Space Race (Space Race 1) Nathan Hystad (ebooks children's books free .TXT) 📖

knocked down a peg. I wasn’t sure I wanted to do it again. But seeing the look in her eye, I was drawn in. I flipped my legs over the mattress, sitting beside her.

Before I had a chance to reply, she continued. “And that’s saying the Primaries will even let Bryson take it. From what I’ve seen, the chances of that are slim to none.”

“What would you have us do?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Find a way to fight this. Work with Eclipse.” Jade’s tears subsided, and she frowned. “We’ll win the race and use the platform to our benefit. We can convince Bryson to team with Eclipse, start a new way of living.”

I glanced past her shoulder, ensuring we were alone. “I’m not sure how much convincing we’ll need to give him. I appreciate your passion, but what else can we do? We’re just four people and a robot in a Racer—in a competition designed by the Primaries and the Board, the same people you’re talking about facing off against.”

Her chin lowered to her chest, and she stared at her hands. “I know, but it could work. Promise me you’ll consider it.”

“I will.”

“Good.” Jade looked at me. “Can I tell you something?”

“Sure.” I anxiously waited for her to speak. The room was quiet, only her breathing breaking the silence.

“I’m not who you think,” she said.

“You’re not Jade Serrano?”

She shook her head.

“Then who are you?”

“I am Jade, but my real last name is Trevors.”

Trevors. It clicked, and I glanced at the doors. “Wait. No relation to Erik Trevors?”

“That’s right,” she said.

Erik Trevors was LunaCorp’s CEO. “Are you his daughter?”

“No.” Jade’s voice was small. “His niece.”

“Why are you telling me this?” I asked, feeling more coming on.

“I know how much you hate the Corporations, and if you learned I was related to a Primary CEO, you’d freak out on me.”

I sighed, coming close to arguing with that point, but she was right. “I don’t care, Jade. If you were one of them, you wouldn’t have been kicked off Luna.”

“I wasn’t technically kicked out.”

“Then what?”

She cracked her neck, pausing in thought. “I was removed from my position and was offered a cushy role with the executives. No one was intended to discover my betrayal. But I didn’t want to be employed by a Corporation that allowed their personnel to be killed and covered up. When I saw Bryson’s message, I was intrigued.”

“Intrigued enough to leave a life of luxury behind?” I asked.

Jade nodded. “I guess so.”

“Did you make the right decision?”

“Maybe. Either way, I just wanted you to know. No secrets.” She headed to her own bunk. I wanted to follow her, to tell her I didn’t care what her last name was, but I refrained.

“Get some rest. I’ll head to the bridge.” I left her there, letting the news of her lineage sink in.

____________

“I don’t know how anyone watches this footage for more than an hour at a time.” Luther scrutinized the feeds as they discussed every team member on Lotus in depth. They hadn’t played ours yet, and I was dreading what they’d drudge up about each of our team members.

“I kind of enjoy it,” Holland said.

Jade smiled at him across the cockpit. “We can tell.”

“The fact that the Board hasn’t announced the next elimination round gave me concern,” I admitted. We were a few hours from the final checkpoint of this leg, and we still hadn’t been told what the competition was.

“Captain Lewis, there’s an incoming message from Lead Chair Octavia Post,” R11 informed us, and I accepted the transmission. It was like she’d read my mind.

“Congratulations to each of the contestants on making it this far. As you can see, Saturn is approaching, and you’ve been promised another event to determine our final four.” Octavia beamed, and I felt her eyes staring at me through the screen, even though this was a universal broadcast.

“Four! I still can’t believe they’re cutting three of us.” Luther slapped the back of my chair and settled his hands onto his hips. “This really isn’t—”

“Fair?” I laughed. “It’s their race, and we’re but a small cog in their plan. Way I see it, we have a chance to crush three more dreams.”

Octavia kept speaking, and I focused, lifting a finger when Holland started to interject.

“You have engineers for a reason, and while we’ve never had a checkpoint quite like this, the Board thought we were due to expand our team members’ effectiveness in a Race. As at Mars, when your Racer passes through the last Ring before Saturn, your time will pause, and the first-place team will have that lead the following day. The winner of this elimination round will receive an additional hour’s advantage.”

I glanced at Jade, and she was pensive, biting a strand of her hair.

“The competition will take place tomorrow at 1200 hours. Dock at the Ganymede neutral station and rest up, because you’re going to need it.” Octavia looked different, older even. She was worried about something, and I doubted it had anything to do with the results of the Space Race.

The screen went dark, and Saturn appeared again in her majestic beauty. Not every planet elicited a reaction from me, but there was something different about her: the way the rings presented in their perfect symmetry, the lines of the planet. It was as inhospitable as you could imagine, but that somehow made it all the more appealing.

The moons were hubs for the workers, with most of the Primaries controlling this entire region. These moons were distributed more evenly, according to rank.

“What do you think the competition is?” Luther finally asked Jade.

“No idea. I suspect it has something to do with communication, or Core enhancements. Why does it seem like we’re being set up? That the other teams will already know what’s about to take place?” Jade didn’t sound anxious, just intrigued.

“Whatever it is, you’ll beat them and we’ll move on,” Holland said.

“If only it were that easy. I’ve met these innovators on the other teams.