"First, open a line to Raider."
Jin was quiet. "Please tell me you're not thinking what I think you’re thinking."
Kira grinned into the wind. "I'm going to do exactly that."
"Do you know how dangerous that is?" Jin cried.
"Yup, that's why I need Raider."
A frustrated sound came from Odin. "Standby, I need a minute."
"I thought this would be child's play for you," Kira responded.
"As pleased as I am about your faith in me, I'm not a magician. Miracles take time."
Kira glanced in the direction of the two racers, one falling straight down while the other arced across the sky. Time was the exact thing they didn't have.
"Patching you through now."
There was a brief pause before Raider's voice came over the line. "Is there a reason you're playing chicken with me?"
"There is."
A gusty sigh sounded in her ear. "Fine."
"I'll take Devon; you catch the girl."
"Try not to die," he advised. "I don't feel like dealing with the whining from the rest of your House if you screw this up."
Kira sneered. If either of them screwed this maneuver up, chances were, it wouldn't be her.
Twenty feet. Ten.
Raider flipped so the underside of his board faced her, Kira doing the same on her end.
Seconds before impact, Kira hit the thrust as hard as she could, praying she’d done the calculations right.
The Curs had discovered, quite by accident, that when two antigrav fields came into contact they could create an almost magnet-like effect. The only catch was you had to be exerting the exact same amount of force, otherwise one antigrav field would overwhelm the other and catastrophically repel the weaker field.
With anyone else, Kira would hesitate to undertake this course of action. Raider was the only one, other than her, crazy enough to even make the attempt.
The antigrav fields met, clinging together. Even with her inertia dampening shields at maximum, she felt the jolt in every bone in her body.
Her quads and knees buckled, threatening to give out. Kira flooded the muscles withki,strengthening them the slightest bit. Enough so that she didn't destroy her legs.
"Here. We. Go," Raider snarled, wrenching them sideways and aiming Kira in the direction of Devon.
He stomped on his thrust, sending their balance out of whack. Like a cannonball fired from a cannon, the polarity reversed, firing Kira at Devon.
The board under her feet flexed, bits of its exterior breaking off as the forces of gravity threatened to snap it in half.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Raider recover. Seconds later, he shot toward Skye.
"Your trajectory is good," Jin said. "Prepare for collision in ten. Nine. Eight."
Kira braced. This was going to be rough.
"Four. Three. Good luck, Kira," Jin said. "Brace, brace, brace."
