The last thing Lari expected just before returning to work after her annual vacation was an order to drop everything and take on a rescue mission with only twenty-four hours’ notice.
Finding where Captain Vermillion’s ship had crashed without known coordinates was not going to be easy. To make matters worse, she has to travel to another galaxy in deep space and experience hibernation for the first time on a brand-new spaceship built to transport colonists.
Troy Vermillion can hardly believe his eyes when he sees the beautiful female captain sent to rescue him.
“We have already assigned a new captain to take command of Travantus Two. We need you to take command of The Astraios tomorrow morning when it departs on a mission to rescue Captain Troy Vermillion and his crew. You may not have heard of his ship or the mission they were sent on because the ship departed before you were born. Very recently, though we’re not quite sure how recent due to the time lag of intergalactic communication, their ship, The Romulus, crashed on a planet somewhere in The Black Mirror Galaxy, which is more than twice the size of The Milky Way. We’re also unsure on which planet the crash occurred, so unfortunately, we don’t have an exact location. The rescue operation could be rife with danger, and we need one of our best to command the Ark and direct the mission. You have a flawless record, and after much consideration, the president and the galactic board chose you from the list of fifteen possible candidates.”
Lari didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t an emotional person, but right then… Her throat constricted at the thought of abandoning her crew, the men and women she had worked with so closely for seven years. It was a done deal. They had already appointed another captain to take command of her ship and left her no choice in the matter. And this ship, an Ark as the admiral called it, was untried, new out of the box.
“Captain Johnson, you’re not saying anything. You do realize it’s quite an honor to have been chosen to command the Ark, the first of its kind.”
“Why is it called an Ark?” she finally managed to get out.
“As in Noah’s Ark? I presume you’re familiar with that Biblical story. Like I said, it can hold up to five thousand passengers plus a crew of five hundred or more.”
“It must be huge, sir. Why send such a big ship out for merely a captain and his crew? Depending on the kind of ship Captain Vermillion commanded, there couldn’t be more than maybe twenty to about two or three hundred crewmembers to rescue. I presume it was a smaller spaceship and not a cruise ship because you didn’t mention passengers. And you said it was on a mission.”
“The Romulus was an exploration ship. Including the captain, there were twenty-eight male crewmembers onboard. We don’t know if all of them survived the crash, or for that matter, any of them.”
Lari couldn’t help snorting. “And you would send out a ship that can hold up to five thousand passengers? Isn’t that a tad ridiculous? Sorry for being so straightforward, sir, but it doesn’t make sense. You would be better off sending Travantus Two. Besides, The Black Mirror Galaxy is unexplored, and how many light years away? It will take years to get there.”
