The truth clicked into place with the cold certainty of a lock turning. This was not about heroism or even about simple scavenging. This was a prospector staring at a map, his eyes seeing not a monster, but a vein of gold so rich it defied imagination.
{If a single mothership contains crystals of such immense value...} the unspoken thought echoed in the silent space between his heartbeats, what unimaginable treasures must lie on an entire Void planet?
He wasn't planning a raid; he was scouting the first outpost of a new, galactic-scale empire he intended to plunder.
A faint, almost imperceptible smile touched Cleo's lips, there and gone in an instant. She didn't look at Rex. She didn't need to. She knew he would have felt the shift in the champion's aura, the brief, unguarded flash of naked ambition that betrayed his entire performance.
She leaned back, the picture of calm curiosity, but her next question was a needle aimed directly at the heart of his true motive.
