Chapter 7: Adrienne "Ace" McAllister

Adrienne sat in the command chair, her fingers moving methodically across the console. The ship had settled into its designated trajectory, and now came the real test—making sure everything was stable before they committed to the Sol shot maneuver.

She exhaled slowly, her eyes scanning the flight diagnostics. The ship’s automated systems were handling most of the adjustments, but she still preferred to double-check. The AI-assisted controls were reliable, but Adrienne had learned long ago that nothing replaced human instinct.

"Li, confirm our nav systems are syncing with the expected trajectory. I don’t want even a fraction of a deviation when we hit the burn."

"Already on it, Captain," Gabe responded. "Everything’s aligning so far, but I’ve still got that minor signal interference we picked up on launch. It’s subtle, but I’m running a deeper analysis."

Adrienne frowned but didn’t let the concern show. A minor interference wasn’t uncommon in deep-space operations, but the fact that it had persisted meant something was off.

"Keep me posted. I want full diagnostics on all primary systems. If anything looks even slightly off, I need to know before we hit the burn window."

She switched to reviewing the ship’s power output. The reactor was running at optimal levels, but their fuel efficiency had dropped by 0.3%. It was within safety margins, but unexpected losses were the kind of variables that could cascade into disaster.

"Hernandez, status on propulsion and core integrity?"

"Numbers are holding, Captain, but I’ve got some minor fluctuations in the auxiliary thrusters. Nothing that’ll throw us off, but I’m keeping an eye on it."

Adrienne nodded to herself. Minor fluctuations were expected, but every discrepancy had to be accounted for. The Sol shot wasn’t a maneuver they could afford to execute with uncertainty.

She turned her attention to the crew status feed. Noah was running an equipment check, ensuring their EVA suits and emergency gear were ready if needed. Aurora was deep in her biological systems review, making sure the environmental balance was stable for the long haul.

She pulled up the pressure readings for the external hull. No breaches, no stress fractures—at least, none that registered. The ship was built for this, designed to handle extreme forces, but Adrienne had learned long ago that no system was truly perfect. If something was going to fail, it wouldn’t announce itself. It would wait until it was too late.

"Noah, run a redundancy check on all emergency oxygen supplies and escape pod seals. I don’t want any surprises."

"Already ahead of you, Captain," Noah responded. "Everything checks out, but I’ll do another sweep just to be sure."

Adrienne drummed her fingers against the console. She didn’t like this. Everything was running too smoothly, too cleanly. Years of experience had taught her that quiet didn’t always mean safe. It meant waiting for the first crack to appear.

Her gut told her they were missing something. The signal interference, the fuel loss, the minor thruster fluctuations—they weren’t big enough on their own to warrant concern. But together? It painted a picture she didn’t like.

She opened a private channel to Gabe.

"Li, I want you to dig into that signal interference deeper. Cross-reference it with our comms history, long-range sensors, and any external radiation readings. If there’s even a sliver of a pattern, I want to know."

"Copy that, Captain. I’ll pull historical data and see if anything sticks."

She leaned back, staring at the mission clock. They were hours away from committing to the slingshot maneuver. If something was wrong, now was the time to find it.

"All stations, give me a full report in the next five minutes. I don’t care how small the issue is—if it doesn’t sit right, I want to hear about it."

Adrienne clenched her jaw. She had led missions before, had faced impossible odds and lived to tell the tale. But something about this one felt different.

Something was waiting for them. She could feel it.

Now, she just had to figure out what.