I study the determination on his face and know he's committed. "It's magnetized and many times our size! Either it gets me, or it gets both of us. Let. Me. Go."
Holo strains and cries out as his wrists dislocate.
"Holo—" My ultro races as I glance up at my fate. "It's not going to stop. Please don't destroy yourself for me, or saving you from yourself will have been for nothing."
Holo shakes his head in denial, and I think back to Diesel talking of Holo losing his mind during their BloodCypher stage. Holo was not mentally strong enough for the suit. They inducted him because Diesel needed him to become the machine they needed him to be.
I grab my rifle, fight the magnetic pull, and point it at him. “Save Kelta. Take good care of her.”
Holo grimaces and cries out as his knees and ankles split.
“It’s okay. I’ve had a taste of heaven.” I use the muzzle of my rifle to add a bit of pressure to Holo’s grip, and it finally slips.
I’m promptly sucked up into the sky, where I plant heavily against a magnetic panel. My rifle clangs against the ship’s belly beside me. Holo hugs the boulder and doesn’t join me, for which I’m grateful.
Poison Arrow hovers away from him. I watch the dunes pass and tilt as we bank away from the desert. The planet shrinks, and we head toward the stars. Kelta stands beside her crumpled pod, braids drifting in the breeze of the ship’s engines.
I already miss her wild beauty and the powerful way she touched me. I hang on to the memories as the atmosphere vanishes and the cold darkness of space greets me, for they are my only source of heat up here.
