by JC Cassels
“All this from a cracked dome?”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
Blade drew her to a halt beside a row of lockers. He tucked a key into the slot and the locker swung open. He reached in and opened the fastener of the spacer’s duffel bag inside and hastily sorted through the contents. Satisfied, he pulled it from the locker and swung it over his shoulder. His arm around her once more, he led her across the promenade, wending their way through the steaming crowd.
It only took a few minutes, but it felt like an eternity before he found the maintenance corridor he was looking for. With a nod of his head, he urged her to go first. When the door closed behind them, cutting off the noise from the passenger areas, Bo’s shoulders slumped.
“I didn’t even think when I shot at the dome,” she said. “If these people die, it’ll be Frostfire all over again, only this time, I will be responsible.”
Blade shook his head. “They’re afraid. That’s our fault. But I promise you, love, there isn’t going to be a tragedy like Frostfire here. I don’t see it in the Sentaro.”
Bo’s lips curled in a small smile, oddly comforted by his assurance.
They traveled for several minutes before his steps slowed. He waved her to a halt as he drew his blaster. The priest gave way to the Predator. Blade shoved her behind a row of lockers and crowded in after her. Blaster at the ready, he closed his eyes and stilled. His breathing slowed, and all tension melted from him as a deadly calm settled over him.
Bo held her breath and willed her pounding heart to settle down. Adrenaline flooded her system, and her hand on his back trembled with it. As quietly as she could muster, she drew her blaster from his waistband.
Voices drifted toward them, punctuated by footsteps echoing down the corridor. Half a dozen maintenance workers, in no apparent hurry, ambled past their hiding place.
Blade held a finger against his lips.
They held position until long after the maintenance workers disappeared around the corner. Blade slid out from their hiding place, weapon at the ready. Scanning the area, he waved for her to follow. Hastily, she trailed after him.
Maker, she loved to watch that man in full warrior mode.
He moved lightly, fluidly. His blue eyes scanned the area with deadly intensity, taking in everything. The corridor they were in dead ended into another. He peered around the corner, then took up position further down the left-hand corridor.
Bo adjusted the setting down on her Capre as she followed him. She didn’t need a set of schematics to tell her that they were close to the outer hull of the space station. The change in support structure was all the information she needed. A delicate, web-like truss wove in and out, melding into the heavier girders that shaped the hull.
Tilting his head, he listened and waved her against the bulkhead.
Needing no further urging, Bo pressed her bare back against the cold metal. She turned her attention toward the length of corridor behind them.
In the distance, shadows moved and light patterns shifted.
The featureless corridor hardly provided decent cover. If they got pinned down, they may as well blow a hole in the side of the station.
Bo’s eyes widened.
It was almost crazy enough to work.
She reached into his jacket and pulled out his sunshades.
His brow furrowed.
She ignored his unspoken question. He would get it soon enough – if it was viable.
The HUD flickered as she slipped them on. The holographic station schematic hovered in front of her. Quickly orienting herself, Bo located their present position on the layered diagram and searched for the nearest maintenance hatch.
There!
Just beyond the curve of the corridor.
Bo removed the sunshades and tucked them back into his jacket. Meeting his questioning look, she patted the outside of his pocket with a smile.
Before she could talk herself out of it, she pushed away from the bulkhead.
“Where are you…?” Blade broke off.
Ignoring him, she raced back to the lockers. With one eye on the approaching shadows, she scanned the labels above the locker doors.
This close to a maintenance hatch, they had to be here.
On the far end, she found what she was looking for.
As quietly as she could manage, she reached into the locker and pulled out the first two in the row of nearly identical EVA suits and helmets, looking no closer at them than to make sure their atmo and power packs were fully charged. She eased the locker door shut, wincing at the click that echoed down the corridor when the latch caught.
Blade swore, and the corridor lit up with blaster fire.
Setting her jaw, Bo hefted the suits over her shoulder and ran to the junction. She peered around the corner. Blade faced a handful of security officers. Shouts came from the other direction.
They were out of time.
Muttering a curse, Bo shrugged the larger of the two suits off her shoulder. Kicking off her shoes, she hastily stepped into the smaller suit, fastening it as she pulled it on. Using a utility tether designed to keep hand tools from floating away, she attached her Capre to the right gauntlet and used both hands to seal the suit. She left the helmet off, opting for a wider field of vision instead.
Once she had the suit on, she scooped up the other from the floor and grabbed both helmets. She gave the tether a deft flick, and her weapon swung into her hand.
Stepping around the corner, she laid down a steady stream of covering fire for Blade. When she got close enough, she tossed him the other suit. She pointed down the corridor in the direction of the maintenance hatch, and hand-signaled an approximate distance. With a jerk of her head, she ordered him to precede her.
His mouth set in a grim line, he nodded his understanding. A muscle jumped in his jaw, eloquently communicating his dislike of her plan. Firing off a few more bursts to keep their heads down, he broke off and ran past her.
Bo’s lips twitched as she backed quickly down the corridor after him. For all that he professed he’d learned submission, the man still hated losing control over a situation.
She lay down a constant spray of suppressing fire until she reached the curve that followed the station’s outer hull. She turned and raced after him.
When she caught up to him, he’d reached the maintenance airlock and was already pulling on the EVA suit.
She stood with her back to him, where she could see down the corridor in both directions. The security patrol pursuing them wouldn’t hesitate for long. There was no cover, and the only escape was out the airlock.
His steely gaze flicked over her, taking inventory.
“That one doesn’t have propulsion,” he said, nodding to her suit.
Bo glanced over her shoulder and muttered a curse. “Too late to go back for another one,” she said.
“We’ll bili,” he said.
She shook her head. “Too risky.”
EVA suits could be hooked together via umbilical connection. That meant they shared atmo control. The risk of decompression was greater, though, should a problem arise.
“I don’t need propulsion,” she said. “I cut my teeth on zero gee.”
“Woman…” He growled in warning.
“Fine!”
With her free hand, she tugged on a carabiner attached to the utility belt of her suit. A retractable line hummed as she released it. A tether would keep both suits on individual atmo without allowing them to float too far from each other.
“Happy?” she asked.
“Hardly.”
He placed the helmet over her head. It hissed as he engaged the seals pressurizing it.
Bo wrinkled her nose. The suit’s last occupant had left behind a piquant body odor.
Great.
He hooked his bag to a carabiner attached to his waist and attached his TJ-64 to his gauntlet.
The security patrol eased around the curve. A few tentative blasts whizzed past them.
“Time to go!” She opened fire, driving them back. “Get your helmet on!”
Muttering a curse, he donned his helmet and hit the inner hatch controls. It rolled open and he dove in, dragging his bag with him as he sealed the helmet to his suit.
From the other direction, blaster fire lit up the corridor, leaving hissing pockmarks in the bulkhead. Blade tugged hard on the back of her suit, yanking her into the airlock. He sealed the hatch as soon as she was clear. As he swung her around, Bo slapped the controls to open the outer hatch. The hatch opened and the explosive force of sudden depressurization tore her from his grasp as it blasted them out into the vacuum of space.
The change in gee forces hit her all at once. Fortunately, her entire life had been one big physics demonstration. After the initial acceleration from the depressurization, zero gravity asserted itself. The lack of sensation was deceptive. She’d attained a staggering rate of speed.
Willing her heart to settle into a slower rhythm, Bo focused on taking deep, steady breaths.
Taking stock of the situation, she quickly calculated her trajectory, speed, and the distance to the docking rings.
For all her bravado, some laws of physics were immutable. If she didn’t find some way to slow herself, she could slam into the docking ring with enough force to break every bone in her body, not to mention rupture her internal organs.
But that was a secondary issue. She needed to change direction a few degrees or she’d fly past the docking ring entirely – in which case her speed would hardly be an issue.
Her lips quirked.
She wouldn’t be the first Barron to find final repose in the endless black of deep space.
Shaking off the dark thought, she looked around for any sign of Blade. Already, she’d covered quite a substantial distance from the airlock. She could only guess at his location. She’d given him the suit with propulsion, and there hadn’t been time to tether their suits together. He was likely half-way to Sundance by now.
There was no way to warn her ship she was coming; no way to call for help. She had no way of activating her com-implant, not that she looked forward to a repeat of the overload she’d experienced earlier.
“Well, hell,” she muttered. “What do I have?”
Silence answered her.
The only sound came from her suit’s life-support system and the regulator triggered by her rapid respiration.
Bo listened to the hiss and pop of her own breathing for a moment before a smile curled her lips.
Of course!
How could she be so stupid?
Bo touched the control pad on her suit’s chest, checking her atmo reserves. The helmet’s HUD lit up with the readouts. The indicators pegged at full.
Finally, something in her favor.
With an eye on the docking ring, Bo changed position, calculated trajectory, and adjusted a little more. Watching the gauges on her atmo levels, she released controlled bursts, venting her suit into the vacuum. Her course shifted a few degrees, bringing her in direct line with the docking ring.
One problem solved. Now to slow herself.
Bo looked around for some point of reference. Finding an antenna array, she focused on it, calculating her speed and direction. Shifting her body weight carefully, she moved into position and vented the suit again. Her speed didn’t seem to slow much, so she increased the pressure, venting more precious atmo until she slowed to what approached, to her estimation, a manageable drift.
She looked at the gauges; her heart rate accelerated as the indicators plummeted. Hopefully Sundance was close by or else she’d have to find a way back aboard the station.
She slammed into the docking ring hard enough to knock the breath from her. The precious atmo gauges dropped even more as she struggled to breathe normally. Frantically, she scrambled to find something to grab hold of before she caromed off. Her flailing hand found purchase on a rail. She gripped it tightly while she waited for the adrenaline rush to ease.
Once her hands steadied, she took hold of the carabiner and clipped it to the rail. Securely tethered, Bo pulled herself hand over hand along the rail until she reached the outside of the ring. Trusting the tether to keep her from flying off into space, she pushed away from the hull for a better view, releasing the tension on her tether reel. She floated a good twenty meters before the line ran out.
Bo craned her neck as she scanned the ships as far as she could see.
It was easy to forget how massive Chiron station actually was. From her vantage point, there was no sign of her ship. More to the point, she had no idea where to begin looking. Her rapidly falling gauges discouraged a lengthy search. Wandering off in the wrong direction could be a fatal mistake.
Her brow furrowed. It wasn’t the worst situation she’d ever been in – but it made the top ten.
Something tugged on her tether.
Bo snapped the Capre into her hand as she turned, slowly drifting away from the docking ring.
A humanoid figure in an EVA suit unclipped the carabiner from the station and snapped it to another ring at his waist. A spacer’s bag floated off his other side.
Bo’s heart pounded in her chest as the station rotated away beneath them. Panic clawed up through the dark well of her soul.
They floated off toward the black of deep space.
Cool head, Barron!
It was one thing to free-float on her own when she had a modicum of control, but this… She gasped for air and her atmo gauges slowly counted down.
They’d been too rushed in their escape. One EVA suit looked very like another. For the life of her, she hadn’t had time to note any distinguishing marks on Blade’s before they’d blasted out into the black. The face inside the featureless face shield was buried in impenetrable shadow.
She pointed the Capre at him.
He stilled and spread his arms in surrender. A TJ-64 hovered just out of his reach, attached to the gauntlet of his suit.
Together, they drifted.
Unmoving, he watched her, waiting.
On a station this size, there would always be a small army of maintenance workers swarming about the rings. She’d cracked the dome. They’d be all over, checking weak points in the hull, securing microfractures. There would be armed patrols on the hunt for the terrorists who’d damaged the station, and they’d be in contact with the station and each other through com-links.
There hadn’t been time to activate hers before they’d bailed.
Which was he?
The TJ-64 and spacer’s bag could only belong to Blade…right?
Her gut screamed at her to put her weapon away before she accidentally killed her husband.
Logic reminded her that the odds were against Blade locating her so quickly.
She stared hard into the featureless black inside the helmet.
It couldn’t be Blade.
It had to be Blade.
Bo measured the growing distance between herself and the station. There was no way she would ever get back without propulsion. She didn’t have enough atmo left in her tanks to both breathe and fly with.
“If you’re not Blade, I’m as good as dead.”
As if in answer to her thoughts, he held up his hands in a universally lewd gesture.
Her lips twitched, and she released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.
Only Blade Devon would proposition her at gunpoint.
Bo lowered her weapon and touched the release on her tether, pulling herself along as it reeled in. When she was close enough to make out his lopsided grin inside the shadowed helmet, he took hold of her suit and pulled her the rest of the way.
His amusement faded as he noted her atmo gauges. He arched an eyebrow at her.
Bo gave him a warning look and engaged the lock on her tether reel.
Shaking his head, he unclipped the umbilical from his suit and connected to hers. Her atmo gauges went up substantially, and the intercom in her helmet clicked on.
“Stil
l with me?”
“You shouldn’t have hooked the bili,” she said. “No sense endangering yourself on my account.”
“Now you tell me,” he said. His lips quirked. He hooked his arm around her and pulled her closer. “You act like I’ve never done this before – like we’ve never done this before. Hang on.”
He activated his propulsion system and, chest to chest, they floated farther from the docking ring.
“Feeling lightheaded yet?”
For a second, she debated lying. “A little.”
“I have that effect on women.”
Bo wrapped her arms around him, surrendering control to him and with it, her fear. His arm gripped her so tightly she felt it through the pressurized suit. Her earlier anxiety about leaving the proximity of the station faded. Her worst nightmares were peppered with scenarios of decompression and drifting helplessly into deep space. He knew it, too. Back when they were together, he’d too often shaken her awake from dreams that left her screaming in terror and held her, much like he did now, until her fears subsided.
For him, this was nothing more than another day at work. He was all business, his calm self-assurance speaking volumes of the hours he’d logged on the outside of vessels in deep space, and the dangerous training that had consumed his youth.
Because of that, in the midst of her worst nightmare playing out in her waking hours, Bo felt perfectly safe tucked up against his heart.
The reflected lights from the station played across his helmet.
She studied his face through the scuffed and worn transparisteel. He didn’t spare her a glance. He stared past her, his blue gaze taking in the ships lining the docking ring, and watching for potential danger as he coolly negotiated their course.
She needed the reassurance of his touch. She traced the edge of his visor with the fingertips of her glove, contenting herself with that.
“How did you know where to find me?” she asked. “I looked for you. I didn’t see you.”
“I will always find you.”
More than a statement of fact, it was a promise. The sincerity in his dark eyes curled her toes.
Maker help her.
After spending a few days under the full weight of the man’s charm, he’d already reduced her to a lovesick fangirl.
