“On my way.”
Jen grabbed her tool kit, letting the door seal behind her, boots ringing on metal grating. Seven was a vertical warren of ladders and catwalks that stank of machine oil and salt. She’d learned every twist and passage in her first month. Now herbody moved on autopilot—east corridor, through the bulkhead door, heading for Level 3.
“Chief?”
Jen turned.
A young woman hurried toward her, tablet clutched to her chest. The collar of a pink T-shirt peeked out beneath her orange coveralls—her newest junior engineer, Caro Sparks. “I’m seeing a spike in missile tube seven’s coolant pressure. Maybe it’s a glitch but—I didn’t want to ignore it.”
Jen stopped. She had all the time in the world for Caro. She knew how hard it was to be a woman in this environment. “Quick. Show me.” She took the tablet, scanned the data. “It’s within tolerance. Keep monitoring. If it spikes again, flag me.”
“Got it. I’m heading back to the missile deck right now.” Caro hesitated. “And, uh, thanks for looking at my system efficiency proposal. I know you’re busy?—”
“It’s good work, Caro.” Jen broke into a jog, talking over her shoulder. “Needs refinement, but the core concept is solid. We’ll review it next week.”
Caro’s face lit up. “Really? That’s—yeah, okay. Thanks, Chief.”
Heat hit Jen like a wall the moment she entered lower engineering—thick, wet and oppressive. The machinery down here ran harder than anywhere else on the rig. Coolant pumps chugged away at the seawater they pulled through the system. Hydraulic lines hissed. Backup generators stood ready to power the entire station if the main systems decided to take a day off.
Max crouched beside a prone figure near the coolant manifold with Smith and Cutter—both propulsion techs, both pale under the fluorescent lights that turned everyone vaguely corpselike.
Stoller was on the floor. Blood matted his hair, a dark wet smear down his skull. His arm lay twisted, his chest rising in shallow breaths.
Shit.
Jen skidded to her knees. “What the hell happened?” She pressed fingers to Stoller’s neck. Faint pulse and his skin had a sickly greenish cast.
“He was checking the coolant manifold.” Max’s voice was strained. “He radioed he heard something—rattling, maybe. Next thing, nothing. We found him like this.”
She bent to examine Stoller more closely. The blood came from a wound at the back of his skull, just above where his neck met bone. The edges were torn. Not clean like a slice from sheet metal. More like blunt force, skin split against something unforgiving.
“Explain to me how someone hits the back of their head checking a coolant line,” she muttered.
Smith stared at his boots while Cutter shrugged.
Super helpful.
She pulled a penlight from her kit and checked his pupils. Left, blown wide, swallowing the iris. Right, a pinpoint. Her stomach clenched.
She wasn’t a medic. But everyone on the station cross-trained because when you were forty-seven miles from the nearest hospital, and you learned to handle things yourself.
Possible fracture. Brain bleed. Damn.
She checked the wound once more to be sure.Someone did this.And whoever it was—was still on Seven. She kept her mouth shut. No point panicking the men until she knew more.
“We need to get him to medical.” She looked up at her team. “And we need to call for an evac. This is beyond Doc’s pay grade.”
Max hesitated. “Chief, you know what happens if we call for an evac. Command’s gonna be pissed about the attention.”
Jen boosted up to her feet. “I’m not risking his life because Command doesn’t like paperwork. Get the stretcher and a neck brace.” She jerked a hand in command at Smith and Cutter. “Move.”
Smith and Cutter took off. Max stayed beside her as she shrugged off her heavy jacket and draped it over Stoller. While she waited for the two men to return, Jen keyed the radio, switching to the command channel. “Chief James requesting immediate medevac. We have a crew member with a serious head trauma in lower engineering.”
A beat of resistance crackled back. “Copy that Chief. Making the call.”
“Chief,” Max murmured. “This feels wrong.”
She glanced around the shadowy space. He was right. “I need Doc to meet us in the med bay.”
