Ghosts

THREE

Layla’s hand brushed Michael’s, and their fingers interlaced.

“Got bad news,” Weaver said. “Samson sent a team into a tunnel connecting to the rudders from inside the ship, but the issue seems to be on the outside.”

“So they’re going to need us to fix it from…” Layla’s words trailed off, and Michael squeezed her hand.

“Afraid so,” Weaver said. He hurried toward the launch bay doors, leaving Michael and Layla alone.

Most of teams Apollo and Angel stood near the portholes of the launch bay. Lightning illuminated their uneasy faces as they awaited orders.

All eyes were on Michael and Layla as they suited up. He pulled his chest piece from his locker and slipped it over his head. After putting his arms through the slots, he rotated for Layla to fasten the clasps on either side. The single piece fit snugly over his synthetic suit, but it was lightweight enough that it didn’t weigh him down once his boots hit solid ground.

“We’re still on for dinner later, right?” he said, smiling at Layla.

“Y-yes, of course,” she said.

The hitch in her voice broke Michael’s heart. He wasn’t afraid to die if it meant saving the Hive, but the thought of losing her terrified him.

“Is there any chance,” he said quietly, “that if I ordered you stay here, you’d listen to me?”

Layla grinned. “Why would I ever start listening to you now?”

She leaned in until they were so close he could smell the mint on her breath.

“You sure you know what you’re doing?” she asked.

Michael nodded. Three years ago, he had fixed one of the ship’s rudders, but that had been in clear skies. He hoped this would be another easy fix—say, an open circuit—but he wouldn’t know until they were up there.

“Your turn,” Michael said. He gazed into Layla’s dark eyes. He was exactly her height now. When they were growing up, she had been a bit taller, but he caught up. He liked finally being on her level.

“What’s our plan?” she asked.

Michael had to smile at her use of “our.” Layla wasn’t just his lover; she was his best friend. She was his person and always had been.

“Diagnose the problem.” He cocked his chin at the coils of wire on the floor. “And fix it.”

“And don’t get fried,” she added with a halfhearted grin.

“Right,” he said. “Make a note: don’t get fried.”

Michael secured the clasps on the sides of her chest plate, trying not to think about what she looked like without the armor. Oh, well, the prospect of climbing on top of a moving airship during a storm was more effective than a cold shower. He fastened the plates around his legs and pulled his helmet from the top shelf of his locker, then traced a finger over the Team Raptor crest for good luck, before slipping the helmet over his head.

Layla handed him his battery unit. If the armor had a heart, it was the battery. He clicked it into the socket on his chest plate, and it warmed to life, spreading a bright red glow over the dull black armor.

“Well, look at that,” Layla said. “Did you modify your battery again?”

He nodded. “It’s got twice the power now. All I had to do was mess with the—”

Before he could finish, the double doors to the launch bay screeched open. Magnolia hurried inside the room, with Rodger and Andrew behind her. They all looked exhausted.

“Where’ve you guys been?” Michael said.

“Kicking Weaver’s ass at cards,” Magnolia said. “I was about to be rich!”

“ ‘About to’ being the operative phrase,” Rodger said. “I’ve almost been rich about as many times as I’ve almost died on dives.”

Ty and a couple of technicians carried bags of gear into the room. Weaver directed them away from the launch tubes and toward the control room. Then he jogged over to Michael.

“You almost ready, kid?”

God damn it, Michael thought. “Kid” was even worse than “Tin.” Weaver seemed determined to be everybody’s dad, but Michael wasn’t interested in yet another father figure.

“Yes,” he said stiffly.

Across the room, Magnolia was still ranting about the card game. “This is some horseshit!” she yelled. “I had a straight flush. You owe me two hundred credits, Weaver!”

“Save it for the rematch, princess,” Weaver said.

Michael just shook his head. Weaver didn’t call him that, at least.

Within minutes, the launch bay was full of personnel. Hell Divers, militia soldiers, technicians, and engineers from Samson’s staff fanned out to perform their assigned tasks.

Another tremor rippled through the Hive. Outside the portholes, a skein of lightning filled the sky in front of the ship. Michael flinched as it licked the outer hull. The raucous crack rose over the screech of emergency sirens and reverberated in his ears for several seconds.

Forcing his gaze away, Michael punched his wrist minicomputer. Digital telemetry appeared in the upper right corner of his heads-up display. He opened a private channel with a bump of his chin on the comm pad and turned back to his locker.

“Double-check your gear,” he said over the channel. He followed his own orders and did a quick inventory of what he would need up there, going over all the potential issues in his mind. He stuffed the coils of wire into the cargo pocket on his leg, checked his parachute and booster a final time, and grabbed his duty belt.

By the time he was done, Magnolia had finished gearing up and Layla was rechecking her booster.

Ty dropped two bags of climbing gear in front of them. “Three hundred feet of eight-kilonewton-test rope. Should get you to the rudders.”

Michael bent down and grabbed a handful of carabiners from one of the bags.

“Make sure you attach those to the hangers on the side of the ship every fifteen feet, and run the rope through it,” Ty said. “That way, if anybody slips or gets hit, you won’t go far.”

“We know, Ty,” Magnolia said, and Michael could almost see her eyes roll behind her visor. Her armor plates clicked together as she fidgeted.

Normally, Michael would have felt those same predive jitters, which brought with them the messy and addictive combination of adrenaline and fear, but this wasn’t a dive through the clouds. Climbing onto the side of the ship during a storm was, in some ways, even more dangerous, since they would spend more time exposed to the storm and the threat of lightning strikes.

Get your shit together, Michael. Focus. You’re not a kid anymore.

He summoned his most commanding voice and shouted, “Let’s move it! We’re working on borrowed time here.”

With everyone in the launch bay watching, he clicked on his duty belt and led Magnolia and Layla to the ladder. Bumping his chin pad a second time, he opened a line to engineering.

“Raptor One to Samson, do you copy?”

He waited a second while Samson secured the line.

“Copy that, Michael. Where are you?”

“On my way topside. Any idea what the problem is yet?”

There was a frustrating pause.

They stopped at the bottom of the ladder, and Magnolia uncoiled the rope. She handed one end to Layla, who looped it through three steel clips attached to the bottom of her chest armor, just above her navel, and tied it in a figure eight.

Michael accepted the line when she was finished, and did the same thing. He didn’t like the idea of being tethered to someone as unpredictable as Magnolia, but orders were orders. Captain Jordan wanted her up there with them, so he must think she would be useful on the mission.

Samson’s voice came over the line as Michael secured the rope. He took the coil of slack and clipped it on his belt.

“We’ve troubleshot all three rudders from the back end,” Samson said. “It’s an electrical problem. You’ll need to replace the wire and connect the rudders to a different grid.”

Michael grimaced as he grabbed the first rung of the ladder. Rewiring the rudders was a lot more complicated than closing an open circuit. Ten years ago, he had patched a gas bladder from inside it while men with guns tried to lead a mutiny against Captain Ash. If he could do that, this should be easy.

He was no longer a little boy called Tin. He was the commander of Team Raptor, and he would fix the rudders no matter what it took.

“Roger that, Samson. We’re on it.” Michael swung up onto the ladder.

The ship trembled again as he climbed toward the narrow tunnel above. The slack came out of the rope connecting him to the other divers. With each step, he kept three points of contact on the worn metal rungs. If he lost his grip, he would bring Layla and Magnolia with him.

As soon as he reached the hatch, a transmission crackled from the comms. “Raptor One, Captain Jordan. I want Magnolia taking point once you’re topside.”

Michael held on to the rungs and glanced down at Layla and Magnolia. No way in hell was he going to let Magnolia take the lead. She would probably see something shiny on the other side of the ship and get all three of them killed when she chased after it.

“You’re breaking up, Captain,” Michael said. “I didn’t catch your last.” Switching off the frequency with a bump of his chin, he opened the hatch that led outside.

Magnolia was the fastest and most agile diver aboard, but walking on top of the ship while surrounded by the biggest storm she had seen in years was daunting all the same.

She had been so-o-o-o close to winning back the credits she lost to Weaver two weeks ago. Now she was up here, tied to a couple of lovesick kids.

Ahead, Michael battled the fierce winds. The glow from his weird red battery unit guided them across the top of the ship. They were right on the edge of the swirling mass, getting pounded by sheets of wind-driven rain.

Magnolia swore.

“You okay back there?” Michael asked.

“Fine,” she lied.

Fearless, fast, and freaky. She liked Rodger’s addition to Weaver’s description of her. She did appreciate a man who could make her laugh. Hell, maybe if she survived this, she would share a mug of shine with Rodger and show him the true meaning of “freaky.”

Nah. He’s got to earn that.

She continued across the ship, ordering her priorities: fix the rudders, win those credits back, then decide whether to give Rodger a chance.

Ahead, Michael clipped a carabiner through the hole in a steel hanger and clipped the rope through the biner, then waved the team forward.

“Stay on the center line!” he shouted over the comm channel.

Magnolia could hardly hear him above the shrieking wind. Violent gusts slammed into the three divers as they worked their way aft.

Thunder boomed in the distance, like explosives going off in the center of the storm. A black fortress of clouds stretched across the horizon, blocking out the sun. If she hadn’t seen it before, she might have wondered whether the sun wasn’t just an invention from fairy tales.

Magnolia lowered her helmet and moved along the spine of the ship. The aluminum beam that ran along the top of the Hive was two and a half feet wide. To either side of the beam, the hull sloped away. Her boots had lug soles, but the surface was slick from the rain. A wrong step could send her sliding over the edge.

“Raptor One, you have thirty-five minutes to get us back online,” Hunt said over the comms.

Rain pummeled Magnolia’s armor. She wiped her visor clean, blinked, and focused on their destination. She could hardly feel any sense of motion beneath her, but she knew that the turbofans were whirring away under the ship’s belly, helping keep them aloft. Jordan was backing away from the storm, but it was expanding, and without the rudders, he couldn’t turn around.

Magnolia tightened her grip on the rope. The wind pushed against her, but she pushed back, fighting her way astern one step at a time. A spider web of lightning streaked across the sky, illuminating the scene.

Once, a long time ago, she had read in a book that there were more stars in the sky than grains of sand on the faraway beaches of Earth. The idea had made her feel small and lonely. She felt that way again now.

Magnolia tried not to think of herself as a tiny figure moving along the top of the vast metal ship. A slap of wind reminded her that she was not a kid anymore. She was a Hell Diver, and if she didn’t pay attention, she was going to end up as a very small and lonely splat on the ground four miles below.

“Almost there,” Michael yelled over the channel. He twisted slightly and clipped another carabiner to another hanger.

Magnolia still couldn’t see the rudders, but she could see the horizon of the drop-off that led to them. Michael clipped the rope into the biner, then clipped another bight of rope to the next hanger for backup, equalizing the tension between the two.

“I’ll go first,” he said. “We’re going to have to rappel down.”

A brilliant flash reflected off Layla’s mirrored visor. Magnolia didn’t need to see her features to know that the girl was scared. She had grabbed Michael’s hand and was holding on to it as if it were the only real thing in the world.

“Be careful,” she said. “I’ll kill you if you die.”

“I love you too,” he said.

They pressed their helmets together. Magnolia groaned. This was exactly why she didn’t have a boyfriend. Such cheesy, sentimental shit made her want to puke.

“Use a private channel,” she grumbled.

With his back to the storm, Michael bent his knees and kicked off, rappelling down the sheer wall of the stern. Layla stepped closer to watch, but Magnolia reached out and pulled her back.

“Careful, kiddo.” Magnolia winced as she said it. X had called her that, and she had hated it almost as much as being called “princess” by Weaver. Was she turning into one of those grumpy old Hell Divers who thought everyone under thirty was a kid?

“Okay, off rappel,” Michael said over the comms, letting them know he had disconnected from the rappel rope. “Layla, you’re next.”

Layla grabbed the slack rope, clipped it through her rappel device, and turned her helmet toward Magnolia. “See you down there, kiddo.”

Magnolia almost chuckled, but a thunderclap focused her. She turned to face the storm, determined but terrified. Brilliant arcs of electricity left behind blue tracers across her retinas. Blinking them away, she turned back to the edge. By the time she looked down, Layla was gone.

She waited for the all-clear from Layla, who would by then be with Michael, anchored to the stern ladder that ran past the access tunnel and its three protruding rudders.

After clipping in to the rappel line, Magnolia took in a deep breath and pushed off into the darkness.