The Pink Slip screams. Sparks shower from the overhead console.
“Shields down to sixty percent!” Zip warns. “Another hit like that and we are venting atmosphere!”
“We can’t outrun them,” I say, the tactical reality settling in. “Not in a straight line. Their tracking computers are too fast.”
“Then we don’t run straight.” Polly’s hands are a blur on the controls. “We thread the needle.”
“Polly, look at that wall of fire! There is no needle!”
“Watch me.”
She throws the Pink Slip into a corkscrew dive, plunging us directly toward the debris field of a shattered moon that orbits the sector edge. It’s suicide. It’s brilliant.
“Rynn, shields!” she yells as a barrage of missiles streaks past our canopy like angry hornets. “Divert everything forward! I need you to hold them off while I calculate the micro-jump!”
“Micro-jump? Inside a gravity well? While dodging asteroids?”
“It’s that or become space dust!”
I slam my hands onto the shield controls. I close my eyes for a split second, reaching for the core of my bio-energy—the same power that unlocked the crystal. I push it into the interface, willing the ship to hold together.
Hold. Protect her.
I can feel the strain on the generators, the groaning of the metal, the sheer, overwhelming power of the enemy fleet bearing down on us. Every impact against the shields feels like a blow to my own body.
Another blast rocks the ship. The lights flicker and die, replaced by emergency red. They still need me alive otherwise we would be obliterated by now.
“Shields at thirty percent!” I shout over the din. “Rear deflectors are failing! Polly, we are running out of time!”
“Almost there!” She grits her teeth, sweat beading on her forehead. Through the bond, I feel her intense concentration, her absolute refusal to yield. She isn’t flying with instruments anymore; she’s flying on instinct. “Come on, baby, hold together...”
The Dreadnought looms ahead, filling the viewport. Its main cannon glows again, a blinding green eye charging for the final shot.
“They’re firing!” I warn. “Brace!”
“NOW!” Polly slams the hyperdrive lever.
The lance of energy strikes the space where we were a microsecond ago. The shockwave hits our aft shields just as the drive engages.
The stars streak. Reality bends. For a split second, we exist everywhere and nowhere—caught between the explosion and the slipstream. The ship groans, a terrifying sound of metal twisting beyond its tolerance.
Then we slam back into normal space.
The silence is sudden and absolute.
I open my eyes. We are drifting. The console is sparking. The air smells of ozone and burnt wiring.
“Status?” I croak.
“ALIVE,” Zip replies, sounding genuinely surprised. “ALTHOUGH I BELIEVE WE LEFT THE PORT STABILIZER FIN BEHIND. ALSO, WE ARE VENTING COOLANT.”
“They’re following,” Polly whispers. She’s staring at the rear sensors. “They tracked the micro-jump. They’re jumping in right behind us.”
I look back. Space tears open again. The Dreadnought tears through the fabric of reality, its massive bulk displacing asteroids as it arrives. The rest of the fleet follows, a swarm of locusts descending on a field. They are relentless. Inescapable.
“Get us to the fortress,” I urge, my voice dropping to that low, possessive growl. “We need Henrok’s guns. We cannot take another hit.”
I reach across the console and cover her hand with mine. I push everything I have down the bond: faith, strength, the absolute certainty that we are unbreakable.
