so dangerous, and sleep? And that was just the mission. That didn’t even take into account the rest.
General Jennix expected me to go to the moon base and disarm the Dark Fleet controls by hacking in from the Phantom after my pair bond was arrested and thrown in the brig? For being a cheater?
I laid in bed staring up at the ceiling. Willing myself to wind down and sleep. It wasn’t happening. The sheets were a tangle around my legs, and I turned onto my side. Stared at the wall. What was I going to do without Kass in the pilot seat? Could I even hack and take down the force field over Xenon? Was I even qualified? What if I failed? What if I actually couldn’t do it and Kass had done things to the training program to make me succeed?
I now questioned everything I’d done in the game. Because everything I’d done had been with Kass.
Had he been using me?
Scheisse.
Everyone was counting on me. On us, whoever the other half of the new MCS pair was.
Us was supposed to be me and Kass. But now I had no idea what was real and what wasn’t.
I paused, thought about what was real.
Kass had admitted he’d hacked his way into the Starfighter program. That was fact. Sponder hated him. From what Kass had said, for a long time. When I’d first arrived on the battleship, Sponder was there. Waiting. He’d discovered Kass’s shift to the MCS group while Kass had been on Earth. Sponder hadn’t mentioned cheating then. He must’ve had someone look into it after that. But why? Jennix had been the one to tell Sponder off, not Kass. I’d even sassed him. Sponder didn’t like to be humiliated. That was fact, too.
Why was Sponder such a dick? Had he always been one, or just to Kass?
Kass was cocky. He bent the rules. Literally flew by the seat of his pants. Hacking into the Starfighter Training Academy and adding himself as a potential match wasn’t the end of the world. Jennix didn’t even seem to care.
But cheating? Humans and Velerions had similar notions of honor.
Kass was rebellious, without doubt. But a cheat? A liar? Something just wasn’t right.
If Jennix wanted me to sleep, too bad. I climbed from the bed, threw on some clothes. A glance at the clock told me well over an hour had passed as my brain churned. Yeah, I’d rested.
Now it was time to get to work. If Kass had broken into the system, there would be a path to follow, data and records showing him adding himself to the training program. Invisible bread crumbs of sorts. I’d find them. I’d also find out exactly how he had cheated.
If Sponder had found it, I definitely could. And why had Sponder wasted time looking? The IPBMs were a huge problem. Everyone was working around the clock to deal with the issue. So why was Sponder so focused instead on Kass? A cheater was bad news, sure. But shouldn’t Sponder be focused on the most crucial issue of saving his planet?
And why would he pull in that old guy? The commissioner. Sponder knew about the mission. He was the leader of Group Two. Yet he’d left his base and those under his command to deal with Kass instead. Here on the Resolution.
There were answers here, and I was going to find them. Kass had showed me that the main computer controls were in the wall. But there was a portable unit, like a laptop, that could be pulled from it to work more efficiently. I took it from the small docking station beneath the comm display and went to the couch. Setting it on the low table before me, I got to work.
This was my element. A comms screen, a keyboard, and access to data. Lots of data. I began to work my way through it, starting with the basic bio on Kass. When his smiling face came up on the screen, I ached for him. My body, sure, but my heart, too. When I’d accepted him as a pair bond, I hadn’t known he was real. I’d thought him part of a game.
I’d loved him. Even then. But now? Now I followed the trail. Dug back to the day I’d started the game, when I’d chosen Kass by answering a partner questionnaire. I found his access even before then. His acceptance into the program. He’d been waiting.
It showed it wasn’t me specifically he’d targeted. He was one of a long list of matches. It was my random data that matched to his. Statistically it was almost impossible for us to have been put together. But we had.
Then I searched our training data. The scores at each level.
I stilled. Froze.
There it was. The original scores. The modified ones. The edits to the game code that made each level easier. Shorter. Gave additional lives. Points. All the advantages we’d need to win.
Scheisse. He’d cheated. It was all right there.
I leaned back on the couch. It was true. Sponder wasn’t lying.
God, I hated Kass. I loved him, but I hated him for it. He’d made me believe. Made me think I was different. Special. Important.