DAY 69 — 14:18 (SHIPTIME)
The silence held.
Not the false silence where sensors lied and the dark hid teeth—this was the other kind. The kind that made Lyra's board stop lighting up with faint sweep patterns. The kind that made the Union feel less like a hunted animal and more like a knife tucked back into a sleeve.
Dack didn't trust it.
He used it.
The Union sat down on a dusty, half-forgotten service port that barely qualified as a "port"—a groundside yard built around old landing pads and a short strip of prefab hangars, with a single control tower that looked like it had been repaired by people who didn't own the right parts. Wind pushed fine grit across the concrete in slow waves. Industrial floodlights buzzed even in daylight, as if they weren't sure the sun would stick around.
No banners. No militia parade. No curious crowds.
Just the quiet traffic of mechanics, loaders, and contract brokers who learned early that asking questions got you hurt.
Moonjaw's mechs were clamped in the bay—Dire Wolf, Highlander, Griffin, Marauder, Awesome—and the chained Atlas still hung like a captured god, now empty of its pilot.
The woman called Mother Lark was locked in a private cabin deeper in the Union's spine. Lyra's cameras watched her from three corners and a ceiling lens. Audio was live. The door stayed locked. No one went in alone.
Dack walked the bay, eyes moving across armor plates and stress marks the way other people watched faces. He stopped under the Awesome's chest cavity where panels had been resealed and scrubbed.
Quill stood near it, helmet tucked under her arm again out of habit. Her posture was straight, disciplined, controlled. She didn't try to talk her way into trust.
She just waited for orders and followed them.
Jinx lounged on a crate in a tight black-and-red outfit that looked like it had been designed to irritate common sense. Her long dirty-blonde hair was loose today, falling over one shoulder. She watched Dack like she was bored and hungry at the same time.
Taila sat on the bay's step ladder rail with her boots hooked under the rung, halter top and red-striped leggings fitting close, eyes sharp but quieter than she'd been weeks ago. She still looked like she didn't believe she belonged here—and she still showed up anyway.
Morrigan leaned against the Marauder's leg armor like she owned it, arms crossed, gothic glare locked on the world. She looked like she'd fight a sunbeam for touching her wrong.
Rook and Rafe worked at a bench under bay lights, tools lined with obsessive precision. They didn't speak much unless there was a reason.
Lyra's voice came over internal comms—calm, clean. "Dack. I have our hires."
Dack didn't ask if. He asked where.
"Pad Three," Lyra said. "Outside. I want you there."
"On my way," Dack replied.
He went.
---
Pad Three sat at the far edge of the yard where the wind hit harder and the service port's cheap cameras didn't always track. It smelled like fuel residue and old paint. A battered ground cart sat nearby, piled with sealed tool cases and personal bags that looked too neat for this place.
Three women stood beside it.
Not in matching outfits. Not in synchronized posture.
Three separate storms trying to pretend they were calm.
They looked related in the face—same bone structure, same dark lashes, same soft curve of mouth—but everything else diverged.
Iona stood closest to the cart, hands clasped behind her back like she was posing for an inspection. She wore a simple, practical jumpsuit that had been repaired at the knees and elbows, boots scrubbed clean despite the dust, hair pulled back tight. Her eyes kept flicking to the Union's landing gear like she was calculating weight distribution without permission.
Elin hovered half a step behind, fingers twisting the strap of her bag, talking under her breath like the words were keeping her heart from leaping out of her ribs. She had a narrow face, quick eyes, and a jittery kind of energy—like she'd been raised around machines and alarms and learned to fill silence before it filled her.
Sera stood to the right, chin lifted, trying to look like she belonged anywhere she decided to stand. Her posture said confidence—until her gaze snapped to the Union's ramp, and then she swallowed, and her confidence turned into a mask worn too tight. She wore a light jacket that looked like it had been chosen for function, but the way she kept tugging at the collar betrayed nerves she didn't want anyone to see.
Lyra stood with them, slate tucked under her arm. She looked as calm as ever—like she'd been born inside a cockpit and never learned to panic.
Dack stepped into view.
All three women reacted differently.
Iona straightened like she'd been waiting for him to inspect her.
Elin started talking immediately, too fast. "Hi—sorry—hello, I mean, you're Dack Jarn, right? I'm Elin, and this is Iona and Sera, and we—Lyra said you needed—like, crew, not like crew crew, I mean crew-crew, ship crew, for operations, and we can—"
Sera cut in, too loud, trying to regain control. "We can do the work. We're not— we're not fragile."
Iona finally spoke, voice steady and formal. "We reviewed your stated requirements. We can fill the positions. I can manage inventory and burn rate. Elin can handle comms and passive sensor watch. Sera can run deck operations and smallcraft procedure."
Elin nodded too hard. "Yes. Passive. Quiet. I'm— I'm very good at quiet. I mean, not quiet as in me, obviously, but the systems—"
Sera muttered, "Elin…"
Lyra looked at Dack. "They're clean. No flags in what I could reach from here. Their background reads 'sheltered service enclave'—shipyard family. The kind of people who learned to keep things running and stayed out of politics."
Dack stared at the three of them.
Talkers.
Nervous.
But their eyes tracked the right things: the Union's landing gear, the yard's exits, the wind's direction, the little camera on the tower that wasn't pointed at them but could be.
"Why here," Dack asked.
Elin started. "We—"
Iona stepped in, formal again. "Because we can work. Because we want to leave. Because the enclave isn't safe anymore."
Sera added quickly, "And because we don't want to spend the rest of our lives… waiting."
Waiting for what, she didn't say. The way she didn't say it made it feel heavier than if she had.
Dack didn't soften.
He said, "Prove it."
Elin blinked. "Right now?"
"Now," Dack replied.
Lyra's mouth curled faintly—almost a smile. She tapped her slate once.
An alarm chirped through the pad speakers—short, sharp, ugly.
A fake ship alert. Deliberately chosen.
Sera jolted like it bit her.
Elin flinched and then started talking faster. "That's— that's a bay integrity alarm? Or—wait—no, that's a fuel differential chirp, I've heard that exact tone in older—"
Iona was already moving. She grabbed the cart's top case and popped the seals with fast hands. Tools glinted inside, neatly arranged.
Sera snapped into motion too—mask of confidence locking into place as she started pointing. "If it's fuel differential, then we lock down refuel lines. If it's bay, we seal ramps. Elin, stop talking and isolate the channel."
Elin choked on her own breath. "I'm isolating it— I'm doing it— I just— I need access to a panel or a slate—"
Lyra handed her a secondary slate without looking like she was handing over anything important.
Elin's fingers flew across it. She stopped talking for three whole seconds—then resumed in a quieter rush. "Okay. It's internal only. No external broadcast. No external ping. That means it's either local fault or someone playing with our systems—like, like a test—sorry—"
Iona slapped a diagnostic plug into the ground cart's power port and started writing a rapid inventory listing on the slate's side display, eyes narrowing. "If the fuel differential is real, it will show on the port-side feed line. We can reroute through the secondary manifold and reduce output to match—"
Sera was already walking toward the Union ramp, hands lifted as if she could calm the ship by gesture. "Deck procedure: seal ramp. Post at bay. Control personnel movement. If we have fire, we don't run—we isolate it. If we have spill, we don't chase—we contain it."
Elin blurted, "And if we have comm contamination, we don't talk— we just listen— because listening is safer—"
"Enough," Dack said.
All three froze.
Their breathing was loud in the wind.
Dack looked at Lyra. "They did it."
Lyra nodded once. "They did."
Dack looked back at the triplets.
Iona's face was steady, but her eyes were bright with restrained anxiety.
Elin looked like she wanted to crawl out of her own skin from embarrassment.
Sera's confidence-mask was cracked now, revealing nerves under it.
Dack didn't reassure them.
He gave them something better: rules.
"You work for Moonjaw," he said. "You follow chain. Lyra runs ship operations. I run contracts. You don't leave the ship alone. You don't talk about the prisoner. You don't access route logs without Lyra. You don't use external comms unless cleared."
Elin nodded too fast. "Yes, yes, absolutely—"
Iona bowed her head once. "Understood."
Sera swallowed. "Understood."
Dack stared at them for a long moment.
Then he said, "You're hired."
Elin exhaled like she'd been holding her breath for years. "Oh—thank— I mean—okay—yes—"
Sera snapped her mouth shut before she started rambling too. She nodded once, hard.
Iona looked like she might cry from relief, and then she stiffened as if emotion was a failure.
Lyra tapped her slate again. The alarm shut off.
Silence returned.
Dack turned toward the Union.
"Move your gear," he said. "Welcome aboard."
---
The moment they stepped into the mech bay, the scale hit them.
Steel. Height. Shadows.
The Dire Wolf sat like a mountain, its armor scarred and cleaned and scarred again. The Highlander looked like it wanted to pick a fight with gravity. The Griffin stood poised and lean, ready to spring. The Marauder looked like a predator with its arms hanging at rest. The Awesome waited like a wall that had learned to walk.
Above them, the chained Atlas still hung restrained—empty, but terrifying in its dead weight.
Elin stared up and whispered, "That is… a lot of mech."
Jinx appeared beside them like a problem that wore lipstick and smiled too brightly.
Her blue eyes flicked over Iona, Elin, and Sera like she was already deciding how to tease them. "Aww. Lyra brought home puppies."
Sera stiffened. "We're not—"
Elin jumped in, words spilling. "We're not puppies. We're just… new. And we don't— we don't know you, obviously, but we can learn procedures very quickly, and we're very respectful, and—"
Jinx leaned closer with a grin. "Do you know what a harem is?"
Elin froze so hard she might've been powered down.
Iona's mouth opened, then closed, then opened again. "I— I'm not familiar with—"
Sera blurted, too fast, "Is that a supply classification?"
Jinx laughed like she'd just been given a gift.
Taila approached more quietly from the Griffin's side ladder. Her cheeks were faintly pink already, like she could feel where this was going and hated it.
She looked at the triplets with a kind of careful softness. "Ignore her. She's like that."
Jinx hooked an arm around Taila's waist anyway, dragging her closer like she owned space. "I'm not 'like that.' I'm educational."
Morrigan appeared behind them, silent, eyes narrowed.
She looked Iona up and down once. Then Elin. Then Sera.
"Three," Morrigan said flatly. "Great."
Sera tried to smile. It came out wrong. "Hello. We'll be—useful."
Morrigan stared at her like she'd said something insulting. Then, after a beat, she said, "Be useful."
And walked away.
Quill watched from near the Awesome's berth, expression controlled, gaze sharp. She didn't flirt. She didn't tease. She evaluated.
Her eyes flicked to Lyra first—chain-of-command—then to Dack.
Dack met her gaze briefly, then looked away. The rule stayed the same: no one replaced his judgment, but everyone earned their place.
Jinx leaned into the triplets again, undeterred. "So. Have you ever kissed anyone?"
Elin's face went bright red so fast it looked painful. "I—what—no—why—"
Iona made a small strangled noise that might've been a cough. "No."
Sera tried to salvage the conversation by force. "We… were busy."
Jinx's grin sharpened. "Busy doing what?"
Elin panicked and blurted, "Maintenance schedules!"
Taila covered her mouth, trying not to laugh.
Jinx looked delighted. "Adorable."
Dack cut through it with a single blunt sentence.
"Jinx. Leave them alone."
Jinx pouted immediately. "You never let me have fun."
Dack looked at her.
Jinx sighed dramatically and backed off two steps, still smiling like she'd already won something.
Lyra clapped her hands once—quiet, controlled. "Iona, you're with me for inventory and burn rate. Elin, you're on comms. Sera, you're on deck and Leopard procedures."
The triplets snapped into motion like that was what they understood: work.
Dack watched them go—still awkward, still nervous, but moving with purpose.
He liked purpose.
---
Later, in the Union's small command alcove, Lyra laid it out like a roadmap.
Not a dream. A plan.
"No one hires rookies for big money," she said, tapping the holo where their finances and repair lists overlapped. "Not unless they're desperate or stupid. We want employers who pay because they think we're worth it."
Dack stared at the map. "So we get worth it."
Lyra nodded. "We build a record. We don't need to be famous across the Inner Sphere tomorrow. We need to be known in a region. A string of clean jobs. Clean after-action reports. Salvage handled correctly. No rumors of piracy. No rumors of… weirdness."
Dack didn't comment on "weirdness." He knew exactly what she meant: a ghost ship, a captive Atlas, a prisoner with an unknown name.
Lyra continued, "We take two contracts that are visible but survivable. Convoy protection. Anti-raider sweep. A garrison relief. We keep it planetary. We win clean."
Dack nodded once. "Then we climb."
"And then," Lyra added quietly, "we start hearing about higher-paying work."
Dack's voice stayed blunt. "And a JumpShip."
Lyra's eyes didn't shift. "Still on the table. But first we need stability. Crew. Routine. Less chaos."
Dack stared at the holo a moment longer.
Then he said, "I'm talking to her."
Lyra didn't ask who. "Cams are live. Audio open. I'll monitor. Quill is not permitted near the door."
"Good," Dack said, and left.
---
The prisoner cabin door was still locked, still watched.
Lyra's voice came through Dack's earpiece. "Recording."
Dack keyed the manual lock and opened the door.
The woman—Mother Lark—sat on the bolted bed like it was a throne. Cleaned up since last time: she'd been given a basic hygiene kit under watch, her hair retied neatly, her posture too composed for someone who should've been afraid.
Her eyes lifted to Dack.
No flinch.
No fear.
Just that calm, predatory interest.
"You're expanding," she said softly, like she'd heard the ship breathe different. "More mouths. More hands."
Dack didn't react. He stepped inside and stopped where the cameras could see both faces cleanly.
He didn't sit.
He didn't lean.
He made it clear he wasn't here for comfort.
"Name," he said.
Her smile sharpened. "Mother Lark suits you better."
Dack stared at her. "That's not a name."
"It's what you call me," she replied.
"It's what you call yourself," Dack corrected. "Because it scares people."
Her eyes gleamed at that—approval, maybe. Respect.
Dack continued. "I'll trade you for it."
"Trade," she echoed, amused. "You think you have something I want."
"You want options," Dack said. "You're locked in a room. You want to move. You want air that isn't recycled through my ship. You want to be treated like a person instead of cargo."
Her smile didn't fade. "And you want my name."
"And a reason," Dack added.
The air tightened.
She studied him for a long moment, as if weighing whether he could be manipulated.
Then she spoke, quietly.
"My name is Helena," she said. "Helena Lark."
Dack didn't blink. He didn't show surprise. He stored it.
Lyra's voice in his ear was almost silent: "Got it."
Dack kept his eyes on Helena. "Why."
Helena's smile became smaller, more dangerous.
"Because you're Ronan's son," she said, voice smooth as oil. "And Ronan was mine… until he wasn't."
Dack's jaw tightened, but his voice stayed flat. "Details."
Helena's eyes drifted to the camera lens in the corner like she enjoyed being recorded. "I was loyal. I was useful. I was devoted. He took that devotion and he wore it like armor."
Dack didn't move.
Helena continued, "Then he chose someone else. Not because she was better. Not because she was stronger. Because she was… simpler. Softer. Easier to pretend the world wasn't what it is."
Dack's voice was blunt. "My mother."
Helena's mouth curved. "Your mother."
A beat.
Helena leaned forward slightly, just enough to make the gesture feel intimate without touching him. "When you grow up in the kind of places I grew up… you learn early that people don't love you. They use you. They choose you when you're convenient. They discard you when you're not."
Dack's gaze didn't soften.
He said, "So you became the one who discards."
Helena's eyes gleamed. "I became the one who survives."
Dack held her gaze for a long moment.
Then he said, "Who put a leash on you."
Helena's smile widened again, pleased. "That's a better question."
Dack didn't repeat it. He waited.
Helena's eyes slid away for the first time, thinking.
Then she spoke, slower, careful—like she didn't want to give away everything.
"I learned," she said, "that there are people who like collecting tools. Men who buy loyalty with contracts. Women who sell their souls for security. Machines that grind everything into obedience."
Dack's voice stayed flat. "Names."
Helena laughed softly. "Not yet."
Dack's eyes narrowed. "Then you don't get more."
Helena studied him again, then shrugged like she didn't care—like she wasn't trapped in a locked cabin on a mercenary DropShip.
"You'll learn," she said. "You're already learning."
Dack turned toward the door.
Helena's voice followed him, gentle and poisonous. "Tell me, Dack… does it make you feel strong, building a crew? Making them loyal?"
Dack didn't look back.
"It makes me feel alive," he said.
He stepped out, locked the door, and keyed Lyra.
"She stays locked," Dack said. "Same rules."
Lyra's voice was calm. "Understood."
Dack paused outside the cabin, listening to the ship's hum and the new sounds inside it—three new voices in corridors, nervous laughter turning into work talk, footsteps that hadn't existed here yesterday.
He didn't trust windows of calm.
But he used them.
Because to survive, Moonjaw needed c-bills.
To get c-bills, Moonjaw needed contracts.
To get contracts, Moonjaw needed a name worth paying.
And to get that name…
They'd have to start being seen.
Dack headed back toward the mech bay, already thinking in cold lines.
And later, when he was back inside the Dire Wolf—when the world narrowed to steel and pressure and the truth of a cockpit—he would say the number again, quietly, like a vow.
But not yet.
Not yet.