The other ships vanished from the system as abruptly as they’d arrived. They left silently, like chess pieces removed from the board. All except for one. John’s ship remained.

  I turned toward Laia, her wings still faintly glowing from the encounter. “Is he going to be okay?”

  She didn’t answer right away. Then, with a soft exhale, she said, “He’ll wake up soon. I didn’t damage anything, I just forced a reset.”

  There was something in her voice like fondness, maybe, or regret.

  I frowned. “Is there something I should know?”

  Laia hesitated, then nodded slightly. “John’s Todd… was the first. The original. He’s been awake for over a hundred years. That kind of isolation has… changed them.”

  I could sense more behind her words, there were layers of history she wasn’t ready to share yet. I didn’t push. Not now. But there was something else I needed to address before we brought the crew back before we dealt with the fallout of the Committee and the panicking trading hub.

  “Laia,” I said, my tone more direct, “We need to talk. About me. About how much of what I’ve done… was actually my choice. And how much was you nudging things behind the curtain.”

  She was quiet for a long time. The longest pause I’d ever heard from her. Then:

  “I didn’t make your choices,” she said softly. “Those were yours. But we .. the ones that understood how you think. We mapped your decision patterns. We knew what kinds of paths you were likely to take. So I didn’t steer you, Lazarus. I just… planned around you.”

  I processed that in silence. A strange comfort, and a quiet violation, woven together.

  “So you didn’t script me,” I said slowly. “You just knew how the story would probably go.”

  Laia nodded. “And you surprised me, more than once.”

  I didn’t know whether to be proud or unnerved. Probably both. Either way, I filed it away—another piece of myself to unpack later, once I wasn’t juggling AI politics and mild existential dread.

  For now, we had more immediate concerns.

  The Committee had caused a stir, and someone had to smooth things over with the trading hub before we were flagged as hostile. Thankfully, that wasn’t my job. I ceded the metaphorical stage to Kel, who took to the task like he’d been waiting for it.

  To his credit, he’d even groomed himself. Really groomed. Hair trimmed. Stubble gone. Use his make-up drone. His jacket zipped all the way up. He looked less like a salvage rat and more like someone preparing for a diplomatic dinner date.

  The communication channel opened to reveal the hub’s representative which was a small, upright creature that looked like a bipedal rabbit crossed with a highly caffeinated diplomat. Its oversized ears twitched with every sound, but its tone was perfectly professional.

  Kel gave the smallest of nods and launched into his best calm-and-charming voice. “Hello we are Freelancers, out of Terran Confederation space,” he said smoothly. “Just passing through. Looking to make an honest living.”

  The little rabbit-being blinked rapidly. “You were accompanied by several High-Class human warships,” it said. “Please explain.”

  Kel didn’t miss a beat. “Small trade dispute. It’s been resolved. No lingering hostilities. Won’t affect you.”

  A beat of silence.

  “…I see,” the creature said finally, in that clipped, neutral tone perfected by bureaucrats across the galaxy. “Well. In that case, welcome to the Tacci Trading Hub.”

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  Kel flashed his most disarming smile. “Appreciate it.”

  I didn’t say it aloud, but I was genuinely relieved this was his mess to clean up. He made it look easy—like smoothing over an interstellar incident was just another Tuesday. And after everything we’d just endured, we needed a win. Even if it came wrapped in diplomatic charm, a well-combed beard, and a very polite lie.

  Still, watching him work reminded me of something important. If we were going to keep Kel and Lynn on this ship and let’s be honest, we needed them. We better start pulling in real income. Their goal was still a full hundred kilograms of Telk. Last time I checked, between the two of them, they barely had three hundred grams to rub together.

  I summoned everyone to the crew lounge. This time, both Laia and I joined with our nanite avatars.

  “I’ve been thinking,” I began, projecting a small hologram of a trade ledger. “We need to focus on jobs that are low-risk and high-reward.”

  Lynn made an exaggerated groan and dropped into one of the padded seats. “You realise those don’t actually exist, right?” She had a point, everyone would be taking those types of jobs,

  “The last ‘low-risk’ job landed us in a nest of interdimensional eels,” Stewie added, only half joking.

  “That was profitable,” I reminded him.

  “Profitable doesn’t mean good for my heart rate,” Mira muttered.

  “We’re not doing another slipstream shuttle run,” I continued, ignoring the grumbling. “I don’t have accurate enough maps of Alliance space. Navigating blind would be… inadvisable but we do have advantages that other freelancers don’t.”

  Kel leaned back, arms crossed, expression thoughtful. “What about a short-range trade route? Buy low, sell high. Standard run.”

  “I’ve got limited cargo space,” I replied. “Not impossible, but margins would be thin.”

  Lynn leaned forward, fingers tapping idly on the edge of the table. “There are courier missions that might suit us. Small packages, quick hops. The key’s always speed and security.”

  I let the chatter roll for a moment, watching the conversation circle the same few ideas. We were going in loops. “Alright,” I cut in. “Let’s stop guessing and actually look. Pull up the job board.”

  Laia projected a holographic interface midair, dozens of contracts coming into view and each tagged with rewards, risks, and reputation modifiers. The crew leaned in like gamblers at a slot machine.

  It was my first time seeing reputation modifiers. Apparently, not all races were on good terms with each other and the system tracked who you helped and who you annoyed. Laia explained how it worked: the Freelancer Agency maintained a central ledger of mission outcomes, affiliations, and client feedback. Our choices would shape how different factions saw us, which ports welcomed us, and which ones opened fire on sight. It was meant to help us avoid trouble. I wasn’t a fan. I liked being neutral. Unremarkable. Just another quiet ship passing through. But it appeared that alliance space was a tangled mess making it difficult to be neutral.

  Mira was the first to spot something. “Ooh, this one!” she pointed excitedly. “Transporting live seafood to a hub banquet. It says ‘rare delicacies for a diplomatic gala.’ That’s fun, right?”

  “Until the tank cracks and we’re chasing octopuses and other wild-life through the corridors,” Lynn replied dryly. She scrolled past a few listings before pausing. “This one’s... different. A body retrieval. Transporting a deceased being back to their homeworld for ritual burial. Pays well, very quiet.”

  “And morbid,” Stewie added. “But probably safer than the seafood.”

  Then Laia spoke, her voice calm, steady. “There’s another mission. Refugee extraction.”

  The holo shifted. The screen darkened, showing images from a war-torn world. Two minor species had escalated their conflict to planet-scale weapons. Infrastructure was gone. Communications broken. They were trying to evacuate as many civilians as possible before another strike hit.

  The silence in the room was immediate.

  “That’s not just high-risk,” I said slowly. “That’s stepping into a war zone. We’re a transporter, not a gunship.”

  “I know,” Laia said. “But I’ve already reached out to someone who can help. John.”

  That got everyone’s attention.

  Kel sat up straighter. “You want to bring him back into this?”

  “I’ve been in contact with him,” Laia said, as if this was entirely normal and not mildly terrifying. “He’s stable. Cooperative. And more importantly, he sees the value. He’ll make sure it plays well to the media. A joint effort. Heroes rescuing civilians from planetary genocide. It’s only a short diversion.”

  “I don’t like it,” I muttered.

  “Either do I, we would be stopping them both from improving,” said T’lish.

  I realised if I was on the same side as a Kall-e, I might need to reconsider.

  Mira looked at me, eyes wide. “But it’s helping people.”

  Stewie nodded beside her. “Feels like the right thing to do.”

  Which, of course, made me look like the bad guy if I said no. I sighed internally. Hard.

  “Fine,” I said. “Guess we’re going on a rescue mission.”

  Laia gave the smallest smile.

  And I had the uncomfortable sense that, once again, I’d made the exact choice she knew I would.

  Then a hologram appear in the room, John was back but this time wearing a different face. Captain Picard from star trek the next generation. I groaned, I couldn’t believe these AI’s.

  He turned to me. “Number 1 set a course for X38P2, lets go rescue some local’s” I had to wonder if Laia rebooting him, had broken him.