I shouldn’t say anything to him. I should make sure there’s nothing for either of us to tell when we return. I should make sure he continues thinking I’m the worst person he’s ever met. But for some reason, when I’ve got a section of the green and white wires stripped, I find conversation fighting its way out of me. I mean to be conciliatory, but despite my best intentions, it comes out as acidic as ever.

“On the frontier, isn’t this how they hot-wire a hover—”

I brush the two wires together, and instantly the rockets ignite, catapulting the pod away from the ship. I have only the briefest glimpse of the wall in front of me careening at my face before the universe goes utterly black.

“What did you think was happening at that point?”

“I didn’t know. There was no communication equipment in the pod.”

“You didn’t try to guess?”

“We’re trained to work with solid information.”

“But you had none?”

“No.”

“What was your plan?”

“Sit tight and hope. There was nothing to do except wait.”

“And see what happened next?”

“And see what happened next.”

FIVE

TARVER

THE POD’S STILL WOBBLING AND STABILIZING as it shoots away from the ship, but we’re not spinning, so I risk unclipping my harness. The gravity’s fading out to half strength already and I know it will go completely soon, so I hook a foot under one of the grab straps on the floor as I kneel beside Miss LaRoux. She’s on the ground, stirring and groaning, already complaining before she’s fully conscious. Somehow, not surprising.

There’s a tempting view down the front of her dress, but I can practically hear her snapping at me like she did before. So I jam a hand under each of her arms and rise to my feet, lifting her and setting her down in one of the five molded chairs. She lolls against me, murmuring something indecipherable as I shove her arms through the straps, yanking them tight around her.

Resisting the urge to yank them tighter still should earn me another damn medal. I check the chest strap, then lean down to grab her ankles, pushing them into the padded plastene clip waiting for them. Closer than I should be to Miss Lilac LaRoux’s legs. And how the hell does she even walk with those things on her feet?

The pod lurches again, and I swallow hard as I stretch over to dump my grab bag in one of the storage alcoves, slamming the lid shut on top of it. Then I thump down into my own seat opposite her, pulling on the harness and strapping in, pushing my ankles back into the clips. In my hurry, I bang my legs into place too hard—the left clip breaks with a snap, the right one holds. The last of the gravity fades out, and I have to strain the leg that’s not secured to stop it lifting up.

I study her bowed head. Where did you learn how to do that? I’ve never met a rich kid in my life who even knew how wiring worked—much less how to hot-wire a state-of-the-art escape pod. She must keep this side of her buried so deep that even the relentless paparazzi don’t find it.

She moans again as the stabilizer rockets fire, throwing us both sharply against our restraints. The pod vibrates, and the constellations visible through the viewport behind Miss LaRoux’s head become fixed points. I can see the ship silhouetted against the static stars. And she’s rolling.

“What did you do?” My sleeping beauty is awake, glaring at me with the eye that’s not swelling shut. She’s going to have a shiner, black and blue in a few hours.

“I fastened your safety straps, Miss LaRoux,” I say. Her scowl deepens, bordering on outrage, and I can feel my own temper bubbling up to match. “Don’t worry, I kept my hands where they belong.” I’ve mostly managed bland so far, but I can hear the subtext in my tone as well as she can. And you couldn’t pay me to try anything else.

Her gaze hardens, but she offers no retort except cold silence. Over her shoulder I still see the Icarus rolling, and in my mind’s eye I see the stopping and blurring of the stars through the viewing deck window, and the books in the first-class salon falling out of their shelves as the room tips and the tables and chairs topple.

The Icarus is spinning when nothing should be able to cause her to do so, and I can’t see any other detached escape pods in the fragment of deep space beyond the viewport. Are the others out of sight? I catch a glimpse of something impossibly huge—the same thing I saw before—reflective and bright. Where is the light coming from? The next instant the pod spins and all I can see is starry darkness.

I study the metal grid on the floor, then the circuit boards overhead that the builders didn’t bother to cover, the metal plates riveted into place. Not like the rest of the escape pods, I’m sure. They’ll be cushy and expensive. I’d rather be in this sturdy, utilitarian pod than one of the others, somehow. Our pod jerks again, when it should be using sensors and thrusters to keep us floating gently in space. Something’s causing it to ignore its programming.

I look across at Miss LaRoux, and for a moment our gazes meet. She’s some combination of tired, pissed off, and just as sure as I am that something’s not right. Neither of us breaks the silence, though, or names the things it might be.

Her hair’s coming loose from the fancy loops and curls she had it up in, and in zero gravity, it’s fanning out around her face as though she’s underwater. Even with a black eye on the way, she’s beautiful.

Then a violent shudder tears through the pod, shattering that moment of peace. The metal begins to hum as the vibrations increase, shaking me through the soles of my boots. I look up to see a glow outside the viewport, and then an automatic shield slides across it, prompted by some reading from outside.