He didn't answer, instead changing the subject to basic sublight engine theory and power generation.
Chapter Eight
Relay
“Ready to rift jump to Ollan's Hub in three minutes, give or take,” Barix said in a bored voice.
Aiden didn't even bother to acknowledge, although he did do the finger and hand exercises that would keep them quick and limber in case the Last Stand was jumping into trouble and he needed to fly sharp.
Because most rift jumps were hugely variable, largely dependent on the specific calculations used by each navigator, chances were infinitesimally small of anyone intercepting them coming out of a jump anywhere but at a specific destination, like a planet or spaceport. That meant pirates were more likely to haunt those points, but even there they had a hard time because most ships jumped within an hour or two of their destination, then made the rest of the trip at sublight speeds.
Unless you actually knew where a ship was coming out, or there was some cosmic phenomenon that narrowed the area ships could jump to, or there was a lot of pirate activity at that destination, it was rare to jump into an ambush. Most pirates operated by having fast ships and trying to intercept potential victims approaching their destination, before they had time to make another rift jump and escape.
Of course, Fleetfoot could've warned them about assuming ambush was impossible.
Aiden would've bypassed Ollan's Hub entirely, since it was just a small communications relay that offered basic repairs and emergency services. But the main reason the Last Stand hadn't already been blown to the void was that they kept their ears to the ground and gathered as much information as possible.
Part of that was parsing what they got from the databanks of ships they captured, part of it was picking up information when they stopped at spaceports, even purchasing tidbits from brokers and contacts. But it was surprising just how useful it could be to stop in at communications relays they were passing close to, and just take a few minutes to dump all the latest scuttlebutt from the allnet into their databanks.
Of course, it wouldn't be nearly as useful without Ali; she could parse information far better than even the Last Stand's computer, and did an infinitely better job of determining what was relevant. Thanks to her they had a much better chance of evading manhunts, avoiding ambushes, or simply steering clear of problem areas.
Not to mention finding new targets.
Speaking of his space angel now, as Aiden waited on the rift calculations Ali leaned away from her station to his left and intimately put her lips close to his ear. Unfortunately, it turned out what she had to say was anything but welcome.
“My love,” she said quietly, for his ears alone even in the otherwise mostly silent bridge, “if I could offer some advice?”
Aiden snorted, not bothering to lower his own voice. “That is one of your roles as my adult companion, right? Everything I need you to be?”
“I'm glad to hear you value me for that,” Ali replied. “Here's the thing. I've noticed you're unusually attentive to Lana's demeanor towards you, more so than you are with others you interact with. Bearing that in mind, I should alert you to the fact that your . . . aloof treatment of the gunner seems to be negatively impacting her opinion of you.”
He grimaced, glancing over at the gunner, who couldn't hear the companion and showed zero curiosity about what they were talking about. All he showed was discipline and duty, just like he was supposed to. Like he always did.
So why was this such an emergency that the conversation had to happen now, in whispers? “Is this the time, Ali?” he asked, finally lowering his voice.
“The best time to address a potential issue is immediately, my love,” she replied firmly.
Aiden settled back in his seat with a resigned sigh. “Let's have it, then.”
This had to be about the little incident a few hours earlier, when he'd excused Lana from her first day on duty, even if that duty at the moment involved simply learning the ropes. He'd firmly ordered the young woman to go get some sleep after discovering that, eager to become a useful member of the crew as soon as possible, she'd talked the gunner into continuing to teach her even long after her shift was supposed to be over.
Harmless enough, even admirable. But something about seeing those two together was making it harder and harder to tolerate being around the gunner. It wasn't jealousy, there was no reason for that, but something was irritating him about the whole thing.
And to be honest, him noticing that attitude in himself was why he'd ordered the gunner to assume responsibility for teaching Lana in the first place, hoping that having the two working together would make it easier to get used to.
Turns out it hadn't, at least not yet. And then when he'd discovered Lana pushing herself to exhaustion in a stubborn race to finish learning stuff that would take her months in any case, he'd taken it out on the gunner in front of her. And more harshly than usual.
By the same token, he shouldn't have been so annoyed by Ali even mentioning any of this, especially given his behavior. But he was; she followed her core priorities looking out for the welfare of all humans, of course, but sometimes it felt like she had a soft spot for the gunner. And, even more aggravatingly, she insisted she had Aiden's own best interests at heart by trying to improve his relationship with the young man.
And who knew, maybe she did. It still irritated the void out of him.
Ali slipped into his lap so she could have an easier time whispering directly in his ear. And, probably, also to soothe him and put him in a more reasonable mood; hard to be unreasonable while snuggling up to the universe's most beautiful woman.
“Have you considered,” she began gently, “that
