They’re hurtling out of the L3 vicinity, and everyone’s fingers are on the edge of the trigger. Every airlock’s booby-trapped. Haskell watches it all on her screens while her bodyguards watch her, eye the bridge’s only door.
“Rearward hull breach,” says the pilot.
“Confirmed,” says the navigator. “Combat,” says the voice of the Throne.
The metal walls shudder as an explosion passes through them.
We’re catching up,” says Lynx. “No way we couldn’t,” says the Operative. The ship they’re in is the fastest the Euro Magnates could configure. And the craft they’re chasing is wounded. They’re overhauling it quickly.
“Suits,” says Sarmax. “On the rear of the hull.”
“Blast ’em,” says Lynx.
“Not so fast,” says the Operative.
• • •
A signal echoes in Spencer’s helmet. The codes check out. Spencer takes the call.
“Yeah?”
“Spencer,” says the voice of Carson. “You reading me?”
“Jesus,” replies Spencer. “That Carson?”
“You guys turn up in the strangest places.”
“So do the Rain. They’ve boarded.”
“Thought you’d say that.”
The ship is caught in an agony of reverberations as explosions slam against bulkheads somewhere farther back. The speakers are a cacophony of voices and shots. It sounds like all hell’s breaking loose back there. Haskell’s bodyguards have their guns out, pointed at the cockpit door. One signals for her to huddle in the corner. She does. “Rear units no longer reporting,” says the copilot. “Cauterize,” says the Throne.
Haskell obeys, sending out the signals. The ship shudders. And diminishes.
Smooth move,” says Sarmax.
“Ain’t gonna be enough,” says Lynx.
Close enough to be visible in the windows: the rearmost sixth or so of the president’s ship has suddenly been jettisoned, along with the two men desperately clinging to it.
• • •
Jesus Christ,” says Spencer.
“That’s a new one,” says Linehan. They’re still hanging on—just barely. The engines next to them have shut off. The newly visible engines of the newly shortened presidential ship have switched on, powering the craft away from the derelict that’s now drifting through space.
“Guess they thought we were Rain,” says Spencer.
“Or else the Rain’s inside this piece of tin.”
“Which could be about to detonate.”
“Which is why I’m bailing,” says Linehan, and he hits his jets, swans away from what’s now a floating island. Spencer looks at him receding and lets go, follows him. Stars glimmer all around.
“What now?” he says.
“Now we give you a lift,” says the voice of the Operative.
The combat’s intensifying. More explosions. More shooting. More speakers falling silent. “They’re cutting through the perimeters,” says the voice of the Throne—tense, taut. “Can’t stop them.”
“Fall back,” says Haskell. “We’ll cauterize other sections.” Which is when her bodyguard is suddenly slammed against the wall. He pitches over even as the other bodyguard’s whirling and getting shot through the chest by a nasty-looking heavy pistol wielded by the ship’s navigator. The pilot and copilot are drawing weapons, too, vaulting from their chairs. Haskell hits the ship’s zone and is pushed back: someone’s activated a point-blank jammer. The conduit to which she’s connected has been switched off. The pilot yanks the razorwire from her head. “The Manilishi,” he says.
“Which one are you?” she asks.
“You forfeited the right to know.”
“You’re Iskander. Right?”
“Enough of this,” snaps the navigator. “We’re here for the Throne. Not her.”
“I’ll cooperate,” says Haskell.
The navigator sneers, kicks off a wall, reaches Haskell. Shoves his gun against her visor.
“Cooperate with this,” he says—starts to pull the trigger—just as the windows of the cockpit explode and shots start riddling the space within. The navigator crashes into Haskell, gun firing wildly as they both go over. Haskell grabs the hand that holds the gun, turns it toward its wielder, only to realize that there’s no resistance. She seizes the pistol, shoves the navigator’s body away from her. The bodies of the pilot and copilot are floating lifeless, suits shredded. The windows of the ship are gone. But in that space float more suited figures. They fire their jets, enter the cockpit. She recognizes them.
“Hi guys,” she says.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” says Carson to her and everybody else. “Claire, you’re going with Leo. Lynx and I are going to bail out Harrison. Linehan and Spencer: stay here and hold the cockpit.”
“Splitting up?” asks Haskell. “Is that a good idea?”
“We need to get you away from the Rain,” says Carson. “You can work this ship’s zone from the next ship over.”
“There’s not much of a zone left,” she says.
It’s true. In the moments after the Rain jacked her, they hacked the microzone aboard the ship. She’s reversing the hack now, but the damage has already been done. The ship’s defenders are no longer reachable. Carson pulls open the cockpit door and Lynx goes through with his guns at the ready. Carson turns, follows him. Linehan hovers in the doorway covering them. Spencer takes the ship’s controls while Sarmax gestures at Haskell. “Let’s go,” he says.
Through the cockpit doors and they’re off. The ship is large enough to make that complicated. There’s combat going on across both decks. The internal monitors are fucked. Everything’s being jammed. The Operative doesn’t know where the Throne is. He doesn’t know the exact location of the Rain. He’s only got one thing going for him.
“The Rain think they’ve got him caught between them.”
“They’ll be driving him toward the cockpit,” says Lynx.
The Operative has no intention of waiting for them to get there. He and Lynx charge through another doorway, through a chamber, through an engine room …
“How many fucking engine-rooms are there on this bitch?” asks Lynx.
“Nowhere near enough,” replies the Operative.
Haskell follows Sarmax up through the shattered windows and out onto the ship’s roof. The Euro interceptor sits atop it, tethered just aft of the cockpit. Its canopy is up. The back’s packed with weapons and extra spacesuits.
“We need all those?” says Haskell. “The Euros were into redundancy,” says Sarmax. “For all the good it did them.”
Sarmax nods, then starts the motors as Haskell straps herself in.
• • •
Linehan’s crouching at the side of the door, ready for whatever might come through it. Spencer’s at the controls. He’s watching as the Euro craft sails past the cockpit, engines glowing. It hurtles out ahead of the ship they’re in, swings off to the left. As soon as it’s out of range of small-arms fire, it matches speed. Sarmax’s voice echoes through the cockpit.