Breakout (24 page)

A distant explosion shook the docking bay; the comm issued another polite alert.

Frag. We have to hurry.

29

Fly or Die

Dred held the metal in place while Jael did the soldering. Calypso was inside helping Vost add struts to the damaged part of the ship. Martine had gone to see if Tam was awake, but they didn't have time to administer first aid. Jael had said he wasn't gushing blood, so hopefully it wasn't serious.

“How's it coming?” Vost yelled.

“Halfway,” she called back.

Wild laughter echoed all around them, and all the hair stood up on the back of her neck. Jael paused to check the area, but when he didn't see Silence, he went right back to work. She'd never heard of Death's Handmaiden uttering a sound before, but desperate times called for desperate measures apparently. Her arms ached with the weight of the panel, but she couldn't falter. If she slipped, Jael might burn one of them with the kit. The scent of hot metal blazed into her sinuses, mingling with the low-grade irritation already bothering her from the fires earlier.

Throat hurts. So tired.
But she wouldn't let Perdition—or Silence—win.

“If she goes after the ship again, I'll kill her,” Jael said quietly. “You keep working. We're running out of time.”

He wasn't exaggerating. The air didn't seem to be filtering anymore, so the smoke wasn't clearing out. It hung in the bay, polluting the air and making it hard to get enough oxygen. A station the size of Perdition took a while to blow itself to pieces; it only remained to be seen if Silence had crippled them as completely as she intended.

Jael worked the welder to the other side, and Dred slid over, trying to stay out of his way. The inside of the ship vibrated from whatever Calypso and Vost were doing. Finally, he finished the first circuit, but it needed time to cool and lock together. Time they didn't have. Jael revealed his awareness of how half-assed this patch job was as he lowered his tools.

“Let's get inside. That's all we can do out here.”

With a quiet nod, she followed him into the craft. This shit bucket literally had a shit bucket, nothing like even the basic amenities they were leaving behind, but when those bay doors opened, all kinds of possibilities did, too.
Finally. We're down to the wire, fly or die.
Instead of fear, the strongest exultation rocketed through her. Dred slammed an open palm against the ceiling.

“Are we doing this or what?” There was no time to think about Silence now, or why Vost had killed Keelah.

Everything else can wait. But there
will
be a reckoning.

“Ready on my end,” Vost said.

He was already strapped into the pilot's chair on the damaged end. Martine headed aft; presumably she had some experience flying, too.
Not the time to ask for a license.
Tam was conscious in the seat next to Vost, so Calypso went with the other woman, leaving Dred and Jael to scramble into the cargo space in the middle. The area was piled with all of their supplies—all the water they could find containers for and every last packet of paste. For one or two people, this would last a very long time. Six, however, might make for a chancy voyage. But there were more immediate dangers than dehydration or malnourishment.

We don't have suits. Hull breach means instant death.

“We don't have seat belts,” she said ridiculously.

Jael smirked. “Here. This is my handiwork. Didn't I tell you I'd build us a love nest?”

“You never said that.”

He pulled down some netting and wrapped them both in it, then reattached it to the wall. It was like being trapped in a web, but since he was close enough to hold her, there was comfort in it as well. She put her arms around his waist and leaned, breathing him in.
We're alive. We're together. And we're leaving.
From her vantage, she could see the bow cockpit while Jael was looking to the back, and she watched Vost adjust the instruments.

Then he shouted at Martine, “Time to go!”

Both engines fired simultaneously, but Dred could tell that there was a problem in the one Vost was manning; it alternately roared and dropped, unlike the steady purr coming from the aft section. Silence hadn't taken it out entirely, but it was no longer running at peak efficiency.
Nothing we can do now. There's no time to replace parts or make a salvage run.
Something slammed the outside of the ship, and Dred jumped.

“Easy,” Jael whispered. “She's just a sad, crazy woman. She can't pull this thing apart with her bare hands.”

“No, but she could blow the ship with us in it. You know she wouldn't care if she got caught in the blast radius.”

“True.” Jael raised his voice. “Move! We've got incoming.”

Vost yelled back, “On it. Silence is circling, four o'clock. Not letting her mess with my ride again. Martine, can you take us out while I input the codes?” His hands moved furiously on the control panel.

“Roger that,” she said.

The ship juddered. Calypso shouted something, but Dred couldn't make it out. Martine yelled, “I never said I was
good
at this. I just said I've done some flying.”

“Shit,” Tam mumbled.

A red light flashed. Vost spat a curse and went at the console again, slower this time. The silent prayer formed without her volition.
Please, Mary. Guide his hands. He wants out, too.

“If you don't know the codes,” Tam said icily, “I will cut your throat myself.”

“They'll work,” Vost snapped.

The craft bucked, distracting her. It had been so damn long since she'd been in a moving vehicle. At first, Dred thought this one would crack apart just lifting off, but it wobbled, then Martine seemed to get the hang of the stabilizers. A couple of test swoops, and they were off.
Mary, dear holy Mary, we're actually moving.
Dred swiveled her head and saw the back wall receding behind her.

Jael tightened his arms around her. “Here's to freedom, love.”

•   •   •

THE
small craft raced toward the bay doors, and just when Jael thought they'd slam into them, the huge slabs of metal shifted upward in a slow grind of long-untended machinery.
Thank Mary, they aren't fused shut, and Vost wasn't lying.
Since they'd taken no safety precautions, loose debris slammed past, thumping along the hull and out into the void. The drop off the platform was a little rocky, but Martine leveled them out.

Then the ship headed away from Perdition at full speed. Jael wasn't sure, but it seemed to be safe enough to unstrap. Reaching up, he unfastened the netting, so Dred could step away and stretch. She went aft, crouching behind the other women to stare out the maintenance rig's view screen. A little gasp escaped her; he understood that reaction. He choked up a bit too, staring at the stars all around them. Darkness and light, some faint and others in white-hot clusters. Even in an empty system like this one, there was beauty if you'd been starved of it long enough.

“So far, so good,” Calypso whooped.

She launched out of her seat and grabbed Dred in a tight hug, one arm about her neck, and Jael stepped back in reflex. So he was surprised when the tall woman grabbed him with her free arm and hauled him in, openly affectionate. Squished between the two of them, his heart did a strange awkward two-step, back and forth. It was hard enough to accept that Dred loved him, but in that moment, he realized he mattered to the others, too. Calypso would probably fight for him; Martine already had. And Tam . . . hell, he could probably call him a friend, too.

He let out a slow breath and disengaged with a pat for both of them.
That should do it.
To his amusement, Calypso actually kissed his ear and stroked his head like he was a kid.

Never was, actually. But he didn't mind the gesture.

“We probably spaced Silence,” Dred said softly.

Probably. Possibly.

After everything that woman had survived and accomplished, it was hard to write her off. He imagined her standing alone in Perdition, even now.
Hell, maybe she
is
Death's Handmaiden.
For her sake, he wished it was true—that she was about to achieve something instead of just reaching the terminus of a sad, atrocious life.

“I was wondering,” she added.

Jael cocked his head. “What's that?”

“If Rebestah was an auditor, why did we find her handheld in the docking-bay area. That dormitory wasn't designated for white-collar workers.”

Excellent question.

“There's no way to be sure . . . but I suspect she must've lived there for a while. After everyone else pulled out, before Monsanto locked the place down.”

Dred looked thoughtful. “That makes sense. It's kind of sad, though . . . she was still wearing the Monsanto uniform.”

“Maybe she knew it was important. She just couldn't make the pieces fit with the VR running constantly in her head.”

“Poor Silence,” she whispered.

Jael couldn't believe he agreed. Gently, he kissed her cheek, eyes full of apology. “Some things can't be changed.”

“I know. And I'm
not
sorry we left her. I only wish I'd ended her personally.”

Yeah, that's enough talk about people we didn't kill.

“How's your head?” he asked, turning to what had become the main side of the ship.

“Hurts like hell,” Tam answered. “But it's not debilitating.”

“That's good. Would suck if you dozed off and never woke up.”

Tam's mouth twisted in amusement. “More for me than you.”

“Show of hands, who thought we'd die before we got this thing out?” Martine called.

Nobody put their arms up, Jael suspected because they didn't want to admit to such private doubts. He wanted to run and scream, but there was no space. If people left their seats, there wasn't even room for everyone to stand in the hold.
If the air refreshers burn out . . . but no. It's too early to list all the ways this can go horribly wrong.

Leaning over, he saw the shallow nick on Tam's scalp. Not serious, like he said. Surprise fluttered through him at how relieved he was. Some of the tension seeped away as he straightened, leaning on Tam's seat. Vost glanced back like he didn't like having someone right behind him, but Jael gave two fucks for the merc's comfort zone.

He's got to know he's on the razor's edge now. The asshole just cashed in his value.

Setting aside the question of whether he should execute Vost, he peered out the screen. The transport he'd arrived on didn't have a viewer, so he'd only seen the station from the inside, where it looked like a maze and felt like hell, but it was hard to get a sense from the internal schematics. For a few seconds, he just soaked it in.

Perdition was a massive, steely structure, H-shaped, with levels that rotated slowly to create their own gravity. He had no idea what the center level had been used for during the place's mineral-refining days, but based on the central location, it seemed likely the executives had apartments there. Currently, dark spots and jagged holes pocked the surface, and blinding flashes popped all over, hinting at more explosions.

“It's collapsing,” he said.

“And that's a problem for us,” Vost replied.

“Yeah.” Dred came up behind them, rested her head on Jael's shoulder, and stared at the station they all hated. “Before, you mentioned a shrapnel wave . . . ?”

“When Perdition blows completely, there won't be a shock wave like there would be with grav, but we still have to worry about light-energy displacement and the debris field.” Vost always sounded cranky when he explained things.

“What does that even mean?” Calypso demanded.

“That the farther we are,” Tam said, “the less likely it is that we'll be smashed apart when Perdition goes boom.”

The tall woman made a face. “Ah. So . . . can this heap go any faster?”