Page 162 of Tempting Fate

Reskavi turned away from the window. His voice gentled. “What do you want to do, Imani?”

Oh god, what had happened? “Me?”

“Kapi got one of their thrusters, but they hit our photon generator,” he said slowly and clearly. “Our weapons. They’ve still got theirs. We’ve got one more shot, but Kapi’s down to manual targetting. If he hits the other thruster square on, we’ll immobilise them. If he doesn’t… Docking with a burning vessel is for fools and the dead.”

My brain stole valuable seconds parsing the information. “And if we don’t shoot?”

“They get away.”

Everything condensed into one line of thought. Every moment, every touch. If they got away, it all would have been for nothing. There was no guarantee the bounty would get cancelled. His mother would have won. No, no, no. “Kapiya, you’re a good shot, right?” I yelled, hoping he could hear me down the corridor.

“The best! I swear it.”

It wasn’t just the only choice. It was logical. I put as much confidence and steel into my voice as I possessed. “Then fucking light those bastards up.”

“You heard her,” Reskavi growled. “Fire.”

The persistent klaxons faded into white noise as I watched the last twin blasts appear from beneath us and streak towards the floundering ship.

Seconds passed like years. I dug my teeth into my lip so hard I tasted blood. It couldn’t end like this. Not out in space, not separated when we should have been on solid ground, in Zyamzh, in the caves, by the lake, anywhere but here, anywhere but apart.

Not when I hadn’t even told him I loved him.

Kapiya’s shot connected. Another explosion on the hull of the ship carrying my love. One I’d given the order for.

“Direct hit!”

The bridge erupted in muted cheers, but I couldn’t join in. So we’d landed a shot. We hadn’t blown them up. But we still had to get him out somehow, and they wouldn’t let him go without a fight.

Kapiya trotted through the door, giving me a respectful nod before settling into the spare jump seat.

We’re one more step forwards.

Reskavi had already put the Tusk in motion, and we bore down on the Fanged Altair faster than I could have imagined. “Urula, get ready to deploy the docking tube.”

“On it, Cap.”

Airida, we’re coming.

I watched the Altair grow in the bridge window until we were so close I could make out the details on the hull, the burnt out thruster, the docking bay, the massive smoky scars clawing over the formerly shiny craft, leaving it a beaten, battered husk.

Nearly there.

A sharp dagger of deep orange energy knifed out from a vent next to the Altair’s docking door.

“What…?” Static fuzzed my brain, not letting me believe what I was seeing. It had been a direct hit. We hadn’t damaged anything that mattered. So what was—

The whole section around the Altair’s door erupted into flames.

CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

The Void

Airida

WEAPONSFIRE BOMBARDED THE Altair, the warning klaxons forming a discordant orchestra around us.

The ship AI spoke with eerie calm. “Captain, there is a critical fire in the port nacelle. Are you sure you don’t want to evacuate yet?”