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Eden jerked in her seat as the ship slammed off course, laser fire punching into them.

“Hold tight.” Blaze silenced an alarm in the cockpit, working the controls until the ship stopped spinning.

“Damn! We’re losing speed,” Eden said as the display for the engine power decreased.

“We’re almost there. We need another few minutes until we’re in the planet’s gravitational pull. They don’t dare follow us when we’re that close.” Blaze fought the controls, stabilizing the juddering.

Eden nodded. The sanctuary may be a peaceful place for the animals, but they had systems to monitor for intruders. If they caught them, they warned them to leave. If they didn’t, they shot them out of the sky. No one messed with the animals at the sanctuary and got away with it.

She opened a comm link to Tiavac. “This is Eden Franco from the Apocalypse. We’re coming in fast, and we’ve taken fire. We’ve got a full cargo and three Pecket ships on our tail.”

“Copy that. This is Jendar Mallick. We’ve been expecting you. We’ve got you on the scanner. Where’s your escort?”

“Dealing with the Pecket problem,” Eden said.

“Do you need extra backup?”

“I’m sure they’d appreciate a hand.”

“No problem. We’ll send our rescue team to make sure your military support gets here in one piece.”

“Thanks,” Eden said. “We’re entering your atmosphere now.”

“We’re still losing power,” Blaze said. “If we go any slower, the Pecket will take us.”

“We need another thirty seconds,” Eden said. “Once we get within range of the sanctuary’s guns, those assholes won’t come after us.”

“Lower the cloaking,” Blaze said. “We don’t need to give anyone a fright when we appear out of thin air.”

“On it.” Eden scrambled to get the ship’s cloaking device to disengage. “Dammit. It’s locked in place. Is it supposed to do that?”

“Try again,” Blaze said. “You’ve got this.”

The ship jolted, and the engine groaned. Several more alarms kicked off in the cockpit.

“This whole damn thing feels like it’s about to fall apart.” Eden kept trying to get the cloak disengaged. “Got it. We should be visible now.” She gripped the arms of her seat as they shot through the atmosphere, diving through a huge cloud bank and into the pale green sky of Tiavac.

Blaze continued to watch the scanner. “It looks good. No one followed us.”

“Ranger, Wilder, and Gunner will stop them.” Eden unclasped the arm rests and rolled her shoulders.

“That’s what they’re here for,” Blaze said.

“Don’t you wish you were up there with them?”

“No. My job is to protect you.”

Eden’s heart jolted almost as hard as the ship. He did always protect her.

“We’ve got you on visuals,” Jendar said. “Head to landing pad eight in the docking bay. We’ll have a repair crew waiting for you.”

“Excellent. Thanks,” Eden said. “How’s our military support doing? We lost their signal.”

“They’re still taking heavy fire. We’ve got a team on the way to assist.”

“Thanks.” She cut the comm link. “I hope they’re okay.”

“We’ve got some of the best fighters watching out for us,” Blaze said. “They can handle a few rowdy Pecket spoiling for a fight.”