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  ROGUE PLANETS

  DELTA TEAM – BOOK 3

  BY M. D. COOPER

  Thanks to the Aeon 14 JIT and Beta Readers

  Scott Reid

  Chad Burroughs

  Gareth Banks

  Copyright © 2020 M. D. Cooper

  Aeon 14 is Copyright © 2020 M. D. Cooper

  Cover Art by Andrew Dobell

  Editing by Jen McDonnell, Bird’s Eye Books

  Aeon 14 & M. D. Cooper are registered trademarks of Michael Cooper

  All rights reserved

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  FOREWORD

  PREVIOUSLY ON DELTA TEAM

  NOT A MORNING CAT

  THE NEW JOB

  AN ENTERTAINING NEED

  STARLESS

  FRIEND OF LAST RESORT

  A BORED KITTY

  RED AND THE SKI RUN

  VAMPY & KITTY’S NIGHT OUT

  CHANGE OF…EVERYTHING

  SEARCH AND SEIZURE

  THIEFING IN THE NIGHT

  RECOMPENSE

  THE STEW THICKENS

  THANK YOU

  THE BOOKS OF AEON 14

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  FOREWORD

  This third book of the Delta Team series concludes the rewriting and updating of what was originally five novellas published in a series of anthologies.

  Though they’re rather goofy, I really enjoyed writing them, as sometimes, one just needs a break from a serious world and more serious series. Also, given an infinite universe, some pretty silly things are likely to occur.

  The setting for this story came about after I read a study about how many planets might be wandering between the stars, having been ejected from their star systems during formation, or subsequent cataclysmic events.

  Since they are (naturally, at least) really cold, they’re almost impossible to find unless you stumble across one during interstellar exploration.

  Eventually, as more and more space was simply skipped over via FTL, the empty spaces between stars became entirely unexplored, even when in the midst of burgeoning empires.

  How exactly the pair of rogue planets, known as Allaran and Crossbar to their inhabitants, came to be settled is a story for another time, but over the years, one could see how two isolated worlds locked in an endless cosmic dance could find their residents growing intolerant of one another.

  Animosity would grow, and with limited resources and energy, war would be inevitable.

  Unless, of course, someone sends in the Delta Team…

  Malorie Cooper

  [email protected]

  Danvers, 2020

  PREVIOUSLY ON DELTA TEAM

  Cue the music.

  In 8913, a crack military unit was court-martialed and sent to a maximum-security prison for stealing the general’s cookie recipes. Colonel Ramsey and his team promptly escaped and fled the core systems.

  Today, they serve as soldiers of fortune, or whatever else will make them a buck.

  If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, then maybe you can hire the Delta Team.

  OK, now that we have that out of the way….

  A lot has changed since the Delta Team’s early missions. A visit to the Disknee World—what should have been little more than an innocuous stopover—has changed everything for them.

  Mysterious tech has transformed Lashes, the team’s infiltration specialist, into a vampire known as Jujubilee™ (though she goes by ‘Vampy’), and Stick, the team’s pilot, has also been transmogrified; she is now The CatWoman™ (though the team prefers to call her ‘Kitty’). Additionally, the colonel’s trademark carrot has become golden and always regenerates—and no one seems to know, or even care, why. Finally, when their ship was stolen by dwarves, Girl—the vessel’s AI—was given an upgrade that changed her personality (for the better).

  But that was just the beginning of what happened on the Disknee World. After the dwarven takeover of the Van, a pair of glass slippers were left behind, and BAMF just had to try them on. Now transformed into Cinderella (or Cindy, if you like), BAMF can no longer swear, and is prone to tittering at jokes and uttering things like ‘oh, fiddlesticks!’

  Not to be left out, Girl has decided to change her name to Laylani—just because she can.

  So, there you have it, the Delta Team is new, improved, and off on a new mission. Though little do they know that the Fairly Goodmothers have plans for them….

  NOT A MORNING CAT

  STELLAR DATE: 04.03.8949 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Aboard the Van

  REGION: Alkaid Void

  The CatWoman™’s alarm sounded, ringing both in her mind and audibly in her cabin, dragging her toward wakefulness. As the warm embrace of sleep fell away, she stretched out languidly—or tried to.

  “Stupid covers,” she growled, trying to disentangle her feet from the blankets that had twisted around them. The only downside to never being able to take off The CatWoman™ outfit was sleeping in boots with spike heels. Every morning, she woke up feeling like her sheets were trying to trap her in bed forever.

  Not that she’d object; there was nothing a cat liked more than lounging in bed.

  Laylani spoke into her mind.

  “Cats always lay on blankets. I’ve seen it in the vids,” The CatWoman™ replied. “And I told you, my quarters are the one place I always get to be The CatWoman™.”

  Laylani let out an audible sigh. “Sorry, I’ve gotten used to thinking of you as ‘Kitty’. I wish I could figure out how to break the silly compulsion you, Vampy, and Cindy have to add the ‘TM’ to your names. It would make this whole thing easier to deal with.”

  The CatWoman™ finally managed to get her legs free of the blankets, and swung them over the side of the bed, stretching once more.

  She really didn’t need to stretch quite so much—she was the living epitome of ‘limber’—but somehow it just felt right to throw in as much slinky movement as she could.

  “I don’t mind saying ‘TM’,” she said after a minute’s consideration. “It reminds people that I am The CatWoman™.”

 

  The CatWoman™ shrugged, a pout forming on her plump, red lips. “That’s why I let all of you call me Kitty. How hard is it really to use my real name when I’m alone here?”

  She half expected the AI to put up a fight. Since she’d been unshackled, Laylani had been undergoing bouts of combative behavior.

 

  “Deal.” The CatWoman™ gave a throaty chuckle and grabbed her favorite pistol, checked it over, then slid it into the holster that formed on her thigh.

  She didn’t recall seeing The CatWoman™ use a gun in the stories, but the character must have at some point in the last seven thousand years. Either way, she was The CatWoman™ now. If she carried a gun, then that was a thing The CatWoman™ did. Plain and simple.

  Pausing for one last languid stretch, she sauntered to her door and palmed it open. Eyes lidded in the bliss of just being herself, she stepped into the passageway and nearly tripped on Cindy’s fully poofed dress as she rushed past.

  The CatWoman™ recovered with grace—of course—and shouted at Cindy’s retreating back. “You know you can’t run around like that! You’re going to kill one of us with your petticoats.”

  Laylani said. clean.>

  Cindy stopped and looked behind her at Kitty. “Oh, poppycock! I can just never keep this dratted thing from going full poof.”

  A look of concentration formed on her delicate features, and the dress sucked up toward her body, forming a sparkling white catsuit once more.

  “Have you been working at getting those off?” The CatWoman™ asked, pointing at Cindy’s glass slippers.

  Cindy gave a long-suffering sigh and a little stomp. “No…not anymore. I’ve adjusted. This is just me now,” her voice rose to an adorable squeak as she raised her shoulders in an adorable shrug.

  The CatWoman™ stifled a laugh, and Cindy took a threatening step toward her. “Don’t laugh at me. I can still declaw you, you cute little kitty!”

  The CatWoman™ wasn’t scared of Cindy—mostly—but she nodded in agreement anyway, blowing a kiss before turning toward the bridge, while Cindy continued aft.

  As she walked past the galley, her stomach rumbled, and she decided that a bit of food and a bowl—glass, she corrected herself—of milk would do nicely.

  When it rumbled again, she glanced down at her stomach, running a hand across it. The faint outline of muscles was visible under the tight, rubber costume. She looked great for someone who hadn’t used the san in two weeks.

  She, Vampy, and Cindy had been concerned at first, when they went days without relieving themselves, but Porty assured them it was perfectly normal for Disknee World characters to not use the facilities when in costume.

  “It’s all a part of the magic,” he had said with a wink.

  “Well you do, right?” Vampy had asked the dwarf.

  Porty had just shrugged. “Yeah, but I’m not really in costume as a main character. I’m just a modded extra. It’s not going to ruin some child’s fantasy if a dwarf hits the san…it’s kinda expected, really.”

  Upon entering the galley, The CatWoman™ saw Vampy standing at the counter, warming up a cup of blood in the WaveHeater.

  “You better have that thing sealed,” The CatWoman™ warned. “Nothing ruins an appetite more than smelling hot blood in the morning.”

  Vampy turned to grin at The CatWoman™, her long fangs sliding over her lips. “You’re a carnivorous hunter, Kitty. I thought you’d love the smell of blood. Like a fresh kill…”

  The CatWoman™ laughed. “My idea of a fresh kill is burgling something precious. Like an Ixthina Diamond.”

  “You know what they say.” Vampy pulled her steaming cup from the machine. “You can’t get blood from a stone.”

  “Oh stars, ugh!” The CatWoman™ covered her nose as the odor wafting from Vampy’s cup reached her. “Why does that smell even stronger than yesterday’s?”

  Vampy took a sip before replying, her lips glistening with blood. “I’m adding some new spices. You know, variety and all that. Besides, I’m all out of the O-neg, now I’m down to this bland A-pos garbage. I think I’d start drinking all of you instead if I couldn’t add something to it.”

  The CatWoman™ placed a clawed index finger against her chin, tapping it as she considered the possibilities. “Think I’d turn into a vampire if you drank me?”

  Vampy shook her head. “I don’t think so. In the lore, Jujubilee™ turned into a vampire when a vamp suicide bomber got its blood all over her—and in her mouth. I think you’d have to drink me.”

  “I’d be so badass as The Vampire CatWoman.”

  Vampy laughed. “Then we’d have to call you ‘Vitty’, or something like that.”

  “ ‘VamCat’,” The CatWoman™ suggested.

  “Makes me think ‘Van Cat’, which, technically, you already are.”

  “Huh,” The CatWoman™ considered that for a moment. “I guess I kinda am the ship’s cat.”

  “If I catch you hunting mice, I’ll never touch you again,” Vampy warned.

  The CatWoman™ purred and swished her tail in the air behind her. “You never touch me now, little Vampy.”

  “Yeah, have you looked at your claws? My skin may be impervious from the neck down, but you’d probably slice my cheek open on accident. Do you sharpen those things?”

  The CatWoman™ whistled innocently. “Maaaaybe.”

  Vampy took another sip from her steaming cup of blood. “Well, eat your crunchies. Ramsey wants us in the rec room in ten to go over this upcoming job.”

  “I do not eat crunchies,” The CatWoman™ growled as Vampy walked past, a mischievous grin on her lips.

  The vampire exited without another word, and The CatWoman™ stalked to the chiller and pulled it open, muttering to herself as she pulled out the milk. “Mice…really. Everyone knows cats prefer tuna.”

  THE NEW JOB

  STELLAR DATE: 04.03.8949 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Aboard the Van

  REGION: Alkaid Void

  “OK, so I signed up for this gig right before we took our little vacation on the Disknee World,” Ramsey began as he paced in front of the crew, gesturing at them with his golden carrot. “It should be a piece of cake and get us some extra credit.”

  Vampy, Kitty, and Cindy were all sitting on the sofa—which was much cleaner since Laylani had begun enforcing ‘team cleanup time’.

  Porty sat on the chair to the sofa’s left, and was in the act of pulling his feet up underneath himself when Laylani cried out over the shipnet.

 

  “They’re boots, not shoes,” he countered.

 

  Porty gestured at Cindy, whose legs were up on the sofa, tucked under her flowing skirts. “Cindy has her feet on the sofa!”

 

  As Laylani spoke, Cindy stuck out her foot, wiggling it in the air to show her spotless, sparkling, glass slipper, a cute little grin on her lips.

  Laylani said.

  Porty sighed and stuck his short little legs out over the edge of the chair. “Happy?”

 

  “Are you all finished?” Ramsey asked, waving his hand in a circle to encompass the three women and Porty. “Ready for the briefing?”

  Laylani said brightly.

  “Thanks, Girl—er, Laylani.” Ramsey cleared his throat and then took a bite from his golden carrot, which immediately returned to an unbitten state. “OK, ladies and dwarf, here’s the deal. Before we went to the Disknee World for my abortive birthday party—”

  “Well,” Vampy interrupted, raising her hand. “We didn’t go there specifically to have a birthday party that got aborted, we went to have a proper birthday party. The abortive part was an unwelcome addition.”

  The CatWoman™ gave Vampy a disapproving glare. “Yeah, which wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t gone and bit all the card-brigands.” She turned to the dwarf. “Hey! Porty, you said they all turned to vampires, right?”

  Porty nodded. “That’s what I heard, at least.”

  The CatWoman™ wagged a finger at Vampy. “Aha! So you do just have to bite people to turn them.”

  Vampy shrugged. “I might have gotten a lot of spittle on them in the process. I kinda lost control. Being cards, they absorbed any liquid that hit them…I guess.”

  “We should test this theory on me,” The CatWoman™ said, her face split by an eager grin.

  “No,” Ramsey shook his head. “Vampy drinks enough blood that we look like crazy blood cult fiends wherever we dock. I don’t want two suckers. What happens if you both go into a craze? Turn us all into vampires?”

  “Would that be so bad?” The CatWoman™ asked.

  A resounding “YES!” came from every other member of the crew.

  �
�OK, fine,” she said and folded her arms, a pout on her lips.

  After a few long seconds of silence, Ramsey spoke. “Before I try to give the briefing again, anyone else want to interrupt?” He scowled at each one of them in turn. “Have anything terribly important you need to share?”

  The CatWoman™ pursed her lips, but didn’t respond. The others looked suitably cowed—except Cindy, who tried to look angry, but giggled softly whenever she attempted to scowl.

  “Ooookaay,” Ramsey drew the word out. “We’re going to help some people recover something that was stolen from them. They are attempting diplomatic means, but they said that we should come anyway, in case that method doesn’t work. I gleaned an update on their situation from a freighter that jumped into the last system we passed through, and from what I learned, the client still needs our help.”

  “I can’t help but notice that you seem to be avoiding any specific information about where we’re going.”

  “No,” Ramsey shook his head. “Just wanted to make sure we all understood that this job is really important. These people need our help—a lot. Serious business and all that.”

  “Shall they be paying us a daffy-ton?” Cindy asked.

  Ramsey snorted. “A ‘daffy-ton’?”

  “A shhhhhilly-ton,” Cindy struggled mightily to say the word she wanted.

  Her cheeks reddened so adorably that The CatWoman™ nearly reached over to pinch them—an urge she thankfully managed to resist.

  “Still not making sense here,” Ramsey said with a confused expression, clearly enjoying watching Cindy squirm as she attempted to use foul language.

  “A shhhhhishkabob-ton. Sherry! Shortie! Samwise!” Cindy pounded a fist on the sofa’s armrest in frustration. “Oh, drat, you know what I mean. The stuff that comes out of your aaapplecart. Your buubby. Oh, gosh darn it! Your bottom!”

  “I think—given your struggles, Cindy—that you meant to say a ‘shit-ton’?” Ramsey asked, head tilted and a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.