“I don’t want any of your bloody excuses. I want her found!” Thea growled and slammed both palms against her desk, making them sting.
“Madam President, we have intel that she was on a jumper heading for cube eighteen when it—” Commander KahSandra went rigid as Thea rounded the desk.
“I don’t give a damn about your intel. I want you to search every part of Pathfinder and find Caya. She may well have had time to get off that jumper—or perhaps she was never on it. She would have foreseen what was going to happen. She was alive to have visions of the attack—and she tried to warn us about something. If that incompetent idiot hadn’t prevented her from reaching me, she could have been back here. Alive. And I have to believe she still is. She might have had a vision of the attack against the jumper system as well.” Shaking hard, but ignoring her reaction, Thea motioned for the commander and her ensigns to leave.
Alone in her office, she fell to her knees on the floor, every last remnant of strength leaving her in a gush. She bent forward with her arms around her waist, trying to hold herself together as violent sobs threatened to tear her apart. Nothing before in her life had brought her such torturous agony. Not Hadler’s abuse or her father’s dismissal, and not even the loss of her mother. Caya was part of her soul. She would lose the biggest and best part of herself if Caya were gone. How could she face Briar again if she had to tell her that her little sister was dead? As the one in charge of Caya’s incarceration, ultimately Thea was responsible.
“Please,” she whispered to the empty room. She rarely prayed, but now the words poured from her cold lips in a husky, broken whisper. “For the love of Thee, my Creator, I pledge my soul to Thee, I give my days and nights to Thy realm. I vow to carry Thy light. I promise honor to Thy children, and my eternal love and gratitude will be Thine.” Thea remained still, staring at the screens that showed the realignment of twenty cubes…and a kilometer away from Pathfinder, what was left of cube eighteen.
Fury began as a small flame just below her sternum and then grew steadily until an inferno tore through her at the sight of the destroyed cube. It looked like a large space-dwelling predator had dug its claws into it and ripped off almost an entire side, then buried its fangs into it and shredded the decks like they were made of paper. If she squinted, she could make out small dots around the cube, and it sickened her to realize some of them were her people, floating frozen in space—men, women, and children that she was elected to serve and protect, to bring with her to a new, safer world.
Thea knew she should be grateful that not all of cube eighteen’s passengers were sucked out. Emergency bulkheads had slid into place. Yet, some survivors had sustained severe damage, and the casualty toll would be steep. The mere thought that one of the floating dots on the screen might be the woman she loved was unbearable.
Thea stood slowly and began reading the information, one screen at a time. When the jumper car had exploded right at the junction between cubes four and eighteen, it had triggered a chain reaction that tore it away from the rest of Pathfinder. Whereas the emergency bulkhead seals had worked on cube four’s side, several of them did not on cube eighteen. So far, her subordinates estimated that more than ten thousand passengers had lost their lives from being sucked into space. The rest were being ferried over from what was left intact of cube eighteen right now. Thea had given orders that as many as possible of the dead floating in space were to be retrieved if possible. Had this happened earlier during their journey, they would have been jettisoned in body covers, or cremated, depending on their families’ wishes. Now, the surviving family members would have the additional option of burying their dead on Gemocon, as they were not far away from their destination.
Thea smoothed down her hair, making sure the chignon was in place, before walking over to the closet by the door. With jerky movements, she yanked her long black jacket off its hanger. She put it on and examined her reflection in the mirror. Straightening the seams of her dress, she then adjusted the ten rows of pearls around her neck. A quick touchup of her makeup made her look impeccable and strong. She needed every bit of her strength now to make it through the day. She would not allow herself to crumble. As the president, she was not allowed humanoid frailty.
Thea opened the door, and her presidential guards lined up without a word. They walked around her, backs straight, eyes calm and vigilant.
“We’re going to the hospital in cube eleven,” Thea said to her assistant, who had showed up like a ghost next to her. “I’ll meet the chief there and visit some of the patients from cube eighteen.”
“Yes, Madam President.” Her assistant tapped furiously at her tablet.
“I also want to visit engineering and the bridge.”
“Yes, Madam President.”
As they strode toward her private jumper, Thea allowed the sound of their marching feet to calm her. She needed the steady cadence to get her through this.
*
Caya coughed and tried to open her eyes. Every time she did, fine dust settled on her corneas and she closed them quickly again. She felt around her. Metal. Coarse metal on the floor and on the walls. She dared to crawl a bit farther and came across another type of alloy, like a rod. But the rod was stuck to the floor and emanated some sort of heat. She couldn’t figure out what it was, but it seemed to be quite long. She kept crawling, eyes closed hard.
“Hello?” Caya called out and coughed again. “Anyone there? Tomita! Foy!” Where were they? Were they all right? “Aldan!” The last thing she remembered was how they’d stood at the line bordering between two jumper cars as they neared cube eighteen. What had happened after that was a blur. Surely the memory of someone pushing her backward couldn’t be right? Her last clear memory was how they had told everyone to go to the back of the jumper…Yes. That was it. They had looked for a way to separate the cars because of the corrosive agent they’d seen. She tried to remember, but after she was pushed back, it all went black.
“Tomita? Aldan? Foy? Please, anyone?” She was weeping now, because Caya knew deep inside that there was a lot to mourn. She could feel it. “Answer me!”
“Hello?” She heard another weak voice, far away. It sounded like a man. Was it Foy or Aldan? She didn’t think so. He sounded different.
“I’m here.” Caya crawled toward the sound on some cold metal floor. Are you all right?” Caya called out back.
“I’m stuck. Can you reach me?” It had to be a man. His voice was low.
“I’ll try. Where are we, sir?”
“In one of the jumper tunnels in cube four.”
Caya pushed herself along the rod, which she now realized had to be one of the magnetic tracks. So, they never made it to cube eighteen? Then where were Tomita, Foy, and Aldan?
Caya closed her eyes and listened into her mind, trying to conjure up a minivision of her friends while she crawled toward the trapped man. Oddly, she saw nothing. Nothing! Just blank space. Yes, that was it. Space. Caya shivered. She saw outer space with distant stars and other celestial bodies when she focused on Tomita, Foy, and Aldan. What did that even mean?
Dust filled her mouth and nose, and she sneezed several times as she pulled herself along the track. Other than her groaning efforts to reach the injured man, silence surrounded her. Had there been an explosion? Was cube four dead in the water? Perhaps she and the man were the only survivors caught in a closed-off part of the ship. Dread trickled down her spine. Thea. What if the rest of Pathfinder was destroyed? She’d never reached Thea and hadn’t had a chance to tell her…anything. Perhaps Thea had been lost with the rest of the ship, not knowing how loved she was or how Caya regretted not letting her know when it still mattered, when it might have actually changed something for the better between them. Now, Thea might never know how all-important she was to Caya, how empty and hollow her life was without her.
Caya sobbed and then drew in deep gulps of air, not sure it helped. She tried to determine if the oxygen level was normal. All her gasping for air made her even more light-headed, but she didn’t think there was a leak. Pushing her fear of having lost Thea and everyone else she cared about to the back of her mind, she kept crawling. At least she might be able to do something for the man up ahead.
“Are you still there, miss?” the man asked, his voice weaker now.
“I’m getting closer. What’s your name?”
“Olion.” The man coughed, probably affected by the fine dust as well.
“You’re Gemosian?”
“Yes.” He sounded cautious.
“I’m Caya.” She pulled with both hands at the same time now. Using one hand at a time helped her move faster, but her arms ached from overexertion.
“What’s trapping you? Can you tell?” Caya wanted Olion to continue talking. His voice, as weak as it was, helped her not panic.
“One of the magnetic beams from the ceiling must’ve fallen on top of my legs. I can feel the humming. I’m not on the track though. That’s a good thing, or the ceiling beam might have pressed down hard enough to sever my legs. The magnetism in these tracks is powerful.”
“I’ll do my best to help you.” Caya didn’t want to think about having to leave him to get help. And if they were lost in some piece of wreckage, they were on their own. Perhaps people thought they were dead and had left them to float inside a debris field until they perished. Hating how she conjured up horrible images, Caya focused on Olion. “You sound like you know a lot about the jumpers, Olion. You an engineer?”
“Yes. Well, almost. I still have a year left at the university. I’m hoping to get my degree once we arrive at Gemocon. I think I can be of use, and it will make it possible for me to help my family to a better future.”
Olion sounded so much like Briar that tears rose in Caya’s eyes. She blinked them away and they ran down her cheeks. “We’ll make sure you get that chance. How old are you?” He couldn’t be as old as his husky voice suggested. It must be the dust that made it sound rough.
“Twenty.”
“Oh, me too. I had a birthday two months ago. You must be very smart to already have gone to university and have only one year until you graduate.” Caya was impressed.
“I skipped ahead a few years when I was fifteen.” Olion coughed again and moaned louder.
“What’s wrong?” Caya tried to go faster.
“My knee. I think it’s fractured. The beam has started to shift toward the tracks, and it’s pulling at my leg.
On a positive note, Olion sounded much closer, but if the magnetic beam was tugging at him, he might be crushed against the track. Caya had no way of knowing how long the beam was, and if it slid into place along the tracks it could injure her as well. She shook off the sudden dread. “Talk to me, Olion. I don’t have far to go now.”
“You should stay clear. I think the beam will go at any moment now. It might tear my leg right off and—”
“Shut up. Don’t you dare surrender to such thoughts. I’ll be with you in just a few moments.”
“All right.” Olion sounded weaker but kept talking. “That was a brave thing your friends did. “
“What?” Caya nearly forgot to haul herself along the track.
“Your friends. The two men and the woman you were sitting next to?”
“Did you see what happened? I can’t remember.”
“We were close to the junction between cube four and eighteen. You were all running toward the jumper car that was emitting the…was it smoke, by the way?”
“A kind of smoke, yes. Go on.”
“They passed over to the car just before the damaged one. You yelled something like ‘There’s not enough time but we have to try,’ and that’s when they stopped. You were all on the floor, pulling at something.” Olion coughed again, his breathing more labored than before. “You were about to move over to their side when the explosion came. Then that tearing sound…” He drew a trembling breath. “It was awful.”
“What happened then?” Caya wiped at the dust mixed with tears on her cheeks. She could easily picture what he described for her.
“One of the men shoved you really hard and sent you flying back into the car. I was in the one after yours, and I clung to a seat when, for a moment, I saw you fly straight into space. Damn. We nearly decompressed, but then the walls closed. The emergency seal I read about, no doubt.”
“Oh, sweet Creator.” Caya was crying again now.” Her friends. Had they been sucked out into space? Had Foy known what he was doing when he pushed her back? Probably. No. Most likely. They had sacrificed themselves. After knowing her for such a brief amount of time, they gave their lives to try to save hers…why? “And then?”
“I don’t remember anything after that. Where did our jumper cars go? I mean, we’re here, right on the track. Our jumper had seven cars. Three of them were lost behind the bulkhead. Four were left behind here. There might be something left of them behind me. I think I hear faint voices back there.”
Olion sounded so close now that Caya reached out in front of her and felt for him. Her right hand touched something warm. A shoulder. “That you?” she whispered, her throat hoarse from crying.
“Yes. I’m glad you’re here, but I wish you weren’t. The beam is sliding along my body now.” Olion spoke with dread flooding his voice. “Get past me on my other side. You might stand a—”
“Stop it. Remember what I said? I’m going to get you out of here. Preferably with your leg attached.” Caya felt along the young man’s body and found the vibrating beam just above his knees. His lower body was turned sideways under the beam, and his upper body was positioned flat onto his back. What if he had broken his back? She might paralyze him or, worse, kill him, if she miscalculated while trying to move him. “Listen, all right? I think we can use the momentum of the moving beam to our advantage. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the closer it gets to the track, the faster it’s going to move, isn’t it? Like a stronger pull?”
“Yes,” Olion whispered.
“And when it moves faster, it won’t pin you down as hard, not until it’s close to the track, at least.” Caya was thinking fast and trying to engage her physical abilities at the same time. If she could at least have a vision of being successful in saving Olion, she wouldn’t hesitate. “All right. You tell me when it reaches just below your hip. I’m going to scoot over to your other side. Once it goes over your hip, which is the highest point of its trajectory toward the track, it will pick up speed and swoosh along the flat area of your stomach and chest. We can’t let that happen. It will eventually hit your chin.” And take his head off.
Caya didn’t say that out loud. She didn’t have to. Quickly, she crawled on her belly around Olion and felt for his arm on the other side. “Tuck your free arm as close to your body as you can. Stick it into your trouser pockets if you can. That way you’re less likely to get stuck.” Caya refused to tremble as she gripped Olion’s arm and waited for him to tell her where the beam was. If he passed out or she miscalculated, it was all over. She felt with her foot behind her and found plenty of space behind her. The tunnel floor was smoother here than it had been where she woke up earlier.
“Caya. It’s almost there. It’s shaking much harder.”
“When it hits your highest point, your hip, remember, yell at me.”
“I will.” His teeth were clattering.
Caya gripped his arm harder and braced herself.
“Now!” Olion’s voice broke as he screamed the word.
Caya didn’t hesitate. Digging her naked heels against the debris on the tunnel floor, she pulled.