At the end of May 3305 Roger contacted her to come to Bluford for an important meeting with Reedings. He didn't know the details, which worried them both, Reedings normally informed him, but what he had picked up were rumours that Zoe was no longer to be deployed on Bluford. On the flight to the meeting, Zoe's nerves were extremely tense, she was very afraid of the conversation. In her memory, she went over all the differences she had had with Reedings during the two years of her collaboration on Bluford.

Zoe had a big problem with the fact that the OSA was only investigating. The eternal observation drove her mad. All executive duties were handed over to the FSS, in which Zoe had no confidence whatsoever. All organizations of the Federation were in her eyes at best incompetent, or thoroughly corrupt. Zoe preferred to become active herself.

It reminded her of the end of the Dex operation. When she had just uncovered the background, she was pulled off Cabana Hub. At the final briefing, Reedings presented the story as completed. Zoe had risen in horror and had accused Reedings of naivety. Zoe had argued that while the leading figure of the conspiracy had been eliminated, it was far from clear what corporations had been involved in the machinations in the background. After all, this was about research on an AI and unscrupulous experiments in the field of bioengineering and should by no means be underestimated.

Zoe had been sharply rebuked for her arbitrary initiative in the Weyn Dock story. There were long discussions after the operation. On the one hand, Zoe should have informed her department of her plan to leave beforehand. And, what weighed harder, she had flown illegal missions to win Executive Cotton's trust in Boulle Landing, including one in which she destroyed the defensive armament of a megaship travelling through Federation space. Zoe had got herself a bounty with this operation, and Reedings had been called in by the FSS to talk. The OSA was formally independent, but depended on good relations with the superpowers, and relations with the Federation government had been tense enough since Hudson was elected president. That was a point both Reedings and Montgomery had also agreed on in their criticism.

Finally, the big issue of inactivity against the Thargoids. Here, too, the OSA was of the opinion that the most important task of the organization in the conflict was to find out whether it was currently facing the Oresrians or Klaxians, and to what extent the conflict between the two groups was the reason for the reappearance of the Thargoids in the human-populated part of the Milky Way. It was also a protest against this decision that led Zoe to join the Distant Worlds 2 expedition. And of course, she hadn't obtained any permission from Reedings before, but had only informed her a few days before the departure.

Then there was the annoying subject with the encrypted dataslate that had been given to her after her recruitment. She had not progressed with thr decryption of the slate in all the time.

Arriving at Bluford, Reedings greeted Zoe briefly and formally. Then she said, "As you may have heard from Roger, you will soon leave our office. There have been new developments in the matter with Weyn Dock. 64 Arietis Jet General Solutions, as you may have already noticed, has lost control of Weyn Dock to another group, and investigations have shown that there was an investor who has been directing JGS's actions in the background. We couldn't determine who this investor was, but there are indications that he has ceased all activities in the Federation and has left for the Empire. You will therefore be transferred to Unit 52 at Shen Terminal in Guuguyni..." Reedings paused when she noticed Zoes astonishment. "I assumed that I would be rebuked because of all our differences in the past and that I would have to look for a new job," Zoe said. "The time with you hasn't always been easy, and I'm not unhappy to hand you over to the dandified imperial slave drivers. There's definitely no use for you in the military, as you don't have the required discipline and you can't follow any given orders. But recently I received a message from senior management that the OSA wanted to conduct further investigations into Weyn Dock, and since Unit 77 had done the initial work here, I was asked if I could spare staff for the investigation. I then thought about it some time, and I think that if there is someone who can do this work for me, you will be able to do it. Perhaps leave the empire intact." She then took a break, and went on, "You are not a soldier, but you know how to survive, and you are stubborn to self-abandonment. These are qualities that I value very much in you."

When Zoe took off from Bluford Orbital in the Icarus, she looked back at the station from the cockpit and thought for a moment. From the outside, people always described Zoe as exceptionally strong and self-sufficient, but inside her, there were hurricanes of self-doubt. It usually cost her a lot of energy to keep these disintegrating voices small inside. When she was successful, Zoe often felt like a cheater who didn't deserve the praise. That day, however, it was easy for her to forget her doubts. Reedings' criticism was understandable to Zoe, and she knew they would never become anything like friends, but the statements had been honest, and the praise completely unexpected. Zoe had already left many places and people behind, and mostly it had been a runaway. It wasn't this time, she didn't leave behind a shattered pile of broken debris. It was unusual to have a place to return to. There is no greater fortune than having people who make you feel understood. Then she activated the FSD and turned her attention back to the present.

At the beginning of April 3303, Roger Montgomery forwarded a job advertisement from his employer to Zoe. The UC office on Bluford Orbital in LHS 3447 was looking for a second pilot with a university degree. Zoe sent an application to Ms. Reedings, the head of the office, and was hired for testing.

Her duties were mainly logistical, while Commander Montgomery was doing the more remote research assignments. One of her recurring tasks was to transport a 14-man team led by Sophie Montgomery. She had not yet met Roger's sister in person, but only knew that she had trained at the FSS like her brother Roger.

Most of her assignments were purely routine transport assignments and did not require any of the skills she had learned during her studies. Something out of the ordinary was an assignment in the following May when she was to find a crashed Nav Beacon on LHS 3447 A 2. The satellite had last been located 150 clicks north of La Cosa Base with a motion vector heading 315, and her job was to find the crash site and read out any data still available on the device. A few days after receiving the mission she flew her Asp Explorer to the described location and began the search. After a long flight over the deserted planet she found the crash site, but there she was attacked by two S5LM skimmers. The appearance of the two guard drones completely surprised Zoe, and after the long flight the shock caused panic and she instinctively accelerated away from danger. When she regained her composure, she realized that she had lost all orientation, and finding the crash site again ultimately took longer than the original tracking. Since she was expecting the drones this time, she landed near the crash site and switched to her SRV, which she used to destroy the skimmers and finally completed her mission.

Zoe had her first personal meeting with Reedings at the end of her probationary period. Reedings seemed very distant and incredibly disciplined on Zoe. Her way intimidated Zoe, she couldn't help thinking what Reedings would think of her if she knew of Zoe's chaotic past. It seemed inconceivable to her that such a rigidly appearing woman would understand her. What would Reedings have thought if she had met Zoe 10 years earlier, she wondered. Standing here before her was a little scary; was Reedings just pretending, not showing her sentiments? What did she know of her past? These thoughts made Zoe very insecure.

But Reedings also had another surprise in store: "Commander Prochaska, as you might have already guessed, this bureau is no ordinary subsidiary of UC. Our team here is Unit 77 of the OSA, which is the Office of Strategic Affairs. Our organization was originally founded in the 2850s alongside INRA. The original mission of the service was to protect the INRA from sabotage and espionage, and after the INRA units were disbanded the mission was adapted, and since then we have been protecting all of humanity from external and internal threats. OSA teams exist within the control of all three superpowers. Our task is to record and analyse the respective threat situation, after which we pass on our findings to the locally responsible security forces. The existence of OSA is known only to the highest levels of government.

Unit 77 was reactivated when in 3301 an encrypted dataslate was found on a moon in the Antal system containing a SimSense reproduction of the events surrounding the Prism system. The type and quality of the recording was far beyond any known technical means. Furthermore, when the file was transferred to the memory of a Lakon Spaceways Python, we found that it was designed to turn any system to which it was transferred into a playback device. The result of the operation was a python-shaped lump of metal floating in space..."

In fact, Zoes doubts about her new employer had been minor prior to this meeting, but in hindsight, she thought that she should have guessed that Roger had not possibly been involved in a simple civilian business endeavour. She remembered that even his old enterprise, the Utopia Deep Space, had been backed by the FIA, or whoever exactly.

Some day in early May 3305, Reedings summoned Zoe for a meeting in the Bluford office. The greeting was short, and Reedings came straight to the point. Rodriguez had contacted her, and the subject was the attack on Zoe in the system PRAEA EUQ OG-O B6-3. In the past Rodriguez had made an Imperial Senator an enemy, and he has since reciprocated with sabotage of Rodriguez and her security company. Research by the FSS had revealed that an unknown under false identity from the Empire had been shadowing the Void Stalkers for a while, and when Zoe was picked up by those at Weyn Dock, she was falsely linked by this agent to Rodriguez's organization. Her participation in Distant Worlds 2 was publicly known, which made her an easily accessible target. The execution of the attack required a lot of logistics and resources, which is obviously both freely available for this senator. Officially, of course, his involvement could not be proven, as is always the case in such cases. But Rodriguez had now figured out where Julie Price was still being held. She was in the Rishmi system, Planet 3 a, on planetary outpost Brooks' Progress. Reedings could not provide Zoe with any resources from the bureau for the liberation, but was willing to release her from her duties during the duration of the operation. It was impossible for Zoe to accomplish the liberation on her own, and at the present time, she only had Diya Glenn and Janos Sikorski, who had the necessary skills, Diya in the field of investigation and weaponry, Janos in bypassing security systems. When Zoe mentioned Janos' name, Reedings immediately rolled her eyes. She made no secret that she would still like to deliver him to the next detention center, but left the decision to Zoe.

Zoe, Diya and Janos went to the outpost in the Icarus. Diya and Janos took care of finding the hiding place. A few hours later, they returned to the accommodation with a result, and the team got ready for action. They then left together and watched the hiding place, a small warehouse in the cargo area of the outpost. There was always at least one guard inside, and there was a back door that was less secure. Here Janos forced an entrance. The guard was a fierce, beefy guy who had obviously been caught unaware. Zoe and Janos were both able to hit with their laser weapons and hurt him badly, and when his shotgun went off, it only perforated the wall. Diya then went up to the seriously injured man and finished him with a contact shot to his head; Zoe and Janos startled and shared a disgusted look. Had that been necessary? But there was no time for an argument now. After that Julies minor injuries were provisionally cared for. Zoe stood a moment apart, watching Julie. It felt strange, seeing her again, and it did not help that she knew that Julie had not fired that shot back in May, on the Copernicus' bridge. But that was not Julie's fault, and the flashbacks would get less over time. And then they left the outpost on the quickest route.

Zoe was surprised at how helpful Janos proved to be in the rescue; he seemed more focused to her than in their previous time together. How likely was it that someone with his addictive past fundamentally changes his life and does not relapse? This thought accompanied her for a long time. But the performance of Janos not only had an effect on Zoe. When meeting with Reedings after returning to Bluford, she revealed Zoe that they had received an assignment from the FSS, in which Janos talents could be useful. The FSS had commissioned a series of security tests from Federation military installations that he could take over. In the Bluford office there was no staff free for additional tasks at that time. The only condition was that Janos remained an external, he received no access to resources in Bluford, all contact and the contracting were always done indirectly through Zoraya. She told him, and he accepted the task.

After more than a year of doing mainly transport services for UC, Zoe complained about the monotonous tasks, and Reedings began looking for an alternative. Starting on the 1st of October in 3304, she finally engaged D.V. Rodriguez and his Void Stalkers to do the routine transport jobs.

And even later, on the 14th of December 3304, when the alien creature on Weyn Dock was neutralized, Zoe was stranded on the station and called in for transport back to Bluford Orbital, and since Montgomery was occupied, a Void Stalker flight of the two Federal Dropships Scimitar 2 and 4 was assigned for the job.

Weyn Dock had been the place where it all came together. Janos had been searching for Zoe since he had left his job on Mars. Then he finally came across the news of the incident on Weyn Dock, and her name appeared in it. She had already left the station at the time, but Janos investigation revealed that she had left Weyn aboard a Federal Dropship. Although it took Janos till February 3305, he finally managed to locate Scimitar 4, it usually operated in the area between Bluford Orbital, LHS 3447 and Rennie City in MCC 858. Since the ship was currently in dock on Rennie City, he spent his last money on the flight there. There he used modified AutoHacks to gain access to Scimitar 4 when he suddenly heard someone behind him, saying "kinda impressive"; he was still wheeling around when it got dark around him.

He woke up restrained, eyes blindfolded and with a headache. Someone was with him, and he seemed to be talking to his superior via a Communicator. “We have his ID, and the forensic team has scoured through his belongings, well, he's broke, no weapons, but they found some details on his Com. He is obviously looking for Commander Prochaska...” and after a pause:”He studied Astrodynamics on Mars, that might be the connection. We also found out that he has been involved in drug trafficking in Sol back then, but the lucky bastard has evaded apprehension by the FSS”. Again, there was a longer pause, and then he continued. "According to the team, he has modified the autonomous hacks himself with his com, that much is clear, probably he has acquired the knowledge of the FDS during his work on Mars, with a FSS or Navy FDS the crack would have been successfull, his bad luck that we do not use anything off the shelf.” Then, there was silence again. He resumed:“I have been ordered to space him if he causes any trouble on board, the rest is up to you, Major.” That much was clear, these were no ordinary Cops, Janos thought...

Zoe had just been in flight from Colonia to Sagittarius A*, when a priority message popped up in her cockpit. It came from Reedings, titled “consultation required”. She started to read, and stared in disbelief when the name Janos Sikorski appeared in the message. When the disbelief had dispersed, her reaction was defiance. Even being more than 20000 lightyears away, she nonetheless felt crushed by his perseverance. She filed a report in which she admitted his talents in computer sciences and her former relationship, but delighted in pointing out his overall uselessness and his drug abuse. In her final note, she made clear that she did not care about him and left the decision about his fate to Reedings. She smiled in triumph when the report was sent, having freed herself of the felt pressure. But Reedings' answer dissolved her comfort zone: Ok, then we will hand him over to The Shield of Resolve in G 203-51 for final disposal. At that point, Zoe knew she had to reconsider her decision.

Back in December 3304, and also on Weyn Dock, there had been another stranger that had taken an interest in the two Federal Dropships. If someone would have searched his room very closely, he might have found a Com unit of the IIS hidden among his belongings. When Zoe was brought aboard one of the Dropships, the stranger had also been there, observing the scene. He identified Zoe as a close associate of the Void Stalkers, and immediately filed a report and sent it to his superiors.

It seemed the curse of her life had been to experience everything twice - two miserably lengthy flights with passengers to Hutton Orbital, because after the first flight the name of the station had not been burned into her memory for all eternity; two stays in Colonia before finding the message from Commander Hyford; and finally Janos, who had pushed himself back into her life. The ambivalence in the relationship with Janos was exhausting. She was glad when he was not around, but her crippled self-esteem benefited from his his stubborn admiration. It was an inadequate sealant for the disintegrating sense of her own deficiencies that plagued her in loneliness. When he was near her there was the need to keep him at a distance. Light years away she missed him, sometimes she was even afraid to lose him completely. The knowledge that the ideal solution was independence from their own self-doubt did not make the pressure bearable. Just as she had a huge hate against those responsible for the disappearance of her parents. The hatred instigated her, but the responsibility she gave these people for her own shortcomings gave a group of unknown people of the distant past far too much power over her reality in the present. On the other hand, the knowledge of these coherencies did not dissolve her perceived inadequacies. She thought of the feeling of vulnerability, and a pain shot through her chest that caused her to wince, at the spot where the projectile of Julie's doppelganger had hit her body. The wound had healed, but the memory still caused intense dizziness. Images of the red bubbles dancing in the weightlessness before her eyes forced themselves back into her consciousness. The panic that had arisen in her was then suffocated by the sedatives and painkillers automatically injected by the emergency system of the flight suit, leaving only helplessness, damned to watch the slowly progressing end of her own life. When she lost consciousness, she suddenly saw herself from outside her own body, all tribulation was overcome, and she was free to float away. The greater the distance from her body became, the more pleasant and at ease she felt, until suddenly there was a thought: if you go further, you will never be able to return; Zoe will stay behind in the cockpit and die. She turned around, back to the reality of her heavily injured body, and when she awoke she saw Ms. Reedings bent over her, and in the background Commander Roger Montgomery. She was given medical treatment, but she kept asking herself the question: could they have saved me with all the medical equipment if I had not decided to return? Or was her floating out-of-body state ultimately just a meaningless dream image? Whenever she thought about it, she felt esoteric.

Ms. Reedings was her superior, the head of UC's office on Bluford. When contact with Zoe was suddenly lost, Reedings had immediately suspended all ongoing operations and sent all elements to the sector where the Copernicus had reported it's last Position. And now she had been beside Zoe and treated her wounds. Everything about her, the way she talked to subordinates, her movements, had clearly betrayed her past service in the Federal Military for Zoe. Zoe had always distrusted Reedings since she was hired. Too many secrets, that was what had triggered her distrust. She had told Roger her suspicions and he had answered her that Reedings had been his superior during his time of active service, and she would never have left one of the subordinates of her unit behind - no matter in which situation. Well, he had been right after all, she thought. Her thoughts were interrupted by the familiar voice of Montgomery:"The attacker stood in the door way over there. As soon as the shot was fired, the ship's computer activated the lockdown and sealed all the compartments, thus locking "Miss Price" off from the bridge. When our team entered the ship, we had to disable the lockdown, and our culprit was free to move again. We found one escape pod to be missing. There was an Imperial Courier hidden nearby in silent running which picked up the pod and jumped away. Dragon One One chased the ship, but lost it's track after some jumps. We found the debris of the destroyed escape pod there, though, and as there also was organic material among the debris we have to assume that whoever is responsible for this mess does not like to leave potential witnesses alive." Reedings looked up. "Did you find anything on board of the Copernicus?" "The memory store has been accessed, we will need some time to figure out which data she was after. But we found parts of an analysis tool that is used by the ISS...". His voice grew more and more distant and as the applied sedatives kicked in.

This incident had happened around PRAEA EUQ OG-O B6-3, and had been the final stage of the Distant Worlds 2 for Zoe. When thinking of it later, she was astonished how much her own perception had deceived her judgment of Reedings. Even after being rescued, there was always some discomfort left, one last doubt. But that Montgomery and Reedings knew each other from serving together made perfect sense for her. And concerning Janos, he proved to be useful later when saving Julie Price.

After returning from the Distant Worlds 2, Zoraya first provided the Type 10 with armour and an 8A Power Core, and then visited the engineers Ram Tah and Selene Jean, from whom she had been invited some time ago. Selene then made contact with Didi Vatermann for Zoraya, and she got him the right amount of Lavian Brandy. Zoe then went to the Pleiades to see a Thargoid structure up close. She needed a thargoid probe and a sensor for access. The sensor was quickly procured from a Thargoid wreck on HIP 17862 6 C A, and then she flew on to Delphi. Here she was at first directly interdicted by a pirate in a Federal Assault ship, who attacked without warning, but regretted his decision. Despite the anti-Thargoid armament of her Type 10, the fight was over quickly. The search for the probe proved to be very tedious. Zoe went to groups of Thargoid scouts several times, only to find out later that she had not only not captured a probe, but she had also lost the sensor apparently due to the cargo hatch being destroyed in the fight with the scouts. She was then involved in the evacuation of the Lowell-class research vessel HLD-667, and thanks to her help, 40 escape capsules were salvaged. And again, another Thargoid scout attack had to be repulsed here. After all, her stand at Aegis has changed through all the action in Delphi, Zoe is now connected there. She has also scanned a listening satellite in Delphi and found the following message: QRX-663-B Message from HIP 16753, Pleiades Sector OI-T c3-7, 38-40 Ly from Delphi, probable crash site on a planet, lat. -95.67. This message was related to the Anaconda which was attacked and destroyed by Thargoids in the HIP 16613 system, which Zoraya had stumbled on in late December 3304 in her search operation in the Guardian sector. Then, finally, she was able to snatch a probe from a Thargoid Interceptor. She then avoided any fight and flew back to the wreck in HIP 17862, and thence to the Thargoid structure on HIP 14909 2 A. With the captured artefacts, she was able to enter the structure and make her way past the scavengers and into the inner tracks. The scavengers seem to do a kind of brood care for eggs or similar objects. In the central hall, the probe, the sensor, and a third object found in a side chamber of the structure had to be deposited, and then the whole chamber was filled with a kind of hologram of a spiral galaxy. A nice view finally, but it brought no progress in the research into the fate of her dead parents.

Then she set out to visit the planetary settlements attacked and destroyed by Thargoids, to search for traces there. Here she noticed some details about the Thargoids. On the one hand, that thargoid sensors obviously send a distress signal when their outer skin is injured, which causes a prompt reaction in the form of Thargoid combat ships. Furthermore, she noticed that Thargoids apparently have already massively kidnapped people from the attacked settlements alive. And finally, that Thargoids in an unknown way adjust the temperature to at least -20° before they enter a settlement.

When she had finished this, the long abandoned INRA bases from the time of the first Thargoid war came were the next targets on her list. She noticed that Carmichael Point on HIP 16824 A 2 is located directly in a neighbouring system of 64 Arietis. On this base, weapons tests were carried out by the INRA. The last of these tests attracted an unusually large Thargoid ship that destroyed the base. The audiologs found in most other bases told the story of the mycoid virus, from its accidental discovery, production and testing of living Thargoids, to its use by John Jameson, and his eventual death as his Cobra Mk III was sabotaged.

Then she noticed the article in the Sagittarius Eye issue 15 about the activities of the "Black Flight" in the Pleiades sector. The activities described fit in with the messages found by Commander Hyford, who was apparently involuntarily involved in a secret operation by non-state actors and then eliminated as a disagreeable witness. Zoe flew to the described relay station PSJ -17 in Celaeno. The system was now controlled by Operation Ida, the station itself was no longer secured by the ships of the Black Flight. The audiologs on the operations were still available at the station. Here were several hints, among others also a message from the ship Aida of Sirius Corporation, which reported an attack by unknown Thargoid ships. She also found recordings of two attacks on Survey Vessels, the one on Victoria's Song in HIP 17125 and the other on Pandora in HIP 21478. Zoraya then examined the wrecks of both Survey Vessels and the logs she found there. Both ships had been destroyed by unknown ships after sources of extraterrestrial signals had been discovered by the survey crews. It was followed by a lengthy search at other facilities associated with the Black Flight: in the Electra system to the communication hub Zeta 12, whose operation was shut down when extraterrestrial signals were received there; to the crash site of Recon 6, a Black Flight ship, on HIP 17746 3 C, which apparently had discovered a thargoid structure in Pleiades Sector OS-U C2-7. Then finally into the Nommai system. There was a convoy beacon there. In the past, transport flights of Black Flight ships with extraterrestrial artefacts on board were carried out here; but now, there were only tons of cargo containers with Toxic / Chemical Waste to be found at the beacon, and a patrol of the local system security. There were also several references to the megaship "Overlook", which seemed to represent a control center for the Black Flight operations. The ship was unreachable, in the permit locked system HIP 22460. In terms of human experiments, she found a trace in the bubble. In the system HIP 106288 was the Janus Corp. Medical Facility, and in the neighbouring HIP 105408 still existed a Listening Post. Whether a direct connection with the activities of the Black Flight existed could not be determined on the basis of the log files found there.

As a result of the investigation of the Black Flight's operations, Zoraya first found out that their activities were carried out lately, so that no direct link could exist to the disappearance of her parents 15 years ago. As the next destination Zoe targeted the crash sites of Thargoid spaceships. The first she examined was in the Pleiades Sector AB-W B2-4 system. It was the first one ever found, and the research station Noctrach-Ihazevich was built in the immediate vicinity of the ship, named after the two pilots who had discovered the wreckage. The military station was controlled by the Merope Expeditionary Fleet, which belonged to the Empire. She landed at the station but could not detect any signs of suspicious activity during her stay. At the other wreck sites there were no human settlements in the direct vicinity to be found, so there were no signs of forbidden research to be found either. For the moment, all her research had been interesting, but regarding her lost parents, all discovered traces had only led to dead ends. By checking the map she observed that 64 Arietis had a new owner now, it was controlled by the Argus Panoptic Corporation. Then she flew her Type 10 back to Bluford Orbital and equipped the FAS for chasing Thargoids. In a first fight against a Cyclops, she could only damage it, but the better weapon convergence made the smaller FAS much more effective in combat than the big Type 10. On the 10th of June 3305 she destroyed her first Cyclops with the FAS. The fight went well, but in the last seconds before the caustic cloud of the destroyed alien vessel had dispersed, she ventured to close. The hull strength was reduced quickly by the substance, and very nearly finished the FAS. With 0% hull remaining, she entered The Oracle and had the hull repaired. Not that she had not known of the danger, but holy clumsiness...

Then she decided to venture out to the Zurara Megaship, visiting the Dynasty Expedition's Formidine Rift sites on the way. Not that she hoped to find anything on her parents there, just finishing some research she could have done a year earlier when she transported Dr. Orr and her team. She went back to Bluford to switch ship back to the Copernicus. Another 14000 Ly out and here we go again...

The station Weyn Dock, orbiting the gas giant 64 Arietis 3, was heavily damaged by attacking Thargoids in February 3304, and the repairs were still going on in December. Diane Verlaine, commander of the Torrens where Zoe had worked for one year in 3300-3301, had accepted a contract to transport a team of executives from Jet General Solutions, the company in charge of the 64 Arietis system, to the damaged starport to retrieve the flight recorder of a long lost Type 9 transporter. The flight recorder was located in the Science/Medical facilities, which was sealed off from the rest of the station at that time. Verlaine contacted Zoe as an engineer was needed for that mission, and she accepted the assignment. Due to the mission target being located in a sealed off environment, access to it was not possible via docking at the station, and an EVA had to be conducted. While omitting the details of this operation, the results foud out in the end were these: together with the recovered flight recorder, an alien specimen had been brought to the station, which decimated the crew over time. The presence of the creature on board was not a coincidence, but it's transport there and the sealing of of the Sci/Med departments it resided in after it's arrival seems to have been a deliberate act of JGS. At the same time as Zoe and her team there was another team operating on the station to apprehend the creature itself, which failed. The alien specimen had constructed a hive-like site on the station, which Zoe was able to destroy, and the creatures where eventually vented into the vacuum of space. While the recovery of the specimen was a failure for JGS, they were able to attribute the fatal breach of quarantine on human error and arbitrary action of the station personnel in the chaotic environment of the damaged starport, evading legal consequences for the incident this way. Zoe, while being isolated with the alien specimen in the confinement of the quarantine, was able to locate a trace to her lost parents. She found out that they were the crew of the lost Type 9, whose flight recorder was the target of the retrieval operation.

On Weyn Dock Zoe had found out that the specimen had originally been found on an alien world, and she thought it likely that this was one of the discovered Guardian sites. So directly after the incident, she went to the guardian sector of space near the bubble to look for clues there, but she only saw empty ruins. Zoe used the time spent there to collect some Guardian tech, but her search was basically a failure. She returned to 64 Arietis to look for clues and cause some havoc for JGS. Docking at Weyn, she remarked that Diya Glenn, the executive responsible for the Station, was replaced by someone else. Zoe tried to get in contact with Diya, but that was not possible. After that she flew to the Blue Meteor Co. installation, also owned by JGS. This was under attack by pirates. Zoe received a call for help, and her old bounty hunter instincts immediately took control. After the attack was repelled, she realized that she had failed her initial plan to cause mischief. Instead, she went to Boulle Landing, another big installation controlled by JGS on planet 4 e of the System. She got acquainted with executive Precious Cotton there, and was well received by her. Zoe had to complete a further mission for her, the sabotage of a megaships defensive systems in one of the neighboring star systems. After completing this task, she was informed that Diya had been abducted to Blue Meteor Co and was being detained there. Zoe also got some information that got her access to the station. While freeing Diya, she was surprised when realizing that Diya had considerable experience in single combat. Together they left 64 Arietis and returned to Bluford Orbital.

Here came the explanation for Diyas unexpected abilities. Diya explained that she worked for a private investigative/security outfit and had been on Weyn Dock on an assignment from Sirius to collect Information prior to a possible takeover of JGS. After her last report to Sirius about the failed Operation involving the Alien organism, the takeover plans were dropped by Sirius. After that, her cover was blown and she was abducted from the spaceport. She also had insider knowledge about the background of the Weyn Dock incident: JGS had an employee in it's research department, a Dr. Mayakovsky. He claimed he had been involved in a secret Research Project years ago that had discovered alien artifacts in the area around a crashed Alien spaceship. He had found out that the specimens produced a specail liquid for the hatching of their breed. He wanted to spend more time and resources into it's analysis, as he saw the substance as potentially valuable. But the creatures proved to be dangerous and caused some deaths among the team, and the Project was dropped and traces hushed up as a consequence. Two of those dead had been Zoes parents that were hired for this project as transport pilots. After being recruited by JGS, this Mayakovsky had been able to convince his superiors of the potential profitability of a continuation of his project from long ago.

Then Zoe came across the announcement for the Distant Worlds 2 expedition and decided to take part. During the Expedition, she met Commander Marc Ueberall, whom she had attended high school with. He belonged to the Colonia Citizen Network and brought up the idea to visit the Colonia system. Zoe did that and there she stumbled upon the crashed Type 9 of commander Hyford on planet 5 e and his related message at the listening post in Orbit around planet 2 b. Hyford had been hired by an outfit not part of any of the three superpowers to fly transport missions to the Pleiades sector of space. He found out eventually that one of the "goods" he was transporting were living human beings that were used for illegal experiments. Hyford had finally been disposed of as he was a witness. The similarities of Hyfords assignment and that of her parents were striking and she would investigate this further once back in the bubble. So the focus of her investigation had been redirected to the Thargoids.

Born on the 16th of May 3275 on Mars, in the Sol system. After Primary and High School she started studying of Astrodynamics and Space Engineering at Olympus Village University, graduating with an M.Sc. in Astrodynamics. Her parents were the Co-owners of the "Interstellar Logistic Services", who died in an accident in 3290. The parental assets were lost due to fraudulent machinations of their business partner. After she sold what was left of the parental property there was barely enough left to pay the tuition fees at the renowned university; Zoraya struggled with small jobs and lived in shared apartments until completing her studies in 3299. During her studies she met Janos Sikorski. He also studies Astrodynamics and Computer Sciences, but is extremely unstable and involved in drug trafficking and small ripoffs. The two have a relationship; the chaotic Janos fits perfectly into the chaotic life situation of Zoe. Zoe gets more and more involved in his criminal activities until eventually she pulled the ripcord and ended the relationship. In October 3299, she can no longer afford the horrendous cost of living on Mars and hired for a year as a navigator on the Keelback Torrens under Commander Diane Verlaine, with the aim to start her own business as soon as possible. She also at that time lost her Sol Permit due to the doings of her parents' former business partner, who had created rumors linking her parents to enemies of the state; with this, he wanted to discredit a possible witness. With no money and just in the final stages of studies, Zoraya has her defense dragged and then officialy has her Sol-permit revoked during her time on board the Torrens. The mysterious death of her parents and the scheming machinations cause Zoe to develop a deep mistrust of her fellow human beings in general and the Federation in particular. She still has contacts on Mars, notably the astrophysicist Cornelsen, who worked in Interstellar Logistic Services' development department, but also a few fellow students. The post on the Torrens is well paid, in the end it was enough to buy a small Sidewinder.

Acquisition of the Sidewinder on the 26th of June 3301. Then followed 2 years as a freelancer, first on the Sidewinder, then on a Cobra MK III named Orion. She earned most of her money by hunting criminals and pirates. In addition, she enrolled as an auxiliary with the Federal Navy, to regain her sol permit and worked in between with an old acquaintance, Roger Montgomery, in his company "Utopia Deep Space". Together they participate in the search for Starship One and Jasmina Halsey. However, the company has to stop its activities very soon because most of the employees start working elsewhere. At the beginning of March 3303 acquisition of a Type 6 freighter, flying mostly on the route between Bluford Orbital in LHS 3447 to Cleve Hub in Eravate. Towards the middle of April there are increasing attempts to pull her ship out of Supercruise, but she can avoid it every time; everything else would have been fatal as she had removed all the shields in favor of cargo space. A practice she then gave up because of the increased danger.

On the 15th of April 3303 she is employed with Universal Cartographics as pilot and chief technician on Bluford Orbital in the system LHS 3447. After the dissolution of the UDS Roger Montgomery had begun to work here and finally helped her to a position. On the same day she bought the Keelback Icarus and sold her Type 6, since this was acquired only for the transition to the Keelback. Initially, for UC, she mostly handled transport orders, sometimes also salvage operations. From time to time she participated in community goals, such as the anti-piracy campaign in LTT 377; from the money earned she bought an Asp Explorer on the 17th of May 3303. On the following day, Zoraya made a transport flight to the local Darwin Research Facility, as the alliance was expanding its presence in the California Nebula at that same time. This journey was about 1000 Ly long, her first long-haul flight.

Some time after joining UC, she also worked for Felicia Winters for a few months. The assignments she carried out for Winters mainly revolved around the smuggling of propaganda material for the politician's advertising campaigns. During the time of her work for Winters, she finally received the promotion to Petty Officer and thus her Sol Permit. Zoraya's distrust of official bodies and politicians of the Federation, however, ultimately outweighs and so she gives up working for Winters finally.

In the time around the 22nd of July 3303 she helped in the construction of the research station in Abroin.

On the 15th of August 3303 purchase of a Federal Assault ship. She mostly financed the ship by sightseeing tours for tourists.

On the 16th of December 3303 transport of Commander Montgomery to the deployment area for operation Osiris on 134 Tauri C 7 A. He was sent to recover some artifacts of the failed federal research base there. This operation lasted until the 27th of January 3304, when Zoraya collected him again for the return flight.

2nd of February 3304 until 28th of February 3304: Operation Clandestine. A simulator exercise of some fictitious 20th century clandestine operations, conducted on Bluford orbital.

On the 7th of May 3304 transport of a research group under Carol Orr to the system EAFOTS BP-I D9-35 to the Children of Raxxla Staging Post. She returned on the 11th of May. The distance of about 7500 Ly discouraged Zoraya at that time from further exploration expeditions. She had decided that the big Empty out there is not for her.

31st May to 15th of June 3304: operation Dex on Cabana Hub in HIP 95864, an investigation into AI-related activities by a local corporation in the Colony. She completed the operation successfully, During this time Zoraya became aware of the Strange Worlds expedition by Commanders Skoomer and Zach. The idea of an expedition along a series of sightseeing points to Sagittarius A solidified in her. On the 9th of August she launched for her expedition after a long preparation in the newly acquired Anaconda Cygnus. On the way, she followed the Colonia Connection Highway to Jaques Station, and then made the detour to Sagittarius A, finally reaching her destination on the 24th of November. She discarded the idea of flying on to Beagle Point after that and set off on the way back. In an attack by pirates at the tourist station Tranquility's Stop her cockpit canopy was destroyed, and she had to use the emergency oxygen supply to cover the 8800 Ly to the next available station. On the 29th of November 3304 she finally reached Bluford Orbital again.

From the 11th to 14th of December 3304 Zoraya is located on Weyn Dock in 64 Arietis. Her former commander from the Torrens, Commander Verlaine, had contacted her, in need of an engineer for a retrieval mission on this station. The object to retrieve was the flight recorder of a missing Type 9. The station was severely damaged since a thargiod attack in February. On board, an extraterrestrial organism was found in the Sci/Med area of the station, which had decimated the crew there. The organism had, contrary to all quarantine regulations, been smuggled on board by the local company Jet General Solutions for research purposes. Zoraya was the only survivor of the incident after all. Further research revealed that her parents' deaths were related to the illegal research activities of Jet General Solutions in the Pleiades region. Zoraya then stayed longer in the Pleiades sector to find further tracks there. She is able to uncover some vague leads toward an operation named Myrmidon, supposedly conducted by JGS to acquire a substance produced by the alien species.

The launch of the Distant Worlds 2 expedition had been postponed from the end of 3304 to 13.1.3305, allowing Zoraya to participate. A week before the start of the expedition, she enlisted and began her preparations. After the conversions were complete, she renamed her Anaconda in "Copernicus" for this expedition. Her Copilot, Julie Price, accompanied her on this journey. While she was away, Janos was able to locate Zoe. After the splitup years earlier, he had finally completed his studies and worked some time, but then decided he still wanted a relationship with Zoe, and went out to find her again. He tried accessing UC equipment in the aftermath of the Weyn Dock incident, and was apprehended by the staff then. Being confronted by her superiors with the choice to either have Janos handed over to the authorities or give him another chance, using his abilities for UC, Zoe first did not know what to do. She finally decided she did not want him to be sentenced to prison, although she felt very reluctant to having to work with him, not trusting that he had really changed for the better. On her way to Sagittarius A, Zoe visited Colonia again, and investigated the crashed Type 9 in the system and the story of Commander Hyford. His disappearance after being hired for transport services into the Pleiades for an illegal operation related to research into alien artefacts and technology bears strong resemblances to the disappearance of her own parents. It remains unclear if these two incident are really connected or if their resemblance is just coincidental. With the Distant Worlds expedition, she reached Sagittarius A on the 3rd of March and Beagle Point on the 30th of April. There she decided to return home as fast as possible to join the fighting against the Thargoid incursions into human space. On the 5th of May she reached the Bubble again.

On the same day, in or around PRAEA EUQ OG-O B6-3, Zoraya is shot while in the cockpit of her ship. After being recovered by Montgomery and other members of the UC staff, they found out that Julie Price had been abducted and replaced some time before, her double having fired the shot. A chase of the perpetrator only leads to a destroyed escape pod with the remains of Price' double on board. The background of the attempted murder and the whereabouts of Julie remain unknown.