Tense as hell, I leaned against the wall where Jax had propped me for balance and prayed I wouldn’t fall over as the cargo hold began to rattle and shift. Between not being able to steer this thing myself or stand up on my own, my breathing turned tight and shallow, the stale and stinking air leaving a bitter coating on my tongue. The sour bite of people sweating hope and terror from their pores swelled inside the cargo hold. The same mixture rose in me. No Tess. A body I couldn’t use. Bridgebane my puppeteer again. No clue as to the outcome of this. I grimaced, clenching my teeth.
After the initial jolt of Jax setting us into motion, the cargo unit steadied as we floated through space on a trajectory toward the Stench. Merrick would wait for Tess. There was no question. The nervous silence broke when a man pushed his way forward through the crowd and moved toward us, his eyes on Frank. The blond captain sat slumped against the wall beside me, holding his side, his features stiff with pain. The black uniform made the rest of him look as white as a pristine, snow-capped peak.
“I’m a doctor.” The man took in Frank’s pale face, tense jaw, and blood-soaked fingers with a worried frown. “Can I help?”
Frank glanced up at him and then lifted his hand from his side, giving unspoken permission for the man to take a look.
As the doctor crouched by Frank and began lifting his shirt, Tess spoke again. “I’m at the Lower Y cargo door,” she panted. “Opening it now.”
Come on, baby. My lips moved, hardly making a sound. It was torture not having a visual on her, not being able to help. My heart pounded like it wanted to punch through my chest and burst right out. You’ll get through this, starshine. You’ve made it through worse.
Silence. Silence. Gunshot!
I jolted off the wall, nearly pitching over. “Tess?”
“They’re here! Just above me. Come on, come on!”
“Stop! We’ve got you now, rebel!” Gunshots cracked over the com, riddling my nerves with bullet holes.
“Tess? Baby!”
No answer, and my chest started to collapse in on itself. Powers. No. Fuck!
“Tess!” I bellowed, swiveling frantically to look at Jax.
Jax might’ve howled louder, covering whatever sounds came from the crews on our ships. He whipped toward me, a crazed gleam spreading through his eyes at the speed of light.
“I’m in!” Tess cried. Another shot went off. She hissed. “Son of a bitch!”
Fear choked me. “What is it?”
Gabe echoed me from the Endeavor when he really needed to shut the fuck up.
“Daraja?” Mwende said.
More gunshots roared over the coms, so loud I knew they were point-blank. My world spiraled out of control. No one survived that.
“I’m in the air lock,” Tess panted out. “Just blew the station-side control panel.”
“Thank the Powers.” My leg gave out, and I slid down the wall, landing next to Frank.
The doctor threw me an anxious glance. “Is she all right?”
I nodded.
“Are you?” he asked.
“Stun blasts.” I flopped my hands and one foot. “Still recovering.”
He nodded and went back to examining Frank. It occurred to me that he might not have been asking about my physical state.
Caeryssa caught my eye and gave me a reassuring nod with her sharp chin. Things are moving along just fine, she seemed to say.
I blew out a breath. A day in the life of a Nightchaser. I might go gray before my time, but at least I’d go gray with Tess.
She updated us on her progress. “I’m opening the second lock. It’s a fancy one again.” Her only way out of here now was in that cargo hold. “Someone shot me in the ass,” she added, outrage firing up her voice.
“The ass?” I croaked. “Can you walk?”
“Yeah. It hurts like crazy, but I can walk. Or limp,” she said.
“Holy shit, Tess. What can I do?” Gabe over the com, sounding panicked.
What can you do? Zip it and man the damn air lock.
“It’s fine,” Tess ground out, her growing impatience either due to the slow override of the sophisticated lock or to Gabe’s stupid question when she had other things to worry about. “Surral will help.”
My jaw flexed. That was Tess’s solution to everything—Surral will fix it. Well, Surral wasn’t here. What happened if Tess couldn’t get to Starway 8 before she bled to death?
“Can you fly that hold?” I asked. After she broke the vacuum seal, maybe someone already inside it could pilot the box.
“I can do it.” She didn’t elaborate, and I waited for the lock to beep over the com. It finally did. The door whooshed open, and her breath hitched. “It’s the same. A hundred people, at least.”
The door swooshed again as Tess sealed herself inside with the human cargo. “Ignore the uniform,” she told the people in the cargo attachment. “I’m here to help. I’m breaking you out of this place.”
Soft murmuring and cries of relief came through to us. A shiver rippled over my half-numb body, the discernible reaction of the people trapped in that place painting a sudden wash of goose bumps across my flesh. My blood pumped harder, making me giddy and sick and fearful and alive all at once.
“Lock door and…detach,” Tess muttered to herself. “I’m loose, Merrick. Pick me up as soon as I’m far enough out.”
“Put pressure on the wound,” Merrick answered back.
“I am.” She sounded distracted, already on to her next task. “I’ve got a joystick in one hand and my ass in the other. That sounds like fun, but it really isn’t.”
Frank snorted and then winced, earning himself a frown from the doctor for jostling himself.
“Grazed rib. No organ damage that I can see.” The man gently probed Frank’s injury with one hand, keeping the blood-soaked uniform out of the way with the other.
“Stitches?” Caeryssa asked.
He nodded. “Several.”
Great. Another patient for Surral—if we could get to her.
“Or this.” The doc pulled something from his back pocket that made my jaw drop.
A medical laser. It would heal Frank in mere minutes. And Tess, too—as long as we could get the bullet out.
The doctor’s smile was a little sad and lopsided. “I never leave home without it. I learned my lesson the day my wife died and I couldn’t do a damn thing about it.”
“Holy shit, I could kiss you right now,” Frank said.