Something was off.

  It wasn’t the thin air. It wasn’t the feeling of being holed up in a crater on the outskirts of Quay—on the outskirts of civilization itself. It wasn’t even Snake’s silent company. All of these things and more rushed through Cenn’s mind as she sat on a crate atop the Razor, leaning back against its hull with her boots kicked up and watching the distant shimmering skyline of Quay. None of these annoyances alone had her fuming, for she’d been through worse.

  It was the timing, she decided. Bad timing killed the old man. Bad timing put them in an ice box for a hundred years. In a near-reality she made it to Jupiter, became Occam’s pilot, won the war, and maybe even died a hero. Instead, here she was on Quay of all places—babysitting, and doing a piss-poor job at that. And someone had gotten Erin killed, a fact that still gnawed at her harder than anything.

  Snake climbed over the prow of the ship to meet her. Thoughts crept in as she watched him come. Being left behind to tend the Razor was expected of Snake. The man wasn’t a pilot, or a field man. He didn’t argue—Snake rarely ever did—but he hadn’t complained once since Arthur snuck out. He was too calm and that pissed Cenn off.

  Resentment burned inside her, pressing behind her eyes, driving her to act, to do something.

  Snake reached out with a cup of recycled water. Cenn took it, stifling a growl.

  Another person might’ve given her lip, recoiled, or otherwise gotten miffed. Instead, Snake just sat on the hull beside her, patting her knee on the way down, like soothing a cat’s hackles. He didn’t even ask for the other crate she used as a footrest. The fumes burned for one more second, then dissolved.

  “Thanks.”

  He nodded in reply, and they watched the dust roll by. Their shelter blunted most of it, but like campfire smoke it still swirled and swayed.

  “It’s not right,” she said, carefully squeezing the cup. It was cheap plastic, and she knew she could snap it with a touch. “Leaving us. I mean.”

  Snake shrugged.

  “Of course you’re not mad.”

  He shrugged again, shoulders higher this time. The look he gave her was inquisitive.

  “What are you confused about? They left us to do repairs while they probably stopped for a meal, a shower. Who knows.”

  Snake sighed and went back to staring. The problem with venting to a mute was hearing your own tone hang in the wind.

  “I’m just saying. Thought they’d be back by now anyway.”

  Cenn thought of Mina, and that big brain of hers.

  “Guess she didn’t think about how we were going to communicate, huh?”

  Snake crumpled his forehead.

  The other problem with venting to a mute was that you started finishing both halves of the conversation yourself.

  “Mina. Smart as she is, maybe she could’ve remembered to take along the mobile coms? Didn’t think about that, did she?”

  Snake tapped his temple smartly, then pointed at Cenn and thumbed back at himself.

  “Why do you and I always have to come up with the great ideas?”

  He shook his head.

  “Besides, you saw the way they’re all taking orders now. If it’s not Mina, then there’s Robotori. I’d like to see him try and force us to do the next task.”

  Snake gave her an admonishing look, pointed at the Razor, and then at the rest of Quay.

  “No, that’s different,” Cenn nearly spilled her water, “we had to follow the plan Daiko left for us, but Hitori didn’t make me do anything.” Cenn was about to go on when she caught movement in the distance.

  “Shh.”

  She squinted. For a moment she thought it was Arthur, but that possibility died as the vehicles met Quay’s thin oxsphere, their engines bearing a terrible sound.

  “That’s not the kid.”

  Five vehicles churned up asteroid dirt as they came into the crater, looking like motorcycles except the front wheels spun like shredding teeth. The sound of revving chainsaws filled the air. Cenn glanced at Snake who, bless him, could read a room better than most.

  They tore across the Razor’s hull, Cenn scooping up the pikes and saws from their repair work as they went—the tools had just been promoted to weapons.

  The vehicles’ roar echoed throughout the crater, multiplied, as though there were more of them coming from every angle. Balancing the pikes across her arms, she slid down the ladder. In under fifteen seconds she sealed the aft port, waved Snake ahead on the main gangplank, while she closed and locked the remaining entrances. As the last closed, she saw the crater’s shadow split wide by the bright orange beams of their headlights. The sound roared right up until the door sealed.

  Inside the bridge, Snake extinguished the aux lights below the hull. That was good, best to let them think no one was home.

  “Not a bad deckhand, are you?” she said, peering out the bridge’s viewport.

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  Snake nodded. His composure was subdued compared to her own eagerness. She finally had something to do.

  “I’d kill for armaments. When we get out of this, add that to the list of things smart people don’t do: build a spaceship with weapons.”

  Snake ignored the jab. He was peering hard through the viewport. Then he turned to her, made a peace sign with two fingers, and pointed outside.

  “Doubtful.”

  He gave her a questioning look.

  “I’ve seen bikes like those on Mars, or something close. Modified mining equipment, turned vehicles. It’s never a good sign.”

  As the beams of light carved silhouettes of men across the crater walls like ghouls, Cenn noticed they weren’t empty handed. The lighting made it hard to tell what they carried, but she guessed anyway.

  “Friendlies don’t show up unannounced with scrapping tools.” She nodded, “scavengers.”

  Snake leaned across the console beside her, their foreheads nearly brushing the viewport as the scavengers descended. Lamps flicked on as they neared the bottom, illuminating small spheres around their suits.

  “Did I ever tell you about my first tour on Mars?” Cenn twisted the grip of the pike in her hands, the thrill rising inside her. “On the way there, some scavengers tried to peel the carrier but got the timing wrong. Our troop had just thawed out of cryo.”

  She grinned, teeth flashing.

  “Drop-kicked one of ‘em with ice still melting off my eyelashes.” She elbowed Snake. “Imagine thinking you’re walking onto an unguarded ship, about to nick the motherload, only to find you’re 30 minutes early, and the entire battalion’s waiting for you.”

  Snake gave her an appraising nod, then pointed to the console feed. The scavengers couldn’t be seen from the viewport anymore, but exterior cameras showed them clearly. They wore light exo-suits, good for near-vacuum but not total exposure. The bikes probably carried portable oxcellerators and gravwells.

  Cenn watched one man light a torch and approach the main entrance while the rest leaned against their weapons and waited.

  “Perfect. They think she’s empty.” She patted Snake’s shoulder before turning to leave the bridge.

  Snake snapped his fingers to get her attention, then pointed toward the exit with a raised brow.

  “I’m just going to say hello,” she grabbed a short-wave com from the wall, slipped it over her ear, and flashed him a wolfish smile. “See? Great idea. Click the receiver if you need something.”

  Of course he didn’t protest.

  Cenn slipped into a maintenance shaft above the main entrance. It was only a few meters long and just big enough she could crouch. At the end, a hatch of narrow slats opened to the threshold below. She eased the lever with both hands, foot braced against the wall, careful to keep it silent.

  A man stood directly beneath her, a two handed torch in the crook of his arm.

  This close, she saw their suits weren’t military cut. Nor were they rugged enough for long spacewalks. They were patchwork—different sleeves, mismatched boots, scraps of armor like a magnet had rolled through a junkyard, but with an iridescent shimmer glinting in the seams.

  Licking her lips, she adjusted the pike to the pulse setting then leaned on the slat with one hand, and drew the weapon back with the other. She thought of ten things she might say—but settled on one.

  “Hey.”

  The man froze, torch held a hand’s breadth from the door. He turned to his peers.

  “What?”

  “What?” someone else echoed.

  He tugged the kerchief from his mouth. “You say something?”

  “I said nothing.”

  Cenn repeated herself.

  The man tilted his head up. His mirrored goggles gleamed in the torchlight just as Cenn brought the pike down, stabbing the soft bit between collarbone and neck. A flash of blue arced—electricity meant to weld ship hulls surged through him, better than any stunner. She held it for a breath, then snapped the pike back into the vent like a scorpion’s tail.

  The man collapsed, croaking, lips and tongue twitching uselessly.

  Before she could taunt the rest of them, a ball of fire rolled across the vent.

  She cursed, brushing at the heat on her face—then laughed. They hadn’t even moved their friend before slinging fire at the shaft.

  “Someone’s up there,” a voice called.

  “No shit. Herm, get Ronnie out of there before we fry him.”

  So they do care.

  “You get him, Tully,” Herm shot back.

  “I’m in charge, and I say you get him.”

  “I’m not doing it. Ronnie might be dead anyway, just leave him.”

  A groan curdled from poor Ronnie’s mouth below her.

  “See? He ain’t dead. Now go get him.”

  “I ain’t—”

  “For crying out loud, Herm, just do it,” another voice snapped.

  “Yeah,” said a deeper one. “I got you covered.”

  These two voices—steadier than the others—carried the largest weapons of the bunch.

  “Covered?” Herm barked, “Fran, you look fit to torch me and Ronnie both.”

  “That’s what covered means.”

  “Nicola, Fran, both of you shut it,” Tully cut in. “Herm. Get him out. Or the boss is gonna cook all of us.”

  Herm cursed but began to crawl on his belly toward Ronnie, to stay out of range of Cenn’s pike.

  Always send the dumbest ones first.

  She aimed her grappling hook through the slats, delighted to see its prongs would fit clean through. Designed to reel in spacewalkers, it would hook an idiot scavenger just fine.

  She fired the gun, and with a soft pop, it hooked itself to Herm’s reaching arm.

  He screamed as though he’d been bit, but was cut off as Cenn hiked the line over her shoulder and sprinted down the shaft. In reduced G, he flew up easily, slamming into the vent like a bug on glass. She wedged the wire on a catwalk outcropping and ran back to the vent.

  One side of Herm’s puckered face was pressed between the slats, and she could see his eyes bulging at the site of her.

  “Hey, Herm,” she murmured, jabbing the pike into his gut. He rattled, then hung limp, groaning.

  A trumpet-like sound rolled out of his stomach.

  Cenn covered her face as someone below yelled, “He shit himself!”

  Herm groaned again, and Cenn couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Leave him,” Tully barked. “Spread out. There’s more than one way to get in.”

  “And if there are others inside waiting?” Nicola asked.

  “Waste ’em.”

  “Now you’re talking like the boss,” Fran said.

  With Herm blocking most of the vent, Cenn could only guess at their positions now. She dropped back into the Razor’s main bay, cavernous without Occam inside. She no longer felt a hint of resentment for being left behind.

  In the stillness, she closed her eyes and listened…a soft vibration… to her right.

  She sprinted toward it, rounded the corner, and saw a crack of light splitting the entrance from top to bottom. Something was prying the doors apart.

  Rolling her shoulders, she slowed then spotted a wrench on the wall, big as a baseball bat.

  “Oh, you’ll do,” she leaned the pike against the wall and hefted the wrench. She eyed the widening crack, smiling.

  “Now let’s give ’em a welcome.”

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