“Anything important damaged?” asked Jeth.
Flynn grimaced. “Nothing I can’t repair, but only because I’m brilliant and I stocked up on supplies before we left Peltraz.” He pulled a piece of candy out of his pocket, unwrapped it, and popped it into him mouth.
Jeth considered asking him if by “supplies” he really meant chocolate, but he refrained. “Well, good thinking.”
Flynn seemed surprised by the compliment, but it was momentary as he returned his attention to the task at hand. Jeth left him to it, heading down the stairs to the passenger deck. He heard voices from the common deck below, including Shady’s, and figured he and Celeste must’ve finished their second damage sweep of the lower decks. He was about to head down to check for an update when he saw that Milton was still in sick bay.
The austere room was the only place aboard Avalon that Jeth ever found uninviting. Milton kept the place immaculately clean and organized, a complete one-eighty from the clutter of empty bottles in his cabin.
Milton looked up from where he stood in front of his main worktable. Some kind of medical instrument whose name and purpose Jeth didn’t know sat on the table. A soft whirring sound issued out from it.
“What are you doing?” Jeth said.
“Nothing important. Just some boring doctorish stuff.” Milton pressed a button on the machine and the whirring stopped.
Jeth shook off his curiosity. Milton doing anything doctor related was better than his usual activities of boozing and pipe smoking. “Anything get damaged in here?”
“No. Everything’s fine. You should check with the others.”
“Did our passengers check out all right?”
Milton smiled. “Yes, at least Vince and Cora. I’m sure Sierra will pass inspection, too. They’ve been very lucky.”
Depends on how you look at it, Jeth thought, considering everything that had gone wrong since he’d brought them on board. The desire to run back to the bridge and check on Lizzie’s progress gripped him again. Ignoring it, Jeth said, “Yeah, very lucky.” He inclined his head toward the doorway. “I’m gonna check in with Celeste and Shady.”
Jeth headed down to the commons deck, flinching at every sound he heard. He’d never before realized how noisy a starship could be. Even the low, constant hum of Avalon’s engines seemed ominous at the moment.
He arrived in the common area to find Celeste, Shady, and Vince standing in the middle of the room and looking down at one of the armchairs—his favorite one. Jeth spotted the holes in it right away.
Son of a bitch.
Lucky, indeed.
“Is that the extent of the damage?” Jeth asked, motioning toward the chair. It wasn’t entirely ruined, but he doubted it would be very comfortable to recline in anymore with the series of holes running up its back.
“Yes,” Celeste said. “Unless there’re some in the cabins. We haven’t checked them yet.”
Jeth grunted. “I guess one damaged armchair is good news.”
Cora, who had been sitting on the sofa when Jeth arrived, stood up and walked over to him. “See my bandage?” She held up her arm, where Milton had placed a small white bandage over where the cat had clawed her.
“Um, yeah. It’s great, Cora.”
She beamed at him.
Feeling awkward, although mildly pleased by the kid’s delight, Jeth cleared his throat. But whatever he’d intended to say got lost, as Lizzie’s voice echoed out from the comm speakers. “We’re ready.”
Without a word, Jeth turned and bolted up the stairs. Lizzie was already sitting in the copilot chair with Sierra at the nav.
Jeth sat down in the pilot chair and looked toward his sister. “Are you sure you’re done?”
She nodded, her expression a little too fearful for comfort.
Jeth glanced at Sierra in a silent question.
“The calculations are as accurate as humanly possible.”
Jeth grimaced. Whatever that meant. He turned back to the front and switched on the main comm. “We’re jumping now, people. Get ready.” Then, not bothering with goggles, he leaned forward and placed his finger against the button that would the engage the jump. Butterflies flitted through his stomach. “I guess if this doesn’t work none of us will be around to complain about it, right?”
“Not funny, Jeth,” Lizzie said.
He exhaled and pushed the button.
The familiar weightlessness came over him, same as always. But then it changed, and everything felt wrong. The weightlessness wasn’t definite like it should be, but tenuous, as if he were being held in a spiderweb that might break any moment. Even worse, he was so aware of being in that state. Never before had he been conscious of his thoughts while in that suspended, living-death moment.
It lasted too long. Normally, traveling through metaspace was like being swallowed by a giant animal that found you distasteful at once and spit you out again. Not this time, though. The animal held on, like it never intended to let go.
What seemed like hours later, they finally came through on the other side of the jump. Jeth stood up, stooped over, and dry heaved a couple of times. His insides felt as if they’d been run through a meat grinder. Lizzie was dry heaving, too. Jeth looked over at Sierra and saw her face had turned an alarming shade of green.
“Was that more Belgrave crap?” he asked, pressing his palms against his temples to still the pounding in his skull.
Sierra shook her head, unable to speak, it seemed.
He turned and checked the system readouts, making sure the Donerail had made it through the jump. Then he turned back to Lizzie, who looked better recovered. “Any idea where we are?”
“No, not yet.” She placed her shaking hands on the control panel. “I’ll run an area scan.”
Jeth patted her back. “We’re still, alive, Liz. That’s good enough.”
She ignored him, her concentration completely focused on the screen as she started running the scan. Knowing it would take a few minutes, Jeth called down to the common room to check on Celeste and the others.
“Nobody puked,” Shady told him, which Jeth guessed meant they were fine.
Next Jeth checked in with Milton in sick bay and then with Flynn in the engine room. Everybody had come through the jump okay, and they were all still here. No unexplained vanishings.
Finally, Lizzie said, “I don’t believe it.” A huge grin split her face.
“What?” Jeth and Sierra said in unison.
“We’re not far from the Belgrave border. I don’t know where we’ll come out exactly, but we made it!”
Jeth squeezed her shoulder. “I knew you could do it.”
Lizzie smirked up at him. “Of course. That’s ’cause I’m the best.”
“Well, every now and again, I suppose.”
Flynn’s voice came over the intercom. “Um, Jeth. Can you come up to the engineering room a sec? We got a little problem.”
Dread did a tap dance on Jeth’s chest, stomping out his relief at once. He flipped on the comm switch. “What is it?”
“I need to show you.”
Please don’t let it be any more holes. Jeth swept his gaze over Lizzie and Sierra. “Stay here. I’ll be back.”
He exited the bridge, taking the stairs up to the engineering deck two at a time. He spotted Flynn standing beside the metadrive compartment. There wasn’t any new damage in the room that he could see.
“What is it?” Jeth said, worry making him breathless.
Flynn’s gaze shifted to the metadrive compartment then back to Jeth. “Um, I’m no expert or anything, but I’m pretty sure the metadrive is shot.”
Jeth didn’t respond. He couldn’t. This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t possible. Not on Avalon.