We arrive at the living quarters of dad's old partner. It's old, relatively speaking but it sat in the old part of the artificial ring system surrounding the planet. Nekomon's light blasts through all the windows as we walk inside. We arrive at a common grounds area, where all of the light in the room came through the window. Soon we are at the 20th floor, room 101. Darrin looks at me for a moment and shakes his head. Marcus sands next to me and I reach up and knock.
No response at first, so I try again. Then the door creeks open. A man peaks his head on the other side. His hair was worn and uncut. He's untrimmed and overweight.
"Hello?" He asks.
"Is this Jun?" I ask
"Who's asking?"
"My name is Demi...I-"
"-wrong room."
"Wait!" Darrin yells, holding open the door.
"Kid, I already told you-"
"We were sent to find you." I yell
"By whom?"
"Barrett!"
He stops for a moment, then looks up at us. He lets go of the door and stands closer to me, looking me in the eyes.
"Barrett sent you?"
"Yeah."
"Have we met?"
"No. My name is Demi. Commander of the RNS Boseman."
Something inside him lights up, likes he's seen a long-lost puppy or something.
"-Her eyes were a purple as the star in the sky. The locals called it Demira."
He recalls an old tale father would tell me at night, the source of my name. He knows.
"You have beautiful purple eyes, just like his wife." He continues.
"I get that a lot."
"You're Burt's kid."
"Yeah."
"By the father! Come in. Come!" he says gleefully opening the door.
We enter his room, and he closes the door behind us. It's small and dirty but passable, if I could describe it.
"Sorry. The windows cannot be opened on the upper floors. The artificial atmosphere can only go up so high."
"I can tell." Marcus says coughing. "I can smell the recycled air."
"So, what can I do for you?" He says as he sits in his chair.
I sit in the couch across from him while Marcus sits next to me.
"Actually." I said, "I could use your help."
"What do you need?"
"Years ago, you and my dad were investigating a ship, it was Meklarian."
"Hmm. Yeah, the Gridlock."
He stands from his chair and head for a closet in the back of the room. He pulls out a box and places it on the table and starts scavenging through it. He pulls out a photo and hands it to us. It was a picture of a ship. It was blurry and hard to read but it was very large and very long. Darrin and Marcus look through the rest of the box.
"What is this?" I ask.
"The last known picture we have of the Gridlock. We couldn't find it for the life of us. There was a missing scientist we were looking at, too. I think it may have something to do with is."
As I look a the photo, I found myself very confused. I give it to Darrin to confirm my suspicions.
"What is it?" he says as he grabs the photo, not paying attention to anything we said previously.
"That is the Gridlock. What does that not look like to you?"
Darrin takes a hard look at it as Marcus peaks over my shoulder to see what we were talking about.
"That looks like...not the Gridlock. What the fuck?"
"Excuse me?" Jun asks.
"We found the scientist you were looking for a few days ago." I said
Juns eyes light up.
"What?"
"Yeah, he was held captive on a planet near the Meklar border. He died at the hands of a ship named the Gridlock, but it looks nothing like this photo."
"What is that? Three ship now that we have found called the Gridlock?" Darrin asks.
"Someone doesn't want to be found." Marcus says, looking back through the documents.
"So, you have anything else about the ship? Anything we could use?" I ask.
"I thought you shot down the ship." Jun says.
"Turns out, we shot down one of many."
"Hmm."
"So, what is this, Demi? A dead end?" Darrin asks.
"I don't know."
"I don't think it is." Marcus says handing me a document.
"What is this?"
Darrin leans in for a closer look.
"Looks like a ledger. A request for parts. Looks like they want electronics...thrusters?"
He takes the paper from me and keeps looking.
"There are cannons, missiles, and fuel. Hundreds of millions of pounds of it."
"Are they building something?" Marcus asks.
"If they are, its big, or there is a lot of them."
"Someone is building an army, for what?"
"Maybe not an army." I said, thinking hard on everything that has happened so far. "If this is what I think it is...what if it's a peace force?"
"A peace force?" Marcus asks
"Yeah, there was an independent peace force in development by Princess Cadence. She hasn't announced it yet.
"Where did you find this?" Darrin asks Jun.
"We found it in Harrison's office, inside of a folder with a bunch of random drawings. I remember the insignia on the front. The symbol of a triangle. It was upside down and a planet passed through the center, I think."
"Now that sounds familiar."
Marcus pulls a document out of the box and gasps at what he has found.
"You mean like this?" He asks.
The same symbol is written on the front of the paper. "Varamount Industries" is written underneath.
"Now where have I seen that name before?" Darrin asks.
"Varamount. Stella's dad's company."
"Stella? How did she get involved with this?" Marcus asks.
"I don't know." I said. "Let's go ask her."