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Hoan looked up from his inspection of a dead panel. “This stuff is beyond saving.”

“There must be something operational.” Loka thumped a dead panel.

The sound of footsteps had them both turning and lowering their heads in preparation to disembowel whoever was approaching.

Heather hobbled around the corner, her attention on a piece of paper in her hand.

Loka bellowed with pleasure. She was here. Of course she would be, trying to fix things and make it right for everyone.

Heather’s head shot up, her shaking hand holding out a laser. She gasped and lowered the weapon before hobble running toward Loka.

He scooped her into his arms and kissed her.

She made a startled sounding noise but didn’t object. Her arms wrapped around his neck as he pulled her closer.

When they broke apart from their kiss, they were breathless.

Loka gazed down at Heather. He was never letting her go again. “I’ve been looking for you.”

Heather grinned. “I wanted to find you too. But we have to fix the code before this whole place blows up.”

Loka nodded, proud of his female for thinking of others first. “You’re hurt.” He lowered her carefully to the ground, his gaze going to the leg she balanced gingerly on.

“It’s nothing. A cyborg got a bit handy with its fist as I deactivated it.”

Loka’s fingers hovered over her leg, longing to ease her pain. “How did you escape your cell?”

“With the help of a lot of awesome people.” Heather took hold of his hand. She nodded at Hoan, who stood just behind Loka. “We could do with your help. I’ve accessed the code, but we need to stop it, deactivate the attacking cyborgs, and return the systems to the station.”

“Just like that?” Loka smiled at Heather. She was so smart, she probably could do this all herself.

“You’re doing this alone?” Hoan asked.

“I swear, if I get one more electric shock, I’m taking a laser to this whole damn thing.”

Heather glanced over her shoulder and grinned. “I’m not alone. Most of the people in the cells have fled. We’re in over our heads. I’ve been doing things the old school way with pen and paper. Most of the systems are offline.”

“Show us what you’ve achieved.” Loka noticed Heather kept hold of his hand as she led them around the corner and deeper into engineering. He could get used to this hand holding.

“This is Nell.” Heather introduced them to a petite brunette, who was blowing on her fingers, a look of hatred in her eyes as she glared at the sparking panel in front of her.

“Hey.” Nell shook out her hand. “Heather found me hiding in the office. I’m causing a mess here, though, not helping.”

“And trying hard to set yourself on fire.” A tall, elegant woman with a razor cut bob and pristine nails smiled slyly at Loka.

Heather sighed. “That’s Ivy. She was being useful until about twenty minutes ago.”

Ivy nodded, her attention still on Loka. “Are you our saviors?”

“They’re here to help,” Heather said. “Loka is clever.”

“You’re saying I’m not?” Ivy asked.

Heather turned to Loka and Hoan. “The code is intelligent. It keeps mutating.”

“Like a virus.” Loka nodded. “We assumed it had to be operating within those parameters.”

“If it’s a virus, then we can infect it with something. Make the code sick and stop it working.”