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“These ships form a mind and DNA bond with crew, but she’s chased everyone away,” I said. “Rennick would be gone too, but he’s too damn stubborn to admit defeat.”

“I don’t know why she’s being prickly. That’s a problem.” Doc downed her wine. “I’ve got ships’ worth of data in the archive, and none of it looks like this. This baby is so broken it makes my heart hurt.”

“Not broken beyond repair,” Tambi said. “We will find a fix. We always do.”

“I’ve cross-referenced every fault pattern Kelvane bioships are known for,” I said. “Not one match.”

“So, we’ve got four experts and zero theory so far. That’s just our baseline. This isn’t over.” Tambi tapped her screen. “We need rest. Then we run a full diagnostic. Top to bottom. If this ship is hiding something, we corner it properly, tame it, then put her back together until she purrs.”

Doc raised her glass. “To getting paid an obscene amount of money to be professionally confused.”

Monica’s grin shifted. “Speaking of confused. Cass, do you want to explain what you and Ship Daddy were doing behind closed doors, or should we all take a long, filthy guess?”

“Please make us guess.” Doc laughed.

“We were sealing a containment breach.” I reached for the last chunk of cheese.

“Was the breach in Rennick’s pants?” Monica fluttered her lashes.

“Fuck you.”

“I think you mean you want to fuck Rennick.”

“He’s a job!”

“He would be. You’d have to work him hard.” Doc stood and thrust her hips. “Ride an alien and save a spaceship, isn’t that right?”

I looked at Tambi for help, but she was smiling at her screen, shaking her head.

“I was there for the part where you two were about to eat each other’s faces.” Monica turned to Tambi. “Or did I imagine that?”

“I clocked it, too.” Tambi didn’t even glance up. “Cass, don’t forget the rules.”

“I’m not fucking him! I have no plans to fuck him.”

“You can fuck him all you like, but screw his brains out once he’s paid us in full and we know he won’t come back with more work. Oh, and make sure he’s left a five-star review before booting his butt out of bed.”

“I have twenty credits on it happening before the diagnostic is finished tomorrow.” Doc raised her hand. “Monica’s got fifty on it happening before the end of the week.”

“For the record, I have more faith in Cass’s self-control,” Tambi said. “It’ll be at least ten days.”

“You’ll lose that bet,” Monica said.

“There is no bet! Stop betting on my self-control.” I flicked a crust at her. “He’s a client. I don’t screw clients.”

“You don’t fuck repeat clients,” Tambi said. “None of us do. I have no issue with you ladies having a good time with one-off jobs like Rennick, just don’t make it a messy time, because I’m the asshole that deals with the contracts and complaints. And I don’t want some heartbroken alien sobbing at my desk because Cass won’t return his calls and refuses to be his Valentine.”

“You love dealing with the shit we bring you.” Monica slung an arm around Tambi’s shoulders. “And we love you for it even more because it means we don’t have to do it.”

An empty wine bottle on the counter tipped onto its side and rolled the length of the table, stopping dead against my plate.

“Um... cool,” Monica said. “Very normal. I didn’t just imagine that, did I?”

I set the bottle upright. “It’s the ship settling. Things roll about.”

“The ship is in dock. It shouldn’t move,” Tambi said.

“And that bottle moved uphill.” Doc glanced at the counter, then back at me. “It defied Earth’s gravity. There’s no gravity sphere on board. It shouldn’t do that.”