“Failure to comply will be marked as an act of insubordination!” Kliath said, slashing his hand through the air. “It is not for you to question the will of the High Sentinel!”
The others clamored at that, a few hastily heading toward the door. Kliath rounded on the others.
“Get to the pods at once!” he commanded. “We must evacuate!”
A few more scampered off, arguing in hissed tones with one another, leaving a handful behind, wavering between escape and their stations.
“I don’t believe this,” the first man who’d questioned him piped in, eyes narrowed. “I’ve heard the way Urien speaks of you. There’s no chance he’s left you in charge of such a vital announcement. And why isn’t it coming over the loudspeakers? The Lord Commander himself would be the voice of such a matter!”
There’s no time for this.
She stepped out of cover and trained her blaster on the male, who was unprotected by armor and slow to react as she came into view. His eyes widened, jaw going slack, and his hand drifted up to point at her in accusation before it halted, jerking as the plasma round tore through his shoulder. He wailed,clamping a hand over the smoldering wound. Kliath cried out in surprise, whipping around to look at her in stark horror.
“Get the fuck off this bridge or die on it!” she shouted at the others behind him. “How is that for a command?”
When they did nothing but gape at her, she fired a warning shot and aimed at the closest, a male with gray skin that paled to white at her threat. “Move!” she yelled.
Stumbling over one another, they complied, leaving her alone with Kliath.
“Which one of these stations is the flight controls?” she asked, turning the blaster on him.
With a shaking hand, he pointed to a sunken spot just in front of the glass viewport that made the nose of the ship.
“Great. Now get out.” She tucked the blaster away and climbed down into the pilot’s seat, eyes darting as she tried to memorize the location of everything, straining for anything that looked familiar.
“What will you do now?” Kliath asked in an uncertain voice so unlike the one he’d just used to command his colleagues.
“Land it. Crash it. Toss a coin.” She leaned forward and flicked a switch, and the whole ship shuddered.
“Gravity anchor disengaged,” a robotic voice announced.
“Female, you cannot truly intend to pilot theGidalan. Have you any idea the amount of schooling we require of pilots for a ship of this class?”
“I’m sure I told you to go away.”
Where was Rentir? What was taking him so long? Had the struggle with Urien wasted time he and Thalen didn’t have? Were they already…
She shook herself hard, focusing on the task at hand. Another switch jumped out at her; when she hit it, the ship began to whine.
“Engines priming,” the computerized voice said.
“I… I want to help.”
She looked back at Kliath, eyes narrowed. “It would be immensely helpful to me if you would go the fuck away.”
“I have done things,” he blurted. “Terrible things which shame me, all in the name of surviving this post unscathed. A hundred times I have thought about playing the hero—defying my commander, initiating a mutiny, rescuing the hybrids from their quarters. And every time I have balked. Every time. I am begging you, let me have this chance to do what I should have done a hundred times before. Let me help.”
She sighed hard, slamming her fist against the control panel in frustration. He was dividing her attention and pulling at her stupid, witless heart strings besides. “Fine,” she barked. “Pull up the security screens and tell me where my people are if you want to help so badly.”
There was silence except the sound of his boots against metal, and she took the moment of peace to pick out the switches she still needed to activate. Lidan had done his best to prepare her, but he’d never seen the cockpit of theGidalan, and there were so many more damn buttons than there had been on the ship they’d practiced in.
“Engines ready,” the loudspeakers announced.
“There!” Kliath said suddenly. “They’re breaking free of the ship now, look!”
She twisted in her seat, but he was pointing toward the front window, where a small ship was rocketing away from theGidalan. Relief sang in her heart so acutely that tears pricked in her eyes. She blinked fast and swallowed the lump in her throat. “Are there any left on board?”
“It’s hard to say; I can screen for hybrid signatures, but there are still a number of hybrids who must be working on board.”
