at us, so I think they caught on fast enough.
“Wen,” I choke as she swerves again.
“Twenty seconds till we hit the hard part,” Gal agrees.
“Fine,” she seethes, hauling on the Ruttin’ Hell’s throttle. She cuts the main engines and throws the rotary thrusters into a lazy spin that curves the planet through our windshield before bringing it to rest squarely beneath us. “Happy?” Wen asks, holding her hands up.
“Don’t—” I start.
Gal lunges across the controls, firing the thrusters as the atmosphere blazes around us. The Ruttin’ Hell lists before aerodynamics take hold, and Gal fights to keep the Beamer level as the deceleration bends him over the dash.
I release my handholds and crumple, trying to save myself from the uncompromising force. The armor around my chest and the helmet on my head keep my vital bits from cracking, but my legs and arms are about to melt into the bench. The straps over my shoulders feel like forty-pound weights.
Gods of all systems, I think, and it’s halfway to a genuine prayer.
The first thing I hear when the roaring dies down is Wen cackling. She throws her head back and howls, leveling the ship off, and Gal glances back over his shoulder with a look that says, You’re leaving me alone with this?
I give him a slow, tight-lipped nod.
“They’re catching up,” Wen notes, bringing our attention back to the Beamer’s instruments. “Looks like they’re trying to get on either side of us.”
“And they’re hailing. Again.” Gal dismisses the communication with a well-practiced swipe. “Five minutes until we’re in academy airspace. Best to look complacent until then. Let them think they wore us down. Do whatever they bully you into.”
“Yes, sir,” Wen says with a roll of her eyes and a jab that engages the autopilot. She can’t commit fully to the sarcasm—not when she knows that it’s almost her time to shine.
Gal glances back at me. “You should be in the hold.”
“Should,” I agree, but don’t move. Terror is creeping up my throat as the distance to our goal closes. Not because I’ve got a helmet on, gear strapped to my back, and a wingsuit webbing my arms and legs, begging to catch the prairie air over the academy.
No, I’m terrified because all of a sudden I’m not so sure about what we’re doing. No matter how hard I’ve tried to flush it, I can’t rid myself of the giddy joy that swept over me when I saw Archon take its first victory in years. I tried to tell myself it was an illusion. It’s all going to come crashing down.
I’m going to bring it all crashing down.
I feel the weight of my little velvet bag pinned against my chest by my armor. There’s no telling what will happen next, so I slipped it in my front pocket when nobody was watching. Now it scorches me like the reentry burn has seared it. What would my parents say if they could see me now? Would they even bother saying anything?
Or would they just see how forsaken I am?
“Ettian,” Gal warns. The Beamer shudders around us, and one of the skipships noses into the windshield’s periphery.
I unstrap, standing on shaking legs. I want to pretend it’s the aftereffects of reentry or fear of the jump, but I’m so ruttin’ sick of lying to myself. “Wen?” I croak.
She tips a gentle salute up at me.
I salute back. “Look out for him, will you?”
“You got it,” she says, then turns her gaze pointedly to the dash so I can bend down and pull Gal into a rough kiss.
His fingers find my collar, tugging at the wingsuit. “Be careful,” he murmurs against my mouth, and I hate how final all of it feels. I want to tell myself that there will be other chances, but everything beyond this moment is mired in the uncertainty of battle. So I sink hard into this kiss, my hand tangling in his hair, my head filling with just him, just this moment, just lips and tongue and teeth.