Grey and Rin ran to Mrs. March, but she shook her head, backing up toward the elevator.
“No, girls, no.”
They didn’t listen to her, and Grey unlocked Mrs. March’s cuffs with her skelette. They snapped off and revealed a purple ring around the woman’s wrists.
“We’re not leaving without you,” Rin said.
“Please don’t do this.” Mrs. March tried to push them away. “I’ll never forgive myself if they kill you because of me.”
Benton March was suddenly in front of his wife, holding her by the shoulders. “Fleur, for once in your life, let someone help you.”
Mrs. March opened her lips to speak, but nothing came out. Benton didn’t give his wife a chance to argue. He pushed her toward the passageway leading toward the prison.
Chapter 44
Two human guards, a male and a female, picked Dana up by the arms. They hadn’t bothered to cuff her. Her feet barely touched the floor as they escorted her from the holding cell down a stark hallway. Would they bring her before the council again?
They dragged her into an elevator at the hall’s end, and as it slowly dropped downward Dana’s heart did too as she realized where they were going. Once as a girl she’d snuck her way into the lowest levels of the hall and watched in horror as a guard beat a prisoner for accidentally tripping while he was being taken back to his prison cell.
She knew about the passageway connecting the two buildings. She also knew it had no surveillance cameras, which the human guards often used to their advantage. She’d be helpless to fight back.
The elevator doors slid open.
Dana didn’t expect what happened next anymore than the guards did.
A blinding flash of laser fire shot through the air, and the guard on her left dropped with a groan at her feet, clutching his chest. A second shot hit the other guard as she tried to pull her own weapon. There was no time for her to fire. Blood spurted from a wound to her head, and she was down too.
Without their support Dana stumbled, losing her balance.
“Don’t fire! Stop!”
It was Commander March’s voice. Dana staggered forward two steps and saw Grey and Rin Alexander standing next to March. A grizzly old man flanked by two drones pointed a violetflare at her.
Was she dead already? What else would explain the Alexanders and March standing there in the underground lair of the Mazdaar dragon?
Dana tried with all her might to put one foot in front of the other. But her legs didn’t respond, and she fell to one knee.
Grey and Rin rushed over, helping her to her feet.
“Hurry!” Grey said, wrapping Dana’s arm over her shoulders.
They hadn’t gone five steps before the siren blared, and Dana heard boots thudding down the stairs.
“Go, go!” The old man stood in the passage doorway, waving them over.
The boots got louder. Someone shouted in the stairwell.
Dana knew they weren’t going to make it. There wasn’t enough time and she was slowing them down. Even if they got inside the passageway the soldiers would be right behind them, ready to mow them down.
An idea flashed in Dana’s mind. She resisted it for one second before realizing it was the only way.
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.
March had already made it into the passage. The old man and drones would be next. She had to plan this just right, or they would never allow it.
She’d already decided whose side she was on. But she had one more choice to make.
Dana made eye contact with March. Then with every ounce of strength she had left, Dana placed her hands on Grey and Rin’s backs and pushed them as hard as she could into the passageway. Like she hoped, they didn’t expect the move and tumbled forward. Before they could fully recover, Dana Yurkutz stepped back out of the doorway and dove for the palm lock.
She jammed her finger on the Close button.
“Dana, no!”
With one final salute at the only real friends she’d ever had, Dana Yurkutz watched the door slam shut. And then she locked it.
The boots in the stairwell approached like thunder.
# # #
Rin pounded on the door, screaming for Dana to open it, but it didn’t budge. Benton tried to unlock it, but nothing responded on the keypad.
He cursed. “She pushed the emergency lock.”
They gaped at the steel door that separated them from Dana and the pursuing guards. It was Grey who moved first, pulling Rin away and gesturing down the dim corridor.
“Don’t let it be for nothing,” Grey said.
Tears streamed down Mrs. March’s cheeks, but she nodded. There was nothing they could do but race for the safety Dana had provided. If there actually was safety beyond this corridor.
Benton led the way with Thing 1 and Thing 2, his violetflare at the ready. Rin followed, but her heart held a cry she couldn’t let out. Dana should’ve run with them! They couldn’t leave her! Mazdaar would surely kill her.
They ran as fast as they could down the narrow passage, feet pounding on the concrete. Benton and Mrs. March struggled for breath as they neared the black door at the end.
Benton hesitated when they reached it, but then he placed his hand on the sensor. The light turned green, and the door slipped open.
Rin gasped as Paul Alvarez stepped into the doorway.
Chapter 45
Dana shuffled toward the dead female guard, dropping to all fours beside her body. The woman’s fingers were still entwined around her violetflare. Dana pried it from her hand and crawled back over to the passageway door. She would guard it with her life to give them as many precious seconds as possible.
She pulled herself up using the wall for support and stood as tall as she could, leaning against the keypad. She gripped the violetflare with both hands as the stairwell door burst open and soldiers in black graphene armor and helmets poured through, lasers brandished just like hers. Several held riot shields she knew could withstand even a blueflare’s intensity.
“Drop it!” someone yelled, but Dana didn’t.
A lightning bolt burst from the head soldier’s pistol and pierced Dana in the shoulder, shoving her against the wall. Her skull knocked against concrete, and the edges of her vision began to sparkle. But even as pain exploded in her muscles and weakened her arm, Dana stood her ground.
“Hold your fire!” a female voice called.
Dana didn’t want to kill anyone, but if it meant March and the others escaping, she would fire this violetflare until they took her out. She raised it higher.
Marie Johansson pushed forward, her own pistol pointed at Dana.
“It’s over, Dana. Drop your weapon.”
She shook her head, gritting her teeth against the pulsing fire in her shoulder. Of all the people to face now, it had to be Marie.
“Please,” Dana said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then lower your gun.”
“I can’t.”
Marie and Dana stared each other down. They were two felines in the wild ready to tear out each other’s throats to defend what was theirs. She could feel blood beginning to soak her shirt, and the fingers of her left hand were becoming numb. The acrid scent of burning cloth pinched at her nose, a haze of smoke shrouding Marie. Fabric rustled. A boot heel squeaked.
Twenty weapons, all trained on her. Twenty recruits who wouldn’t hesitate to kill if allowed. If she shot at any of them now, they would all open fire.
Marie slowly raised her hand, waving at the soldiers behind her. “All of you, back up.”
They hesitated.
“I said back up!”
Weapons still drawn, they obeyed.
Marie’s pistol lowered a half inch. “Dana, why are you protecting them?”
“Stay where you are.” Dana sucked in a raspy breath.
“All you had to do was follow the script.” Marie glanced up at the ceiling for a second then focused on
Dana again. “You could’ve gotten back everything you lost and more.”
“I don’t want that anymore.”
“They robbed you of your birthright!”
Her breath hitched, and Dana drew on every ounce of her resolve to stay upright and not crumple to the floor. “I didn’t have a life without freedom.”
Marie glanced over her shoulder, keeping her gun steady. She waved the soldiers farther back. “Leave us alone. Wait in the stairwell. Tell command I’ll bring her in myself.”
This time Marie’s entourage obeyed and backed up, though they looked unconvinced. When they were all in the stairwell, Marie closed the gap between herself and Dana.
“I’m giving you one more chance, and that’s more than you deserve.”
“I’m not coming with you.”
“Do you want to die so badly?” Marie took another step closer.
“Stop, please.” Dana pointed toward the woman’s chest.
“Are you really going to shoot me?”
“I don’t want to.”
“And I don’t think you will.”
Marie was three feet from her. If Dana fired now, it would be a kill shot. But if she allowed herself to be captured again, she knew what would be next, and she would wish for death.
Dana felt herself slipping down the wall, and as she did she turned the violetflare to her own head. Before she could fire, Marie was upon her. She grabbed Dana’s wrist, and in one savage twist wrenched the weapon away and threw it to the cement floor.
“That’s not the way you’re going to go.” Marie held on to Dana’s tunic and kept her from falling. Then she shoved her away from the passageway keypad.
Marie was right. It was over.
Dana tried to resist, but she didn’t have any fight left.
Punching in the access code to the passageway with one hand and holding Dana up with the other, Marie was shaking her head as the door opened, and a blast of cool, damp air hit them.
Dana stared into the tunnel. “What are you doing?”
“We both made our choices, but I have one more to make. I only wish I’d gotten to you sooner.”
“Please, Marie. Just kill me now.” Her vision was starting to blur. “I won’t hold it against you.”
Marie glanced over her shoulder toward the stairwell, then turned Dana around until they faced each other. For the first time Dana saw their resemblance. They both had the eyes of their father.
“You never really knew me,” Marie said. “But unlike your mother, family means something to me.”
Her shoulder throbbed, and she felt like she was going to pass out, but Dana still managed to stand before this woman of Mazdaar who’s blood she shared. Despite all she’d seen Marie do, and even what happened next, they would always have a connection.
“I wish I’d known you sooner too,” Dana whispered and meant it.
Marie gave her an almost imperceptive nod, then pushed her toward the passageway. “I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I will not have your blood on my hands.”
Understanding dawned. Dana clutched at the front of Marie’s shirt. “If you let me escape they’ll do worse than kill you.”
Marie pried Dana’s fingers away. “You overpowered me and got away before I could fire. Now get out of here quickly before I change my mind, sister.”
Gripping her shoulder, Dana managed to stumble into the corridor. As the door closed, she caught one last glance at Marie Johannson. The Mazdaar soldier gave her a sharp salute.
Leaning against the wall for support, Dana struggled to get moving. She would probably always wonder about Marie Johansson and what their relationship could’ve been, but now wasn’t the time. Dana knew she would never make it to safety. She could barely stand much less walk or jog. She squinted down the corridor at the widely spaced lights and the way the dripping ceiling soaked up the illumination. She saw no sign of the Alexanders or March.
Marie might’ve spared her one death for another. Dana lifted her hand from her shoulder. It glistened crimson. Maybe the laser hadn’t hit a vital organ, but she could still bleed out.
Her head spun, but somehow she kept conscious and weaved from wall to wall until she saw the exit at the far end of the passage. She shuffled toward it, warm blood dripping through her fingers and down her hand.
As she reached the keypad, she realized any access codes from her childhood would long ago have been changed. Her DNA would never unlock another Mazdaar door.
She pounded both fists on the door and slid to the ground, leaving a bloody stain on its metal surface. At least the others got away. She could die knowing that maybe, just maybe, her life hadn’t been in vain.
Dana curled up on the gritty floor and let herself fade.
Chapter 46
When Dana’s eyes fluttered open, she saw the girders of a bunk above her head. A steady rumble reverberated through the wall beside her, but she couldn’t tell if it was an engine or the blood flowing through her veins. Had she been captured by Mazdaar?
She reached for her shoulder, which seemed to be covered in several layers of cloth or gauze beneath her tunic. It ached and her legs felt stiff and uncooperative, but she was still breathing and someone had bandaged her wound.
“Are you awake, Dana?”
She turned toward the voice. Grey Alexander sat on the floor beside her bunk. Her hair was damp, and her tunic and cargo pants looked new.
“What happened?”
Grey stood up and came over to the bed. “You saved my life a second time, that’s what.”
“Did the others make it?”
Grey nodded, and relief washed over Dana.
“Remember Paul Alvarez from our flight?” Grey said. “He called on every favor ever owed his family and bribed every guard who could be bought. He helped my parents escape, and they were waiting for us at the prison end of the tunnel. Luckily we heard you at the door.”
Dana touched the wall beside her. It purred under her fingers. “Where are we?”
“Cleared the stratosphere by the skin of our teeth. They knocked you out with some painkillers, but I’m surprised you slept through it.”
The thought of leaving Earth brought a pang to Dana’s heart. Something in her had stirred when she’d set foot on familiar soil, the land of her birth, but she realized she could probably never go back. At least not to Mazdaar City. She was now as much a fugitive as Commander March.
“So we’re going back to Jupiter,” Dana said.
“They need us.”
But to everyone on Jupiter she was still a traitor. No one would ever look at her the same again, never sure if she would turn on them. As Dana tried to absorb the news, the wall behind Grey dematerialized and Commander Fleur March entered. She wore a plain Yien flight suit devoid of any rank.
Grey headed for the door. “I better go check in with Mom.”
And then she was gone and Dana was alone with March. She couldn’t look the commander in the eyes.
March sat on the edge of the bunk. “We’ll have your shoulder looked at once we get planetside, but I think it will heal.”
She nodded, blinking hard. “Commander, what I did . . .”
“Was save our lives.”
“I don’t expect you to ever trust me again.”
The crinkles around Commander March’s eyes deepened. “You were willing to die for me, Dana. I think that counts for something.”
“But I believed so many lies Marie told me. Even after all you did for me.” Dana’s eyes filled with tears, and she turned her face toward the wall. “I’m so sorry. I thought maybe my mother had changed, that it would be different if I went back. But she had no room in her heart for me, and I couldn’t admit I was wrong.”
March reached for Dana’s hand. “There’s no greater love than to lay down one’s life for your friends, but few ever do. You had the courage to make the ultimate sacrifice knowing better than anyone what Mazdaar would do to you.”
“I couldn’t help them execute yo
u, Commander.”
March stared down at her. The bruise on her cheek had darkened to a greenish shadow, and her eyes were still bloodshot from the macro shocks. “Thank you is hardly enough, but I speak for all of us. We owe you our lives.”
“I still don’t expect you or anyone else to trust me.”
“I just reunited with the man I betrayed forty years ago, thanks to you. He forgave me, even after what I did. Do you think we can’t do the same for you?”
She’d been taught forgiveness was a sign of weakness. If someone hurt you, you retaliated twofold. An eye for an eye. Or two.
“My father never really wanted me, did he? He just used me to get to you.”
“You can’t know that for sure.”
But she did. They would never have given her back her title and the status of her family. She could only pray Marie would eventually find the truth Dana now realized was more important than any material gain. She sat up with a wince, cradling her arm.
“Remember when you told me that light shines in the darkness?”
“And the darkness can’t overcome it.”
Dana held on to March’s hand like it was a lifeline. “For me, that light was you.”
# # #
At some point Dana fell into a deep sleep again. When she woke she felt stronger. As she struggled to the edge of the bunk, Rin Alexander poked her head into the sleeping bay.
“I brought you something.” Rin stepped inside.
Dana drew in a deep breath and grimaced at the stab in her shoulder. The cosmoship probably didn’t have much of a sick bay and certainly no doctor.
Rin held up a wad of cloth. “Found it in the med kit.”
“What is it?”
“A sling.” Rin came over and helped Dana slip her arm into it and pulled the strap over her head. “I thought it might help.”
“Thank you,” Dana said. Even though Commander March might’ve forgiven her, she couldn’t assume everyone else would. Yet Rin was going out of her way to be nice.
Jupiter Storm (Jupiter Winds series Book 2) Page 19