TSD: 3049-10-08 — Local: 09:12
Leopard-class DropShip Wayfarer — Galatea Zenith Jump Point Approach / Mid-Burn
Space travel was mostly waiting.
Waiting while engines burned at a steady fraction of thrust. Waiting while the ship's life support cycled the same air through filters that never quite erased the smell of sweat and metal. Waiting while the crew learned one another's rhythms in tight corridors—who slept light, who hoarded ration bars, who talked too much when nervous, who went silent.
Kel treated the waiting like a mission phase.
Every shift had structure. Every check had a time. Every person had a role. It kept the ship from becoming a pressure cooker.
It kept them from becoming sloppy.
The Zeus and Valkyrie stayed secured in their cradles, mag-clamps humming faintly. Rina spent hours in the bay studying the Zeus's maintenance panels like she was trying to learn the machine's language. Tessa watched her work without praising often—just correcting and occasionally giving a short "good" that made Rina's ears turn pink.
Nadia learned the cargo inventory system from Mara, stumbling at first over the abbreviations and codes. When she got one right, she looked startled every time, as if success was an accident.
Avery drilled with Jori in the narrow lane beside the vehicles—movement, muzzle discipline, contact calls. Not glamorous. Necessary. Their boots thudded on deck plates in a steady rhythm that made the ship feel less like a trap.
Elin ran hard checks on everyone twice a day—hydration, bruises, stress fractures, the kind of small injuries that became infections out in the corridor. She was blunt about it. Nobody argued.
Sienna floated through it all with that half-smile that said she was relaxed, but her eyes kept catching on details—hatches, shadows, anything that didn't belong.
Kel checked on each of them without hovering. A question here. A correction there. A calm nod when something was done right.
No speeches.
Just leadership.
---
TSD: 3049-10-08 — Local: 14:27
Wayfarer — Mid-Bay Workstation (Mara's Station)
Mara sat at her workstation with the port incident file opened in layers.
She'd rebuilt the event timeline from scraps: pad camera angles, comm timestamps, weapon discharge patterns, the charge puck's casing, and the attacker's last breath. She was building a packet that would make MRB auditors' eyes widen without giving ComStar enough to bury it.
Kel stopped beside her, hands behind his back, gaze on the screen.
Mara didn't look up immediately. "I'm almost done."
Kel's voice stayed calm. "What's the cleanest claim?"
"Attempted sabotage of registered merc assets," Mara said. "Secondary: attempted murder on a bonded MRB unit. Tertiary: violation of port authority security—though they'll downplay it because it makes them look weak."
Kel nodded once. "Focus on what forces a response."
Mara finally looked up, holding eye contact for a beat. "You're good at this."
Kel didn't react outwardly. "You're better."
Mara's throat moved slightly. She looked back down to hide it, fingers tightening around her stylus.
No touch. No lingering brush.
Just a quiet exchange that meant more than it should have.
Across the bay, Tessa called Rina's name sharply. "Vale—stop staring and hand me the torque wrench."
Rina squeaked, "Yes—ma'am!"
Kel glanced that way automatically.
Tessa didn't look up.
Mara noticed the glance and went right back to the screen, expression unchanged. If there was anything in it, it was gone as quickly as it appeared.
---
TSD: 3049-10-09 — Local: 06:03
Wayfarer — Galatea Zenith Jump Point (Inbound Corridor Lane)
The stars didn't look closer at a jump point.
They looked wrong.
Space was crowded here, not with objects you could see, but with invisible rules: traffic lanes, approach vectors, safety distances measured in millions of kilometers. Far ahead, the JumpShip waited—long and skeletal, sails folded tight, a metal spine meant to carry other people's lives through physics like a knife through cloth.
A docking controller's voice crackled over comms. "Leopard Wayfarer, you are cleared for approach. Maintain vector. Maintain speed."
Kel stood at the bay's forward viewport with his crew strapped in behind him. He didn't have to watch the approach himself. The ship could do it.
But he did anyway.
Because he preferred to see things coming.
Mara sat behind him, tablet on her lap, already preparing the MRB filing transmit for Summer. Her posture was composed, but her foot tapped once against the deck plate, a small tell she probably didn't realize she had.
Tessa leaned against a bulkhead near the maintenance ladder, arms crossed. She'd changed her hair again—braid tighter, wrapped higher, bandana swapped for a simple tie. She looked cleaner, more controlled. Like she'd decided appearances mattered when you were about to dock with a JumpShip that might be watched.
Avery and Jori sat opposite each other near the vehicles, helmets close. Nadia sat with Elin, listening more than speaking. Rina stared at the JumpShip with wide eyes, trying not to look like she was staring.
Sienna looked bored.
She wasn't.
"Eyes up," Sienna said quietly.
Kel didn't turn. "What."
"Traffic," Sienna murmured. "Two small craft, off-lane. Too close to the JumpShip's stern."
Mara's head lifted. "That's not normal."
Kel's tone stayed calm. "Controller, confirm stern traffic."
A pause. Then the controller's voice returned—too smooth. "Traffic is authorized. Maintain your approach."
Sienna's mouth tightened. "That's a lie."
Kel didn't argue.
He didn't need to.
He changed the plan.
"Wayfarer, adjust approach," Kel said over internal comms. "Hold at safe distance. We wait."
The ship's pilot acknowledged, and the Leopard eased off its vector—slow, controlled.
A flicker of irritation came over the public channel. "Leopard Wayfarer, you are instructed—"
Kel cut the public channel.
Mara looked at him. "You can do that?"
Kel's reply was calm. "We can die if we don't."
That was enough.
The two off-lane small craft drifted closer to the JumpShip's stern, lingering like flies.
Then—one of them released something.
A small object, tumbling.
It vanished against the dark.
A second later, the JumpShip's stern flared with a brief, ugly flash—more like a systems failure than an explosion. A spray of debris glittered outward.
Comms erupted.
Dock control shouted orders. The JumpShip's crew screamed about pressure alarms. Traffic controllers tried to regain structure over chaos.
Kel's crew stared at the viewport.
Rina's hand flew to her mouth.
Nadia made a small sound—almost a sob.
Avery's eyes went cold.
Jori whispered, "They just—hit a JumpShip…"
Mara's voice tightened. "That's not pirates."
Elin muttered, "People are going to die."
Kel watched debris scatter in slow, silent arcs. Then he spoke, calm and decisive.
"Wayfarer, we do not dock," he said. "We back out and hold. We do not become the next target."
Sienna's voice was hard. "Those craft are running."
Kel: "Track them."
Mara was already moving, fingers flying. "I can try to tag their transponders if they're broadcasting."
Kel didn't ask if she could.
He trusted her to try.
The JumpShip's stern kept venting—thin mist turning into a widening cloud. A maintenance drone launched too late. A second flash flickered as something inside failed.
A shuttle craft detached from the JumpShip's midsection—emergency evac—moving slow and clumsy, overloaded.
Kel watched it with the same calm he watched everything.
He didn't romanticize death.
He planned around it.
"Everyone stay strapped," he said. "No one moves without permission."
Rina nodded too fast.
Avery's jaw clenched.
Nadia swallowed and forced herself to breathe.
Mara's eyes stayed on her tablet. "Tagged one transponder—partial. It's spoofed but I've got a signature."
Kel: "Save it. Backup."
A single quiet look passed between Mara and Tessa then—nothing dramatic, no posture war, just the shared realization that Kel's caution had kept them from dying.
It was gone in a second.
Kel didn't comment.
He just watched the JumpShip bleed and understood what it meant:
Someone was willing to sabotage interstellar transit.
That wasn't a grudge.
That was strategy.
And strategy at the edge of the Periphery usually meant only one thing:
Something big was moving.
---
Unit Ledger — Iron Inheritance (Running C-Bill Log)
(Maintained by Mara Saito; updated end of TSD 3049-10-09, 06:03)
Liquid on hand: 70,650 C-bills ✅
Restricted/held: 25,000 C-bills (not accessible)
Minimum liquid reserve floor: 60,000
New expenses (in-transit):
Emergency station-keeping fuel burn (unscheduled hold + vector change): −1,100
Replacement comm filter module (burned during transponder tag attempt): −450
New liquid total: 69,100 C-bills ✅ (above reserve)
Operating liquid above reserve: 9,100 C-bills