"Damn it!" She kept running.
"Tiffin! Wait!" Dewey called out behind her.
She had no intention of waiting. Squeakers needed her, and there was nothing more dangerous than a girl protecting her baby mouse.
She turned the corner and saw both creatures barreling down the middle of the next corridor. "Run, Squeakers! I'm coming!"
Running full speed, she shot again, but unaimed, the blast widely missed, hitting the ceiling before even reaching the Gefreety. Sparks showered and a metal panel from the ceiling fell, clanging as it hit the floor.
She chased the two of them down four more passageways, blasting at least one hole in each. Wether Dewey was still running behind her or not, she didn't know. Sarah had healed his shoulder pretty well before they tried the transfer of the Gefreety, but she knew he was still feeling drained.
She watched Squeakers run through an open door. He'd put some distance between himself and the Gefreety. Go Squeakers!
She willed her legs to carry her faster, but she'd hit her top speed halfway down the long corridor and fatigue was setting in. But it didn't matter. Tiffin was horrified when the Gefreety rushed through the same open door after Squeakers, and, before she could follow, the sliding metal door closed. She slid to a stop in front of it and reached for the handle. The sound of a locking bolt sliding into the wall from the door sent a panic up her spine. She could see through the small crystal pane of the door. Squeakers was almost to the other side of the room, running toward a second door, which was open, but the Gefreety had nearly caught up to him.
Tiffin banged on the door. "No!" She pulled at the handle again. "No! Sarah! Open this! Please!" Her cry sounded angry and tearful. The door didn't open and Sarah didn't answer.
"Tiffin!" Dewey called out from the other end of the corridor behind her.
"Please!" Tiffin screamed. "Squeakers!"
Staring through the small window in the door at the scene, she had never felt so helpless and angry, or so it seemed at the time. But then, just before the Gefreety ran through the second door in pursuit of Squeakers, that door slid shut, blocking the Gefreety's path. The creature slammed into the door and staggered before falling onto its side.
"Yes!" Tiffin jumped for joy with her hands raised to the ceiling, but she lost sight of the fact that she had an armed blaster in her hand and in her excitement she accidentally squeezed the trigger. The blast blew a hole through the ceiling above, just to her right. She ducked her head and shielded it with one arm as the sparks rained down, and a metal panel dropped. It landed beside her. She glanced at the ceiling, then to her blaster. "Oh." She leaned forward and looked through the window in the door again. "Yes." The Gefreety was still trapped in the room. Squeakers had escaped.
Dewey caught up with her. "Are you okay?"
Tiffin smiled at him. "Yes. I'm just fine. And so is Squeakers." Her smiled turned to a huge grin, then she hugged Dewey.
"Tiffin," Sarah said through an overhead speaker a few feet away from the hole Tiffin had blasted. "The creature is trapped in the room and I've just notified Jake."
"Thank you," Tiffin said, still holding onto Dewey.
"And," Sarah said, "Squeakers is in the other room, on the other side of that second door I closed. He's okay. I'll keep him locked in there until you come get him. It's a small room."
Tiffin let go of Dewey and looked up to a camera on the ceiling. "Oh, thank you, Sarah! You're wonderful!"
"I see Jake getting really mad," Dewey said.
Tiffin looked at him. "You getting a vision?"
"No, but..." Dewey looked up at the ceiling, then Tiffin did. A few more sparks flickered inside the hole she'd blasted.
Tiffin gulped. "Maybe he won't notice."
Chapter 22
"Calm down, Jake," Sarah said. "This is why I told her to take Squeakers to her room and stay there for a while. I knew you'd overreact."
"Overreact?" Jake, still pacing like he had been since the conversation started, gestured wildly toward the camera above him. "She shot holes all over my ship!"
"She was trying to save her mouse."
Jake stopped pacing and stared at the camera on the ceiling. "You have any idea how stupid that sounds?"
"Not to her."
Jake looked away and groaned.
"You told me how you found her on Eon. That mouse is the only person she could trust before you came along."
Jake looked up again, imagining he was looking at Sarah's face. "It's not a person. It's a rat."
"Mouse."
"Whatever. She shot up my ship."
"Oh, come on. It's just a few holes. You don't hear me complaining, and I actually felt it. Sort of. You know what I mean."
"Yeah, well..."
"Jake." Sarah's tone shifted. She sounded more sympathetic. "What is it really? It's the delivery, isn't it?"
Jake stared at the floor.
"You know it wouldn't be such a bad thing if we let this one go. Can't we go back to the way it was?"
I wish we could, darlin'. Believe me.
Jake knew what she meant, but in his mind, back to the way it was meant something else entirely. Something long gone, unfortunately.
Instead of answering, he just took a couple of deep breaths and tried to calm down. He knew she was right. He'd overreacted, and now he was taking it out on her too—the last thing he wanted to do. But, he thought, she could never understand why he felt so strongly about stopping the General once and for all.
"Jake?"
"Yeah, darlin'?"
"Forget the holes."
"Fine." He still couldn't get himself to look at her camera.
"And the delivery. You know it'll be a trap. Just like the last stop."
Jake bit his tongue for a moment, taking a couple more breaths before answering. "Yeah. It will. He's never going to stop trying."
He heard Sarah exhale like she was relieved.
"But," Jake said, "I'm going anyway. You're not changing my mind on this, Sarah." He lifted his head and stared at the camera. "I'm serious. This has to end." He shook his head. "I'm not doing this anymore. No more looking over my shoulder. No more worrying some of his men will try to hijack you and take you away from me like they tried on Eon. I'm done with running. Done with hiding."
Jake continued staring at the camera for several moments. Sarah said nothing, but he could hear a faint sound coming from the ship's speaker, like she was failing to hold back tears. He knew they were in her A.I. Head, but he felt like crap anyway.
"It'll be over soon," Jake said. "Then it's just you and me. No more checking the shadows everywhere we go." Jake tugged the sides of his belt as if he was adjusting it, but it was really because he didn't know how to deal with the emotions he was having and he had to do something for a second to distract himself.
"What about Tiffin and Dewey? You can't take them into this."
"You're right. I'll drop 'em somewhere on the way. Or, if we can't find a good place, after the delivery. They can stay on the ship until then. But this needs to happen. Whoever's waiting for me to deliver this cargo-"
"To ambush you, you mean."
"Yeah, that's right. And they may know where the General is."
"And then what? If they don't kill you first."
"Then we know our next destination."
"Maybe our last one."
"I won't let that happen," Jake said, smiling at Sarah's camera.
"I wish I could be as sure as you. But..."
"But what? Don't you trust me?"
"I do," Sarah said. "But..."
"But what?" Jake said.
"But...I'm a lot smarter than you."
Jake furrowed his brow, annoyed at first by her words, but he knew how to take it. "Yeah. You're probably right."
"You should go apologize for yelling at Tiffin about the holes."
"Right again," Jake said. "But it's not going to help much after I tell her that she and Dewey are getting dropped off."
"She's
going to be devastated, but if you're going to go through with this, going after him, I mean, then it's the right thing to do. She's too young to..."
"To get killed in this crazy plan?"
"I wasn't going to say that."
"But that's what you were thinking."
"Just go talk to her, Jake."
"Yeah. I will. She's in her room?"
"Try to let her down easy."
"You got it."
Chapter 23
Tiffin was sitting on her bed when she heard a knock on the door to her room.
"Not now, Dewey. I'm..." She sniffed and wiped the corner of her eye. "Squeakers is resting...and I am too."
"It's Jake."
She didn't even want to answer him after the way he talked to her earlier, after he saw all the holes she made shooting at the Gefreety.
"I...I figured you might want to go down to the spare cargo bay with me. Get some shooting practice in."
What?
Tiffin didn't know whether to be annoyed or laugh at Jake's awkward attempt at an ice breaker.
"No thanks," she said. "I don't want to cause any more damage than I already have."
Or listen to you yell at me about it.
"Can I come in for a minute?" Jake said. "I need to talk to you."
"Squeakers is trying to sleep. And I don't want him to get out again."
"Understood, but...it's important. Maybe you can come out here for a minute."
Tiffin could hear that Jake was trying to talk with a kind tone. She was still upset at him for yelling at her, but she also knew he had every right to get angry about the holes she put in his ship.
"Fine," she said. "Give me a minute."
"Thanks."
Tiffin had been holding Squeakers, petting him the way he liked. It had put him asleep, and even through she'd been talking to Jake, Squeakers was still out. All that running from the Gefreety had exhausted him. She gently put him on her pillow and slipped her feet into her boots, then went to the door.
She took a few deep breaths before opening it.
"Hi," Jake said. "Thanks."
Tiffin shrugged. "I thought you said to wait until tomorrow to start fixing the holes."
"I did, but that's not why I'm here."
"No?"
"No. I...I want to tell you I'm sorry for losing my temper with you. It shouldn't have happened."
Tiffin pressed her lips tightly together to hold back the surprising urge to cry she felt. She wanted to answer, but she was afraid if she opened her mouth to say anything the tears would come out. Instead, she nodded, then shrugged.
"So, you're okay?" Jake asked. "And Squeakers?"
Oh, crap. Don't do it. Don't cry in front of him.
The fact that Jake actually asked if she and Squeakers were okay, after all the trouble they'd caused, made it hard enough for her to keep control, but knowing Jake was there to tell her she and Dewey had to leave the ship was too much for her to handle. She'd told herself she'd be strong, but she burst into tears. "Oh, Jake, please don't kick me off the ship."
"What? How did you? I didn't say anything about..."
"But you were going to. I heard you."
"You heard me?"
Tiffin glanced back into her room, at a metal box with a hodgepodge of knobs and switches, and several wires coming out of it and running into the wall where she'd removed a panel to get to the circuits inside. "I...I made that in my spare time."
"Huh?"
Tiffin shrugged. "You said I could use the tools from the tool room. And, I found some spare parts. I...didn't mean to eavesdrop. It started out as a way of learning about the ship's systems...so I could work on things better when repairs came up."
"I can't believe you."
"It was the only time," Tiffin said. "After you...yelled at me." She paused to wipe a few tears from her cheeks. "After that, I just wanted to know what you were going to do. I know I shouldn't have, but..."
Jake exhaled, hands on his hips. "You're right, Tiffin. You shouldn't have. That was too far. This is my ship, you realize."
"I know. I'm sorry. It's just...when I don't know what else to do, I turn to Squeakers and...gadgets. It's how I survived on my own all those years. I always had to watch out for myself."
She noticed Jake had clenched one of his fists, but she knew better than to think he'd use it on her. He'd rescued her on Eon, she recalled...before she then rescued him on Eon. Surely that stood for something, she thought.
He relaxed his hand. "I get it. Really, I do. It's not easy when you're on your own for so long."
"It isn't, but now..." Tiffin allowed a sliver of calm to push away her tears. She wanted to tell him how much he and Sarah, and Dewey, meant to her. They were her family, if that's what her feelings for them meant. It wasn't something she hadn't known before. She waited for Jake to say more, hoping he was going to change his mind about making her and Dewey leave.
"And that's just going to make this that much harder," Jake said, "...for both of us."
Tiffin took a quick breath, realizing Jake was going to follow through with what he'd said to Sarah.
"No! You can't." Tears again poured from her eyes, but she didn't nothing to try to stop them this time.
"I don't want to see you go, Tiffin. But it's for your own good. I...I have to do something. Well..." Jake glanced to the device Tiffin built. "You already know that, I guess."
"I don't care. I'm not afraid."
"Then you don't understand what I'm heading into. This man, the General, he's been after me and Sarah for a long time...and he's dangerous."
"You're dangerous too." Tears dripped from the bottom of her cheeks.
Jake nodded his head slightly. "Yeah, I am, but this is different. He's not like one of the thugs we just ran into." Jake paused for a moment. "Or even Hyde, and I don't have to tell you what he was capable of doing."
"You survived him too." Tiffin sniffed and wiped her hand across her cheeks. "Thanks to me."
Jake smiled. "Yes. Thanks to you."
"So, you need me." She could barely get the words out.
Jake put his hands on her shoulders and met her eyes with his. "I need you to alive. You have your whole life ahead of you. I'll make sure you have enough credits to take care of yourself for a long time, someplace safe."
Tiffin shook her head repeatedly. "Huh uh."
Jake exhaled and removed his hands from her shoulders. "After I do what I have to do, I'll come back. If you still want to come with me and Sarah then..."
Tiffin said nothing.
"Get some rest. I'll let you know when Sarah finds a good place for you and Dewey. I'll drop you both there after I make this next stop."
Tiffin didn't respond, and a few seconds later Jake turned and walked away.
Chapter 24
Dewey went to the door to his room to see who had knocked. He'd been in bed, resting. He guessed it was Jake at the door, since he Tiffin had made it really clear an hour earlier that she needed to be alone. He hoped Jake didn't need him on the bridge. Dewey was tired. The shoulder wound had all but completely healed, but either his body dealing with the recovery or the running after Tiffin when she chased the Gefreety and Squeakers had worn him out. Realizing he should've been over it by now, he looked down at bare torso, trying to decide whether he'd slipped into an early middle age. Before pushing the button to open the door, he shook his head, reminding himself he was barely an adult, as his race aged.
He pushed the button and the door whooshed open.
"Tiffin." Dewey immediately felt uncomfortable standing in front of her without a shirt. "I, uh." He glanced at himself, then back to her. "I didn't expect you."
"Oh, Dewey." Tiffin lunged forward, throwing her arms over his bare shoulders.
Taken entirely by surprise, Dewey stumbled back, but she stayed with him. When the two of them cleared the doorway, the door slowly closed.
"He can't," Tiffin said, inches from Dewey's face.
"Can't wha
t?"
"Jake. He's going to kick us off the ship."
"Huh?"
"You have to talk to him, Dewey."
"Me? He won't listen to me."
"Yes he will. Tell him he has to let us stay."
"What did he say, exactly. Why does he want us to leave now? The holes? He knows what happened. You had to save...Squeakers."
Tiffin let go of Dewey and took a step back, shaking her head. "Not that. He says it's too dangerous for us."
Dewey hesitated for a moment, thinking about what happened on the cargo pickup. "He has a point."
"No." Tiffin's voice cracked, and Dewey noticed for the first time that she her eyes looked like she'd been crying.
"But those men," Dewey said. "They almost..." He realized she didn't need to hear what they'd almost done to her. "Wouldn't you rather try your hand at something else. We could."
"We?"
Dewey shrugged. He meant what he said, but he wasn't sure how Tiffin felt about him, at least not entirely.
Tiffin stepped closer to him. "Will you?"
Dewey felt uncomfortable at the excitement that was building in him. "Will I what?"
"Will you stay with me?"
"Yes. Yes, I will. We can find a nice planet. A fresh start. If we stick together-"
"No."
Dewey's heart sank.
"Not a planet," Tiffin said. "Here. We're staying on the ship."
"But." Dewey didn't know what to say. He thought they'd just gone through this, but she clearly hadn't changed her mind.
"I need to know you'll stay with me too. I want to stay aboard the ship, to be a cargo runner...or at least the mechanic. But..." She inched her face closer to his, looking into his eyes. "I need to know you'll be with me. I don't want to leave the ship...but..." She put her arms around him again. "I don't want to lose you."
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