a grateful look and turns for the back of the ship. I don’t have time to fit any of the little tools or machinery into their snug foam beds, so I just sweep everything into the bag.
“Ten seconds!” Ty yells from somewhere down the back.
“Portables and valuables,” Scarlett shouts in reply. “Travel light!”
I lift the bag with shaking hands, glancing around the cabin in search of anything else I should grab.
Kal and I spent the last few hours sitting in the back as he tried to teach me some Syldrathi exercises he hoped would help me focus my mind. The wild power I briefly controlled on Octavia III is still lurking inside me—I can feel it there, swirling and rolling behind my ribs—but my command of it is shaky at best. If I open the valve that’s keeping it cooped up in there, I have no idea what will come out, but I know it won’t be pretty. Kal’s hope is that with training, with discipline, I can control how I use it.
But as I tried to envision a slowly flickering purple flame, pushing away reality to focus on my sa-mēi—a Syldrathi concept I still don’t understand—it was hard not to peek from beneath my lashes and stare at him instead. Kal gets this little frown when he’s concentrating, and that I could happily push away reality and focus on just fine. But I think he might consider that an undignified version of training.
I spend my final five seconds grabbing the ration packs scattered across the table and shoving them in on top of Fin’s tools, slinging the bag over my shoulder as the others come piling out from the back.
“Let’s go,” Tyler snaps. “Kal, you’re on point. We have two armored hoverskiffs incoming, maybe thirty seconds away. Let’s be gone before they arrive.”
“Yessir,” Kal says simply, glancing across to check my position, then leading the way down the ramp. Tyler’s straight behind him and I’m next, which means I run smack into our Alpha’s back when he pulls up short.
“Hey, watch—”
I lean sideways to see around him, and realize he’s stopped because Kal stopped. And Kal stopped because …
“I think,” our Tank says quietly, “your estimate of thirty seconds was incorrect.”
The three of us are sitting ducks on the Longbow’s loading ramp, which is bad news, because we’re not alone. Two huge floating flatbed trucks have pulled up in front of our ship, lights flashing an urgent blue. And huge, terrifying robot trooper things that look like upright metal cockroaches are jumping down from them, knees bending backward to take the impact as they hit the ground. They’re armed with guns the size of my torso, their polished armor reflecting the strobing lights.
“ATTENTION, SUSPECTS,” one blares, though I don’t see its mouth move. “YOU ARE BEING DETAINED FOR QUESTIONING. RESISTANCE WILL BE MET WITH FORCE. RAISE YOUR HANDS TO INDICATE COMPLIANCE.”
For a long moment, everything’s quiet. Even the roar of the city around us subsides, and as if I’m underwater, all I can see is the flashing blue light dancing against the armor on the cockroach robot soldiers. Kal adjusts his weight ever so slightly, using his body to shield mine. I feel a tingling on the back of my neck, adrenaline thumping in my veins. I feel the world … shift, and without warning, my mind is aswirl with images.
Another vision.
It’s as if I can see the next few instants play out inside my head, like I’m watching on a vidscreen. I can see the pathways we could follow, each branching away in front of me, clear as glass.
I see them putting us in cuffs, loading us up onto one of those flatbeds, snapping the restraints onto the long bar down the middle to secure us. I see Zila’s hands twisted up behind her back, Ty’s jaw squared in defeat and frustration.
Or, down another path, I see Kal start forward and Ty dive to the side, and I see me standing paralyzed by indecision as the troopers open up, their fire slicing through our bodies.
Or I see …
“Be’shmai,” says Kal softly.
“Yes,” I say quietly, pausing for a long, slow breath. I feel my lungs expand, feel my ribs swell with the pressure inside, the thing I’ve awoken roiling and ready, wanting and demanding to be free. I lift my voice a little so all of Squad 312 will hear me. “Everyone, hit the deck in three …”
I hear a query from behind me, the roaring already rising in