Evan didn't plan to waste time adjusting vectors and stopping in what he hoped would be a secure location. He quickly checked the star map, which displayed his heading and drew a line ahead of the sphere that marked the starship, showing his route. The symbols above the line changed continuously in a manner he took as velocity updates and destination ETAs, though he hadn't set a destination. The path ahead was clear on a scale he took to be light years at least. He would continue to let it flee and hope the Möbius ship couldn't catch up.

  He was out of the command chair before the acceleration fully stabilized, legs carrying him toward the lift with desperate urgency. His shoulder burned. His side ached. His entire body vibrated with the phantom violence still happening in Tennessee.

  Harris. He had to get back. Had to help.

  "A bold maneuver, Evan." The woman's voice pursued him across the bridge, emerging from the speakers with cold promise. "I applaud your effort, though it won't do you much good. We've been searching for the Ascendant for centuries. We can wait a little longer. Whether here in this galaxy or on Earth, we will find you. The Umbral Empire has resources you cannot imagine, patience you cannot outlast. You've only delayed the inevitable."

  Evan reached the lift platform, turning to face the bridge one final time. The viewport showed stars drifting past as the ship continued its flight, the Möbius ship already well beyond view.

  "Not if I find you first," Evan replied.

  4

  Evan boarded the lift before the woman on the Möbius ship could respond, the bridge disappearing above him as the familiar walls of the central shaft slid past. Almost there. Almost to the transfer chamber. Almost back to Earth. Back to Harris. Back to whatever crisis was unfolding in the Tennessee night.

  The pain hit him halfway down. Not the dull ache of impact. Not the sharp burn of a graze. This was something else entirely—a pressure that exploded through his chest like a grenade detonating behind his sternum, driving the air from his lungs and sending lightning through every nerve. His legs buckled. His back hit the curved wall of the shaft. His hands clutched at his chest as if he could physically hold himself together.

  His Earth body. Something had happened to his Earth body. Something catastrophic.

  The lift continued its descent, indifferent to his agony. The walls blurred. His vision tunneled to a single point of fading light.

  Harris, he thought. What happened?

  The platform reached Deck 2. The doors opened onto the curved corridor that led to the transfer chamber.

  Evan tried to stand.

  His legs wouldn't respond. He couldn't feel them at all.

  The pain in his chest deepened, spreading outward like cracks in ice. He'd never before felt such agony. It was as though the universe was trying to wrench the part of him back on Earth out of the body here with violent, undeniable force.

  He was dying. He was sure of it.

  He refused to give in. Not now. Not after he had made his escape. He crawled out of the lift, dragging his body with his arms. He didn't go to the transfer chamber. That wouldn't help. Instead, he dragged himself toward the medbay.

  The corridor stretched before him like a tunnel collapsing inward.

  Evan pulled himself forward, his fingers clawing at the smooth composite floor, using friction to gain purchase. His legs dragged behind him, dead weight, refusing every command screaming down his spine from his brain.

  The pain in his chest was a living thing now. It pulsed with each heartbeat, spreading tendrils of fire through his torso, his shoulders, his neck. He could feel something tearing inside him—not physically, not in any way that made anatomical sense, but real nonetheless. The quantum link between his bodies was fraying, the connection that bound his consciousness to this duplicate form stretching beyond its limits.

  The medbay door was ten feet away. It might as well have been ten miles.

  Evan dragged himself another foot. Another. His vision was narrowing, darkness creeping in from the edges like ink spilling across paper. The orange light bands along the corridor walls pulsed in slow rhythm, indifferent to his suffering.

  Five feet.

  His arms were shaking now, muscles burning with effort that shouldn't have been necessary. This body was healthy, strong, untouched by whatever violence was destroying him on Earth. But the link didn't care about physical condition. The link only knew that one half of the equation was failing, and it was dragging the other half down with it.

  Three feet.

  The door sensed his approach and began to open, the material softening and peeling back in those overlapping arcs he'd grown familiar with over weeks of exploration. The sharp ozone scent of the medical bay washed over him, cold and sterile and promising.

  Evan hauled himself over the threshold.

  The four pods rose from the floor in their precise arrangement, their surfaces dark and waiting. The nearest one was maybe six feet away. Six feet of agony. Six feet between him and whatever salvation the Maker technology could provide.

  He reached for the base of the pod and pulled.

  His body screamed in protest. The pain in his chest spiked, a white-hot lance that drove the breath from his lungs, leaving him gasping on the floor. For a terrible moment, his vision went completely black, and he felt himself slipping, the connection to Earth flickering like a candle in a gale.

  Not yet. Not yet.

  He pulled again.

  His fingers found the edge of the pod's opening, the shallow depression where a body was meant to rest. He got one arm over the rim, then the other, and with a final desperate heave, he dragged himself up and into the pod.

  The surface accepted him immediately.

  Orange light blazed to life, the grid pattern materializing above him in geometric precision. Symbols—medical readouts, diagnostic information, data he couldn't read and didn't need to understand—cascaded through the air between his body and the overhead display.

  The pod knew what was wrong. The pod would fix it.

  Heat washed through him. Not the gentle warmth of his previous healing sessions, but something fiercer, more urgent. It started in his chest, where the pain was the worst and radiated outward in waves that made his teeth clench and his hands curl into fists.

  He could feel the pod working on his injuries, even though he hadn't sustained any here. The Maker technology reached across the void between universes, finding the damage and weaving it back together with processes that human science wouldn't develop for millennia, if ever.

  The pain began to recede. First from his extremities, the fire in his arms and shoulders fading to warmth, then to nothing. Then from his core, the terrible tearing sensation in his chest smoothing over, healing, becoming whole. Finally from his legs, sensation returning in a rush of pins and needles that made him gasp.

  He could feel his toes again. Feel his thighs, his calves, the muscles responding as he sent commands down the newly restored pathways.

  The orange grid pulsed once, twice, then faded. The symbols above him dissolved into nothing. The pod had done its work.

  Evan lay there for a moment, breathing hard, staring at the ceiling of the medical bay. His body felt new, restored, every trace of the damage erased. And through the link, he could feel the same restoration echoing in his Earth body. Bones knitting. Tissue mending. The quantum entanglement carrying the healing across the void between universes.

  Both of them were whole again. But that didn't mean he was safe.

  He threw himself out of the pod and hit the floor running. The corridor blurred past him, white composite and orange bands streaking in his peripheral vision. The transfer chamber was just ahead, past the berthing compartments, through the curved passage he'd walked a hundred times before.

  The alcove in the wall waited for him, its surface already beginning to darken in anticipation of his arrival. Evan threw himself into the indent. The green grid materialized around him. The paralysis took hold. The universe contracted to a single point of light.

  He came back to the taste of copper and iron, thick on his tongue. Residue from injuries that no longer existed. His eyes opened to darkness and confusion. Shapes that made no sense. Angles that defied gravity. A world turned upside down.

  The truck was resting on its roof.

  Evan hung suspended by his seatbelt, the strap cutting into his waist and shoulder, his body weight dragging him toward a ceiling that had become a floor. Shattered glass covered every surface, glittering in the dim moonlight that filtered through the shattered windows. The effigy was still clutched in his hands, its white hull warm against his palms, his hands dark with dried blood.

  His blood. From before the pod had healed him.

  Harris!

  Evan turned his head, fighting the disorientation, and found his friend hanging beside him. Harris's eyes were closed, his face slack, a deep gash across his forehead painting half his features in crimson. Blood dripped steadily from the wound, falling upward from Evan's perspective, pooling on the truck's crumpled roof.

  "Harris." The word came out as a croak, barely audible. "Sarge!"

  No response. At least he was breathing. Evan could see the shallow rise and fall of his chest. Could hear the ragged wheeze of air moving through his lungs.

  Alive. For now.

  Evan remained inverted, letting the fog from his near-death experience clear. Judging by the truck's crushed hood, it appeared they'd crashed and rolled, coming to a stop in a grassy field. He smelled oily smoke, undoubtedly coming from the engine, and a ruptured line was hissing. Whatever was leaking fluid on the still-hot engine, he hoped it was nothing combustible.

  He heard something else.

  Footsteps.

  They were approaching from behind the truck, crunching on broken glass or taillights or something. No flashing lights. No sirens. No crackling radios or the heavy tread and voices of first responders.

  Evan's left hand tightened on the effigy. With his right, he slowly reached for the Glock holstered inside his waistband.

  The footsteps grew louder.

  Harris stirred.

  Evan watched his friend's eyes flutter open, confusion giving way to shock as he registered Evan hanging beside him. The surprise was naked on Harris's face. He hadn't expected to find Evan alive, never mind moving.

  That made two of them.

  Evan's fingers curled around the Glock's grip, and he eased the weapon free of its holster. Harris saw the movement, understood immediately, and went still.

  The footsteps reached the cab.

  A shadow fell across the shattered passenger window. A head appeared, silhouetted against the moonlight, leaning down to peer inside.

  Evan pulled the Glock and fired. The report was deafening in the confined space. The man's head snapped sideways, and he crumpled out of view without a sound. A second operator had stepped up to the driver's window.

  Evan was already tracking him with the Glock. As he pulled back, reacting to the gunshot, Evan fired twice. One round caught him in the thigh. He cried out, stumbling backward, his weapon discharging harmlessly into the air.

  Evan released the effigy, letting it fall onto the crumpled roof. His left hand found the seat belt release. The buckle popped, and he dropped, catching himself on the doorframe and scrambling through the passenger window.

  Dragging his wounded leg, the operator was circling the front of the truck. His weapon came up despite the pain. He had no other option, fight or die.

  Evan came around the hood just as the man cleared the opposite fender. Their eyes met for a fraction of a second. Then Evan put two rounds in him, one in his shoulder and one through his ribs. He didn't take the time to watch him fall. He pivoted, his finger resting on the trigger, ready for the next threat. He scanned the tree line, the road, the shadows behind him.

  Nothing moved.

  Clear.

  A sedan sat parked maybe a dozen yards behind the overturned truck, its headlights dark, doors hanging open where the operators had exited in a hurry. Their confidence had cost them. They'd expected to find bodies, not a fight.

  Evan circled back to the driver's side of the truck and crouched beside the window. Harris was still suspended by his seatbelt, his face tight with pain, blood still dripping from the gash on his forehead.

  "How bad?"

  "Arm's broken." Harris's voice was strained but steady. "Ankle too…maybe. Forehead's going to need stitches." He paused, studying Evan's face. "How the hell are you alive? I was sure you died in the crash."

  "Only half-dead." Evan reached in to help Harris with the seatbelt. "Maybe ninety-five percent. I made it to the medbay on the ship."

  "Lucky bastard."

  The buckle released, and Harris dropped with a grunt of pain. Evan caught him under the arms, pulling him out through the window. Getting him upright was harder. Harris couldn't put weight on his left ankle, and his right arm hung at an angle that made Evan wince just looking at it. "Lean on me."

  They made it three steps toward the sedan before they both heard it.

  Rotors. Distant but growing. The rhythmic thump of a helicopter approaching from the east.

  "Son of a bitch is coming back," Harris said.

  "Where's the M39?"

  "Still in the truck. I hope."

  Evan lowered Harris to the ground beside the sedan, propping him against the rear tire. "Stay down."

  He sprinted back to the overturned truck, dropping to his knees beside the passenger window. The cab was a mess of broken glass and scattered debris. His backpack had ended up wedged beneath the dashboard, the effigy lying where he'd dropped it on the crumpled roof. And there, pinned between the seats, the long barrel of the M39.

  Evan could see the helicopter's navigation lights through the trees, could hear the pitch of its rotors changing as it slowed to approach the crash site. He reached through the window, careful to avoid the few jagged shards of glass still stuck in the bottom runner, and grabbed the backpack. He shoved the effigy inside, and slung it over his shoulder. Then he reached for the rifle, working it free from the twisted metal that had trapped it. The M39 came loose, and he pulled it out of the cab just as the helicopter cleared the tree line.

  Evan ducked down on one knee, the rifle settling against his shoulder with familiar weight. The helicopter was maybe three hundred yards out, descending toward the road, a figure visible in the open side door.

  Machine-gun muzzle fire flashed. Rounds tore into the ground near the sedan, kicking up dirt and gravel. Harris flattened himself beside the tire, cursing.

  Evan sighted the helicopter through the scope. It was still two hundred yards away. Evan tracked past the gunner and up to the engine housing just behind the rotor mast and retaining nut.

  He fired.

  A plume of dark smoke erupted from the engine, streaming back along the fuselage. The aircraft wobbled, then the pilot banked hard, pulling away before whatever in the engine Evan had hit could cause a catastrophic crash.

  The navigation lights receded into the darkness.

  Evan lowered the rifle and ran back to Harris. "Can you walk?"

  "I can hop." He reached up and grabbed Evan's helping hand. Together, they covered the distance to the sedan's passenger side. Evan helped Harris into the seat, then circled to the driver's side. The keys were still in the ignition.

  He started the engine, threw it into gear, and pulled away from the wreckage. In the rear view mirror, the overturned truck, surrounded by bodies and broken glass, grew smaller.

  The helicopter was gone. The road ahead was dark and empty.

  For now.

  5

  The sedan's headlights cut through the darkness, illuminating empty asphalt that stretched ahead in gentle curves. Evan kept his speed moderate, fighting the urge to floor it. A car racing away from a crash site would draw attention. A car driving the speed limit was invisible.

  In the passenger seat, Harris had his head tilted back against the headrest, his breathing shallow but steady. The gash on his forehead had stopped bleeding, the blood drying in a dark mask across the right side of his face. His right arm rested awkwardly in his lap, the angle of the elbow wrong in a way that made Evan's stomach turn every time he glanced at it. In the dim glow from the dashboard, Harris's skin had taken on a waxy pallor, the shock settling deeper with each passing mile.

  "How long do you think it'll take them to clean up that mess?" Evan asked, breaking the silence. "Before the cops find it?"

  Harris didn't open his eyes. "Not long. These people are professionals, Marsh. They'll have a cleanup crew on site before the first 911 call goes through. Probably before anyone even thinks of making one." He paused, wincing as the car hit a rough patch of asphalt. "By morning, that stretch of road will look like nothing happened. No bodies. No bullet holes. No overturned truck. Just another quiet night in rural Tennessee."

  Evan thought about the bodies he'd left behind. The operators near the truck, crumpled where his rounds had dropped them.

  "I neutralized two of them," he said. "How many did you get?"

  "Counting the ones who came at us at the hiding spot and the car that went off the cliff, I think nine. Maybe more."

  "I'm impressed, Sarge."

  "I earned that marksmanship merit badge."

  "To think, all of them are about to be erased, scrubbed from existence like they'd never drawn breath."

  "If they ever existed at all."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean, if they're really from another galaxy, who's to say they ever had lives here. Maybe they're all living in compounds somewhere, groups of nobodies who only show up to chase after the effigy."

  Evan shuddered to consider it. "That's actually a terrifying thought. But also plausible. Though, Lars wasn't a nobody."

  "They can't all be."