“You mean you?”
Tessa groans and presses her fingers to her temples. “Are you twodone?”
“Not a chance,” Quinn fires back. Her tone’s sharp, but her eyes soften. Like she needs Dana’s resistance to stay grounded.
I check the others. They’re clustered near the last bulkhead that’s not caved in. Dr. Patel’s uniform is now streaked with grime, but her hair is still in a perfect braid. She's tending to the injured. Guilt pricks at me for not helping her enough with the medical issues. For getting pulled into everything else that needs doing at this crash site.
Dr. Patel tucks a thermal wrap tighter around one woman’s shoulders, then looks up and catches my eye. “You holding up?”
I nod once. I have to hold up. We all do. It’s not optional.
I walk the small perimeter, staying within sight of the other women. Counting steps. Scanning movement. The jungle’s still noisy. Everything here sounds alive. Bigger than we are.
And I hate how much it scares me.
Because it really, really does. I launched myself into the universe during the worst of an attack on my planet, but I can’t bring myself to step out of our clearing and into that jungle.
At the far edge of the wreckage, Dana catches up with me. She doesn’t say anything at first. Just walks beside me while the insects whine and the wet grass sloshes under our boots.
Finally, she breaks the silence.
“You ever wish you’d flunked out?” she asks. “Never gotten picked for this?”
“All the time,” I say. “But then I remember I’d be dead either way.”
She lets out a surprised laugh. “That’s optimism, I guess.”
We make the short loop back to the triage zone, stepping over wreckage that’s beginning to sink into the green.
The women rest in silence. One by one, water bottles are tilted, sipped, capped, and rotated down the line. No one complains. Not about the taste. Not about the portions.
In the lull, Sloane speaks. Her voice is thin but steady. “You think anyone’s coming?”
Eyes closed, Tessa murmurs, “It’s an inhabited planet full of males. We’re females. You don’t crash-land on that kind of planet and stay single.”
Her voice is the softest thing in the world.
I lock eyes with Sophia. Her mouth opens, closes. Whatever she was about to say, she swallows it.
My chest tightens. It’s only been a few hours, but I thought we’d be met by transport ships almost immediately.
I let the others sleep, if they can. I stay awake watching. Knees to chest. Back against a panel of the shuttle hull.
I count the blinks of the beacon.
One. Two. Three.
Trying not to wonder what else might be counting us back.
CHAPTER 5
THE WATCHER IN THE JUNGLE
RYTHAR - XYTHEOS
I crouchbehind a curtain of jungle roots. The crash beacon's pulse paints my forearms in red stripes. I flex my hands, watching the flash hit the light scarring that covers my knuckles. The roots are still slick from last night’s rain and from the sweat soaking my skin.
The humans are just meters away, clustered close, resting. I retreat from the light, not wanting to alert any of the women to my presence. They huddle together, wrapping each other in thin thermal blankets. One of them—a pale, shivering thing with slicked hair and wet shoes—keeps checking the sky, hoping for rescue, not knowing that any New Terran vessel would be obliterated on sight. Unless it carried females.
