Page 13 of Journey to the Forbidden Zone

“Entities such as Captain Corso’sStar Shrike, or Maltese’s own enforcers, possess vessels significantly more capable in direct combat scenarios. Probability of successfully completing a transaction without hostile engagement is negligible. Probability of theAntillessurviving such an engagement in its current state: 23.1%. And decreasing with each potential encounter.”

Silence descended again, heavier than before. The stark reality Zed laid out was undeniable. Even if Carmen could stomach selling the alien, trying to do so was like painting a target on their hull and inviting every pirate and opportunist in the sector to take a shot. Twenty-three percent. Less than one in four. Those weren’t odds; they were a death sentence with a slight delay.

Norvik’s calm facade cracked, just a hairline fracture. A slight tightening around his eyes.

“The Collective calculus prioritizes the survival of the group. The risk, while significant, must be weighed against the certainty of financial ruin and the high probability of lethal reprisal from our creditors or law enforcement if we do nothing.”

Carmen sighed. Norvik’s cultural adherence to his species’ principles of what’s best for the group drove her insane sometimes. As a general rule, she agreed with him. But always prioritizing the majority was a slippery slope that led to tyranny.

“The potential reward justifies the elevated risk profile,” he went on. “We require capital. The Xena provides it. We must leverage the asset.”

“She is not leverage!” Letitia shouted. “She’s a prisoner! And you’re talking about her like she’s a crate of spice!”

She pushed away from the table, pacing now herself, mirroring Carmen’s earlier path.

“There has to be another way! We fix the ship ourselves! We take smaller jobs, build up slowly.”

“Slowly?” Sark’s laugh was hollow, desperate. “Letitia, the COPS fines are accruing interestdaily. Velasco is not gonna wait for us to ‘build up slowly.’ He wants his money or his goods, neither of which we have. He’ll send collectors. Violent ones. We don’thavetime!”

He ran a webbed hand over his forehead.

“Zed’s right about the risks of selling her, sure. But what’s the alternative? Keeping her? How? Where? Every port we approach is a deathtrap! Letting her go is suicide! Doing nothing is suicide! Selling her is the only chance we’ve got that doesn’t end with us spaced or breaking rocks!”

“So we trade her life for ours?” Letitia stopped pacing, facing Sark, her expression one of profound disappointment. “Is that the crew we are? Is that what theAntillesstands for?”

Her gaze swept over Norvik, then settled back on Carmen, pleading, accusing.

The weight of their stares threatened to crush her. Norvik’s cold pragmatism. Sark’s terrified practicality. Letitia’s burning moral outrage. Zed’s grim tactical assessment. They pulled her in different directions, each argument valid in its own terrifying way. Money or morality. Survival or suicide.

Control. Where was her control?

It was fracturing, crumbling under the weight of an impossible decision. She’d led them into this. She’d signed Maltese’s manifest. This was her mess. Her responsibility.

Focus. She needed focus.

Her gaze drifted to the empty chair at the table. The space felt accusatory. They were arguing about this woman’s fate, her life, her freedom, and she wasn’t even here. They hadn’t heard a single word from her. They didn’t know her name, her story, whatshewanted.

Was she content with her supposed “voluntary servitude?” Did she yearn for freedom? Was she terrified? Did she even understand the danger she was in?

The thought struck Carmen with sudden, unsettling clarity. They were making decisions in a vacuum. Treating the woman like cargo, like an abstract problem, just as Norvik kept calling her – an asset. But she was a person. A person currently frozen in a box in their cargo hold.

Carmen had railed against being powerless, against the humiliation Corso and Maltese heaped on her. Was she about to do the same thing to someone else? Impose her will, her desperate need for a solution, onto this alien woman without even consulting her?

It was wrong. Deeply, fundamentally wrong. Control wasn’t just about commanding her ship or her crew. It was about responsibility. Seeing the people affected by her decisions. Including the one locked in the life-support chamber.

Carmen straightened up, pushing away from the bulkhead. The movement silenced the brewing argument. Four pairs of eyes snapped to her. Sark hopeful, Norvik expectant, Letitia defiant, Zed’s lenses unreadable.

“Enough,” Carmen said, her voice low but cutting through the tension. She looked at each of them in turn as she continued. “We’re talking in circles. Arguing about her like she’s a damned side of beef. We don’t know her. We don’t know what she wants. We don’t knowanythingexcept what Maltese screwed us with and what Zed pulled from the database.”

She took a step towards the center of the room, her boots echoing in the sudden silence.

“We’re not deciding her fate behind her back. Not like this.” She turned to Zed. “Revive her. Safely. Get her out of that box. Bring her here.

“We’re going to ask the Xena what she wants to do.”

CHAPTER 5

Nick Corso strodedown theStar Shrike’s main corridor, the sharp click of his expensive boots echoing off the polished steel bulkheads. The ship rumbled around him, a low, powerful vibration that usually felt like an extension of his own will. Today, it was a drumroll. Anticipation, thick and sweet as blood, coiled in his gut.