Page 66 of Stealing Jia

The grenade smacked her in the face and rolled across the floor.

Slurppp!We went from zero to warp drive in ten seconds flat. The horrific, twisting funnel of energy rocketed us across that weird black void and dumped us on the bridge of Trayon’s battle cruiser.

“Ax.” Cason giggled and clapped his hands.

His tail wagging crazily, Pepe grinned up at me. “Fun. Do again.”

Dad let out sigh of relief and took a seat at the tactical console.

Bey was perched comfortably on the back of Trayon’s chair.“I told you not to worry. Jones females always survive.”

Adoz landed on my right shoulder and twittered loudly.

“He is angry you left him behind,” Chiara translated.

I petted his head“Sorry, it wasn’t by choice.”

“How long did you set the timer for?”Trayon wanted to know.

I glanced down at my gauntlet. “Five. Four. Three. Two. Boom.”

Off the port bow a nimbus of white-hot gases and debris abruptly appeared. The silhouette of a badly damaged ship blotted out the stars.

“Ta-da! There’s her ship.”

“Coordinates locked. Squad Rio you are a go,”Trayon commanded over his comm-link.

On the main view screen Trayon’s warriors transported aboard Lilkee’s ship in full battle gear. Few of the Legionnaires had been wearing armor when the hull ruptured and now floated lifelessly in zero gravity. The fight to take the ancient warbird was a short one.

Dad advised, “I’ve run scans on Lilkee’s ship. Their stealth technology is the prototype stolen from the Farins three months ago. The palladium blocks the electromagnetic waves our tracking scanners use. It allowed them to get close enough to our ships to activate their transporter beam.”

“With our shields down, Waewae easily got on our ship and Lilkee was able to snatch us,”I grumbled.

Sariel, the father-in-law from hell, studied the tactical screens. “I must have this technology.”

I exchanged amused glances with Trayon.“Did your warriors find Lilkee?”I wanted some alone time with the bitch.

“No. Her body was either pulverized in the explosion or sucked out into space,”Trayon replied.

Chiara slithered up my arm. “The transporter was activated just before I ported us. It is possible Lilkee is on this ship.”

“Merda!”

“Scanning now,” Dad advised.

Trayon tapped his command panel. “Intruder alert. All warriors man your battle stations.”

“Got her! Deck four. She’s heading for engineering.” Dad teleported.

There was a flash of black as Sariel and Trayon zoomed off the bridge. Bey clung to Trayon’s back.

I eyed the captain’s chair. Why not? I sat down in it. Pretty cool. Built into the armrests were all sorts of controls. I could touch that icon and fire the laser canons. That one would launch a missile and… Why was the navigations officer giving me the stink eye? I glanced around. The rest of the bridge crew were ignoring me, why couldn’t he? “Relax. As much as I’d like to, I won’t blow up Zarek’s warbird.”

“That is the High Commander’s battle cruiser,” the Navigation Officer replied snottily.

“Oh, don’t want to blow that up either.”

The Navigations Officer gave me a toothy grin. “It would be a fatal mistake.”

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