The long gun’s recoil knocks Anna sideways.
There’s no sound, but she feels the kick, feels the butt slamming its way past her right side. It sends her spinning again. She fumbles with the joystick, tries to right herself, but every move makes the spin worse.
The wall of the dock rushes towards her. She hits it faceplate first, the heads-up display shuddering and fracturing as the transparent material takes the impact. The material holds, and Anna finds herself moving away from the wall, still turning in that sickening spin. Somehow, she brings herself to a halt. Her fingers are trembling inside the gloves, holding the stick tight, but she’s not spinning any more.
Slowly, Anna raises her head and looks for the tug. She doesn’t want to know. If she missed, then she won’t be able to stop them from leaving.
The tug’s heat shield is torn in two.
It may be strong enough to withstand the intense, even heat of re-entry, but the direct, shearing impact of the bullet sliced right through it. The two halves are still rigid, but there’s a gaping hole in the crinkly golden material, the edges bending slightly in the vacuum. It’s beyond repair–even if they managed to patch the two sides back together, the heat of re-entry would worm its way through.
The tug itself is spinning slightly from the impact, and as the gold heat shield angles towards her, as it picks up the light from the sun, Anna can’t help smiling. Guess guns do work in space, after all.
The suit’s radio is going insane: a dozen confused voices, all clamouring for attention. Dax cuts through them. “What’s happening?” he shouts. “We—”
The radio cuts off again, stays silent for a few seconds, then roars back.
“Some sort of impact. I can’t see it.”
“Hey, Dax,” Anna says, keying the transmit button. “How’s that heat shield looking?”
She doesn’t wait for him to respond. Moving as carefully as she can, she turns herself until she’s facing the mouth of the dock, then uses the thrusters to steer herself out. She keeps each burst short, aware that her supplies are limited. Still, it should be enough to get her back to the pod bay.
Dax is swearing at her over the suit radio. She turns it off, almost absentmindedly.
She feels drained. But it’s a good feeling. She survived. It didn’t matter how young she was–she made the right call. She saved the station, just like Riley did. That’s enough.
Anna doesn’t know if the people in Dax’s group will be able to make it back inside, but there’s nothing she can do about that. They don’t have a choice–if they don’t make it back, they’ll die.
She’s outside the dock now, moving along the curve of the station. She’s gone past most of the debris, gently spinning, letting herself drift. She sees the others start to make their way out of the dock, moving in short bursts, close to the station’s hull.
She’s drifting too far away. As she activates the thrusters to correct her course, Anna sees the curve of the Earth below her.
She stares for a moment, mesmerised. The planet is brightly lit, the clouds swirling, scraps of brown land only just visible. It looks alien, forbidding. And yet, somehow, it’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen.
Riley is down there. Waiting for her.
Anna makes herself focus. She can see the pod bays now, just dimpling the hull at the point where it starts curving away from her. She angles herself towards it–she’s really got the hang of this now. The nausea is still there, but she feels it at a remove, as if it belongs to someone else. There’s a readout on her display–a vertical bar, decreasing every time she hits the thrusters. She’s still got a third of her fuel left: more than enough to take her right into the pod bay. Almost home.
Something smashes into her from behind.
In the half-second available to her, Anna thinks it must be a piece of debris–something she missed. But whatever it is is holding her, pulling her tight to itself. She’s spinning out of control, the station whirling away from her.
Dax’s face slides into view, inches from her own. Behind the transparent helmet, his face is contorted with hate.