"I said I needed the sonic wrench!" Cassie called from underneath the heater, holding out the completely normal battered wrench that Danny had just handed her.

  He took the heavy tool back from her. She looked up at the partially dissembled internals of the machine as she waited patiently for him to bring her the correct item. It was just as disorganized as everything else, on top of being cramped, stuffy and greasy. She couldn't find a position where the floor didn't dig into her back. Her gaze fell on a scrawled, illegible note tapped onto an old red wire.

  Everything here reminded her of Aqeel.

  Cassie heard a metallic clink noise above her. She stretched her arm out to grab hold of the sonic wrench. The short, green object with a hexagon sticking out of one side was not what she was looking for.

  "That's a hyperbolic tension adjuster," Cassie stated irritably as she handed it back to him.

  "The sonic wrench?" Danny repeated uncertainly.

  "It's the blue one!" Cassie called out as his shoes passed by, coming disturbingly close to her head.

  "Which blue one?" Danny asked.

  Cassie sighed in frustration. Grease dripped onto her cheek. She wiped at it unconsciously, leaving a huge black smear. She was beginning to wonder if Danny had overstated his own experience, or if he was simply being purposefully thick.

  Either way, she wasn't making any progress down there. She crawled out from under the machine, bits of dust flying off her clothes as she moved. She scowled as she watched Danny dig through the toolbox.

  "Look, here's a screwdriver." Cassie handed him the tool. She tapped on the painted yellow metal square, secured with dozens of screws. "Just take this panel off so I don't have to keep crawling in there."

  Helen appeared in the doorway behind them. "Cassie, I need to borrow you for a minute."

  "Yes, ma'am," Cassie answered. "I'll be right back," she told Danny, feeling confident that there was no way he could screw up this particular task.

  She followed Helen down the corridor. They turned a corner to find Shrey standing there, holding a tablet loosely with a grim expression. Helen stopped and they all loitered there awkwardly for a minute, listening to the low hum of the ventilation fans.

  "What's going on?" Cassie finally asked.

  Shrey spoke first. "The navigation malfunction... wasn't a malfunction."

  Cassie stared at him. Her stomach dropped. She already knew what that meant. She knew what they were going to say.

  She had to ask anyways.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  "What does that mean?"

  "It was sabotage," Helen clarified.

  Cassie's heart pounded. They were both staring at her, watching her reaction. She could feel the sweat dripping down her back.

  "Are you sure?" Cassie whispered finally, her voice barely audible over the ship's hum.

  Shrey nodded grimly. "Navigation is still a mess but it's obvious that we were off course the moment we left the station." He absentmindedly gestured to the tablet. "Someone sent us straight into that debris field."

  "Might have even made it too," Helen mused. "Graveyards aren't usually that dense."

  "A pretty clever way to make a ship disappear when you can't find it." It almost sounded like there was an undertone of admiration in Shrey's voice.

  "Anyways, that's where you come in," Helen said.

  "Me?" Cassie squeaked.

  Helen raised an eyebrow at her, as if that should have been obvious. "This person may have sabotaged other systems as well."

  Cassie wiped her sweaty palms on her pants and silently hoped no one noticed how tense she was. "Um, I'm really not good with computers."

  "That's alright, we'll handle that." Helen gestured to Shrey. "I need you on the mechanical side. Right after you're finished with the heater, I need you to start a physical inspection of every vital system onboard."

  Cassie blinked. "But... I thought you said it was a computer problem?"

  "It was, but our ship isn't networked to the station, they would have had to have physical access to our computers to install this," Shrey explained. "At which point, they could have damaged any number of other systems."

  "Oh, right," Cassie said in a small voice.

  "Look, it was probably just someone that snuck onboard, messed with the system, then left," Shrey reassured her gently. "Geoff and Danny were moving cargo in and out the whole time, and they do not do a very good job of watching the doors."

  Helen nodded in agreement. "We barely made it out of that alive," she reminded them. "Nobody here is suicidal. Whoever did it is probably still on the station."

  "Do you know who did it?" Cassie asked nervously.

  "The logs are scrubbed, but it must have happened while we were in port." Shrey shrugged. "They'll have to look at the dock's security footage."

  "We'll leave solving that mystery to the security team," Helen said, with a hint of finality. "We can send them a message as soon as we drop out of dark mode, let's just focus on getting to Phoebe in one piece."

  "So what am I looking for, exactly?" Cassie shifted her weight uneasily and the metal grating creaked ominously. "Are you talking about... a bomb?"

  "No, nobody could bring explosives into port undetected," Shrey answered immediately. "Security is way too tight."

  "They don't need to attempt anything so drastic," Helen added, sounding almost worried. "There's a dozen other ways to blow the ship up. Or get the rebels to do it for them."

  "Like turning off the dark generator." Shrey tapped his tablet. "We've been monitoring it but..."

  "But I'd feel better if you took a look at it," Helen finished.

  Cassie hesitated, thinking it over. "With everything that happened... I've been over every piece of it already," she said slowly. "I didn't notice anything strange."

  "That's one piece of good news then." Helen relaxed a little. "But air, water... I'd feel better knowing that nothing else was compromised and, to be clear, the heater is still your top priority."

  "Right," Cassie agreed instantly. "I should get back there." She turned to leave, her mind already whirling with this new, unexpected information.

  "And Cassie?" Helen said loudly.

  Cassie turned around.

  "Let's keep this quiet," Helen said seriously. "Bring anything you find directly to me."

  Cassie nodded once before walking back to the heater at a carefully calculated pace, only to find that Danny had not managed to get the panel off. Instead, it looked like he'd picked up the drill and ended up stripping half the screws. The other half were lying scattered on the dirty floor. She took a deep, calming breath as she picked a bent screw up off the floor, examining it momentarily before letting it drop.

  This was going to be a long day.