Avalon

CHAPTER 13

“I NEED MORE TIME,” LIZZIE SAID AS SHE STOOPED toward the maintenance computer’s screen.

“We don’t have more time.” Jeth paced back and forth across the bridge. Once he’d determined no new damage had occurred there, his impatience to get out of there had quadrupled.

“I know.” The glare she shot him was hot enough to incinerate. “But this isn’t something you rush. One mistake and we all die.”

Jeth stopped pacing, all the muscles in his body tense from the effort to be still. He knew pressuring her was counterproductive, but he was having a hard time keeping calm with his ship falling apart around him.

“You keyed that wrong,” said Sierra from where she stood beside Lizzie. She pointed at the screen. “The last four should be eight, zero, one, five.”

“Oh. Right.” Lizzie made the correction.

Unable to stand inactivity a moment longer, Jeth said, “I’ll go check on the others.”

Sierra glanced up at him, her expression cool. “Sounds like a good idea. We’ll be done soon. I promise.”

Jeth didn’t reply as he exited the bridge. He was determined to stay away until they were done. He wasn’t stupid. He understood the danger of performing a manual jump. Navigating space wasn’t like driving a land vehicle. It was like jumping blindfolded off the top of a building and trying to catch hold of a passing jet. At least that was how Jeth imagined it in terms of difficulty. One single decimal point of miscalculation and the jump could be off by hundreds of light-years, launching them out of metaspace into anywhere.

Or nowhere at all.

Shuddering, Jeth headed back up to engineering. Flynn stood near the top of the stairs, already making repairs to the new set of holes. He looked up at Jeth’s approach.

“Anything important damaged?” asked Jeth.

Flynn grimaced. “Nothing I can’t repair, but only because I’m brilliant and I stocked up on supplies before we left Peltraz.” He pulled a piece of candy out of his pocket, unwrapped it, and popped it into him mouth.

Jeth considered asking him if by “supplies” he really meant chocolate, but he refrained. “Well, good thinking.”

Flynn seemed surprised by the compliment, but it was momentary as he returned his attention to the task at hand. Jeth left him to it, heading down the stairs to the passenger deck. He heard voices from the common deck below, including Shady’s, and figured he and Celeste must’ve finished their second damage sweep of the lower decks. He was about to head down to check for an update when he saw that Milton was still in sick bay.

The austere room was the only place aboard Avalon that Jeth ever found uninviting. Milton kept the place immaculately clean and organized, a complete one-eighty from the clutter of empty bottles in his cabin.

Milton looked up from where he stood in front of his main worktable. Some kind of medical instrument whose name and purpose Jeth didn’t know sat on the table. A soft whirring sound issued out from it.

“What are you doing?” Jeth said.

“Nothing important. Just some boring doctorish stuff.” Milton pressed a button on the machine and the whirring stopped.

Jeth shook off his curiosity. Milton doing anything doctor related was better than his usual activities of boozing and pipe smoking. “Anything get damaged in here?”

“No. Everything’s fine. You should check with the others.”

“Did our passengers check out all right?”

Milton smiled. “Yes, at least Vince and Cora. I’m sure Sierra will pass inspection, too. They’ve been very lucky.”

Depends on how you look at it, Jeth thought, considering everything that had gone wrong since he’d brought them on board. The desire to run back to the bridge and check on Lizzie’s progress gripped him again. Ignoring it, Jeth said, “Yeah, very lucky.” He inclined his head toward the doorway. “I’m gonna check in with Celeste and Shady.”

Jeth headed down to the commons deck, flinching at every sound he heard. He’d never before realized how noisy a starship could be. Even the low, constant hum of Avalon’s engines seemed ominous at the moment.

He arrived in the common area to find Celeste, Shady, and Vince standing in the middle of the room and looking down at one of the armchairs—his favorite one. Jeth spotted the holes in it right away.

Son of a bitch.

Lucky, indeed.

“Is that the extent of the damage?” Jeth asked, motioning toward the chair. It wasn’t entirely ruined, but he doubted it would be very comfortable to recline in anymore with the series of holes running up its back.

“Yes,” Celeste said. “Unless there’re some in the cabins. We haven’t checked them yet.”

Jeth grunted. “I guess one damaged armchair is good news.”

Cora, who had been sitting on the sofa when Jeth arrived, stood up and walked over to him. “See my bandage?” She held up her arm, where Milton had placed a small white bandage over where the cat had clawed her.

“Um, yeah. It’s great, Cora.”

She beamed at him.

Feeling awkward, although mildly pleased by the kid’s delight, Jeth cleared his throat. But whatever he’d intended to say got lost, as Lizzie’s voice echoed out from the comm speakers. “We’re ready.”

Without a word, Jeth turned and bolted up the stairs. Lizzie was already sitting in the copilot chair with Sierra at the nav.

Jeth sat down in the pilot chair and looked toward his sister. “Are you sure you’re done?”

She nodded, her expression a little too fearful for comfort.

Jeth glanced at Sierra in a silent question.

“The calculations are as accurate as humanly possible.”

Jeth grimaced. Whatever that meant. He turned back to the front and switched on the main comm. “We’re jumping now, people. Get ready.” Then, not bothering with goggles, he leaned forward and placed his finger against the button that would the engage the jump. Butterflies flitted through his stomach. “I guess if this doesn’t work none of us will be around to complain about it, right?”

“Not funny, Jeth,” Lizzie said.

He exhaled and pushed the button.

The familiar weightlessness came over him, same as always. But then it changed, and everything felt wrong. The weightlessness wasn’t definite like it should be, but tenuous, as if he were being held in a spiderweb that might break any moment. Even worse, he was so aware of being in that state. Never before had he been conscious of his thoughts while in that suspended, living-death moment.

It lasted too long. Normally, traveling through metaspace was like being swallowed by a giant animal that found you distasteful at once and spit you out again. Not this time, though. The animal held on, like it never intended to let go.

What seemed like hours later, they finally came through on the other side of the jump. Jeth stood up, stooped over, and dry heaved a couple of times. His insides felt as if they’d been run through a meat grinder. Lizzie was dry heaving, too. Jeth looked over at Sierra and saw her face had turned an alarming shade of green.

“Was that more Belgrave crap?” he asked, pressing his palms against his temples to still the pounding in his skull.

Sierra shook her head, unable to speak, it seemed.

He turned and checked the system readouts, making sure the Donerail had made it through the jump. Then he turned back to Lizzie, who looked better recovered. “Any idea where we are?”

“No, not yet.” She placed her shaking hands on the control panel. “I’ll run an area scan.”

Jeth patted her back. “We’re still, alive, Liz. That’s good enough.”

She ignored him, her concentration completely focused on the screen as she started running the scan. Knowing it would take a few minutes, Jeth called down to the common room to check on Celeste and the others.

“Nobody puked,” Shady told him, which Jeth guessed meant they were fine.

Next Jeth checked in with Milton in sick bay and then with Flynn in the engine room. Everybody had come through the jump okay, and they were all still here. No unexplained vanishings.

Finally, Lizzie said, “I don’t believe it.” A huge grin split her face.

“What?” Jeth and Sierra said in unison.

“We’re not far from the Belgrave border. I don’t know where we’ll come out exactly, but we made it!”

Jeth squeezed her shoulder. “I knew you could do it.”

Lizzie smirked up at him. “Of course. That’s ’cause I’m the best.”

“Well, every now and again, I suppose.”

Flynn’s voice came over the intercom. “Um, Jeth. Can you come up to the engineering room a sec? We got a little problem.”

Dread did a tap dance on Jeth’s chest, stomping out his relief at once. He flipped on the comm switch. “What is it?”

“I need to show you.”

Please don’t let it be any more holes. Jeth swept his gaze over Lizzie and Sierra. “Stay here. I’ll be back.”

He exited the bridge, taking the stairs up to the engineering deck two at a time. He spotted Flynn standing beside the metadrive compartment. There wasn’t any new damage in the room that he could see.

“What is it?” Jeth said, worry making him breathless.

Flynn’s gaze shifted to the metadrive compartment then back to Jeth. “Um, I’m no expert or anything, but I’m pretty sure the metadrive is shot.”

Jeth didn’t respond. He couldn’t. This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t possible. Not on Avalon.

“I figured after that jump there might be something wrong,” Flynn went on. “It’s never felt like that before. And—”

“Just show me.”

Tight-lipped, Flynn slid open the door into the compartment.

Jeth’s body went numb. Normally, the power source of Avalon’s metadrive was a swirl of purples in every shade. But not anymore. The porous material had faded to ash around the edges near the frame, with myriad pale streaks running through its center like a web. It was just like he saw on the Montrose, but worse. Much worse.

“I don’t think we’ll be making any more jumps anytime soon,” Flynn said, quite unnecessarily.

Jeth wanted to punch him, if only to have an outlet for his anger and the despair fueling it. He ran his hands through his hair instead.

“Any idea where we are?” said Flynn.

Jeth exhaled. “Close to the border out of this damned place.”

“But that’s great.” Flynn clapped once in emphasis. “We just fly over the border and call Hammer to come get us.”

Jeth didn’t say anything. It was definitely the obvious solution, but not one he wanted to take. Not yet. He still had a couple of days before the deadline. If he called Hammer now, there was no way to hide the three extra people on board. Hammer would void their deal about Avalon, and if they were lucky, that was all he’d do. Then again, Jeth still doubted Hammer planned to honor the deal anyway. So what did it matter?

You could call Renford.

Yes, he could. But was that the better option? He didn’t trust the ITA. Renford might’ve been lying; he might arrest them instead. He knew they were thieves, after all. Even if Renford did follow through with getting Avalon for him, there was no guarantee he would protect them from Hammer afterward. And Hammer would certainly seek revenge after a betrayal like that. If he caught them, he might decide to turn Jeth and the other boys into members of his Guard, implants inserted into their brains, all identity erased. And there was no telling what he would do with the girls.

That was a lot to risk. Maybe too much. Jeth didn’t know what to do. He needed time to think.

Flynn cleared his throat. “So, what’s the plan now, Boss?”

“Nothing. It’s been a stressful enough day already, so for now let’s keep this between us.”

“Sure, okay.”

Jeth couldn’t tell if it was relief or concern he heard in Flynn’s voice. He decided it didn’t matter. He turned and left the engineering room, fighting back the rising despair that threatened to overwhelm him.

He kept it at bay long enough to convince the others that nothing was wrong and that whatever repairs and plans they needed to make could wait until they’d had a good night sleep. He made sure that Sierra, Vince, and Cora got something to eat and a chance to clean up. Then once they were settled into their cabins, he retreated to his quarters.

The moment he was alone, the dam of emotions broke inside him. It was so horribly, impossibly unfair. Seven years Avalon had been imprisoned at Hammer’s spaceport. Seven years Jeth had dreamed and planned and hoped for his freedom. And now, just when he was on the verge of succeeding, this happened.

Even if he had the money to buy a new metadrive, there weren’t any to buy. For every metadrive the Shades managed to steal, Hammer had ten customers in line to buy it, customers who bid up the price well beyond what Jeth could afford to pay.

Hell, he couldn’t even buy a different ship. The money he earned toward Avalon went directly to Hammer, kept in trust. I’ll be stuck working for him forever. The bitter thought burned its way through Jeth’s body like acid in his veins.

He stretched across the bed, burying his face in the pillows. For so long he’d thought Avalon was the answer, the ultimate solution. He was wrong. She was just a ship, an object that could break and fail him as easily as his parents had failed him. As Milton had.

For the first time in his life the idea that freedom might not exist at all threatened to overwhelm him. Was the promise of freedom just something the desperate and oppressed clung to because they didn’t have anything else? Had it always been just a dream, a fantasy built up in the mind of a boy forced to grow up too soon?

Jeth didn’t know. And as the hours ticked by, he tried to convince himself that he didn’t care.