Lost Planet 01 - The Lost Planet by Rachel Searles Page B

sink into the floor and vanish. An intercom? How could Parker be so dense?
    â€œYou’re Lyolian. You can’t be in the Fleet,” said Parker, his cheeks blooming scarlet.
    Maurus opened his jacket and pulled off an elliptical silver badge, holding it out like a shield. “It’s real. You want to check?”
    Parker glanced at the badge and returned his gaze to the floor. “What ship do you serve on?”
    â€œThe IFF Kuyddestor .”
    â€œAnd … who’s your commanding officer?”
    â€œCaptain Lionel Lennard.” Maurus’s dark, severe eyes bored into them. “What, is that it for the interrogation? Come forward.” Both boys stepped through the doorway, and the door slid shut behind them. “There, I’ve locked it. We’re all going to stay up here in the pilot’s cabin for now. Hand over the knife. Handle first.”
    Parker shook the weapon from his sleeve, avoiding Maurus’s eyes, and passed it over. Glowering, he sank into one of the seats on the back wall.
    â€œCorbin, come take a seat up here.” Maurus made a few entries on the console and then turned to Chase, studying his face for a minute. “Is this your cruiser?”
    From the corner of his vision, Chase could see Parker’s gray eyes blazing in his direction. He bit his lip.
    Maurus waited a moment and shrugged. “You’re lucky. I’d turn you in myself, but because of the situation with Trucon, I’ll need to report for duty right away.”
    â€œDo you know what happened back there?” asked Chase. “Was it an attack?”
    â€œNothing’s certain yet. The whole galaxy’s in an uproar.” He turned back to the console. “We’ve got a few hours ahead of us until we get to Qesaris. I’ll monitor the emergency band for more information.”
    If Maurus really was from the Fleet, he didn’t seem to recognize Chase, so that was a good sign. Maybe it was just because Parker had given a fake name for him. Chase closed his eyes briefly in gratitude for Parker’s one good move and turned to give him a nod of encouragement, but Parker kept his eyes glued to the floor and wouldn’t look up.
    Chase gazed back out the front window of the cruiser, barely aware of the movement as they hurtled onward through space. He wasn’t able to say whether the past few hours were some of the worst of his life so far, but they were certainly some of the hardest he had spent in the short time he could remember. The seat was too uncomfortable to sleep in, and in his exhaustion he stared off into space, his weary brain returning to the same questions. Who am I? What happened to me?
    Why had Dr. Silvestri’s lab been raided? And why had those soldiers tried to shoot them on Mircona? Was someone trying to have him killed? His hands clenched on the armrests. No, maybe someone important was trying to find him. All sorts of possibilities bloomed in his mind, and he imagined several different fantastic scenarios before his thoughts crashed back down again with the recollection that nothing was the same as it had been before Trucon burned.
    His thoughts cycled back and forth like this for the next few hours, until the stress twisted his stomach into a grizzled knot. He looked over at Maurus for the first time since they had stopped talking, and gasped.
    Maurus looked like he’d gone berserk. He stared at the console with wild eyes, his cheeks flushed. His lips moved as if he were in the middle of a heated debate.
    â€œWhat’s wrong?” Chase’s first thought was that it must have been about him. Maybe the Fleet had reached Maurus with news about his young passengers. Panicking, Chase leaned toward the console. What he saw there was a line of streaming words, and an ID photo of someone with dark eyes and sharp cheekbones.
    Maurus slapped the console, and the image vanished. A coordinate map filled the screen. “What?