Desclaimer: I do not own anything.

Author's Note: Since English is not my mother tongue please don't flame me for my mistakes - help me correct them.

DEFIANT

BOOK I

I.

'Risian flu! How in hell could I get risian flu? Couldn't I just get the normal one like everybody else?' No, she would not waste her time with something that minor. Hope sighed. She never ever got ill and why it had to happen this time was beyond her imagination. The doc told her that she was lucky because he had never seen such a slight case of that disease - more than 30 of the people that get it don't survive. But that was just cold comfort. She already hat not felt that good in the morning but blamed it to the amount of work she hat to do in the last three days.

She worked as a spaceship-, software- and computer engineer and she had to trace a computer virus that crippled the power supply of whole districts. Each time it happened to another one and in different time intervals. And it never lasted longer than ten minutes. But long enough to scramble sensible systems. Alarm systems, security systems.

The district with the max security prison wasn't affected yet but that was just a matter of time if she could not trace that damn virus and eliminate it. She didn't dare to imagine what harm a power failure in the prison would do. Afore said prison was one of the oldest in this quadrant and till the emergency power plant kicked in a lot could happen.

Hope lived in the district next to the prison - she was able to see the towers from her balcony. When she started working for her company she wasn't able to rent an apartment in a better area and then the little apartment had grown to her. Especially the big balcony. In the warm season she had a lot of plants out there - herbs, flowers, even some vegetables. She enjoyed working with the plants after a day in the company where most of the time she stared at a screen or worked in the hangar in which they were building the prototype of the best starship that has ever been built.

The whistling kettle, a relict she brought from her home world, interrupted her thoughts. The meds the doc has given her lessened the pain in her head and bones but the tea would improve her mood. It was a tradition in her family to drink tea at all occasions. If you are sad - drink tea. If you are ill - drink tea. You have a chat with somebody - drink tea. Celebrate something - … you get it. It was a tradition that went way back to her ancestors on old earth. She never could get used to pouring milk in her tea though. Just thinking of it caused a minor nausea. Quite apart from the fact, that the sorry excuse of a milk they sold on this planet never could stand against the milk she drank in her childhood on Aurelius III, an agricultural planet, teemed by plants and animals. The planet was beautiful but that had never seemed to be enough for her. She always had the ambition to leave the planet, explore new worlds, the whole universe, to lead an adventurous live. Computers and their innards have been more important to her than the kids in their neighborhood and most of the time she forgot to go out and play when she studied wiring diagrams and software. It was just a logical step to go to the university at Karolos V to study computer-, spaceship- and software sciences. She graduated each one summa cum laude and the companies had been keen to take on her. That's why she got here on this little planet known as the centre of computer- and starship technology in the whole galaxy. All the important inventions were made right here.

Currently she was working on a new kind of spaceship - finalized it would be the best starship ever built. It would be faster because of the warp drive, it would be invisible because of a cloaking device and it would have a lot more gadgets to make space travel easier, faster and safer. The warp drive was already finished and at the moment she was working on the cloaking device. She was making great progress when the power failures started and so her boss had to ask her to abandon her work on the ship temporary to get rid of the virus causing all the chaos.

And now she had to stay at home because she was ill instead of looking for the bug and she just could hope that her team was able to trace the virus without her help. Secretly she doubted it. She nearly got hold of the program this morning and hat tried to proceed despite her rising temperature but at noon her boss hat sent her home. He was afraid that she could make things worse while not 100 fit. Phh - like she would do something that stupid. She had planned on working from her home, as soon as she didn't feel so tired anymore. As soon her bones stopped hurting like hell.

She yawned, took her cup of tea and shuffled to the bedroom. She crawled into her bed, rested her head against the wall, enjoyed its coolness and sipped her tea. She now was tired enough to sleep despite her headache and her aching bones. She put down her cup, nestled in her pillow and relaxed.

When she heard the loud rumbling she wasn't sure if it was part of her weird dream (a computer threw its inner parts at her for infecting him with the flu - spooky) or if it was real. When she heard the noise a second time she awoke completely and a quick glance at her watch showed her that it was nearly midnight. She felt slightly better and was downright thankful that the noise saved her from her creepy dream.

Curious she made her way towards the window but couldn't see anything. Because of the noise actually coming more from the balcony she moved to the living room. "Lights 10 at the balcony" she instructed the house computer. She had no fear of any danger lurking out there - she lived on the 5th floor and from her first bonus she had a special glass built in the windows and glass doors. In the strict sense it was not even real glass - it was transparent aluminum. And in front of that there were bars made of duranium. With this rebuilding she could stay in her apartment and feel save despite its nearness to the prison.

When she reached the windowpane she saw that most of the flower pots have been knocked over, a couple of them were even broken. Anger welled up in her. She already had prepared everything for the new plants and now the whole work was for nothing. But what hat caused that chaos? She chew her bottom lip while she tried to decide whether to go out and have a look or go back to bed when she saw a movement out of the corner of her eye. In the right corner of her balcony she had an evergreen bush in a big pot whose leaves prevented the light to fall in the space behind.

"Damn, that's way too big to be the neighbor's cat." While she stood there clueless what to do she heard the sirens from the prison. A jailbreak? There must have been another power failure while she was asleep and this time exactly there. She tried to calm herself down - her apartment was at the 5th floor -who could come up the front of a house that high? She could not decide what to do - call the cops or return to bed and forget about the whole affair until she felt good enough to clear out the chaos outside?

To go outside was not an option anymore - she was a little scared by now although she cursed herself for her cowardice. "5th floor and she is afraid of the bogeyman! How old are you? And when will you start crying for mama?" she muttered.

She shook her head reluctantly and was about to return to bed when she saw it again. Yes, there has definitely been a movement. And what ever it was it approached to the French window. She stared outwards, magnetized. She was so overexcited that she first recognized holding her breath when a coughing fit hit her. 'If this isn't a feverish dream then there actually is somebody out there.' The light on the balcony was just dim and the figure had nearly gotten to the door till she could see details.

A muscular guy, baldy, his clothes tattered and dirty. He was injured albeit the wound seemed to have stopped bleeding. She had no clue why she continued staring and didn't call the cops yet, when the man lifted his head and looked straight into her eyes. Silvery, very intense eyes locked on hers - she could not avert that gaze. She did not want to - she was mesmerized.

'Call the security police!' she commanded herself. 'Now! Don't do anything stupid!' But it was too late. She already had ordered the computer to turn out the light on the balcony and to unlock the door. Something in these incredible eyes assured her that this was the right thing to do. That there would be no threat for her.

A last doubt let her pause for a moment. She did not have to help this man. She did not have to open the lock. In fact - she must not open it. She would jeopardize everything she had for a gut feeling. What was wrong with her instincts? Where did her sanity go? In a swift motion she reached for the handle and opened the door.