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My eyes widen at the realization that he’s talking about Z’Ree. “Are you out of your mind?! She wouldn’t do that! Not to mention, why would she? She’s on this ship as well. If the systems fail, her life will be in danger too!”
“Well, perhaps she doesn’t care about her life anymore. I don’t know how crazy people think,” D’Aakh smirks.
I’m standing in front of him before I even realize I’ve moved. Fist in his shirt, I’m practically snarling into his face. “What did you just say about her?!”
In a motion too fast for me to comprehend, D’Aakh slips out of my grip, slams me against the wall, and twists my arm up behind my back, proving he’s not just a brilliant technician, but also an elite soldier. I struggle momentarily against his grip, then push myself off the wall and throw the back of my head at his face. The bastard dodges and twists my arm up further. Then there’s yelling and people pulling us apart.
“What the fuck is going on?!” Zarkan hollers, easily pinning me to the wall with just one arm.
“He put us all in danger!” D’Aakh protests, held back by both Tareq and Lyriana.
I bare my teeth at him. “Don’t call Z’Ree crazy again. She’s a better person than any of us here and she’d never do anything to endanger someone else.”
I’m certain of it. Z’Ree wouldn’t hurt anyone even if her life depended on it. Up until recently, I considered myself the same, but clearly, my instincts have finally gotten the better of me. I’m acting like a damned caveman. “Sorry,” I mutter in D’Aakh’s direction, sucking in a deep breath to calm down.
Zarkan gives me a wary look before releasing me, then turns to D’Aakh. “I don’t want to hear any more accusations. We’re here to determine what’s going on and we will do so together, without arguing or fighting.”
“Fine,” he pushes through his gritted teeth. “I’m just trying to save everyone’s lives, and I can’t really do that when you keep hiding things from me.”
“It was my decision not to tell anyone about the stowaway,” Zarkan says. “At the time, her presence appeared insignificant. What makes you believe she’s behind these incidents?”
My mouth opens to protest but Zarkan holds his hand up, silencing me. D’Aakh brings up the ship’s schematic, with several areas colored bright orange. All of them lining the maintenance walkways Z’Ree currently uses as her hiding spot.
“These are the places where important conduits have been damaged. Plumbing, wires, whatever you can think of, it’s all been shredded. The automated systems keep cutting off the damaged areas to contain the issue and since we only use a small portion of the ship, we haven’t really noticed it, not until the problems became too great.”
“And you’re sure someone deliberately damaged those conduits?” Zarkan asks, frowning at the schematic. “Couldn’t it be accidental? You said it yourself. This ship wasn’t in the greatest shape when we took it from those Genixarian slavers. Could it be the wear and tear catching up with us?”
D’Aakh shakes his head, his head antennae swaying from side to side. “I only checked one of the locations since I’ve been too busy keeping the ship together, but there were cables and pipes missing. Literally. It looked like someone had torn them off the walls and dragged them somewhere else.”
“That’s…disturbing,” Astra says, shuddering. “Do we have a creepy monster on board?”
“No, but we do have a stowaway,” D’Aakh jeers, shooting me a glare.
I can’t help but laugh. “This is ridiculous. Z’Ree is five feet nothing and skinny as a twig. Are you really suggesting she’s roaming the damned ship, tearing things off walls? Perhaps you’re the crazy one here,” I jab.
“Well, someone is doing it!”
“What are the odds that we have two stowaways?” Astra asks.
Zarkan shakes his head. “None. At least not someone we picked up on the Arcade. Cai, play the footage.”
A security footage from the airlock plays on the screen, showing me walking away from the entrance. The moment the airlock is unguarded, a familiar figure dressed in oversized coveralls tiptoes toward the ship's entrance. Z’Ree looks around for a moment before making her decision and darting through the airlock.
Another camera shows her inside the ship, heading for the nearest maintenance walkways hatch. She struggles to open it before slipping through and disappearing from the screen. Shortly after that, the crew arrives back at the airlock.
“No one else entered the ship while we were docked with the Arcade,” Cai announces.
“I thought you were keeping watch,” Astra says. “How did you not notice someone sneaking on board?”
Cai sounds aggrieved as she explains, “At the time, I was deeply focused on keeping the Arcade’s AI from rebooting emergency protocols, which would reactivate the slave collars. That was the order given to me by the captain. I apologize for missing the unknown person boarding the ship, but my computational capacity is limited.”
“There’s no need to apologize, Cai,” Zarkan interjects. “We’re not here to assign blame. Nikolai, it sounds like you’ve spoken to the stowaway? What did she say?”
I shift uncomfortably, not wanting to share anything about Z’Ree with others. Something inside me keeps chanting “mine”, making me more than a little possessive but everyone is looking at me and I know I have to give them something.
“She doesn’t really speak. I think she has been punished for speaking so many times she now has a mental block that prevents her from speaking altogether.”
Astra sighs. “Poor girl. How long has she been a slave?”
