The Scales of the Space Whale — Joe Vasicek

That's no moon...So there I was, trapped in a separatist prison on the wrong side of the Kanab system. Perhaps, if my pacifist starship had actually done its job instead of debating the finer philosophical points of the non-aggression principle, I wouldn't have been here. But now, my only two choices were to help the separatists harvest the diamond scales of a space whale—an incredibly dangerous feat that no one had ever survived—or to let the separatists kill me. And the one overseeing all this was a girl who hated my guts.How could things possibly get any worse? Please don't ask!