Avalon

“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.