Devon shifted the goggles on his face and pressed his mouth cover closer. Even with the manmade atmosphere it was frigidly cold on Europa. He could feel it chilling through his gear, an oppressive sort of cold trying to find any hole or tear. Devon shivered and kept walking, trailing Seach across the thick ice. He glanced back at Zephyr once, admired the way the steel of the ship bit into the pale white terrain. The ice stretched for miles in every direction, making Zephyr the only thing of note to see.

It looked far more resolute than he felt.

Why had he insisted on going with Seach? He wasn’t a soldier. He had no skills with tactics or anything. Hell, he’d never been in a real fight before.

Neptune didn’t count, all he’d done was sit in that stupid chair and watch Seach get his face beaten in by that agent. Devon frowned and shifted his pack. He had no business being here and he knew it, but he couldn’t stomach being left behind. Seach might need something. Jorry might not be able to walk. Any number of contingencies ran through his mind and he took a deep, steadying breath.

They would need him in the end. He didn’t know how, but they would and he would not back down from this.

“You coming, fearless leader?” Seach shouted above the wind.

Devon turned, leaving Zephyr behind. He had a sinking feeling about leaving the ship, like something was going to go very wrong and he might never see it again. He shoved that thought firmly aside and concentrated on Seach. His father stood at a cube-like structure jutting up from the ice. It was the only structure for miles and Devon thought it looked quite underwhelming compared to Zephyr. He was suddenly overcome with a sense of vulnerability and shuddered.

If they were caught there was nothing beyond the gear on their backs to protect them.

He picked his way across the ice, curiously twisting to test his ALICE V and the armor Seach had insisted he wear. It was lightweight, pliable, bending with his every move. The only discomfort came from the small generator box at the base of his spine and that was more of a buzzing sensation than anything else. Devon reached the small building and glanced at Seach’s goggled, half-masked face.

If Seach was right then this building was an access to Europa’s atmospheric station, a manhole that led to the copper pipes running throughout the moon’s surface. It wasn’t as good as a half-molten core like Earth or Gliese but the harmonic pipes kept the oxygen in at least, and, as Seach had explained, they required a great deal of maintenance. Which meant tunnels; lots and lots of bisecting, crossing tunnels, one of which ran directly by the Consulate base.

“You don’t have to do this, Devon,” Seach said. “You can go back. I’ll go get her.”

Devon doubted Seach could see his glare through the goggles but he did it anyway. “No way,” he said. “I’m going with you.”

“You know she’ll kill me for this.”

“Yeah, but she has to be alive to do it.”

Devon stood his ground, reaffirming his own decision to be here. He wasn’t useless, after all.

Seach shook his head and smacked one of Jorry’s computer hacking devices onto the structure’s door. A green light flashed and the metal door slid upward with a hiss. They both hurried inside, crowding the smaller space as the door latched closed behind them. Seach moved to kneel beside a four foot wide circular manhole set into the ice and attached the hacking device to its control box.

Devon watched him, fighting off an increasing sense of ineptitude. Everything Seach did was measured, smooth and controlled. It was like watching a stranger or something.

“Leave your breather on,” Seach said without looking up. “It’ll act like a gas mask if we have to throw a canister.”

“Right,” Devon said, flexing his fists in his gloves.

So now they were going to gas people.

“All right,” Seach said, pulling the hacking device from the box. “Security is on loop. We’ve got forty minutes before shift rotation. You’ve got the med kit?”

Devon tapped his left cargo pocket and felt bulky edges press into his thigh. “Yes, sir.”

Seach nodded and turned to the hatchway door, staring at it for a long minute. “This is such a bad idea,” he said. Then he reached down, gripped the hatchway handle, and lifted the door.

Devon kept quiet. If he pushed his luck Seach might send him back to the ship to wait with the others. He knew his father well enough to see the indecision on his face and he could understand the debate. Devon had argued it with himself more than once since making this decision.

This was crazy and stupid and they were all likely going to die, but at least this way they would go down doing something. He swallowed hard, thinking of Peter and the video of his execution. Peter died doing something too. Devon couldn’t agree with it, couldn’t understand the mindset of dying for one’s faith, but he could respect the fact that his biological father had stood up for what he believed in.

“Dad,” Devon said and waited for Seach to look at him. “We can do this.”

“Sure we can, son,” Seach said, but there was an odd note of resignation in his voice.

Devon wasn’t certain if his father was resigned to the fact that he was coming along, or if he truly believed they were all going to be caught.

Seach shook his head and started down the ladder. Devon moved to follow, coaching his nerves to calm. They could do this. He could do this.

His boots slipped a little on the rungs but he descended quickly, ignoring the cocoon-like sensation that encompassed him as he hurried down. The tunnels ran twelve feet under the surface of the ice and he came to the bottom in short order. He stepped away from the ladder and turned into the long, Plexiglas tube housing.

Seven thick copper pipes ran parallel through the center of the space and all of them were buzzing. Pale light illuminated the space, stretching down the tube in either direction and for a second Devon wondered where it was coming from. There were no light fixtures he could see and for a moment he wondered if maybe it originated in the ice itself.

Seach signaled to him and Devon forced himself to focus. They turned, Seach leading the way as they made a quick clip through the tunnel. His boots felt unsteady on the Plexiglas floor but Devon managed not to fall. They made it to the first bisecting mark, a cross in the tunnels where perpendicular pipes ran past each other.

The pipes were louder here, likely because there were more of them, and Devon feared they wouldn’t hear if someone was approaching. But Seach checked all directions and then continued, picking up speed as they passed through a long length of tubing. Devon kept up, determined not to slow his father down, coaching himself that this was no different from spelunking on Pluto.

He lost track of how many junctures they passed, how many open lengths they sprinted through, and began to wonder if Seach had deliberately chosen an access tunnel half a world away from the base. His lungs screamed, his breath making loud puffs into his breather, and his legs felt wobbly from overuse.

The tunnel changed abruptly. One section was darker and Devon realized after a moment that he could barely make out the shape of a building through the ice. The Consulate base had a very big basement. There was supposedly an ocean under Europa’s ice, so the basement couldn’t go too deep. Or at least he hoped it didn’t go too deep.

Seach stopped before an access door cut vertically into the tunnel. Devon could see through the Plexiglas to the antechamber on the other side. Beyond the chamber stood another door, the one into the base itself, and Devon felt his heart pick up speed.

Would there be guards?

“Here we go,” Seach muttered and snapped the device to the door.

It took several seconds before the light above the door turned green and they heard the hiss of the seal breaking just before the door slid open. Devon let go of the breath he’d been holding, praising God for Jorry’s paranoia. He’d have to ask her how she’d programmed those little buggers.

Once they were out of this mess, his mind corrected as he stepped into the antechamber.

Seach repeated the process with the inner door, which seemed to take less time, and they were suddenly staring at a long, weirdly innocuous looking corridor. Devon wasn’t certain what he’d been expecting but the empty hallway wasn’t it.

Seach drew his weapon – a real weapon, not just a galvanizer – and slowly stepped into the corridor. Devon stood stunned for a moment, staring at the familiar way his father held the velocitor. The reality of their situation slammed into him full force. Velocitors were not like galvanizers, they relied on actual bullets to work and until this moment Devon had only ever thought of them as a hobby.

There were no slabs here like out in the desert.

A sick knot coiled in Devon’s belly.

People were going to get hurt today.

Seach kept close to the wall as he hurried to the end of the corridor and peeked around the corner. Devon followed automatically, his heart thundering in his ears. Steel walls boxed them in and halogens glared harsh light down at them. Any minute he expected to hear the blare of an alarm through the hallways but he hurried to Seach’s side, repeating the mantra in his head that this was for Jorry.

This was for his mother. They couldn’t leave her.

“There’s a room across the hall,” Seach whispered to him. “One person inside. Follow me. Shut the door when you get in.”

Devon nodded.

Seach holstered his velocitor, which relieved Devon to no end. The overhead lights dimmed for a moment and then Seach blurred in his vision, running for the room in question. Devon blinked, realizing in that moment that he had already slowed his father down. He launched himself forward, dashing across the hall and into a small room.

He saw Seach reach one very startled officer and then had to turn to close the door. Skidding, he waved his hand at the control box, ignoring the sound of meaty whacks and mannish grunts emanating from behind him. The door hissed closed, sealing them in, and Devon turned in time to see Seach lowering the unconscious man to the floor.

“Find something to secure him with and gag him. We don’t want him coming to before we’re out of here,” Seach said.

“Right,” Devon blinked twice, slowly understanding the order. “That makes sense.”

It did make sense and suddenly Devon felt more useful.

Seach stepped to the computer console in the south wall and pressed the hacking device to it. Devon forced himself not to worry about whether or not the device would work and searched the room for something to gag the officer with. But this was a standard monitoring station, meant to keep track of the pipes outside, and had very little for him to work with. He counted one chair, one table and the computer console as the only furnishings in the room.

Devon rubbed his head and frowned.

A gag, he thought, scanning the room again. The walls were mute gray, the exact shade of the corridor outside, and the halogens above only served to show how desolate the room was.

“Shouldn’t there at least be a trunk?” He muttered to himself.

He glanced at Seach, but his father either hadn’t heard or was ignoring him. Looking back to the floor, Devon spotted the laces on the man’s military boots and perked. He hurried to strip the boots off, praising the eccentricities of planet-dwellers. Travelers always had buckled mag-boots, a safety feature for working in space.

Devon grunted, pushing the heavier man onto his stomach so he could tie his wrists with the boot straps. His fingers discovered a belt hiding under the roll of the man’s belly and he smirked.

Well it wasn’t great but it would have to serve as a gag.

Seach cursed and smacked the console. “Devon! Jam the door lock. Company’s coming.”

Devon stopped, his hands on the man’s buckle. “Jam the door? How?”

Seach turned, drew his velocitor, and shot at the door controls. The muffled snap of the weapon made Devon’s ears ring and he jumped as the controls exploded. Devon stared at the sizzling mess of melted electronics where the door controls had been, feeling suddenly foolish. He was only armed with a galvanizer and an asp but he could have done something similar.

“Oh,” he said, and then went back to gagging their captive. “What happened?”

“Firewall’s too tight. They’ve found us.”

Devon fought back a wave of panic. He forced himself to wrap the belt around Pudgy’s head and thought carefully. The Consulate might know where they are but they weren’t caught yet. They still had time.

“Zoe, you’re patched in,” Seach said, frowning at the console.

Devon tightened the belt on the officer’s head and checked to make sure his nose was clear of the band. He felt breath brush against his fingertips and straightened, surveying his work. Pudgy’s hands and feet were tied, his wide girth splayed across the metal floor like a doughy parcel. The belt wrapped several times around his head, very black against his paler skin. It didn’t help that the man was balding either. He looked pitiful and Devon fought off the desire to release him.

For all Devon knew, this man had helped take Jorry down.

Renewed anger surged through him and held onto it, leaving the trussed-up officer to move to where Seach was crouched beside the eastern wall. A small hologram hovered over Seach’s left forearm, originating from the personal computer mounted to his gear.

Devon frowned, crouching beside his father.

The computer he was using was very different from any Devon had seen before. It had a protective housing that made a square in the underside of Seach’s forearm and a thick, milky screen that Devon suspected could act as a keyboard if needed. The hologram it projected flickered from time to time, a testament to its age or a glitch in the programming.

“What are you doing?” He asked, watching as the hologram displayed a three dimensional rendering of the structure behind the wall.

Seach pulled a laser pen from his cargo pocket and began to draw a large square in the wall. “You didn’t think we’d be running through the hallways in the open, did you?”

Something struck the door and they both paused. Several voices shouted on the other side but Devon couldn’t make out what they were saying. Fear slid down his spine and he glanced at the door seams, trying to calculate how much time they had.

Triple plated steel, he thought. Good and strong. They’d need a laser saw to get in.

“I’ve found her,” Zoe’s voice chimed through Devon’s earpiece and he breathed in relief.

He didn’t want to be in this room when that door went down.

“Have Zephyr send the location to my personal computer,” Seach said.

“Got it.”

His father suddenly stood and Devon followed, glancing between Seach and the weird square he’d drawn. Metal crashed against the door and Devon swore he could feel the whole room shake in response.

“Someone’s getting impatient,” he said.

Seach grunted something like agreement and then took a step back. The halogen light above them sputtered out for a moment and then Seach thrust his leg forward, kicking the center of the square he’d drawn. Devon jumped in surprise, covering his ears too late as the bending of steel rent through the room. The wall caved inward, breaking loose from the perimeter Seach had made and a man-sized hole gaped open at them.

Devon stared. “That’s no normal laser pen, is it?”

Seach snorted a laugh and took a small flashlight from the left shoulder of his gear. He flicked the light on and pointed it into the hole, showing Devon the ventilation shaft that stretched deep into the wall. It opened into a juncture that led in four directions and was large enough for a man to crawl through.

“Why is that here?” Devon asked.

“This is one of the first military bases ever built in space. You can renovate all you want, but the basic structure is still the same,” Seach said. “This is part of the original structure.”

“Alright, but how did you know to look for it?”

Seach looked up at him and grinned. “I was stationed here years ago. Back when I was just a new recruit. I used these shafts back then to get off base during a lockdown.”

Seach gave him a nefarious wink and turned back to the air duct. Devon snorted a laugh, almost afraid to ask what his father might have been doing when he escaped “lockdown.” Another crash against the door stole his attention and Devon grimaced.

Fear lodged somewhere in his chest but he managed to ignore it, shoving it out of his mind as he prepared for the next move.

“She’s one level down and about four hallways over,” Seach said, reviewing his computer again.

The little hologram hovering over his forearm turned, giving them an overlay of the ventilation shafts. Devon saw the red blinking light that signified his mother’s room and took a deep breath.

Hold on Mom, we’re coming.

~*~*~

Jorry slumped against the table. She had to fight to breathe, let alone keep her eyes open. Her taps burnt inch-wide circles into her skin and seared into her bones. Her head felt heavy and light all at once and she prayed she might pass out soon. They would wake her up again but for one second she could be blessedly unaware of the pain.

“Where is the Zephyr?” Movax asked. He sounded bored, which annoyed her enough to rally past her own misery.

“I don’t know …” she said. Her mouth was so dry it was hard to form the words. “Space is an … awful big parking lot. I can’t quite remember the aisle.”

Movax chuckled and shook his head. “You don’t disappoint, Johanna. You are every bit as mule-headed as your records describe.”

“Happy to oblige.” Exhausted, she closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids was the throb of her body, a white pulse in time with her heartbeat. She wanted to sleep so badly she almost felt her body sink into the metal table.

“But you really ought to tell me. I’m trying to save you.”

She snorted an unladylike laugh and forced her eyes open again. “Save me from what?”

Movax gave her a predatory smile, his slightly crooked teeth glinting in the harsh light. Jorry squinted at him. Something in that smile set her on edge – as if she hadn’t been already – and made her shiver. He was enjoying this far too much.

“From Pick-Axe,” he said at last and Jorry tried hard to hide her distress.

She thought of Pluto station and the poor quivering man Pick-Axe had escorted from the bar.

“Don’t make me take another,” he’d said as the man fled.

“So now you’re going to start … taking appendages, huh?” Jorry asked, trying to find her bravado again.

Her right hand was already mutilated and they were keeping her so overloaded that her taps couldn’t fix it. A small, detached part of her wondered if her taps could fix a severed finger. She didn’t think so. Whenever she cut her hair it grew back like normal.

No, if they took her fingers they’d be gone forever. There were just some things that couldn’t be fixed.

“Well I’m going to take something,” Pick-Axe said from behind her.

Jorry ground her teeth and concentrated on anger. Anger was more productive than fear, it wouldn’t leave her sniveling on the floor for mercy. She eyed Pick-Axe as he walked nonchalantly into view, cleaning his fingernail with the point of a long, wickedly curved knife.

“Charming,” she said, looking to Movax again. She could see Relo still stationed just behind him and took a deep breath. “I can save us both some time, Movax, and tell you how all of this is going to end.”

“You’re clairvoyant now, Johanna?”

Jorry felt her eye twitch. She was getting really tired of him calling her that. Nobody had used her full name since her parents had died.

“Deductive reasoning,” she said, grimacing at the weakness in her own voice. She wanted to sound stronger than this. “It’s really not hard to see where this is going.”

“Enlighten me, then.”

“All right,” she closed her eyes, blocking Relo from her view again. It hurt so bad to look at him she thought she might wither up and die. And considering the wretched state of her body that actually sounded like a good plan; just wither up and die right there, right on the table. But she didn’t, so she opened her eyes and forced herself to speak instead. “You’re about to leave me to Pick-Axe … who is going to cut into me and I’m going to lose a lot of blood. I can’t say I like this plan of attack because … well, who likes being cut into? But in the end it’s going to be pointless. I still won’t talk and you know it. There is more at stake for me here than my life. So the interrogation ends when Pick-Axe inevitably bleeds me to death and you’re left with nothing.”

There, she thought, a speech worthy of Seach Barlow. Seach always had that snarky, disinterested tone to his voice when dealing with situations like this. Her heart ached at the thought of him and she had to concentrate to push him from her mind.

Movax closed his hand around her broken fingers and squeezed tight, shocking her into an agonized shout. Renewed pain spiked through her hand as he leaned intimately close. His breath tickled her skin and she felt the brush of his nose against her earlobe.

“Everyone breaks,” Movax whispered to her. “Even you, Johanna Rorry.”

“B-better men have tried,” she managed to say.

It was a lie of course. Nobody had ever tortured her before, not even in training, but delirium was making her careless.

“Come on, Johanna. You can’t really want me to leave you with him.” He pulled back just enough to meet her eyes. “Tell me what I need to know.”

“I’ve told you what you need to know,” she said, pooling her energy again. They hadn’t shocked her in a while. If she could distract them long enough she might be able to break free of the table. “Zephyr can jump without a jumper. Your payday is cruising away as we speak.”

“You’re lying.”

“Am I?”

She held his gaze for a moment, willing herself not to pass out. She could see in his eyes that he was close to believing her, could see the flicker of doubt, and smirked. Pick-Axe and Relo flanked him, each in her peripheral view but she kept her focus on Movax. The nearby monitor beeped and Jorry willed her taps into functioning, snagging the closest energy source she could find – the galvanizer at Relo’s belt – and reallocated.

Jorry strained against the binding on her left wrist, snapping it with little effort before grabbing Movax by the throat. She squeezed hard, dug her fingers deep into his skin, and felt muscles shifting in his neck as he tried to breathe. Movax clawed at her fingers, his eyes wide with terror as she tightened her grip.

She knew she didn’t have the energy for a proper escape but she could damn well kill him.

If the table zapped her it would only force her fingers tighter and Alexander Movax would choke to death while his little thug watched.

Something blunt struck the side of her face and for a black moment she nearly lost consciousness. Her fingers slipped from Movax’s neck and she dangled from her restraints. Dazed, she blinked at the room, saw Relo strapping her hand down again and grimaced. Pick-Axe held Movax up, who was wheezing and coughing so she knew he wasn’t dead.

“Damn,” she muttered. “Shoulda just snapped your neck.”

Movax glared at her, staggering a bit as Pick-Axe led him from the room. The fury on his face made her smile and for a blissful moment Jorry forgot what was coming. She closed her eyes, pooling her resources again. She had a new tender spot below her right eye, she could feel it puffing to angry life and wondered who had hit her.

Not Relo, surely. Relo could have hit much harder. It must have been Pick-Axe coming to rescue his boss.

She heard a door close somewhere behind her and Pick-Axe’s voice came again. “You shouldn’t have done that, love.”

“No, of course not,” she said, keeping her eyes closed. “I should have just laid here and accepted the fact that you’re going to start lobbing off my fingers.”

The table flared to life, pulsing white-hot energy through her taps. Her back bowed, arching off the table involuntarily as she scrambled to reallocate. Some distant part of her knew that this voltage was several times more intense than any of the others, and she had a momentary thought that she was about to die.

She could sense it, could feel the pressure building in her body, the overload cascading through her until she was almost certain she would explode.

The table shut off and she lolled in the straps. Unconsciousness teased at her, blackness throbbing at the edges of her vision, and for a disjointed moment she lost track of the room. She heard movement around her, sensed when someone had stepped in close but the room was swimming, blurred, and she couldn’t make out who it was. She felt heavy, terribly heavy, like her bones had been replaced by rods of iron.

Her left hand was turned over, palm up, and cold steel bit into the skin around her tap. Awareness snapped back to her. Pick-Axe had a firm grip on her left hand and a pair of pliers pressed to the tap. She tried to jerk away, instantly knowing what he meant to do but his free elbow cracked into her jaw, sending dizzy sparks through her vision.

“St-stop!” She said but it was too late.

Pick-Axe turned the pliers, muscling her tap into movement. She felt her bone crack, felt the hooked end of the tap loosen as her bone shattered. Agony washed through her as each individual tap echoed the sensation. She gasped and writhed, desperate to get away and completely incapable of doing so. Pick-Axe kept twisting, his teeth clenched hard together in concentration. Jorry felt each tap flicker out, felt the energy in the room slip away from her, and choked on a sob.

Two shots hissed through the room, barely audible above Jorry’s own voice cursing Pick-Axe. She didn’t know what she was saying, she just kept swearing at him, trying to find control of her body again, trying to find her taps. Pick-Axe grunted and the twisting stopped, his pliers clattering to the floor a heartbeat later.

Confused, Jorry met his pale, shocked expression and realized what she had heard; shots.

Behind Pick-Axe the room surged to life. Relo darted for the back corner and was met by somebody. She couldn’t see because Pick-Axe was still standing, blocking her view, but she could hear the meaty smack of fists and knew there was a fight going on.

She held Pick-Axe’s gaze, saw his pale eyes glaze over just before he coughed, blood spewing out onto his dark shirt. He staggered to the left, gripped her shoulder in a clammy hand as though to try and stay upright, and finally collapsed out of view. She heard him hit the ground and breathed in mingled fear and relief.

In the far corner she saw Seach duck a punch from Relo and lost her breath again.

He’d come to rescue her. The stubborn, arrogant man had actually come.

Did that mean Devon was safe?

She saw another figure slink away from the far corner and her heart stuttered. The lights flickered in the room as both Seach and Relo drew on their taps, but she would recognize that boy anywhere; Devon.

She watched him hurry away from the fight and step over Pick-Axe’s body as he reached the table. He fumbled with the belts holding her down, quickly releasing her from the table and Jorry just stared, horrified and speechless.

“It’s OK, Mom. We’re here.”

As if that was a good thing, she thought but managed to hold her tongue.

The straps loosened and she fell forward, unable to catch herself. Devon ducked under her shoulder, taking her weight as he dragged her off the table. She made a small, tormented noise and flinched, her body flaring to life. Despair lodged in her chest as they stumbled away from the torture scene.

Seach and Relo were still fighting but they had moved to the consoles. Devon half-carried her to an open air duct on the far side of the room and helped her down. Jorry cringed as her body protested the movement. She felt the cold throbbing through the floor, heard the clink of her taps against the steel wall, but they were a distant part of her now, something unreachable.

She opened her left palm and stared at the loosened tap. Blood ringed the silver disc and she could see where the pliers had bent the metal. Jorry swallowed and closed her eyes, leaning weakly against the wall.

“Devon,” she said, listening to him rummage with his pack just beside her. “Devon, you should have left me. You were supposed to get away.”

When he didn’t answer she opened her eyes to look at him. He yanked a med kit from his pocket and met her gaze. He looked like every terrified recruit she’d ever led into battle; young and foolishly courageous. Then he smiled and all she could see was Devon – sharp, intelligent Devon.

“There will never be a day,” he said. Then he opened the med kit, grabbed a syringe and stabbed her in the arm.

In her exhaustion it took a moment for his words to register. Pride and terror battled in her; pride for the choice he’d made and terror at the fact that she couldn’t protect him.

“Mule-headed, stubborn boy,” she said.

Her heart picked up speed and she realized what he must have given her. She glanced at the syringe as he threw it back in his pack. Her head swam, the room blurring in her vision and she wondered if the boy had just accidentally killed her.

That much adrenaline in a non-tapped body could be lethal.

“Yep. Looks like you raised me right.” He nodded over at where Relo was strangling Seach. “Think you can save Dad now?”

Jorry had to blink several times for the image to clear. She refused to let Devon know what was wrong. If they were going to die here he would not have that on his conscious. She pressed her thumb against the loose tap, growling at the sudden burn that licked through her palm and wrist, and started to move.

There was no response from her taps, no sense of energy in the room, but Jorry staggered to her feet anyway. She’d been a soldier first and Tapped second, she reminded herself. She was just going to have to do this the old fashion way.

Seach had lost his weapon and was pinned up against a sparking, broken console at an awkward angle. Relo had one hand on Seach’s throat and the other holding down his right hand. Several wires hung from the ceiling, torn away from their various ports during the fight and she didn’t have to feel energy to know at least three of them were still live with electricity.

Relo’s abnormal blue tap glowed at the base of his neck. She focused on it and scowled, disliking her plan but at a loss for what else to do.

Her bare feet crunched through bits of shattered console and she hissed. The sound caught Relo’s attention and he turned, still holding Seach down with one hand. She froze, heart hammering painfully in her chest.

She could let him kill her, she thought. Then Devon would never know.

Relo wrestled with Seach, his face contorted in effort as he located the galvanizer at his belt, struggling to free his arm from Seach’s grasp. Jorry watched, swaying unsteadily on her feet as Relo slammed his elbow into Seach’s face and leveled the weapon at her. He slid out of focus twice and for a fuzzy moment Jorry tried to remember what was important about that galvanizer.

“Move!” Seach yelled just as Relo pulled the trigger.

The galvanizer fizzled, the barest spark of light simmering on its pronged points and she remembered.

She’d drained its power to choke Movax.

If a Grey Man were capable of being startled this might have bought them more time, but Relo simply turned and swung the butt of the weapon at Seach’s head. She heard Seach grunt, saw his body jerk under the blow, and lurched forward. Relo lifted the weapon again, arching it for a precise strike against Seach’s jaw.

Jorry half-leapt and half-fell on him, grabbing Relo’s arm and letting her weight redirect the hit. Relo dropped the galvanizer and wrested his arm from her grip. She felt his uniformed sleeve slip through her fingers and then his hand fisted in her shirt, lifting her off her feet. An instant later she was airborne, soaring across the room and straight into the table. Sparks burst into her vision, pain blooming through her broken hand as she crashed to the ground.

Panting, she shook her head and focused on the fight again, squinting up at where Relo and Seach were still locked together. Seach shouted something unintelligible and flipped toward his left, yanking Relo with him. The two men hit the ground, furiously striking at each other, both trying to get control of the situation.

Jorry glanced up at the wires again. She grunted in effort, straining to get back to her feet. She had to grip the table to steady herself and willed the room to stop spinning. Her eyes caught on the fight again. Relo had Seach pinned and was doing his best to rip Seach’s arm off. Jorry scowled and stepped forward, grabbing the closest live wire she could find.

Relo’s back was turned to her, his tap shining blue up at her. She hurried forward and pressed the exposed bit of wire directly against it. He jerked, his spine arching under sudden strain, and she heard Seach pull in a ragged breath.

Something flashed under the wire. Jorry flinched as a sizzling pop resounded through the room. She wasn’t certain how much electricity was pumping through it, but she imagined it was enough. The smell of burning meat curled through the air and Jorry fought back her revulsion. Relo’s body tautened and twitched, his back bowed at an awkward angle until she finally pulled the wire away. He collapsed, his larger frame buckling to the ground with a meaty thud.

Jorry stared at him for a moment, still holding the wire and too frightened to check if he was dead. His tap no longer glowed blue; it was a charred, melted bit of plastic smoking against his nape. Seach knelt next to Relo and checked for a pulse. Jorry released the wire, letting it hang from the ceiling beside her.

“He’s alive,” Seach rasped.

“Blast,” Devon said. “What does it take to kill that man?”

“We’re not killing him,” Jorry said, glancing sharply at Devon.

“Mom, he’s going to come after us.”

“No, he won’t,” she said and met Seach’s eyes.

He understood. She knew he understood. Johnny had sacrificed everything for them thirty years ago, they couldn’t leave him here now.

“We’ve got secure bindings on Zephyr,” Seach said. “Let’s just hope he doesn’t wake up before we get there.”

“We’re bringing him with us?” Devon asked, shocked.

“Chances are I just took out the inhibitor holding him as a Grey Man,” Jorry said, closing her eyes because the room was suddenly too bright. “I might also have fried his brain beyond repair. Either way he shouldn’t be a threat.”

Why hadn’t her heart exploded yet? It should have done something by now.

“If he’s so safe, why are we binding him?” Devon asked.

“Because I could be wrong and I’d rather not have a Grey Man loose on board while we make our escape.” Jorry said quietly, lifting her palm to frown at the offending tap again.

Devon shook his head in exasperation and moved to the consoles. “Unbelievable,” he said and then crouched down to start opening panels.

“She’s right,” Seach said, finishing with Relo’s bindings. “We can’t leave him and we can’t kill him.”

“Whatever,” Devon said as he ducked half inside the console’s underbelly. “I can’t wait for the ‘I told you so’ on this moment.”

Seach stood and moved to her side. Jorry barely glanced at him. All of her concentration focused on that one blasted tap and the fact that she hadn’t keeled over from a heart attack yet.

“Why hasn’t your hand healed?” Seach asked, his voice soft with concern.

She looked up and met his gaze. His mouth tugged down into a deep frown and for a second she wanted to smooth the furrow of his brow with her fingers. But most of her fingers were broken and she knew she had to tell him the truth.

“I can’t feel my taps,” she said, her voice hushed to a pained whisper.

His amber eyes widened in shock. “What?”

“I can’t …” she said again and swallowed back her own mounting fear. “I can’t feel my taps.”

Seach glanced down at the pliers on the floor and then back up at her. She watched the emotions run across his face; shock, anger, pain, and then he stepped closer. His hand cupped her cheek and she forgot about the ache in her body, forgot that by all rights she should be dead on the floor, and leaned into him.

“It’ll be alright,” he said and she could hear the resolve in his voice. “We’ll figure it out.”

“Figure out what?” Devon asked as he pulled out of the console. In his hand was a long length of plasma tubing and Jorry almost smiled.

Something struck the door and they all turned to look.

“It’s alright, I jammed it,” Devon said.

Another crash against the door and Seach’s hand moved to the small of her back. “All the same, I think it’s time to go.”