Renegade

Renegade Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Throughout the night Aria slept peacefully. No nightmares or any kind of dreams came to bother her. Rose woke her up at 8:00 a.m. to have breakfast with her family. Most of her cousins were there, including those she couldn't remember the names of. Her father had eleven siblings. Long ago she had lost count of how many cousins she had, and stopped caring about all of the names unless she liked them.

Dacia came in later than Aria and sat down on her left side. After the standard "Good morning, how did you sleep" small talk, Dacia changed the subject to something Aria wasn't expecting.

"Why wasn't Nathan at the party? Or did I just not see him?" she inquired.

Aria responded, "My brother? He wasn't there." Her tone of voice indicated the absence of her older brother was not unexpected. "Honestly, he doesn't come home very often anymore," she continued.

"I'm sorry," said Dacia. "Do you know where he is now?"

"No. He's on some recon trip for General Vanin."

This raised Dacia's eyebrows. "Really? I was under the impression he was going to leave the Intelligence Service at the same time I did."

Now it was Aria's turn to be surprised. "Why would you think that?" she asked.

"Oh, nothing. Just the way he was acting," was Dacia's reply. Aria thought Dacia was being evasive, but she decided to let the matter slide. "Have you talked to him at all in the past months, Aria?" Dacia went on, evading again.

"No, not really," Aria said.

Lawrence came through the dining room door at that time. He was still in pajama bottoms and t-shirt.

"Well, Aria," he said, sitting down on Aria's right side and grabbing an orange from the fruit bowl near him, "what do you think about coming to StarCorp. Headquarters and picking up your ship later today?"

"I'd love to," replied Aria.

A small cough came from Dacia, who also nudged Aria's side with her elbow.

Aria added, "Can Dacia come too?"

Dacia smiled at her cereal bowl, acting like she didn't know what had just happened.

"I don't see why not," Lawrence commented. "I think we should head out in an hour or so."

***

It took about an hour for Lawrence's personal ship to traverse the distance between the metropolis that was Luna City and the only other biodome on the surface of Earth's only natural satellite. The dome housed Allistair StarCorp.'s corporate headquarters, a manufacturing plant, and a docking area.

Aria, Dacia, Lawrence, and Aria's guards, Caleb and James, were now sitting in Lawrence's personal office waiting for the finishing touches to be put on Aria's new ship. The silence was becoming awkward.

To break the silence, Aria asked Lawrence a question. "So, you said my ship is a completely new model. What does it look like?"

Everyone on Aria's side of Lawrence's desk sat up or leaned forward in their various chairs. Allistair StarCorp. hadn't come out with a new model of ship since Aria's uncle was in charge.

Lawrence sat up in his desk and pressed some buttons. A moment later a hologram as long as the desk that looked vaguely like a spear showed up.

"Here it is. The MT-1, very first ship in its class," he bragged.

"It's a freighter," James commented, rather bluntly.

"Well, true, it does look like one," Lawrence continued. "But it only looks like a freighter. It is one of the fastest ships created, and the smallest ship with a cloaking device. The only drawback is it does not have as much storage space as most ships it size."

"How big is it?" asked Dacia. Aria wondered why she would be so interested in something like this.

"About 35 meters. It can comfortably hold about 12 people."

Aria spoke up now. "You're giving me a ship that can hold twelve people? My guards and I are probably going to be the only people using it."

"Well, I figured you would want to take your friends out joyriding across the empire once in awhile," replied Lawrence.

Someone knocking on the office door interrupted their conversation.

"Come in," Lawrence called out.

It was an older employee. "Sir, the ship's ready," was all he said before quickly leaving.

Everyone looked relieved that no more small talk had to be made.

"Well then, let's go," suggested Lawrence.

***

Aria was impressed. Her ship, which she had named "The Guiding Star," did have an unassuming appearance with its gray, black, and blue paint job, but the inside was cleverly designed to make the most of available space. A captain's cabin, medical bay, and command deck took up the front half of the ship, and crew cabins, a storage area, a small recreation space, and the hatch to the maintenance deck took up the second half.

Lawrence and his engineer's had not left the ship undefended. True to his word, the Guiding Star did have a cloaking device, as well as port and starboard guns, a gun located on top of the command deck, and a ventral missile launcher.

Now Aria, Dacia, and the guards were on their way back to Luna City. Caleb and James were getting familiar with the weapons systems, and the two girls were sitting in the pilot and copilot's chairs, looking out at the star, their star Sol, and Earth.

"So where do you want to take this thing first?" asked Dacia.

"I don't know," Aria replied. "Do you have any ideas?"

"Chicago, Western North America province."

"Why there?"

"My boss would like to talk with you. He has information that can lead to Rex."