“Elara,” I say, turning to her fully. “When I say go, you go. You do not argue.”
Her eyes flash. “We leave together.”
“We do not have that luxury,” I tell her, keeping my voice level even as another explosion rocks the shuttle.
The rear hatch buckles inward with a scream of tortured metal. Alliance operatives pour through the breach in coordinated formation, their armor matte black, their visors opaque.
I unclip my harness and draw my blade in the same motion, the familiar weight settling into my hand like an extension of bone.
The first operative fires. The pulse grazes my shoulder, heat searing through fabric and into skin. I close the distance before the second shot lands, driving my blade through the seam at his collar. He collapses without sound.
“Elara, down!” I bark as another operative swings the barrel of his rifle toward her.
She drops behind the console just as the shot shatters the display, shards of light scattering like fractured stars.
I pivot, intercepting the rifle with the flat of my blade and wrenching it free. The operative stumbles. I strike with my elbow, then my knee, then drive him backward into the breachedhatch. The impact sends him tumbling into open space, tethered only by a safety line.
“Kael!” Elara shouts, scrambling toward the side hatch.
“Now!” I roar.
She hesitates for half a heartbeat, then lunges for the emergency exit I triggered seconds earlier. The panel hisses open to vacuum.
Two more operatives surge forward, weapons raised. I throw myself into them, using my mass and momentum to disrupt their formation. One of them catches my forearm with a shock baton, electricity ripping up my arm in a violent surge. My muscles seize.
I grit my teeth and slam my forehead into his visor, cracking the opaque shield. He staggers, and I drive my blade into his thigh joint, disabling him.
“Elara, go!” I shout again, forcing my limbs to obey.
She leaps through the side hatch into the void where a small escape pod deploys automatically from the shuttle’s hull.
One of the remaining operatives pivots toward her.
“No!” I bellow, launching myself forward.
The operative fires.
The shot hits the pod’s exterior, sparking but not penetrating. Elara pulls herself inside just as the pod detaches.
Relief hits me for one fragile second.
Then a second Alliance craft swoops into position and clamps onto the pod mid-drift with terrifying efficiency.
My breath stops.
“Elara!” I shout into the comm, but static answers.
The Alliance vessel reels the pod inward like a caught fish.
I carve through the last operative in a haze of fury, but by the time I reach the viewport, the small craft is already locked into the belly of the scout ship.
“They have her,” I whisper.
The cruiser’s voice cuts through my comm channel. “Captain, reinforcements inbound. We must disengage immediately.”
“I will not leave,” I growl.
“Captain,” my second-in-command, Rethan, insists through the channel, “three additional Alliance signatures entering the sector. If you remain, you lose the cruiser.”
