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  He nodded, pleased. “Let’s fire this bitch up. See if we explode.”

  Cody answered from the bridge. “Your confidence is so reassuring.” He keyed up the ignition sequence. “Everyone, hold on to something. Although, that won’t really do anything if we explode. We’ll be vaporized, so I don’t really know why I said that. Anyway, here goes.”

  He began the sequence. Fuel pumped into the engine. The ignition caps started the fires. The shielding kept the heat contained. The cooling coils kept them from overheating. It all worked together to hover the ship and idle. They did not explode.

  Joel’s voice echoed over the general comm. “I just want to take this moment to thank everyone in advance for rightfully heaping praise on me for repairing our ship with the dead body of an amusement park. I am but your humble goddamn genius engineer. That is all. If anyone needs me, I’ll be playing Double Dragon.”

  Cody stifled a laugh as he set the ship back down. “Don’t ever tell Joel I said this,” he said to Sam. “But he’s right. He is a goddamn genius.”

  The ship powered down, leaving it quiet in the cockpit. Energy thrummed in Cody’s chest, fueling the ideas rumbling around in his head.

  Sam sensed it. She felt it too. “So, we should talk about it. About Layton Corp.”

  Cody spun around in his chair. “Yes, please.” He brought up the documents he’d been reading on the spa balcony. “You were totally right to press Graham on his motives regarding the amusement park. He made it seem like his attempts at diversifying his income stream were no big deal.” He adopted his best pretentious impersonation of Graham. “Just a savvy business move.”

  “But it wasn’t.”

  Cody maximized the financial records for Sam to see. “No. He was on the verge of declaring total bankruptcy. The amusement park was a last-ditch effort.”

  “He didn’t seem too concerned about us blowing part of it up. And he encouraged us to strip parts from it.”

  The energy poured from Cody’s chest into his blood, making the tips of his fingers tingle. “Yes, he didn’t care about it anymore. His bounce back after Rever blew up was so huge that he could totally abandon that giant asset, the one he’d sunk the last of his capital into.” Cody leaned forward, close enough to Sam that she could hear him whisper. “I don’t think he hired us to get rid of an infestation. I think he hired us to get rid of evidence.”

  Saying it out loud made Cody tingle even more. Conspiracy theories were his Double Dragon.

  “You think he had something to do with the ShimVens infestations?” Sam’s shoulders tightened.

  “Maybe. I mean, I think so.”

  Sam remembered what she saw as they were leaving Rocket Roger’s. “There was a Layton Corp truck parked at the loading dock of the amusement park.”

  Cody shot out of his chair, nearly bumping his head into the ceiling. “I knew it! That’s it. The evidence we need to prove this is a conspiracy.”

  Sam pumped her hands, gesturing for him to put on the brakes. “Hold on. If Layton is behind the infestations, what connection does Graham have to that corporation?”

  The smile slid off Cody’s face.

  “Holy shit, are you two still talking about this?” Joel appeared in the doorway. “They’re bugs. Bugs show up places, shit all over, eat through wires. That’s why exterminators exist. It’s not some vast goddamn conspiracy.”

  “Why are you here?” Cody folded his arms across his chest.

  “Reggie got a call about a job.” Joel left, not waiting for the others to follow.

  Sam attempted a soothing smile, but under her mask, it just looked like she was raising her eyebrows. “I’m not saying you’re wrong. Something is definitely off about Layton Corp and Graham and these infestations. I’m just saying that we need solid proof before we build a case. So far, all we’ve got is coincidence.”

  She left the cockpit.

  Cody stewed in silence, cursing Joel and Graham and everyone. He felt in his bones that there was something to his theory. It wasn’t just conspiratorial nonsense. There was truth there. He just needed to find it.

  The engine room stink wasn’t as appealing to the other Notches as it was to Joel. Reggie’s nose had grown immune to it after being subjected to it for the past several hours, but Sam and Cody had to work hard to keep their food from coming back up.

  “It smells like an outhouse and a locker room,” Cody said, pinching his nose. “Like a locker room inside of an outhouse.”

  Joel looked around like he didn’t know what they were talking about. “Smells like heaven.”

  Sam found Joel’s comment more disturbing than the smell. “Why are we meeting in here?”

  Reggie looked apologetic. “We wanted to show you the patchwork we did on Sonic. The engine is running, but it’s basically being held together with duct tape right now. Same with the hull repairs. We can take her to a steady cruising speed, but any bumps in the road threaten to pop the hull patches loose. Pushing the engine any harder will almost certainly make it explode.”

  Reggie waved for them to follow him out of the engine room, feeling guilty for the green shade of Sam and Cody’s faces. “We can fix the ship up for real after we finish this next job,” he assured them.

  Cody pushed past Sam to get next to Reggie. “What is it? ShimVens take over another space station? A Layton competitor? Is it StrobeNet? I bet it’s StrobeNet.”

  Reggie took a step away from Cody as he continued walking toward the kitchen. “No, not StrobeNet. It’s not a Layton competitor or ShimVens related. It’s a battlecruiser that’s been infested with Rapoo.”

  Joel chuckled. “Every time. I’m going to laugh at that name every time.”

  They circled around the kitchen table where Reggie had set up a display. Floating above where they ate their breakfast was the holographic projection of the battlecruiser Cleopatra. It was one of the newest models, equipped with the highest yield weaponry, bleeding edge navigation and FTL systems, and a next-gen AI.

  “It’s been completely abandoned,” Reggie said. “Left under the watch of its onboard AI to keep it from veering off course and smashing into anything, and to defend it from pirates or anyone looking to steal one of the most powerful ships in the galaxy.” He minimized the projection of the ship and brought up the schematics. “Here’s the docking bay, in the rear of the ship. We’ll start there, establish a forward operating base, and work our way out systematically, together. No splitting up. We took out the Rapoo in the amusement park by pitting them against the ShimVens. We won’t have that option this time, and those things are dangerous. The most dangerous critter we’ve faced yet.”

  He looked at each of the Notches, nodding, jaw firmly set. “Questions?”

  Joel smiled at him.

  “What?” Reggie asked.

  Joel shrugged, still smiling. “That was a good briefing. ‘Forward operating base’? You been playing Call of Duty?”

  Reggie walked away from him. “Let’s gear up. Cody, plot a course to the Cleopatra. It’s time to go to work.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  The engine room filled with smoke two minutes into their journey. Not the kind of smoke that preceded a catastrophic explosion, just the kind that said, “your engine might explode if you hit a bump in the road or collide with some space debris or sneeze in its direction.”

  It was a tense ride.

  Luckily, they didn’t have far to go. The battlecruiser Cleopatra came into view eight minutes after the engine room had completely flooded with black smoke and began seeping into the adjacent hallway.

  Cody readied to dock. “So, the AI controlling this ship is in stand-your-ground mode, right? It’s not going to blast us out of the sky?”

  “Not if you transmit those authorization codes the client gave us,” Reggie said.

  “Right. The codes. On it.” Cody made contact. “Battlecruiser Cleopatra, this is Intergalactic Pest Control on board the shuttle Sonic, requesting permission to dock.” His voice grew
tight as he spoke, like he was in middle school again, trying to ask Sarah Tittweiller to the spring dance.

  “Transmit authorization codes now,” came a calm, smooth voice. It sounded perfect, flawless.

  It may have been Cody’s imagination, since he knew he was speaking to a computer program, picking out oddities where there were none. “Transmitting now.” He sent the codes through, then crossed his fingers. “Please don’t eradicate me.”

  The docking bay doors opened like the mouth of a giant monster about to swallow them. An all too familiar feeling.

  “Welcome aboard the Cleopatra,” the flawless voice said. “Please begin the extermination process immediately.”

  Cody piloted Sonic into the docking bay. He could have done so blindfolded and not worried about bumping into anything, the bay was so big. And with the place completely evacuated, most of the ships were gone.

  He set down as close to the exit as possible, leaving little room between them and the adjoining corridor. The less time the Notches had to spend out in the open, the better.

  “We’re down. I’m heading for the hangar bay,” he informed the team.

  The others were already there, prepping for the job. Reggie checked his weapons, opting to take both the gatling and the semiautomatic. Sam took some practice swings with her sword, loosening up her body—which Cody suspected was the real weapon—and Joel was strapping a small satchel onto Peppy’s back.

  “Why is Peppy wearing a fanny pack?”

  “Because fanny packs are in again,” Joel said. “And because if he’s coming along, he needs to carry his own weight. Or, more specifically, he needs to carry my own weight. All this stuff slows me down.”

  Cody pushed his glasses up his nose. “Wait, Peppy’s coming?”

  Joel admired Peppy’s new accessory. “Yeah, totally. He’s perfect for this job. Great sniffer. Awesome fighter. Most importantly, fierce protector of me.”

  “We still don’t even know what species he is.” Cody’s voice went high. “We don’t know what he’s capable of, we know nothing of his instincts, or how he behaves when threatened.”

  Joel nodded along as though Cody were proving his point. “I know, this will be the perfect opportunity to get some great field data.” Joel patted Peppy on the head and spoke in a baby voice. “You’re going to tear some shit up, aren’t you?”

  Reggie shoved his pair of ShimVen pincer daggers into his belt. “Everyone ready?” He waited for objections. There were none. “Should we have a cheer or something? Like a war cry?”

  Sam pushed past him. “Absolutely not. This is not war. This is work.”

  Reggie’s shoulders slumped. He’d really wanted a war cry. “Okay, let’s just kill space rodents, then.”

  They disembarked, led by Reggie, who readied his gun for an assault. The others followed close behind in a formation that was now familiar: Cody and Sam on the flanks, Joel at the rear. Only, now Peppy loped along like an ignorant puppy, thinking they were on their way to the park when they were really going to the vet to get him neutered.

  Just as it had appeared, the docking bay was empty. Eerily empty. Each of the Notches’ footsteps echoed in the large chamber, giving it a haunted feel.

  “Cody?” Joel said. “Tell me again that space zombies aren’t a thing.”

  Though it was hidden under real concern, Cody recognized the taunt. He acknowledged it anyway. “A space zombie infestation is highly unlikely. It would have to spread from ship to ship. But zombies spread their infection through contact. How would they move from ship to ship? They’re slow moving and have no mental faculties. The zombie plague would be too easily contained in space to spread and become a pandemic.”

  Joel swallowed hard. “What if this is ground zero?”

  Cody stopped abruptly. “I guess…I hadn’t considered that.”

  “Would you two shut up?” Sam said, sheathing her sword. “There’s nothing here and nothing close. And there’s no such thing as space zombies.”

  Reggie let his gatling hang at his side. “Let’s start unloading. This is a good spot to establish our forward operating base.”

  A shiver ran up Joel’s spine, but not because of Reggie’s sexy operative speak. They were inside a corpse. A dead ship. Hundreds of thousands of tons of metal, and square feet of emptiness. The coldness of space had been bottled up inside the Cleopatra, and they were wandering around in it.

  Reggie’s forward operating base was little more than stacks of crates for cover, extra ammo, and some grenades. And snacks. Sam had insisted on snacks. Aside from the forward and flank cover the crates provided, they had little to protect them from a swarm of Rapoo. It was better than nothing, though, as Reggie had argued. Worth the effort to establish now.

  He packed four bags with more ammo, grenades and snacks for each of the team to take with them. Reggie wasn’t messing around anymore. Be prepared, always. That was his new motto while on jobs. If he’d learned anything in their short time as exterminators, it was that no job went as planned, and something terrible always happened. They had all almost died more times than he could remember, and they’d only done a handful of jobs so far.

  Their luck would run out eventually. So it was best that they didn’t rely on luck.

  With the forward operating base established, the team took one last opportunity to check their gear and breathe easy.

  Then Reggie said, “Let’s move out.”

  Cody brought up the specs of the ship. The Cleopatra was massive, but it wasn’t a space station or an amusement park. As far as their typical jobs were concerned, this was a relatively small one. The battlecruiser had three levels. The top level was residential—crew cabins, galley, mess hall and rec rooms. The center of the vessel housed the command and battle stations. The bottom level was the hangar bay and the guts of the ship—the engine room and maintenance sectors.

  “If what we saw of the Rapoo on Kaufman was typical, then I would assume they are in the ventilation systems.” Cody highlighted the vents on the map. “Also, I know through my research that the Rapoo aren’t a swarm creature. They travel in small packs, usually in groups of no more than a dozen. That means we won’t be able to take them out the way we did the ShimVens. We’ll need to change our tactics.”

  “Then we grind,” Joel said. “Take out one pack at a time.”

  “There seemed to be fewer of them than ShimVens on Kaufman. If the Rapoo travel in smaller packs, will there also be less of them overall?”

  Cody considered it. “I think so. But on an individual basis, the Rapoo are way more dangerous.”

  Reggie hoisted his gatling. “Our tactics won’t matter if we can’t find them. Let’s flush them out.” He looked to Cody. “Can you activate the ventilation systems from here?”

  “Let me see if I can hack into Cleopatra’s systems.”

  He’d barely touched the keypad, when the flawless voice of the ship’s AI came through a speaker on the wall next to them.

  “Unauthorized access to the ship’s computer system is strictly prohibited. Cease your activity immediately, or I will take defensive action.”

  Joel jumped, surprised by the disembodied voice. When the threat sank in, he said, “We have access. We already gave you the codes.”

  “You have physical access to the ship, not to its computer systems. This is an alpha level battlecruiser, one of the first of its kind, carrying sensitive proprietary and military information. I am authorized to employ deadly force in protection of that information.”

  “Whoa, chill, robot lady,” Joel said.

  “I am not a lady. I am a computer program. Designation Cleo.”

  Cody looked up, like the source of the voice was all around him, like he was speaking with God. “Cleo, I don’t want to access any of your sensitive information. I just need to access the controls for the ventilation systems so I can flush out the Rapoo infestation. Can you help me with that?”

  The ship was silent. Cody suddenly felt awkward talking to a
computer or a ship or whatever it was. But he also felt crazy excited. Artificial intelligence wasn’t anything new, it had been around for generations. But it wasn’t common. Especially one on this level. Cleo was the sort of AI that only existed in the most advanced military or corporate installations. Only those who worked at those installations, or had a direct hand in creating the program, had the opportunity to interact with the AI.

  He was surprised how quickly he began treating Cleo like a person. He always assumed he would be able to separate the program from the interface, the data from the façade of humanity.

  “Yes, I can comply with your request,” Cleo agreed after a moment.

  Cody’s body flooded with the warmth of endorphins that came with a genuine connection with a person. His mind twisted in knots trying to reconcile it all. “Thank you.”

  A low hum rolled through the hangar bay as the vents kicked on. Then came the low shriek, slowly building into a snarling growl.

  The interaction with Cleo had distracted the Notches from the reason they were speaking with her to begin with. Now they all hunched down behind cover and readied their weapons. Time slowed. It felt like hours passed in silence, with only the sound of their breathing to measure the moments. But it was only seconds between each beat of the Rapoo war drums.

  “Cleo,” Cody began. “Can you get a read on where the Rapoo are throughout?”

  “I cannot,” she said simply.

  Of course, Cody thought. Maybe she’d suffered system issues from the infestation. There were many possibilities.

  A vent on the ceiling twenty meters away burst open. One Rapoo after another fell to the floor, until ten of them stood huddled together, facing down the Notches. The creatures locked the team in a fierce stare, letting their growls be their opening salvo. The sound was enough to freeze the team in a moment’s hesitation.

  And that was all the Rapoo needed.

  They burst forward with alarming speed, some becoming little more than blurs. The Notches opened fire, but they couldn’t lock the Rapoo in their sights. Each shot missed its mark, putting holes in the floor of Cleopatra and none in the Rapoo.