by S Breaker
“Maybe,” Red replied deadpan. “But I didn’t say I needed him to be able to walk.”
Laney put her hands up in an attempt to placate her. “Look, I understand where you’re coming from,” she began. “Eleanor has royally messed with all of us, but there must be another way.”
Red sneered. “You think I’ve wasted years of my life on this when there’s another way? This is our only defense. My world is counting on this for our survival.” Her expression faded. “They’re counting on me,” she added, faltering a little and as she spoke, she lowered her weapon a smidge.
The instant that Red was distracted, Noah immediately dove for the gun.
Red yelped in alarm, firing off a shot in a knee-jerk reaction.
Laney jumped in fright, falling back on the floor.
The shot clanked on metal.
Laney opened her eyes and looked down. Noah had tossed the capacitor tray into her hands and Red had shot a hole through it with the bullet intended for Laney.
“NO!” Red yelled in dismay.
Noah knocked the weapon out of Red’s hands and he pinned her face down on the ground, twisting her arm behind her even as she tried to kick away, screeching. “You have no idea what you’ve just done. This is the future. These are the weapons. You can’t stop it. You two are making a huge mistake!”
Laney was still heaving. She pushed herself up off the floor as she stared at Red who was struggling like mad to get free, but quick as a flash, Noah moved to knock her out and Red slackened on the floor, unconscious.
Noah looked up and met Laney’s somber gaze, a concerned crease on his forehead. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, even as she was still trying to shake off her frazzled nerves. She almost felt sorry for Red. But it wasn’t that Laney couldn’t sympathize with her mission. It was just that she had her own. They were all each only trying to protect their own worlds.
Laney clenched her jaw with a renewed resolve. “We have to move,” she directed, her tone authoritative as she gestured for Noah to follow her.
“Wait.” Noah stopped. “Aren’t we on some sort of space station? How are we going to get out of here?”
“Yeah.” She bit her lip. “I kind of have an idea about that.”
He gave her an incredulous look. “You do?”
“Come on.” She waved him over as she headed for the door, stopping short and pressing back against the wall as a couple of guards strolled by, chuckling and talking among themselves.
Noah peered around and met her gaze with a nod signaling all clear before they sneaked out the door to head down the corridor.
Laney arrived at a doorway, her gaze wandering around, trying to figure out how to open it.
“What is this place?” Noah assessed the control panel.
Aha. Her eyes lit up as she spotted a button labeled “Manual open” and the moment she pressed it, the door slid open with another loud shush.
Noah’s eyes widened.
Beyond the door was the hangar that Laney had walked past earlier.
She met his gaze. “Can you fly a ship?”
He shrugged. “I guess we’ll find out.” He looked around warily to make sure the coast was clear before they moved out of their hiding spot and ran onto the flight deck, dodging behind ships and equipment until they came up to a spacecraft with its canopy open.
“Get in.” Noah motioned Laney up, almost shunting her up into the back seat.
A loud horn blared.
Laney’s eyes lit up in alarm as she slid into the deep chair. “Uh-oh.”
Noah hopped into the pilot seat, surveying all the buttons and switches on the panel in front of him.
Laney couldn’t see him from behind the chair but she tried to crane her neck. “Why aren’t we moving yet?”
“Would you give me a minute? I’ve never flown a…a spacecraft before,” he retorted.
“Oh boy,” Laney mumbled in dread as she saw about a dozen uniformed security staff, charging onto the flight deck, yelling loudly. She heard shots being fired and a couple pinged off the safety glass canopy of the spacecraft.
She ducked in fright. “Holy shit! They’re shooting at us!”
“Yeah, I noticed.” Noah’s tone was dry as he continued to flip switches and buttons until finally, the spacecraft began to move.
“Let’s go! Let’s go!” she hollered, hammering on the back of Noah’s seat.
Noah got the spacecraft to speed up and it rumbled down the deck headed toward the open port—just as the exterior doors began to close.
“Come on!” Noah yelled out in frustration.
Laney was already wincing, bracing her hands against the back of Noah’s seat.
She ducked again with a startled scream as she heard the spacecraft take on more weapons fire even as it sped faster, almost ramming the closing exterior doors, rattling it to just barely scrape past.
Noah blew out a breath.
“We made it!” Laney whooped.
The spacecraft had gathered enough momentum to get propelled clear of The Aquila’s orbit but they still needed to go faster to escape.
“I’m trying to find the thrusters,” Noah was saying.
But Laney was already staring at the cracks forming on the safety glass canopy of the spacecraft caused by the bullet holes. “Noah,” she called out. “The glass is going to break.”
Noah cursed out loud and began rummaging around the pilot seat. “They must have respirators here or something.”
“Oh, no, no, no, no—” Laney edged back in her seat.
Then something materialized in empty space above them.
“Oh my god, it’s the Dauntless!” Laney exclaimed in sheer joy.
“The what?”
Laney watched in anticipation as the docking bay door beneath the hull of the Dauntless opened up as though to scoop them out of the void but then she frowned as she spotted an even larger crack forming on the spacecraft canopy.
The Dauntless was still over a hundred yards away.
She wailed. “Oh no, no, we’re not gonna make it.”
“Ohhh shit.” Noah’s voice sounded incredibly annoyed.
Laney turned and glimpsed another squad of spacecraft launching from The Aquila in pursuit.
The ships were already shooting at them. Not that they weren’t deep enough in trouble. The giant crack on their spacecraft canopy had come into its own.
She closed her eyes momentarily as the glass exploded, leaving shattered pieces of it floating about in space.
She wanted to scream, if only she didn’t have to exhale all the air out of her lungs before the vacuum suffocated her—just as their ship skidded and scraped into the Dauntless’ docking bay, very nearly smashing against the interior wall, right as the doors closed with a loud pressurizing shush.
And Trin’s voice came loud and clear on the PA.
“Welcome back, guys. Brace yourselves.”
Laney met Noah’s astonished gaze as she gasped a big deep breath in, grinning wide in indescribable relief.
“Space jump in 3, 2, 1…”
Safe Space
Laney stepped out of her quarters after getting cleaned up. It felt like she had washed the last few days of chaos off of her.
And the relative silence of space was providing a stillness that for once, she wasn’t feeling an impending sense of doom.
Sigrid had reported that they were on approach to Betelgeuse and that the supernova had miraculously not yet occurred.
Laney had never been so glad to be on time in her entire life.
She was walking down the corridor on the upper deck heading to the bridge when she heard heavy thuds coming from behind her. She turned and saw Sol coming around the corner.
She gave Laney a big smile. “Laney! So glad you made it back.”
“Hi, Sol,” she greeted. “Heading to the bridge?”
Sol nodded, holding up a little tablet. “I’ve got a report on all essential systems. It’s almost ‘go’ time
. This is the first supernova we’re going to be observing this close,” she relayed. “Not to mention, we gotta be quick to haul ass if we don’t want to get our tails severely singed,” she added with a wink as they arrived at the bridge.
The two of them paused by the doorway. Laney felt a smile of wonder as she sighted the very bright star in clear view on the main window against the black vastness of space.
The red supergiant Betelgeuse was about to put on a show.
It was going to be spectacular.
She glanced over and spotted Trin, Dek, and Noah, looking to be having an important discussion around Dek’s console station.
It looked like Noah had also cleaned up and changed, except he had left his jacket off.
Laney’s stomach fluttered at the mere sight of him. Mostly in relief.
She could barely believe that they had managed to rescue him, escape from the generation ship, and foil the plans of The Alliance.
Her smile widened.
Everything was going to be okay now.
“So, that’s him, huh?” Sol elbowed her then whistled. “Now I get why you were so eager to rescue him. I would be too if my primary looked like that,” she remarked as she walked past her.
Laney made a face, flushing a little. “It’s not—that’s not—,” she hissed then stopped short, merely rolling her eyes as she followed Sol toward Cam’s workstation. “Hey, Cam.”
Cam looked up at them with narrowed eyes. “What are you girls gossiping about?”
“Primaries,” Sol piped up.
Laney hurried to cut in before Sol could go on. “The Commander and Dek,” she supplied, making Sol chuckle to herself. “They seem well-matched,” she observed.
“Oh yeah,” Cam informed her. “They make a fantastic team. Dek is a really good grounding influence on the Commander, and she opens doors for him that he otherwise wouldn’t.”
“Huh.” Laney nodded, looking fascinated. “Have you ever seen them fight?” she asked in a hushed voice so that only Cam and Sol could hear.
Cam was already nodding.
“Oh, sure,” Sol confirmed. “Being primaries doesn’t mean you get along twenty-four seven. People are still people after all.”
Laney smirked. Sounds about right. It still felt odd to acknowledge that Noah might be her primary. They hadn’t even had a chance to talk yet since coming back from The Aquila.
Hold that thought.
She felt a warmth in her stomach, remembering Noah’s words back at GNR.
“Laney!”
Laney looked up, snapping to attention, and saw Trin beckoning her over to the big chair. She walked up, giving Dek a nod in greeting as she passed him, before looking up at Noah, but he appeared focused on some screens on a wall panel.
“Listen,” Trin started to Laney. “I’m sorry about throwing you in the escape pod before. I figured the easiest way for you to find Dr. Donovan in that giant spaceship would be to get captured yourself.”
Laney gave her a look. “How did you even know we’d be able to escape?”
Trin pursed her lips, meeting her gaze evenly. “How did you know we’d come back for you?”
Laney laughed. “Fair point. Though next time, you could warn a girl.” She beamed, grateful. “But thanks. Thank you so much.”
Trin gestured to Noah. “I’ve had the rundown of what happened on the generation ship from Dr. Donovan’s report.” Her expression sobered a little. “So I understand it was the other Laney who caused the spacetime distortion on our world.”
Laney made a face. “I’m so sorry.”
Trin gave her a small, reassuring smile. “You don’t have to be sorry.” She gestured to her big chair. “As you can see, from where I’m sitting, the universe looks pretty sweet.”
“What’s going to happen to The Dauntless now?” Laney knit her eyebrows in concern. “I’m sure The Aquila will have seen you helping us escape. I mean, what other ship in the fleet has space-folding capabilities?”
“With all due respect, they will have to catch us first, Miss Carter.”
Laney jumped in surprise and had to laugh.
“Sigrid, we’re having a private conversation,” Trin reprimanded, sounding more exasperated than displeased.
“Sorry, Commander.”
Dek, Sol, and Cam were all sharing a chuckle, having heard Sigrid’s assertive declaration on the PA, and Trin was shaking her head, but Laney could tell that everyone on The Dauntless appreciated Sigrid’s unique personality as though she was simply any other member of the crew.
“She’s not wrong though,” Trin spoke up. “And I’m sure The Alliance has enough problems at the moment. From what I understand, that machine you sabotaged will set them back a couple of years at least.”
“But they’ll just build it again, won’t they?” Laney guessed with not even a shadow of doubt in her tone.
Trin put her hand on Laney’s shoulder, tilting her head, self-assuredly. “Then when the time comes, we’ll just have to be ready, won’t we?”
“Okay, Commander. I have him back,” Dek announced, pressing some buttons on his console.
“Hello?” Berry’s voice crackled over the PA again.
“Greetings, Dr. Vermillion.”
“Hey Sigrid,” he responded. “How’s it going?”
Noah’s eyebrows furrowed in surprise and puzzlement as he looked up. “Is that Berry?”
“Just peachy. I have new blast shielding installed for the supernova.”
“That sounds amazing. I can’t wait to hear about the neutrino flux readings from a type two supernova. It’s going to be magnificent.”
Dek leaned over to Trin and Laney with a grin. “Perhaps they’d like to be left alone,” he joked under his breath.
Trin cleared her throat loudly, pointedly.
“Oh. Sorry.” Berry stopped short to refocus. “Hey. Dek. Trin. Guys. Did you find Laney?”
“Yes, Berry. She’s right here. And so is Dr. Donovan.”
“WHAT?”
“We—Well…we’ve just mounted a rescue for your other friend from the Alliance ship.”
“You did what?” Berry’s disbelief was not disguised.
“Hey, it was Laney’s idea,” Dek pointed out.
Laney’s cheeks reddened. “I mean, well, you said to not to get separated.”
Berry’s chuckle resounded over the PA.
“Berry.” Noah approached Dek’s station. “You could have told us you had a way to communicate with this world.”
“Oh. Well, we had very limited information about that world in the preliminary studies and there was a lot of interference the first time around. I wasn’t sure it was even going to work again and I didn’t want to get your hopes up.”
“Sure. Wouldn’t want us to be too hopeful,” Laney scoffed, her tone wry.
Dek laughed.
“Listen, Berry,” Noah began. “There’s a chance that the boomerang path may be invalid. One of the worlds we jumped through to get here may have been…sucked into a singularity.”
“Oh shoot,” Laney piped up with a grimace. “Speaking of bad news, Berry, I just remembered, I’m also going to need another dose of that memory serum.”
“What? Why?” Noah was the one to ask.
“I had to dose Verren with it to get away.”
“You what?” He gave her a look of disbelief.
Laney shrugged pointedly. “Well it worked, didn’t it?”
Berry chuckled again. “What in the name of Sam Hill have you two been up to since you left here?”
Laney shook her head. “Dude, you seriously don’t want to know.”
“Well then, I actually have good news,” Berry announced. “Trin and Dek sent me the information about Eleanor’s appearance on that world two years ago and I found the path she used to get there.”
Laney’s eyes lit up. “You did?”
“When I was digging through Eleanor’s old transcripts,” Berry went on. “I kept finding a strange footnote, bu
t without this context, it was meaningless. Basically, Eleanor found maybe a one in a quadrillion traversal path probability—a shortcut, if you will. Except she did it all by herself, without the help of any search algorithm. I’m transmitting the configuration to you now so you can program it on the Zeta device.”
“That’s awesome, Berry!” Laney was more than elated.
Eleanor really was the gift that kept on giving. She was like the biggest villain and the biggest hero. The only one who could get them into this much trouble, but also the only one who could get them out.
“Fifteen minutes and thirty-five seconds to the solar core collapse, Commander.”
Berry sort of squeaked on the PA. “This is so exciting! I can’t believe you guys are about to witness a red supergiant supernova up close.”
“Cam, move us to within fifty-million kilometers of the star,” Trin called out.
“Aye.”
Dek looked over at Laney. “Laney, you’ll need to remove anything metal on you.”
Laney’s eyes lit up. “Oh, yes, please.” Her hand flew up to the gadget under her ear. She couldn’t wait to take the aching thing off. “Berry, how do I get this flipping CCL off?”
“Noah will have to detach it safely.” Berry’s voice crackled a little over the radio. “Do you have a laser micro-scalpel?”
Dek gestured to a lab adjacent to the bridge. “You can use the lab in the back,” he said. “Sigrid, why don’t you transfer Dr. Vermillion’s signal into Lab 1?”
“Certainly.”
“Right.” Laney nodded, glancing up at Noah who had already gone ahead.
“Can you believe this? I’m about to get barbecued in a supernova,” Laney announced in mocking as she entered the doorway labeled “Lab 01” with the door shushing closed behind her.
Berry’s voice came over the comms system. “Don’t worry, Laney. The hyper-intense shock exposure from the supernova should simply neutralize the levels of dark energy you were exposed to with Eleanor’s interdimensional insulation.”
Laney shrugged. “I don’t know why I’m not even nervous. Then again, given my week, I’m seriously hoping there’s nowhere else to go but up.”