Grey didn’t have the strength to resist. Between the MI shock, her bandaged wound, and her plummeting adrenaline, she could barely stand.
“My sister has no pulse,” she cried.
“It’s not over yet. Have faith.”
“In what?” She fought to keep herself from becoming hysterical, but Rin was dead or dying, and she couldn’t do a thing about it. She’d given up everything to save her, but Mazdaar had won. Even if Yien’s army could conquer the settlement, Rin would be gone. No matter how hard Grey fought against them, Mazdaar always won.
Mrs. March gripped her by the shoulders. “Have faith in the One who got us all here safely and who kept you and your parents alive for five years. That’s Who you need to have faith in, sweetheart, because through every one of these trials, He has never left your side.”
She stared into Mrs. March’s face, into those clear emerald eyes, and everything melted inside. She took in the full picture of her in Yien battle array. She was barely recognizable.
“How are you even here?”
“I’ll explain, but first, where is your father?”
“They locked him up.”
Mrs. March frowned. She touched her earplug. “Tanner’s not here. Neither is Dana. I have Grey. Continue to search and secure the perimeter.” Guiding her, Mrs. March stepped over the dead drone sprawled across the threshold and led them down the same corridor she and Mom had run through only minutes earlier. This time they headed in the opposite direction.
“I’ve been serving the Yien Dynasty for many years,” Mrs. March said as they rushed. “I’m actually a commander in their special forces.”
“What?”
“I had to be covert for the same reason your parents couldn’t tell you about their involvement. A small group of us from the Preserve arrived on Jupiter a few hours ago using the ship in your silo,” Mrs. March continued. “That’s how Rin got here too. We were trying to figure out how to rescue both of you when Yien reinforcements arrived.”
Grey stumbled, catching herself on the wall.
Rin had no pulse.
“The Yien Dynasty has been trying to claim Jupiter for years in order to keep it out of Mazdaar’s hands, and this invasion is phase one.” Mrs. March stopped running and held her hand to her ear again, as if listening. “Surprise was our only advantage,” she continued. “We had to come with our guns literally blazing. That’s what you are hearing. The maneuver is still in progress.”
No pulse. Her sister had no pulse.
Grey froze in the corridor knowing she was hyperventilating, but she couldn’t control it. “Rin’s dead,” she moaned. “She’s dead.”
“Grey, look at me.”
“I can’t lose her. I can’t.” She clamped onto her head with both hands, nearly crazed with dread. She’d never forget seeing her sister lying there on the floor. How could she possibly live without Rin?
Mrs. March placed her hands over Grey’s. “Lord Jesus, we need a miracle. Please bring Rin back to us. We love her, and we need her. You are mighty and able. I trust you to take care of her.” She gently lifted Grey’s face. “And I pray for your peace to surround this dear girl right now. May she know it fully.”
A group of Yien soldiers ran past, and Grey tried to focus on them. She knew she was endangering both herself and Mrs. March by breaking down. She had to get control of herself and allow Mrs. March to lead her to safety.
“I promised I’d protect her,” she whispered.
“Our doctors have some wonderful technologies, Grey. They will help her. And we need to get you looked at too.”
They ran through the central room with the now-empty cells, and Grey slowed when she saw several Mazdaar guards fallen on the concrete, their foreheads scorched and bloody from the beams that took their lives.
When they finally made it outside, darkness cloaked the Jupiter landscape. All that remained of the giant cosmoship Genesis was a pile of burning rubble.
More bodies littered the ground out here, and a wave of sorrow hit Grey. How many of these men and women had been pawns like Lee?
The landing lights of two new cosmoships, at least as large as Genesis had been, illuminated what looked like hundreds of Yien soldiers marching in formation and escorting members of the Mazdaar military who had been stripped of their armor. Other Yien soldiers were huddled over bodies, probably checking for survivors.
Mrs. March steered her toward the larger of the cosmoships as a man in black approached them. He wore the same Yien armor as the others, but on his chest were six gold stars blazing in the waning light. She gawked when she saw his face.
Jet Yien bowed when he reached them.
Grey’s eyes filled with tears. He’d tried to protect her from the beginning, and she hadn’t trusted him.
“They have taken Rin to the ship’s med bay,” Jet said with a nod to Mrs. March. “I will escort Grey to her.”
* * *
Chapter 40
Grey and Jet walked approached the cargo doors of the huge Yien cosmoship. Soldiers were everywhere, and as a group of them trotted past, cool air whooshed across her still-swollen face.
“We have the very best doctors and medical equipment,” Jet said, echoing Mrs. March. “Your mother is with her, and the doctors are working on her now.”
“Did they bring her back?”
“I do not know. But come.” He rested his strong arm across her back.
Why had Rin tried to take on the general by herself? If she had just waited for Grey to grab the laser, they might be standing beside each other now.
She tried to keep step with Jet and concentrated on his footsteps so she wouldn’t break down again.
“Are you in pain?”
“I’m fine.”
“I’m sorry we could not spare you this.”
When they arrived at the med room, the odor hit Grey like a fog. Burnt and bloody men and women lay on cots scattered everywhere. Not all of them were Yien soldiers either. As she passed a bed where a young man with a bandaged head rested, she spotted the Mazdaar star on his green uniform.
Jet ushered her past the wounded and brought her into one of the private examination cubicles. “Let them check you.”
“But—”
Jet disappeared behind the curtain, and Grey felt trapped again. She couldn’t be alone. Not now.
She turned around as a white-haired man clad in scrubs entered from the other side. Grey’s hand flew to her mouth.
“Dr. Lenoir!”
His sunken eyes widened. “Grey?”
“I thought you were dead.”
“I almost was.”
“Tessa?”
“She wanted you to live,” Dr. Lenoir whispered. “I’m glad you did.”
A grief she hadn’t expected pushed up Grey’s chest. “I’m sorry,” she said, knowing it could never come close to expressing what she felt.
Dr. Lenoir cleared his throat and approached her as a doctor his patient, motioning for her to sit on the examination table bolted to the floor. She obeyed, wondering how he’d talked the Yien forces into allowing him to treat the wounded.
“I helped them deactivate the Mazdaar drones,” Dr. Lenoir said, as if guessing her thoughts.
When Jet returned a few minutes later, her arm was re-bandaged, her facial cuts cleansed and dressed, and Dr. Lenoir had confirmed that the MI pistol hadn’t caused her heart any permanent damage.
Grey flew to her feet when she saw Jet.
“Your sister is alive,” he said.
Without thinking, Grey rushed over and gave Jet a hug. When it hit her that she was hugging royalty, she quickly pulled away, muttering apologies.
Jet laughed.
“How is she?” Grey asked, warmth rushing to her cheeks.
“Our doctors were able to revive her, but she has suffered several broken ribs, a cracked sternum, and a collapsed lung. The light therapist is with her now.”
“What about my mom?”
“She took some hard
blows too, but she’ll be okay. She is quite remarkable.” Jet smiled. “Just like her daughters.”
When Grey crept up to her sister’s cot, Rin lay deathly still under a blue sheet. A clear, oxygen halo shrouded her head. Grey dropped in a chair beside the bed and gently took Rin’s hand. It was warm.
Rin’s eyelids slowly opened.
“Hey.” Grey sniffed and stroked her sister’s hand.
“What . . . happened?” Rin’s voice was faint and scratchy.
“You tried to take down a Mazdaar general,” Grey said.
Rin reached out and touched Grey’s battered face.
“I’m okay,” Grey said.
Her sister knit her eyebrows.
“Really, kid. I am. But I don’t know what I would’ve done if . . .” Grey gave Rin’s hand a squeeze. “But we’re here. We’re both alive. And on Jupiter, no less.” She tried to laugh, but it ended up coming out a choking sob. She dropped her head to the sheet as Rin drifted back to sleep. Yes, they were alive, but their lives were never going to be the same.
Later, when Rin woke up again and asked about Mom and Dad, Grey had to tell her they didn’t know where Dad was. Was he buried under the rubble from the explosions?
She gave Rin a sip of water and helped her get more comfortable on her pillows.
“Grey?”
“Yeah?”
“Can you pray?”
She looked down at her little sister’s hopeful face. Rin was the one who’d believed and kept the faith all these years. She was the one who could remember the verses and who stared up at the stars and talked about a Creator.
Grey started to say no like she always did, but something stopped her. She had to at least try. For Rin. She turned her gaze away and focused on the sterile floor. It took her a while to begin, but the words flowed from her tongue more easily than she imagined they would.
“Where can I go from your Spirit?” she began in a whisper. “Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there.” Grey thought of the millions of miles they’d traveled to get to this foreign planet. To God, the distance was probably nothing.
“If I make my bed in the depths, you are there,” Grey continued. “If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.”
She paused, trying to remember the next phrase. She could’ve been killed multiple times since setting foot on Jupiter’s surface, yet somehow she’d survived.
“If I say, ‘Surely, the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,’ even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.”
Grey knew it wasn’t really a prayer, but Rin didn’t seem to mind. She practically beamed. Then Grey felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up into her mother’s black-and-blue face.
How long had she been standing there?
Mom was smiling too.
* * *
Chapter 41
Grey slept on the floor beside Rin’s hospital bed that night. Her sister’s injuries would heal, but the doctors told them it would take a few weeks before she was completely back on her feet.
When Grey awoke in the morning, at first she thought she was back in the silo. Quickly coming back to reality, she wondered if she’d ever see the silo again. She slipped from the room, careful not to wake her sister, and found her way outside.
Another ten-hour day had dawned on Jupiter, and Yien forces bustled around the landing site. Sentinels guarded supplies while others patrolled the perimeter with finely-tuned ocelli and auris implants, ready to detect the slightest threat.
Jet said yesterday that some Yien drones were being used, though all of Mazdaar’s drones, had been captured and deactivated. After reprogramming, they too could eventually be utilized to defend the settlement and would build the Yien forces up to almost a thousand, though Dr. Lenoir would make sure his son-in-law’s body got a proper burial.
Grey ended up outside the animal pens. A smile came to her lips when she laid eyes on the zorses.
“Hey, boys.”
A soft nicker came from the pen. Grey let herself inside the makeshift gate, and they surrounded her and pressed their noses into her palms looking for treats. She stroked their necks and scratched their withers. What really remained for her back on Earth anyway? She’d miss the only home she’d ever known, but her family was here. Except for Dad. He hadn’t been among the prisoners or the dead. It was like he’d disappeared into thin air. Again.
Grey firmly rubbed the inside of Tram’s ear, and he turned his head to lean into it. She was glad Rin had managed to bring the animals. Grey always tried to keep herself from getting attached, but the zorses had wriggled into her family anyway.
When she heard shouts, at first she thought it was just part of a routine military drill. But her mother came rushing over, gesturing wildly.
She jumped out of the pen. “What’s going on?”
“There’s an alert.” Mom ushered her at a run back toward the cosmoship as Mrs. March and several armed guards poured from the cargo doors. The commander was pointing toward the trees.
Grey strained to make out two figures emerging from behind the contorted trunks. One of them was Yurkutz’s daughter, Dana.
The other was Dad.
As they approached, Grey saw that Dana held a violetflare to her father’s head. His arms were tied behind his back, no doubt with shock cuffs.
“Hold your fire!” Mrs. March yelled.
Grey looked at Mom. Her back had gone rigid.
“Oh, Dana, why?” Mom whispered.
“Call them off!”
When Mrs. March hesitated, Dana must’ve activated the cuffs. Dad suddenly doubled over.
“I said call them off!”
Commander March ordered everyone to pull back, but the Yien soldiers kept their weapons trained on the pair steadily moving closer.
“Release Tanner and surrender yourself, Dana,” Mrs. March said with authority. “We will not hurt you.”
“Where is my mother?”
So that was it. She wanted Yurkutz.
“She is alive and in our custody.” Mrs. March edged closer. “Dana, please. You don’t need to do this. We will be merciful.”
“I’m not negotiating.” Dana pushed Dad forward again, the laser gun still jammed into his temple. “You will release my mother to me, and only then will I give you Tanner.”
“You know we can’t do that.”
“Then I’ll kill him.”
Grey felt herself tense. Hadn’t her parents rescued this girl from Mazdaar? Why had she turned on them?
“Dana, be reasonable. It’s over.” Mrs. March was probably twenty feet away from them now, steadily inching closer. “You are outnumbered. If you kill Tanner, you will be shot immediately.”
“Stay back!”
Mrs. March stopped in her tracks.
“You think I’m not serious?” Dana yelled.
“I can see you are.”
“You never convinced me with all your religion and corny love of freedom.” Dana’s face looked flushed, her hair sweaty and sticking to her forehead. “Mazdaar is the greatest thing that ever happened to Earth and now to Jupiter, and all you want to do is ruin it.”
“Honey, Mazdaar is not taking Jupiter.”
“But you are?” Dana laughed as if trying to sound relaxed, like she was in control. She shoved the gun harder against Dad’s head, and he flinched. “There’s only one way out of this, Commander. Release my mother and swear to me by the god you serve that you won’t follow us.”
Grey watched Mrs. March’s back rise and fall. Then she waved one of her men over and said something in his ear. He rushed off toward the cosmoship.
“I will give her to you, Dana.”
Mrs. March took a step closer. Dana didn’t seem to notice. “Do you have any idea what your mother was planning to do here?”
“You’ll provide us one of your Jeeps too.” Grey could see Dana was breathing heavily.
“Commander, don’t consider me.” Dad’s voice was weak, but his words sliced through Grey.
“I most certainly will,” Mrs. March said.
Within a few moments, a bound Evangeline Yurkutz was led from the cosmoship by four Yien guards. Grey was surprised to recognize Kildare Rooley among them. She hadn’t realized he was a Yien operative.
Yurkutz was limping heavily, but her back remained as erect as ever. They walked her right past Grey. She closed her eyes and didn’t realize she was squeezing Mom’s hand in a death grip until her mother gently loosened her fingers with her own. She could not believe this was happening.
The guards led Yurkutz over to Mrs. March.
“Undo her restraints,” Dana said.
“Release Tanner first.”
“Not until you untie my mother.”
Mrs. March’s lips pursed. “Release Tanner! I have given you my word. You know full well I will keep it.”
Dana looked at her mother then back to Mrs. March. She slowly released Dad with one hand while still holding the violetflare on him. She pushed him toward Mrs. March, taking a step backward. Mrs. March quickly grabbed his arm to steady him and gestured to the guards. They hesitated, but they cut the plastic tie-cuffs from the general’s wrists.
Why didn’t Mrs. March just shoot them both while she could? They certainly deserved it.
Even hobbling, Yurkutz looked defiant as she walked over to her daughter.
Another Yien soldier drove an old Jeep over to Dana and quickly jumped out, leaving it running. Dana leveled her laser in Mrs. March’s direction while she and her mother climbed in.
“How can she just release them?” Grey heard her voice rising.
“I don’t know, but I trust her,” Mom whispered.
As Dana helped her mother into the Jeep, Yurkutz glanced back. Of all the people standing in that crowd, of all the faces, she made eye contact with Grey. Then the Jeep shot forward across the Jupiter landscape and past the dumbfounded Yien soldiers who helplessly watched, their guns still raised and ready to open fire.
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