I looked behind us in the mirror again and saw fifteen spaceships following us at top speed. They were in a V-formation with Ferha at the lead. She wanted to catch us bad and she wasn't going to let a silly little thing like space stop her.

I watched Kiah maneuver the steering wheel of the spaceship with ease. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that it was probably no more difficult than driving a car and they both looked to function about the same.

Ferha and the other Okil security were gaining on us. I looked nervously to Kiah and she looked to be fretting just as much as I was. We were already going at top speed, we just needed to find a way to shake them off.

I looked out the side window and tried to spot any good spots where we might be able to evade them and escape to the moon, which was directly ahead of us. Luckily, there were a lot of asteroid fields around, pieces of rock which had probably once been part of the planet Aploshion. I also saw a few other distant space stations in the far, far distance which looked to be about the same size as Okil. I figured they had probably gotten the recent news about Nexelake as well.

Kiah was vigorously swerving left and right in the space ship, but I think we both knew that that wouldn't be nearly enough to stop Ferha. I suggested to her "Kiah, why don't we hide ourselves in one of those small asteroid fields?"

Kiah shook her head as if she had already discarded that idea. "They have small trackers in those asteroid fields that would still detect us. They were placed there a decade ago, mainly to stop criminals who had stolen spaceships and tried to hide there."

It sounded to me as if stealing a spaceship here was as to criminals on Second Earth having getaway cars. If you had committed a robbery or murder on a space station, obviously you couldn't just stay on that station. Just like Earth, I'm sure Aploshion had its share of criminals too. So for the Okil security, they had probably tracked down and caught countless numbers of Aploshion criminals trying to get away. Maybe they were even trying to get to the moon like we were.

I tried to keep my calm and think as I told Kiah "Well, we have to do something soon or else it's looking like we're going right back to the Okil prison!"

"I know, I know!" Kiah snapped. "But there's nothing-"

Kiah's face then lit up with an idea. Curious, I asked "What is it?"

Kiah immediately swerved the wheel and our spaceship shot to the left in a totally different direction. Ahead of us, several miles away, was the destroyed station of Nexelake. We were headed right towards it and behind us I'm sure Ferha and the others were as well.

Kiah explained as we shot closer and closer to Nexelake. "Nexelake is a huge station Bobby, bigger than Okil. Now that it's all destroyed I believe we might be able to hide ourselves in all of the floating wreckage. I think the salvage teams have just started to come and I doubt they will know anything of our escape."

"So wait," I replied trying to understand all this. "You think we can hide from Ferha in the Nexelake ruins? How long will Ferha keep looking? You know she's going to make the salvage teams help her."

"Oh, I know," Kiah said. "But it's our only chance." Then as an afterthought, as if Kiah was saying this to reassure herself she added "Like I said, Nexelake is huge. There will be many spots to hide and we'll blend in easily."

As we stopped talking we began to enter the remains of what was just yesterday a thriving, glorious city. I didn't have time to look at the wreckage though as we were still going close to top speed. Kiah began to duck and swerve around some of the giant pieces of the station. As I kept looking back I saw that we had actually lost a few of them.

"Kiah!" I exclaimed. "There are only seven of them left. Keep going!"

Kiah actually smiled at me and said "No problem."

Man, this girl could fly. I was holding on to the edge of my seat as Kiah excellently maneuvered the spaceship. It was like being on a roller coaster ride. I estimated that the wreckage went on for a couple of miles so we had plenty of space to lose them in.

As I looked on I saw some big yellow spaceships with cranes on the top and big, huge steel boxes. I guessed that these were the salvagers who were sent to pick through the remains. Sure enough, I saw a few men in yellow spacesuits actually standing and climbing on some of the pieces, looking for anything that could be saved. As I watched them I thought sadly that this was a mess that could take a few years to fully clean up.

But the saddest thing that I tried not to think about as we went was how many people had died. What had I been told, millions? The thought that Saint Dane could take a millions of lives all at once sickened me and made me want to puke. Not that I ever thought he wasn't evil enough to do it…but I guess just seeing it in reality put things in perspective for me. The last time I had seen something truly this awful was the habitat of Magorran on Cloral. But even though that was bad, this was even more people. Which made it all the more worse.

After a few more minutes I looked out the rear view mirror again and almost laughed out loud. We were down to only three security members, even though Ferha was still at the lead. I excitedly told Kiah the news and even though she looked happy she said "Well, we've still got to shake off Ferha and that's going to be the hardest part."

I nodded my head in agreement. Ferha was not going to give us up at any cost. I think she must have been furious because we were right in her grasp back at Okil and we still managed to get away, thanks to Birt. But as much as I wanted to escape from Ferha I couldn't help respect what she was doing. When she looked at us, she saw a couple of psychotic mass murderers. And no matter how much explaining I did, she would never believe that the person who had really destroyed Nexelake was an evil demon who had changed into me so I would get framed for it. Not a very good alibi.

But then everything got worse. Ferha and her two soldiers started to shoot at us! I first noticed when I heard a loud bang and felt the side of our ship shake. I looked back and sure enough, the three had tiny cannons that came out of the sides of their ships, which they were using to fire laser blasts at us.

I immediately got frantic and told Kiah "They're shooting at us! They must have given up trying to catch us and now they just want us dead!"

Kiah looked just as worried. "This isn't good. One of their shots hit one of our boosters! I'm going to have to slow down or we might fly out of control."

As the shots kept firing at us, our ship shook more and more. This was crazy! I wasn't comforted when Kiah shrieked "They hit part of our engine!"

Then another blast hit my side of the ship and I got thrown into the control panel. Everything got dizzy and I started to lose consciousness. Kiah looked terrified when she saw me. Several more blasts came at once and rocked our ship vigorously. One of the big yellow crane ships was coming towards us. Then I blacked out and didn't remember anything more.

I don't remember how long I was asleep. But when I awoke I found myself staring up at a light blue ceiling. Pictures of stars were scattered across it. I was also lying in a very comfy bed. I laid there for a few minutes, staring up at the ceiling until it all came back to me. Nexelake, the chase, firing at us. I sat up in bed immediately and my head throbbed. I then remembered that my head had crashed into the control panel and I had blacked out. But where was I now?

I gazed around the room I was in. Light blue, shiny, metallic walls surrounded me. There wasn't much else in the room except a door (obviously), a dresser, and a small desk beside the bed on which a clock sat that read 6.3, 0.1.

For a second I actually thought that when I blacked out Ferha captured us and now I was back on Okil. I started freaking out but then realized that if Ferha had caught us, I didn't think she would put me in this cozy little room.

Now I was more confused than ever. Where was Kiah? What had happened? Well, I was too curious to go back to sleep so I hopped off the edge of the bed and stood up. I looked and saw that I was still in my typical Aploshion clothes. I walked up to the door and pushed the big button right next to it. I was relieved when the door slid open. At least I wasn't locked in.

I stepped outside the room and found myself in a small silver hallway. Uh-oh. I was getting some bad Okil vibes. What if I really had been captured and they decided to put me in a nice room before my execution? I looked down either ends of the small hallway. There were two doors opposite each other on the left side and one door on the right side.

Cautiously I headed right to the single door. When I got there I saw it was already open so I peeked inside. A short Aploshion man stood there reading something on a techsheet. He immediately saw me and rushed over to where I was standing. My first thoughts were to run away in case he was a guard but instead he eagerly shook my hand and said "Well rise and shine there young lad. Kiah told me it would be a while before you awoke."

Well, he was a friendly guy. I opened my mouth to say something but he continued "I'll bet your right confused now. Well don't worry, I'll fill you in. By the way, my name's Certio. Certio Nadd."

He motioned me into the room and I saw that it was a kitchen. Something smelled great and Certio said "You must be hungry. Come now, take a seat."

He motioned me to sit at a small, round table. I felt like I should thank him so I said "Thank you Mr. Nadd. My names Bobby Pendragon by the way."

"Oh you don't need to thank me. I'll always help Kiah and her friends, especially in her time of need."

Like I said Certio was a short guy with all the usual Aploshion features. He looked to be in his fifties. Unlike all of the people I had seen previously on Okil he wore rusty brown colored clothes. Which made me feel that I was definitely not on Okil anymore.

Certio brought me a plate of some odd looking green meat but when I tasted it was delicious. While I was eating Certio sat down at the table as well and said "So from what Kiah has told me, you two had a pretty busy day yesterday."

Was that how long I had been asleep? A day? I nodded and said "Yeah, tell me about it. But you have got to believe me, I didn't destroy Nexelake!"

Certio smiled and said "I believe you, although I'm sure most people won't. Anyways, it looks like you'll be staying here for a while."

"But where is 'here'?" I asked.

Certio explained "You're on the moon, Bobby. As I'm sure you know some people have farms on the moon. I'm one of them."

"So you're a moon farmer?" I asked trying to understand. "But how can you grow food."

"We have indoor greenhouses that grow all the crops and then we transport them to the different space stations." Certio continued. "I make a trip out to Okil about once every month."

Wow, that was weird. Even though Certio called himself a farmer, technology was doing all the work for him. I would be very interested to see the process that moon farmers did to grow their crops. It seemed way different from regular Earth farmers. But heck, I was just glad to be on the moon. Like Kiah said, the moon was a safe place to hide.

Thinking of Kiah I decided to ask "Where is Kiah, Mr. Nadd?"

"Please Pendragon, call me Certio. Anyways, Kiah dropped you off here and told me to look after you while she had a few more things to clear up."

That was odd. I was dying to know how we had escaped from Ferha. When I fell unconscious it had seemed like we were doomed. Maybe Certio knew the answers.

I asked Certio "Did Kiah tell you how we escaped?"

Certio shook his head with disappointment and said "No, she seemed to be in a hurry. She told me she would be back soon though. Say would you like to see my farm?"

"Yeah, that sounds cool," I told him. We stood up and Certio led me to the farms.

I looked around as we walked down the hallway to the left and I noticed that while this place still had the essence of Aploshion culture it was very different from Okil. It was like being in a different country almost. I couldn't help feeling as if my first chapter of living on Aploshion was over. A new one was starting.