by A. K. DuBoff
I struggled to get my arm into position to stab at the beast, but my sword was too tangled in the tendrils covering the ground for me to get it free from my current position. Instead, I kicked up with my right knee, aiming for the wound in its side. I couldn’t connect. I was pinned, and it was only a matter of time before the creature broke through my remaining defenses.
A sudden glow of energy surged through me, and I balled my right hand into a fist to punch at the creature. As I brought my hand up, my eyes snapped shut on reflex as a fireball smashed into the shadowcat’s side. I opened my eyes to see Kaiden holding his staff. Several seconds earlier would have been nice, but I appreciated his help all the same.
The shadowcat recoiled from the fireball, loosening its hold on me just enough to roll free. The tendrils on the ground slithered over me, and I bolted to my feet as quickly as possible to keep them from getting any purchase. As I stood, I noticed that my three companions had disposed of the other shadowcat already, leaving us the one final foe.
Kaiden launched a series of fireballs at the shadowcat as soon as I was out of range, and it cried out. When he paused his attacks, I made my move to end the fight.
I took a running leap toward the beast and flipped over it, swinging my sword at its neck as I passed overhead. The shadowcat shuddered, its legs buckling. I landed on my feet on its other side as it started to dissolve into soot.
“Just like that!” I cheered. But my celebration only lasted for a moment.
The ground covering, which had remained fairly subdued during the fight, now looked intent on finishing what the shadowcats had been unable to do. The tendrils had all straightened up to almost waist-level, and they were reaching for us.
“Run!” Kaiden shouted, casting a solid stream of fire from his palm in an arc around us. The tendrils shrank back just enough to leave a path. He took the lead, clearing the way, the intentions of making a quiet retreat now a distant memory.
I took the third position after Maris, with Toran at the rear. I kept enough distance between myself and Maris to hack at the tendrils with my sword after Kaiden thrust them back. We ran at full speed toward the relative safety of the open area around the shuttle. Just another twenty meters to go.
The tendrils tugged at my ankles, but I wasn’t about to let anything stop me. I checked over my shoulder to make sure Toran was safe, and he nodded to me.
We were almost to the end of the black field. The ground covering was shorter and sparser now, allowing Kaiden to ease up his flame attack. After another ten meters, we were free from the last of the tendrils.
Maris let out a relieved chuckle. “And that’s why I didn’t want to come with you.”
Toran patted his backpack over his shoulder. “We got what we came for.”
“Yeah, but I expect the rest of this world will turn on us at any moment.” I looked back at where we’d come from. The tendrils were still writhing on the ground, and some were beginning to snake toward us.
Kaiden continued running in the direction of the shuttle. “What are you waiting for?”
We picked up our pace and closed the final hundred meters to the craft. Kaiden was the first to arrive, and he halted two meters from the back airlock.
I stopped short when I saw the look of horror on Kaiden’s face. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
He pointed at black pits in the shuttle’s thermal plating. “We have another problem.”
7
“No! It can’t have corroded this quickly.” My stomach turned over.
“I don’t know what to tell you.” Kaiden took an unsteady breath.
Maris gulped. “Is it flyable?”
Kaiden shrugged. “No clue. It might be superficial damage, or there might be no structural integrity whatsoever.”
Toran cautiously approached the craft. “As long as the support structure is intact, it will be space-worthy. We’ll just need pressurized suits.”
“Are the hazsuits enough?” Kaiden asked.
“Perhaps, for a short time, but the emergency EVA suits would be better.”
I pointed at the tear in my shoulder. “I’ll definitely need one of those.”
Kaiden’s eyes widened. “Elle! Why didn’t you say you were hurt?”
“I just did. I’ve been a little preoccupied with not dying. And, I’m not hurt—just my suit.”
“That means you’re contaminated directly, not just the outer layer,” Toran said.
I shrugged. “I already took off my suit once inside. We lost containment a long time ago.”
Toran took a slow breath a nodded. “We’ll deal with it once we’re back on the Evangiel. Come on.”
He opened the exterior airlock hatch and beckoned us inside. We squeezed in, and Kaiden cycled the interior airlock. The door opened with a hiss.
“I’ll get it started up and see what kind of damage we’re facing,” Kaiden said, rushing toward the bridge. He began stripped off the hazsuit.
“Maris, help me with the EVA suits. They should be in storage back here,” Toran instructed.
“I’ll help Kaiden with the inspection,” I said and followed him toward the bridge. I paused in the common area to remove the hazsuit, then jogged the rest of the way to the front of the vessel.
Kaiden was seated in the pilot’s chair and was busy looking over the preliminary system scans. “…Yes, Commander. Understood.” He ended the comm link.
“What’s the word?” I asked.
He didn’t glance up from his work. “It’s not looking good.”
“Was that Colren? Is he sending help?”
“I told him to hold off. We have a shot at being able to achieve orbit even with the damage; the reduced gravity works in our favor.”
“I’m sorry I got us into this,” I mumbled.
“We needed that information. It was worth the risk.”
“But we haven’t gotten it back to them.”
He shook his head. “We have a datalink. Central Command is waiting for an upload.”
“That’s great the data will be safe, but I don’t want to get stuck here,” I replied. “Things were just starting to get good.”
“Me either.”
“But if this shuttle is too damaged, they can send another, right?”
He didn’t respond.
“Right, Kaiden?” I pressed.
“That’s what I was talking about with Colren. I had to manually pilot us down here. I don’t know that the automated systems could do it. Any pilot without our resistance to the Darkness would likely only last a few minutes here, even with protective gear, based on what Colren said.”
“So, even if they could make it here, it’d be a one-way trip.”
“Yeah. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
I’d never placed one life at a higher value than any other, but when it came down to it, we have unique skills that would be difficult to replicate. I had no doubt that Colren would send someone to their death if it meant saving us, and I didn’t want that on my conscience. “Is there anything I can do to help you?” I asked.
“I’m getting a warning error on the amidships starboard bulkhead next to the side hatch. See if there’s any corrosion visible on the inside yet,” he replied.
“I’m on it.” I headed back toward the corridor, then paused and turn around. “We’re going to get out of here, Kaiden.”
He glanced back at me. “I know we will.”
I returned to the common room to find Toran and Maris donning EVA suits. “Good, you found them!”
Toran moved stiffly in his, the outfit far too tight on his broad frame. “They’ll keep us alive, provided the ship can fly.”
“Kaiden thinks we have a shot,” I replied. “He said we still have a datalink, so you can upload the info you pulled from the crystal.”
“Oh, good. I’ll do that right away.” Toran rushed toward the bridge.
“Did Kaiden talk to Central Command? A
re they sending a replacement shuttle?” Maris asked.
“That’s complicated,” I replied. “Short answer is that we’re on our own until we have no other options.”
Maris frowned. “But won’t we not know this one isn’t space-worthy until we’re, you know, up in space?”
“That’s my worry, too.”
“I mean, these suits are just a precaution, right? We won’t actually need them inside the shuttle…”
I didn’t want to lie to her, so I instead turned my attention to the bulkhead Kaiden had sent me to inspect. “Just make sure your suit is sealed, Maris. We’ll be fine.”
The other woman worked her mouth. “I really shouldn’t have gotten out of bed this morning.”
“You’re tellin’ me.” I turned my attention to the problem bulkhead. Leaning in until I was only a few centimeters away, I looked for any signs of the dark corrosion we’d witnessed outside.
My initial assessment didn’t reveal any concerning patches, and I was almost ready to breathe a sigh of relief. Then, I noticed a dark area with small pits in the metal at the base of the hatch. “Uh oh.”
“No. No ‘uh ohs’!” Maris exclaimed while she hurriedly donned her suit.
“Would you prefer ‘that doesn’t look good’?”
Her face flushed. “How screwed are we?”
“I don’t know.” I turned toward the bridge. “Toran, how important is the starboard-side bulkhead?”
There was only silence for several seconds, then the rapid thud of footsteps. Toran came into view down the corridor. “What did you find?”
I pointed to the problem patch.
He approached and crouched down, frowning at it. “This might be superficial or the interior of these walls might be as brittle as charcoal.”
“Yeah, that’s what I was afraid you’d say.” I took a steadying breath. “I didn’t see anything else over here, but I haven’t looked over the rest of the shuttle.”
“Well, conditions are guaranteed to deteriorate. We should probably try to take off while we still have functional engines,” he replied.
“We’re all going to die,” Maris moaned.
I cast her a silencing glance. “No, we’re not.”
“Finish suiting up,” Toran instructed. “The upload will be complete in two minutes.”
“That’s way faster than it downloaded from the crystal,” I said with surprise.
“This connection actually works properly.”
Maris took a deep breath. “I’ll try to cast a shield around the shuttle in the meantime.” She clasped her crystal pendant in her left hand and closed her eyes.
I bit my tongue to keep from questioning her about why she didn’t do that the moment we got back; it hadn’t even occurred to me, but it wasn’t my responsibility to do her job for her. Instead, I turned my attention to putting on the EVA suit.
The garment was, thankfully, straightforward to secure, even for a novice spacefarer like me. However, as I brought it over my right shoulder, which had taken the brunt of the shadowcat attack, I had to hold back a grimace of discomfort. While I was used to having limited shoulder mobility, it was always my left arm; to be injured on the other side was disorienting and annoying. I was fairly confident that I was only banged up, though, and the discomfort would be temporary.
By the time I was finished dressing, the upload was complete and we were ready to go. I sealed everything below my neck, then picked up the helmet and returned to my seat on the bridge to strap in.
“All sensors indicate we have structural integrity,” Kaiden announced over the front speaker on his EVA suit.
I clicked my helmet into the neck collar and switched to the interior comms. “This is the part where we ignore the maybe-hole back there, isn’t it?”
He kept his gaze straight ahead. “Yep.”
“Nothing could possibly go wrong.” I tightened my restraints.
“Let’s get out of here.” Kaiden made the final necessary entries on the front control panel, and the shuttle lifted off the ground.
“So far, so good.” Maris sounded more cheerful than she had all day.
Toran and Kaiden remained silent, watching the readouts on their respective stations. I kept my gloved fingers wrapped around the end of my armrests while I focused on staying calm.
When we were at an elevation of five hundred meters, the comm chirped, indicating an incoming call.
“Glad to see you’re off the ground. Wishing you a safe return flight,” Colren said.
“Thank you,” Kaiden acknowledged.
“We’re already recoding the data you gathered,” Colren continued. “It’s invaluable.”
“Glad to hear it. I look forward to reviewing it myself,” responded Toran.
“We’ll see you soon.” The commander ended the link.
“That totally felt like he was calling to say goodbye,” Maris said.
I rolled my eyes. “Everything’s fine. We’re off the ground—that was the hard part.”
Kaiden glanced over at me, his expression telling me that wasn’t the case.
“What else is there?” I prompted.
“I haven’t kicked in the main boosters yet to get us up to the Evangiel’s orbit altitude.”
My stomach dropped. “That’s what will stress the structure.”
“Yeah.” He took a slow breath. “We’re about to find out if it will hold.” He activated the controls.
Sudden pressure pinned me against the back of my seat. I ran through the scenarios in my head for what I’d do if the shuttle started to fall apart around me, contriving an epic plan to leap from the doomed craft and somehow make it safely to the ground, where I’d defeat any enemies that dared to mess with me. In reality, I figured that if anything went wrong, we’d be goners before we realized what’d happened.
Even as my mind raced with disastrous possibilities, there was no sign of trouble. Once we made it past the first critical minute of the boost and the pressure eased, I started to relax. “So far, so good.”
Kaiden nodded, but he was still tense. “We’re entering the upper atmosphere now. We should be past the worst of it.”
“I don’t like what I’m seeing on some of these structural readings,” Toran chimed in. “This isn’t my area of expertise, but some of the integrity measures are getting close to their warning levels.”
I was even less of an expert, but Toran’s tone told me everything I needed to know: we were in trouble.
My heart thudded in my chest as the EVA suit closed in around me. If the hull failed, the suit’s thin fabric would be the only thing separating me from the void. “What do we do?” I asked, panic pitching my voice.
“It might be fine. Hang on,” Kaiden replied. His own tone was still calm and level, but his frantic movements belied inner worry.
Through the front viewport, the planet’s atmosphere dissipated, and pinpoints of light from distant stars greeted us.
“We’re almost to the Evangiel, right?” I asked tentatively.
“Yeah, out of the atmosphere—they can pick us up?” Maris added.
Kaiden and Toran remained silent.
“Right?” I emphasized.
“We’re out of the atmosphere, but we’re still in the gravity well,” Kaiden said at last. “I don’t know how much maneuvering I’ll be able to do before we lose structural integrity.”
“The corroded components are right around the mid starboard thruster,” Toran explained. “It’s the main boost we need for landing. If it fails while we’re coming in, part of the infected material could break off and hit the ship. Without being able to decontaminate it properly…”
My chest constricted further. “What are you saying?”
Toran took a shaky breath. “It’s too dangerous to land, but if we don’t land soon, the shuttle will fall back to the planet’s surface and we’ll be stuck for good, assuming we don’t burn up in the process.”
I looked to Kaiden. “There has to be another way.”
His gaze flitted between the shuttle controls and out the viewport. “Maybe.”
“What do you have in mind?” Toran asked.
Kaiden swallowed. “We can’t use the maneuvering thrusters too much, but I may be able to feather them enough to get us close to the hangar entry.”
I tightened my grip on my armrests. “Close enough to land?”
“No. Close enough to make a jump for it.”
“You have to be joking!” Maris exclaimed.
“There’s still risk of contaminating the outer hull of the Evangiel,” Toran pointed out.
“Not if we’re coordinating with them,” Kaiden countered. “They just need to pull away to avoid the craft colliding—that’s way easier to avoid than thousands of tiny fragments from the ship disintegrating.”
“This is completely insane,” I muttered under my breath.
“Well, we either make a break for it or let the ship fall apart around us. Want to vote?” Kaiden asked.
“I don’t think there’s any room for contention,” Toran replied. “Are you thinking the side starboard hatch?”
The other man nodded. “Angles wouldn’t work with the rear airlock.”
“But the corroded area is around the side hatch!” I looked over my shoulder at Toran. “Won’t it—”
“There’s a way to work the angles and approach so the hatch and debris will eject away from the Evangiel,” Toran said. “The nav computer can handle the calculations and piloting.”
I shook my head. “It couldn’t possibly have been designed to do that.”
“It was, actually.” Kaiden’s hands raced over the controls. “All sorts of emergency evacuation procedures are embedded in the system. We almost crashed one time as a kid and the disaster protocols saved us.”
My mind raced, trying to think of any other way to get out of the predicament. But I couldn’t kid myself. I knew nothing about what we were facing, only that I wanted to live. I had no choice but to trust the opinion of the two people on my team who knew what they were talking about when it came to ships.