“It wasn’t my idea,” I said.

  “Still super cool,” Meg insisted. “I’m inserting the datastream now. Since you’ve already got the hypernet open on the console you should see the change.”

  I turned my attention to the center console, noting that the countdown timer had reached twelve minutes. I was already worried about Matt and the others, how long they could survive out there and whether or not they would last long enough for us to rescue them. Knowing the game was about to begin only served to wreck my nerves even more.

  The screen changed as the new input reached it, revealing the screen of one of the active terminals. It currently displayed a static image of Sprite and the opening dialogue entered into the system for her to speak.

  “Now what?” I asked.

  “The location has to be entered into the surveillance system to link up with the remote feed,” Meg said. “Open the video package and look for the settings.”

  My eyes danced across the screen until I spotted an app called WATCHER minimized on the GUI. “Got it,” I said, leaning forward to tap the icon.

  “I should mention, this is a mirror of an active terminal. They’ll be able to see whatever you do.”

  My finger froze over the icon. There was no way we could get the location without alerting the studio to it, which would most likely mean alerting Sedaya too.

  So be it.

  I opened WATCHER, quickly finding the menu and entering settings. The cursor moved immediately after I did, the engineer on the other side trying to seize control. I kept tapping randomly on the screen to move the cursor, fighting to keep the settings screen open while I located the feed coordinates. Tapping through the settings, I could imagine the nerds around the table blaming each other for what they would initially consider a prank.

  It took longer than it probably should have to get to the right screen, and even then it was only visible for an instant before the engineer on the other end finally won over and closed it. Fortunately, Head Case’s datastore saved all of the incoming data.

  The engineer might have closed WATCHER then, except his battle against me for control of the program had left him on the display screen for the incoming feeds. With the audio stream active, we both heard the inhuman scream that arose from one of the feeds. I think we both reacted the same way, leaning forward to scan each visible camera view for the source.

  A second scream followed the first, a hissing wail that sent chills down my spine. A third joined it and then too many more to count.

  CHAPTER 9

  “What the hell is all that screaming?” Justus asked.

  My gaze continued over the thirty small feeds, searching. The engineer found it first, expanding one of the drone views as a dark shape loomed over the camera. Small eyes behind a hardened demonic snout and a mouth heavy with yellow teeth. A long, dark, jagged humanoid body with spindly arms terminating in large, sharp claws already stretching out toward the drone. Struck by the creature, the camera tumbled away, rolling end over end, its signal going out completely.

  I stared at the suddenly blank screen, heart pounding, immediately terrified for my engineers. “Meg, Leo, get back on board, asap. We need to go. Now!”

  “Copy that, Captain,” Meg said. “On our way.”

  I stared at the center console as the user closed the enlarged view from the dead camera. The cursor shook as it moved, the user clearly rattled as the hissing screams continued.

  “What’s going on out there?” Druck’s voice pierced the silence. “What the hell? Let me out!”

  The user found Druck’s feed and enlarged it. Since the camera was attached to his head I couldn’t see him, but I could tell he was turning in a circle, responding to heavy thuds and scrapes against the crate he was trapped in. My heart sank when I realized the destroyed drone was the one that had been on top of his crate.

  “Let me the hell out!” Druck screamed as the scraping intensified. I understood he was scared, but I couldn’t believe he wanted to go out there. I guess it was better than being trapped in the darkness, totally blind to the unknown.

  “Captain, we’re in,” Meg said. “The cable’s cut.”

  “Hold onto something,” I replied. I didn’t waste any time, turning Head Case around and taking off back through the conduit. Unable to keep an eye on Druck’s situation, I put my full attention on flying along the twisting wiring as quickly as I could.The sooner we could get to wherever Druck and the rest of my crew were, the sooner we could help them.

  In the back of my mind, I already knew we could never get to all of them before it was too late.

  “Keep,” I said without looking at him. “Can the Mustang transit again?”

  “Why wouldn’t it be able to…but Bennie, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Maybe not, but do you have an alternative?”

  “Nevermind whatever those creatures are. There are almost three hundred murderers and psychopaths on that planet with Mattie and the others. We wouldn’t stand a chance.”

  “You said an archon is as good as a hundred soldiers,” I snapped back. “And you said I’m worth more than the average archon. That balances the odds a little more, doesn’t it?”

  “Maybe until you factor in the bloodthirsty demons,” he countered. “I know this doesn’t look good for our people, but there’s nothing we can do.”

  “Bullshit!” I shouted, turning the stick hard to bring us up and out of the conduit. “I’m not leaving them to face those things alone.” Swinging toward the outside of the desk, a sea of legs had gathered in front of the table, loud voices overlapping each other as they took in the scene from the Kill Spree feeds.“You can’t help them by yourself.”

  I tapped the comm badge. “Ixitat, can you meet me in the hangar?”

  “Yesss,” she replied.

  “I’m not going by myself,” I said.

  “You don’t know how to transit,” he argued. “And I’m not taking you there.”

  I laughed. “I don’t want you to take me anywhere. I need you to stay here and make sure Head Case makes it to us.”

  “Wait a second,” Justus said. “If you’re leaving, I’m coming with you.”

  “You can’t,” I said. “You’re the only other pilot.”

  “Leo knows how to fly the ship.”

  “Leo needs to focus on keeping the ship running. Besides, if you come with me, you’ll die.”

  “But you won’t?”

  “I don’t know. I hope not.”

  “Kid,” Keep implored. “Take a second to think this through.”

  “I’m not leaving Matt to die. The aliens have nothing to do with it. We have the coordinates, which means we can transit. You brought back the Mustang, so we have the means.”

  “You have the means written on your chest.”

  “But I don’t know how to use all the sigils yet. The Mustang catalyst is single-purpose, right? You can only transit with it.”

  “Technically, yes.”

  “So there shouldn’t be a problem.”

  We reached the sea of legs. I brought Head Case up toward the shoulders of the assembled studio employees. Everyone’s eyes were glued to the Kill Spree monitors, leaving us totally unnoticed. Swinging the bow toward the screens, I saw that they had sent a drone to Druck’s crate. It was invisible beneath the pile of creatures trying to claw their way through it. And his crate wasn’t the only one under attack. At least six more were being assaulted the same way.

  “Who the hell picked this planet?” Yen shouted, pushing his way in front of the others. “You told me it was abandoned.”

  “Over two hundred years ago,” one of the engineers replied. “According to the production notes, it was a fledgling colony that disappeared. The search teams never found any evidence of an outside attack. In the report it says the colonists were abducted by slavers.”

  “Do those look like slavers to you, dimwit?”

  “I’m just reading the notes, sir.”

  “Come on!” Druck shouted over the din inside his crate. “Give me a fighting chance!”

  “Six minutes to showtime, Mister Yen,” his assistant said.

  “We can’t go live like this,” Yen replied. “This is a total shitshow.”

  “Shitshows are good—”

  “For ratings,” he finished, his reticence vanishing in an instant. “Okay, but skip Sprite’s intro. We go right into the action. Focus on the crates that are being attacked as they open.”

  “Sir, don’t you think that’s a bit much?” one of the engineers asked. “We’ve got an extraction team in orbit. We can get them out of there.”

  “Are you kidding? They’re a bunch of murderers, criminals, and lowlifes. Who gives a shit if they die? Denali’s right. This is going to be our best episode ever. I told you so!”

  “Asshole,” I spat as I turned Head Case toward the double doors. Without someone going through them, I couldn’t get out. I swung the ship around again, looking for an air vent and finding it near the wall.

  “Bennie, you can’t transit,” Keep said. “You’ve never done it solo before. It isn’t safe.”

  “You used me to do it when we escaped Sedaya. Technically, I’ve done it already. And I’m more proficient with sigiltech now.” I guided Head Case into the vent, pushing the throttle to rocket through the airway as quickly as possible. “Look, we know where they are. We have the coordinates. All I have to do is transit the Mustang to the planet, round them up, and transit them back. Easy peasy.”

  “I can do that,” Keep said.

  “You need hours to recover after a round trip. I don’t. And how are you going to stay alive out there if you’re too tired?” He didn’t respond. A moment later, my phone vibrated. “What’s that?”

  “The code to access the tracker I planted on Head Case. So you can get back.”

  I dared to look back at Keep, lifting my head so I could see him beneath the visor. “Thank you.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Just don’t get killed out there.”

  I wasn’t ready to leave just yet. We still had to get clear of the tower so I could make Head Case full size again. To that end, I followed the ventilation shaft through the building, searching for the exhaust. It took nearly another minute to find the translucent membrane leading to open air. Designed to keep the birds out while letting the air escape, I had no choice but to blast it on the approach, burning a hole through the thin film large enough for us to pass through.

  Zipping out into the sky, I navigated to the scale controls and reached out to grab the slider bar. Movement to our left caught my attention as one of the colored birds spotted us, flapping its wings hard to intercept.

  “Sorry, Polly,” I said, moving the slider to the middle. A momentary tingle raced through me as our scale changed. The bird seemed to freeze in mid-air before rolling over and frantically diving away from my suddenly normal-sized starship.

  “Thank you!” Justus shouted, clearly grateful to be full-scale again. The ship’s sensors were grateful too. The large blotches of constant contacts vanished, replaced with more normal output, including the transport passing in front of us.

  “Shit!” I snapped, twisting the stick to change course before we could collide with the vessel. The new vector put us right in line with the side of a tower. I barely managed to cut the throttle and slide around it without clipping the corner, Head Case’s undamaged ear coming within inches of one of the platforms where dozens of people sat outside, eating. “Too close.”

  I angled Head Case toward space and opened the throttle, thrusters blazing as we really took off. On the grid, the ships in orbit were already beginning to change their course, some of them angling to drop into the atmosphere. The comms lit up anew.

  “I bet I know who that is,” Justus said.

  “I’m not answering it this time,” I replied. “We can’t make it through them. Justus, you have the stick. As soon as I’m gone, shrink back down and lay low for a couple of hours. Stay small when you head back to orbit.”

  “I don’t want to be small again,” he complained before sighing in resignation. “But I also don’t want to be dead.”

  I pulled off my helmet and slipped out of my restraints, pausing when I reached Keep on the sofa. “How do I enter the coordinates to transit?”

  “Just read them a couple of times and keep them in your mind while you visualize the place you want to end up.”

  “Got it.” I started past him, but he grabbed my wrist to hold me back.

  “Ben, if you use the hemolytic catalyst—”

  “Once shouldn’t hurt me, I’m already wearing it full-time.”

  “Good luck, kid. I’m proud of you.”

  I smile widely in response, racing off the flight deck as soon as he let go. I didn’t head directly to the hangar, instead stopping at the armory to quickly slip into combat armor and grab a few guns.

  “Captain,” Justus said over the comms as I raced back to the elevator. “What’s taking so long? We’ve got Royal starfighters inbound, along with multiple defense units.”

  “I’m on my way to the hangar,” I replied, pulling out my phone and quickly accessing the ship’s datastore. Entering the approximate time the Kill Spree planet’s coordinates were visible, I was able to back up to the action history to get a screenshot. I read over the coordinates as I descended the steps into the hangar. The Mustang was parked in the back.

  Ixitat waited with Kat and his unit, coming to full height as I approached.

  “Ixy, I’m going to use sigiltech to take a shortcut to my friends. It’s going to be dangerous, and there’s a chance I might not survive. But I’d like you to come with me, if you’re willing. I could use your help.”

  She didn’t hesitate. “Of coursssse.”

  “What about us, Cap?” Kat asked.

  “I’m picking up three passengers, and there’s only three seats in the back of the car. Otherwise I’d bring you all.”

  “I can ride in the trunk,” he offered.

  “And leave your unit behind?”

  “Ki can keep an eye on things here. You seem like you need all the help you can get.”

  There was no time to give it much thought. “Okay,” I said. “But you don’t need to ride in the trunk until we pick them up.”

  “Copy that.”

  “Here,” Ki said,” handing him a plasma rifle. The others each passed him spare energy cells for the weapon. “Good luck, Sarge.”

  “Good hunting,” Narayan said.

  “We need to go,” I said, breaking for the Mustang. Kat and Ixy stuck close, Kat going for shotgun and Ixy claiming the back seat as I climbed in behind the wheel.

  I sat there for a moment, trying to gather my thoughts when Head Case shuddered and Justus’ panicked voice exploded from my comm badge.

  “Captain, we’re being fired upon. We need to vanish asap.”

  “Ten seconds,” I replied. “Then hit it.”

  “Copy that.”

  The key already in the ignition, I started the car before opening the shifter to reveal the needle inside. Casting a nervous glance at it, I put the car in drive and slowly rolled forward. I was pretty sure Keep wouldn’t have let me even try to transit if he didn’t think I could do it. In my mind, I swapped thoughts between the coordinates to the planet and the view of the area I had seen through the camera feeds as I dropped my hand on the needle, jabbing it through my skin. Unnatural pain immediately exploded from my palm to the tips of my fingers, but I could also feel the chaos energy rushing to the catalyst to fuel the sigils etched into it. I held my breath and concentrated on the destination, holding the image of the grassy area where Druck’s crate was under assault by the demonic creatures.

  Space and time opened in front of the Mustang in a pure black void. I used that as my signal to hit the gas. The Mustang’s engine roared, tires squealing slightly as they found purchase on the deck and sent us shooting forward.

  “I’m not so sure about thiiiissss…” Kat shouted, face clenching as we drove into the abyss.

  CHAPTER 10

  The transit through spacetime seemed quicker to me than usual, the familiar overwhelming sense of aloneness short-lived. Because I had provided more power to the catalyst? Because I was just better at it? Or was there another reason? Either way, it felt to me as only a few seconds passed before we were bursting out of the other side, reborn on a distant planet.

  My transit wasn’t perfect. As the tear in perpetuity closed behind us, I realized we had emerged at the vantage point of my visualization—the drone that had been flying nearly ten feet off the ground. Pulling my hand from the catalyst, I barely had time to push us up from the grass below to slow our descent and raise the hood before we hit the dirt, suspension bottoming out, wheels sinking into the soft ground, the Mustang bouncing hard as I fought to maintain control.

  Fought and lost. The Mustang slid on the slick surface, skidding sideways and digging further into the dirt before rocking to a hard stop, leaving all three of us shaken.

  “Whoa, Cap. Look at your hand,” Kat said.

  I looked down at my palm, remembering when Keep had first stabbed me with the needle. I’d needed a bandage to stop the bleeding then. This time, the wound was already closing over, chaos energy thick in my palm glowing like I was about to cast out a magic missile.

  My astonishment was quickly interrupted by the sounds of hissing screams and movement to our left. A dark shadow of humanoid creatures blotted out of the landscape, dozens of the demonic creatures racing toward us. A drone drifted overhead, infrared lights allowing its cameras to record the action.

  I could only imagine what the engineers or Yen back on Kirillia thought of our sudden appearance. Probably ecstatic by the unexpected opening scene while confused about how an Earthian vehicle had suddenly popped into existence in the middle of the demon scrum. Was Yen rushing to contact Sedaya or placing bets on how long we would survive?