“Okay. I sealed off the living quarters,” Asher said. “But I’ve got Mace and Nic at the doors.”
“And we’ve got Gabe and Sanaa.” Tess hissed in pain as if she’d moved wrong and hurt herself. “Fiona, you’re on the bridge?”
“Yes,” the botanist answered. “And my plants better not be sucked into outer space, or I will personally dismantleDW 12and make Bridgebane eat a poison mushroom.”
“I like this woman,” Mwende said. “She hasfire.”
For some reason, Jax looked at me. He blinked. “Fiona.”
“Jax?” Her voice seemed less confident now.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “For yesterday. At breakfast.”
A slight pause followed his apology. “I forgive you.”
He drank down her words with a hard swallow. His eyes haunted, he turned back to the monitor.
For fuck’s sake, if he didn’t realizeI forgive youwas actuallyI love you, he needed to have his head examined. ASAP.
For the next thirty seconds, I watched the monitor along with everyone else. There wasn’t any space between us and theStenchnow. Asher was just lining us up at the air lock.
“Almost there…” he said.
Our cargo unit jolted hard as we rubbed up against theUnholy Stenchin a way that wouldn’t have happened if we’d had time to gently drift in. People gasped. The infant wailed now, a raw scraping in my eardrums.
“He’s firing!” Asher’s shout got lost in the rumble of an explosion, the deep roar rolling through the coms. We shook also. Metal grated as we scraped against the ship. Alarms blared on theStench, shrieking like that kid.
“We’ve got damage! Nic? Mace?”
They both answered Asher’s frantic call. Jax did his best to steer us back into position.
“Stay focused,” Tess said. “Make the vacuum attachment.”
“We’re bleeding crap into space. It’s all over the place!”
“Crap can be replaced,” she snapped. “A hundred and fifty people and your crew and captain can’t. Make. The. Seal, Asher. Now!”
“Yeah. Yeah, I got it.” Asher quieted the alarms and got back to work. He’d have to line us up with precision again. Under pressure, that was hard.
I figured I’d see if I could drag myself a dozen feet and do something useful while our fate hung in the balance. It was a struggle, but I managed to reach the terrified mother who could barely breathe, let alone calm down her child. I sat beside her and held out my arms. She passed the infant over. I couldn’t tell if it was a boy or a girl. It was dressed in brown. I laid its bald head in the crook of my arm and stuck my little finger in the kid’s mouth. The baby looked up at me and sucked. Blessed silence.
“We’re in place,” Asher said. “Nic!”
Tension locked my shoulders. I waited.
“Done!” Nic cried in triumph.
“Go!” Tess shouted. “Don’t wait for us. We’ll meet you on Nickleback.”
The imminent reality of leaving Tess behind sent panic blasting through my chest.
“Everyone sit!” Frank bellowed.
These people didn’t need to be told twice. They sat.
Boom!Bridgebane hit theStenchagain. We shook hard along with her. The baby’s eyes widened, but it kept sucking. My heart pounded against my ribs like a professional boxer with a speed bag, punch, punch, punching as fast as it could.
“We can’t take another hit like that. Gotta jump now,” Asher said.
