Most pirates didn’t work alone. She’d always been an exception. Rhihann Vicek kept absolutely still behind the metal shipping containers in the hold of the starship Vorgon’s Wing and waited for her chance. She hadn’t simply stowed away on the Vorgon’s Wing. Stowaways only wanted a ride. Rhihann intended to steal the starship, all by herself. Her skintight invig bodysuit seeped a low level of muscle relaxant into her skin to keep her from cramping and stiffening up. The time readout in her visor’s display told her she’d stayed in this same position for the last twenty minutes as the corvette-class ship had made the jump to wherever the mysterious Otun pilot was headed. Probably to one of the luxury casinos in the rings of Haprodos Seven or the infamous Havva Station. Either way, he’d be getting a surprise when she nicked his ship right out from under him. Rhihann almost pitied the captain, because she was one of the best in the quadrant and he didn’t have a prayer against her. She was a pirate. Specifically an infiltrator corsair, as opposed to the clumsy and violent battle-and-board type of space pirate. She had a bit more class. She commandeered vessels with stealth and finesse, and she was very good at what she did. So she did pity the unsuspecting captain on one hand…but on the other, a wealthy Otun noble had more than enough money to take in stride a little annoyance such as having his space-ride jacked. Remaining absolutely still allowed the invig suit’s cloaking effect to work perfectly against the ship’s scanners, though she could still be “seen” in visible light. Only the military or very rich criminals could afford true visible light spectrum cloaking devices, and someday she’d own one herself. That, or she’d save the money and retire to the water gardens on some UnReg outworld far away from here. She frowned, dragging her attention back to the job. Soon the display timer in her visor would reach zero, and she’d set her plan in motion, exit the cargo hold, subdue the pilot, and take control of the ship. The last of the timer digits flashed down to zero. She switched off the muscle relaxant and waited until her bio readouts read normal again, all except for her elevated heart rate and adrenaline levels. Smoothly, she sat up and shifted into a crouch behind the shipping container. The metal container was speckled with the strange Otun writing of patterned dots and her visor translated each word automatically. Looked as if it stored Otun food, which was almost as bad as industrial waste, because Otun cuisine was some of the spiciest in the known universe. She’d made the mistake of trying a bite once and it had felt as though she’d swallowed a mouthful of plasma. Stop stalling and focus, she scolded herself. Burn a thruster and move. She carefully edged to the corner of the container, peeked around the side, and scanned the two camera/sensor arrays she’d identified earlier. Instead of trying to hack them, her bodysuit rendered her invisible to their lenses and wavelength scans, eliminating the risk of flagging a hijack-sensing computer subprogram. The suit’s hood and visor also shielded her from giving off psychic thought radiation—perfect against alien races who employed psionics. She was effectively invisible to the ship’s computers. Rhihann hurried across the cargo deck to the interior door. The electronic lock was a decent one, but she had access to extrapolator code that would crack it. She settled her hand against the digital pad, but a nervous twinge made her pause before she engaged the code break. During most of the hijacking she’d be invisible and undetected, but opening doors was one of the events that made her vulnerable to the onboard security systems…and this had to go off perfectly. Her friend was counting on it. She steadied herself, took a deep breath, and engaged the code. After a wait of less than a breath-cycle, the door whooshed open. She slipped through and it closed behind her. The feed to the main computer had been looped, so the mainframe shouldn’t have received information that a door had mysteriously opened somewhere inside the ship. She tensed anyway, waiting for the alarm or for someone to show up with a blaster… But after a long agonizing wait there was no alarm and no crossfire, so she pressed on to the engine room, letting the map display in her visor goggles guide her through the ship. She couldn’t afford to be nervous, and she sure as groxx couldn’t afford a mistake. This time the credits weren’t even for her bank account. Her friend Enza had fallen on hard times because of a scumbag boyfriend and his gambling debts. Thanks to that slime-prick boyfriend, Enza now owed credits to a Jogo crime lord, a real nasty bugger named Tarvenoi. She would be sold into virtual slavery if the debt, plus usurious interest, couldn’t be repaid and quickly. So Enza had come to Rhihann for help. Rhihann hadn’t enough credits on hand to cover the debt herself, so she’d had to offer her own unique skills to Tarvenoi to save Enza’s ass. She knew she was a star-eyed fool…but what choice did she have? Her friend needed her. All the same, the complications added a dangerous edge to what should’ve been a standard hijack caper, because Tarvenoi wanted this starship, specifically. Rhihann didn’t know why, and she was smart enough not to ask. Stealing a starship from a young, rich noble from some plush world after he’d spent a week saturating in hedonism and debauchery was nothing to her. Especially not when counted against her friend’s freedom. When Rhihann was done, the Otun pilot would be short one high-end corvette cruiser, but he wouldn’t be harmed—except maybe his pride. None of these rich rubes who looked down their noses at a female human serving in the clubs and gambling halls had ever presented a challenge to her. This one would be no different. She entered the engine room. This was the fail safe for the plan…and she always had a backup plan. She detached the EK pulse device from her the strap on her forearm and secured it to the engine cycle port. A temporary power failure here and the ship wouldn’t be moving anywhere until she deactivated the device with her code. Once again she made her way down the main corridor. Now all she had to do was deal with the rich boy Otun pilot…or she supposed she should keep referring to him as the captain, though she already knew he was alone on the ship. She wouldn’t hurt him. Once she’d infiltrated the cockpit, he’d be so surprised by her presence that she’d easily be able to touch him with the stunner pad hidden in the palm of her glove. She couldn’t bring a standard firearm on board because—even with her suit’s advanced concealment—there were too many security sensors that specifically scanned for weapon profiles and power cores. Besides, the thought of killing with a blaster turned her stomach. Her stunner concealed itself as a seemingly harmless battery module, but the tiny prongs would give an incapacitating shock even to a creature as huge as an Otun male. Once he was unconscious, she’d use a cyclo-lift to haul him into the escape pod and she’d jettison him into space with the distress beacon broadcasting. It sounded cold, but she knew they were in a well-traveled shipping jump route. He’d be picked up within the hour, though he’d have food, water and air for at least a standard month. He’d survive, though he’d be one fancy ship poorer…and she would be able to get her friend Enza free. After the debt was settled, she’d dump Enza on a safe planet away from that scrim-scum boyfriend and even farther away from Tarvenoi. She’d order her friend to find a respectable job, to get laid a few times, and to settle down and be happy with her life, whatever she chose to do with it. That was the idea, anyway. As for Rhihann, she’d be back in space, doing what she was best at: infiltrating pleasure yachts and stealing them out from under their owner’s noses. That was, after she’d also gotten herself laid a few times. A girl had to have some fun, and wearing the invig suit had an unintended effect on her. It conformed to her curves so closely it might as well have been black bodypaint, cupping her ass, her mound, and molded to the curves of her breasts. It was like a lover’s hand pressed on every erogenous zone, and was so light she felt as though she were stalking around stark naked. Her nipples hardened at the pleasure of danger and excitement intermixed. She shook off the distracting thoughts. No time to indulge. The cockpit door was in sight at the end of the main corridor. She lifted her hand, her wrist stunner at the ready. The stunner battery only held enough power for one discharge, so she had to make her strike count. She wasn’t worried, though. With her fighting skills and the element of surprise, these jobs were almost too easy. She’d never missed yet. Another reason why she’d been so quick to agree to take the crime lord’s offer and settle her friend’s debt. Now to rid her new ship of this bothersome alien captain and claim the pilot chair so she could finally have a moment to relax.