Page 50 of Collision!
Her fingers shook almost imperceptibly.“But you remember the name?”
“There were actually several versions, as if I hadn’t settled on one.”He stared at her.“Your name is on the design as well.The Juraszczyk ghostform.”
Her gaze flew up.“Your pronunciation is perfect.Even people on my planet get it wrong.”
“Are they not conscientious of such things on your world?”
“Not like a Szauralithyn chief engineer.”
Despite his efforts to remain still, his quill-scales prickled with agitation.“A chief engineer must be able to leave the ship—in port or in space—without panicking.”
She drew back, clutching the stained gauze.“You remember that?”
He snarled soundlessly.“So Ididlose control.But you told me it was an accident—”
“Youwerehit by a meteoroid,” she interrupted.“So your risk assessment was not faulty.But you went out to do the job anyway.”
“I wasn’t afraid of rocks,” he grated.“I was afraid of…the nothing.”
Silence pulsed between them for a long moment, and he felt strung up, awaiting judgment.
“I know you don’t remember,” she said, “but you told me once that your people adapted to underground dwelling to avoid storms and evolved your armor against predators.No wonder wide open space—especially actual space—feels dangerously exposed to you.”
Had he told her that when they’d been working together on the ship’s mask?Had they been side by side at the console where he’d found the notes he’d left?
A sharp yearning for that forgotten moment pierced him.“Did I also tell you how the captain and I were attacked by pirates on our last ship?How I was almost sucked out into space—without an EVA suit?”
Her eyes widened.“You didn’t mention that, no.”
Part of him wished he hadn’t now either.But another part was glad he could share something with her that he hadn’t forgotten.
“I never told the captain,” he mused.“He would’ve blamed himself.We were the only crew on a long-haul freighter when we crossed a distress beacon signal.It was an isolated route so we had to respond.”
“Sounds like a trap.”
He straightened in surprise.“Yes, exactly as I told Nehivar.If only you’d been the captain.”
“Did the pirates breach your ship?”
With a grimace, he looked away.“Idid.They had us trapped with their grappler, and I had a plan to use one of our magnetized welders… It doesn’t matter, because I lost control of it.The welder blew off their near nacelle.”
He paused when Mariah let out a sound of relief.“It was an accident,” he reminded her.“Not part of my strategy.The explosion also buckled the external hatch in the bay where I was working.Ibreathedspace…until I couldn’t breathe at all.”
Her clasped hands crept up to her throat, as if choking on his memory.“That must’ve been terrifying.”
“I stayed conscious long enough to get partly into a suit.”He looked down at his own hands, flexed into fists.“In the vacuum, venom was bubbling from my quill-scales.But empty space was not a threat I could fight.”
“How did you fix it?”Her expression was so sure of him.
He crossed his arms over his chest, as if he could hide the strain—or hold the heat of life that had leached from him.“I didn’t,” he said flatly.“I saw it on our monitors later.Flying plasteel fragments from a secondary explosion triggered our freighter’s temp docking bay.The inflatable shaft expanded between the two ships.It sheared off their damaged nacelle and detached their grappler.”
“Your ship punched the other ship?”
Ithadrather looked like that, now that she said it.“And a break in the bay’s polymer collar released the expansion sealant which stoppered the broken hatch enough for me to escape.”He let out a breath almost as hard as the one he’d released when the inner bulkhead door had closed behind him, locking out the emptiness.“It wasn’t anything I did.Just…random chance.”
“Sometimes all we need is a chance,” she murmured.
He stiffened.“That’s not good enough.If I can’t fix a problem, why am I even…”
