Civilians clog the hallways. They dash around screaming, pointing out the window as enormous fireballs race toward them.
Sirens blare. Their shrill rings shake the marble pillars lining the extensive corridors. An authoritative male voice rises above the clamor and demands we seek shelter. He repeats the message every minute.
"Brace for impact. Brace for impact. Brace for impact," the recorded voice commands.
ARC10's debris charges their mountain home.
I push my way through the raging crowd. When they touch me, I shove them out of the way.
Over the tops of their heads, I spot Juno. She towers above them. They part for her, allowing her easy access to a new corridor of the ship I can't see. Surrounded by golden helmets and the tips of golden spears, her escorts guide her around a corner.
I follow.
We have impact.
I'm thrown sideways against a cold column.
People scream.
The first of the rogue fireballs and speeding chunks of broken ARC10 crash into Olympi's enormous side. The lights flicker. Sirens wail louder. Civilians scream as if they were directly struck by the fire themselves. But as seconds pass, we right ourselves and return to the thick panic from seconds before.
When I turn the corner Juno had ventured down, a line of soldiers barricades me. Dead in the eyes, completely vacant of any life, they stand sentry. She must have ordered them to do this—only under her complete control would anyone be able to become as lifeless and rigid as this.
I raise my pistol and attempt to blast them away, but it's as if they're a row of upright corpses. They don't react when I pull the trigger and discharge my electric current through their exposed skin. Their bodies have turned to stone. I can't move them. I can't move around them. When I try to climb their bodies, they forcefully shove me off. I can't see Juno anymore.
This will not be how I lose my son.
If I had Moon's strength, I could vault over them. If I had his bones, I could plow through them like a bulldozer. If I had any of the enhancements he boasts, this would be as simple as throwing my body into my obstacles. I see it now. I see why he never stopped adding to his catalog of bizarre super powers.
But look at what good it's done for him. His dead heart and his living skin have kept him suffering in his eternal hell despite having all the potential to become the greatest hero that ever lived.
I will never change my body. Not like that. Not for something as fleeting as strength.
Standing off against the wall of gold and flesh, I evaluate my next course of action. If I can't get through, I need to go around.
Pressing my fingers between my lips, I whistle loud enough to wake the dead. I hope this works.
Through the confusion and screams, the most welcomed sound in the universe tiks its way into existence. John, limping but still alive, reaches my side. He's battered, broken in many places, and shuddering as he moves, but he is here, looking exactly how I feel.
He doesn't even stop. When he passes, I grab onto his legs as he launches himself onto the wall and over the line of Guildeds' heads. When we land on the other side, the soldiers don't move. It's as if we were never there before them.
Together, we race on.
At the end of a darkened, empty hall, with garish strobes blinking shadows across Juno's hasty exit, I spot them. Hunched over an escape pod's initiation panel, she clicks in the code to activate the tiny ship.
There are hundreds of pods and panels—all go unused except this one. The wall of Guilded will be sure it stays that way until Juno has her chance to escape.
She's running away. This is nothing I ever expected Juno to do—not after the stories I heard, the tales of her inflicted torture and power, I never thought she'd run.
"Give him to me," I shout over the looping recording. I reach out again. "He's not yours."
"No," she says, curling in and covering him with her body. "Take the ship. It's yours. Take the gold. Take it all."
"I don't want to have to hurt you. Give him to me."
"No."
Another strike rocks the Olympi. It throws me off my feet and smacks me against the wall.
While I'm down, Juno drops and covers my son's body with hers. As quickly as she fell, she rises and completes the sequence on the lock pad. The door opens and shuts behind her, locking her out of my reach.
I scramble to the door and bang on the porthole as she shuts the airlock between us. Slowly turning to face me, in the way I've pictured hers since the moment I heard her speak on the HMS Valediction, she becomes the empress I know. She raises her chin, glares at me over her wide nose, and, with her gleaming eyes, dares me to challenge her victory. She is free.
With one arm cradled under the bundle, she holds my son to her breast. The blankets fall from around his head.
I see his face.
His green eyes.
His black hair.
His nose and the wide shape of his eyes that are so much mine. His perfect cheeks and perfect lips that remind me so much of Kai.
He's so beautiful. I clutch the shirt above my heart unable to grab the organ that's beating so fast and so hard, it might shatter all my ribs if I look at him any longer.
There he is. He's more incredible than any of my dreams could have conjured. He's so close. I could reach out—
The pod clicks, unlatching from Olympi.
"No!" I bang on the airlock porthole. I batter it with my fists screaming the word over and over and over as she spins around to buckle herself into the drop seats. The beep over my head marks the countdown.
Three.
Two.
One.
Gone.
They pop off the Olympi and speed into the galaxy with the debris of ARC10 whizzing by.
I watch them fly farther and farther away.
A presence looms over my shoulder.
Moon watches with me as they disappear.
"You let her escape," I scream, punching the door again. I kick it and rush to the one next to it. "Help me open one of these things. I'm going after them."
Again, we're blasted sideways as another piece of ARC10 strikes the Olympi. I gasp and gaze out the porthole.
Beyond the thick glass on the other end of the airlock, I glimpse the escape pod floating peacefully through the torrential field of fire and alloy bullets blazing by.
A large chunk of fiery metal speeds forward on a collision course with Juno's pod.
"It's going to hit them." I jab my finger at the large piece of debris speeding toward us like a meteor. "It's going to hit them. They're not going to stand a chance."
"Stand back." Moon opens the hatch and steps into the airlock.
"I'm going with you," I shove my way through the door.
"And what crevice of your ass did that brilliant plan emerge from, Lorn? You're going to be a great help when you're a floating corpse."
My gaze flits between him and the pod and the fireball headed straight toward it. I can trust him to save Juno. I can trust him to protect her who is protecting my son.
But if it came down to choosing, I can't trust him. He would pick her. He would always choose her. I need to trust that he'll bring her home. And she'll have my baby. I have to trust him.
Moon hones his heavy gaze on me, his shirt ripped, the gel crumbling around his heart's empty entombment is still open and unhealed. He never picked up his dead organ and stuffed it back in his chest.
Fuck.
"Go." I rush out and slam the door behind me, locking it and initiating depressurization.
I watch through the porthole as he opens the airlock and leaps into space after the ship.
What is he going to do? Carry the ship back? I realize far too late that his plan is just as asinine as mine.
To propel himself forward, he removes a glucker pistol from his waistband and shoots at the Olympi. The blast rockets him away. He flies through space toward the pod and its annihilator.
Who will make it to Juno and my son first? Moon or the flaming metal?
My gut knots as I wait the agonizing seconds for Moon to reach the pod. The projectile is faster, closer, catching up to the vessel with my baby in it.
They collide. Moon grabs the pod. He latches on and crouches on its top.
The debris strikes the pod on its side.
Beyond my own screams, I imagine the crunch of metal on metal as the pod is obliterated by the truck-sized shrapnel.
I unlock the door to throw myself out.
Arms grab me by the middle to hold me back. Kai's. They are so familiar and so unwanted. I thrash in his grasp and scream for him to let me go. Let me find him.
Nuna is there. She holds my face in her hands and forces me to look at her. "Janika. Breathe. Breathe, my love. Breathe. It will be okay."
I'll never get used to the feeling of losing my son again and again. I crumple. I don't care who is holding me. I don't care what body is supporting mine. I drop to the ground and drown in the pain.
In the explosion just outside the porthole, there is no way anyone could have survived that. Not even Moon.
He's gone.
This time, for good.
I gather myself together one more time to search the darkness for signs of life, but nothing remains.
Kai makes quite noises of comfort. "You did everything you could."
I shove him off and press my face up against the glass. I feel them behind me, watching me, saying things about me. I hear them make plans to lead the civilians to reinforced parts of the ship where the marble won't break off and kill any more people. I hear them talk about the dead Guilded who all dropped like someone had flicked a switch and all their souls were gone. None of it registers.
A glint winks through the black sky like an approaching star reaching toward me. I scramble to press up against it, cupping my hands around my eyes to minimize the glare from the corridor's lights.
It blinks again.
"There's something out there," I say.
No one says a word, but I can feel their stares at my back.
The light approaches. It could be another piece of ARC10's flaming remains, but it's moving in the wrong direction. Whatever it is is coming toward us.
After a few seconds, I can make out the very blurry shape of a black V below the yellow glint. A blue charge blasts behind it.
"It's Moon," I say. I don't know how to react to this discovery. My soul is so deadened by watching my son's ship be t-boned by ARC10's remains, I can't feel a thing. "He's coming this way."
"Oh, thank Christ." Teeno gasps as if the wind was knocked from him. "Thank God."
I track his progress through the flashing glint of fire against the gold in his eye socket. He's speeding quickly blasting his glucker behind him, again and again, to push himself toward the ship in zero-gravity. He holds something in his arms.
My son lies naked within one of the bubbles I would have used to cover my mouth to refresh my oxygen while surfing space. Joy erupts like a geyser.
"Make room," I say, shoving Kai out of the way.
When Moon crashes into the airlock door, he opens it quickly. I wait for the room to pressurize before swinging the door open and throwing myself at my son.
I touch the shell of the bubble around him, staring at the helpless being inside—his lips are parted and blue, his little chest hitches as he gasps for breath. He's nestled in a shallow pool of blood, his left arm mangled.
"He's losing blood." Moon brushes past me and the crowd gathered at the pod ejection site. "Stay here."
"No, I'm coming with."
"If you want to save his life, you'll stay here," he growls. "Trust me."
More blood spills onto the floor. Moon doesn't have blood—it must be from my child.
"Go." I shove him away. "Just go."
Before I can take one more look at him, Moon races off, descending a nearby staircase, and retreating into shadows.
I spin around, trying to find answers. "Where is he taking him?"
Nuna steps up and captures my hand in hers. She stares into my eyes as if searching for what's left of my strength. "He is taking him to Juno's surgeons."
Juno's surgeons.
The enhancements.
That's how Moon plans to save my child's life.
By doing exactly what took his away.