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A large Thorzi cargo vessel floated through space, a hole ripped into its silver hull on the side nearest us. From here, the bodies of the Thorzi warriors that floated through the rift were little more than pinpricks of moving light, reflecting the suns’ light off icy skin. But Lethen zoomed in, and we saw them, frozen and dead. Lost in space before we could reach them.
“The humans,” Lethen mumbled, a heavy scowl on his face.
It was where any hybrid’s mind would be—where any Thorzi’s mind should be. The humans Crux brought to us from Earth had saved our people. Most Thorzi saw them as weak, as a means to an end, but we owed them better than a frigid, agonizing death so far from home.
“They are still on the ship,” I said, glaring at the screen. There were bodies, sure, but they were large and blue. I didn’t see a pink or brown among them. Crux would have kept them safe near the bridge of the ship. It was the engine room that had been torn open—a loss of capable Thorzi, but the humans were still safe.
“Until they have another hull breach.” Aldor grimaced, and the screen shifted to the slight Zathki ship attacking Crux’s, blasting through the hole and widening it, digging deeper toward the center of Crux’s vessel.
“Open fire,” I commanded.
In a flash, Jax had the plasma blasters pointed at the Zathki, his teeth bared in a growl. A few shots, and that was all it took. The moment they realized they were outnumbered, they warped away like the cowards they were.
That did not mean this was over. Crux’s ship was badly damaged. Hard enough to keep a Thorzi warrior alive in space, but with defenses down and the hull breached, there was no telling whether the humans had gravity, or even air. Already, they could be frozen and lifeless in that dying vessel.
“We need to move. I want us on that ship, evacuating survivors. Now.” I was out of my seat and down the short hallway to the dock. Our ship was a fraction the size of Crux’s, but it was sleeker, faster, made for defending our planet, not for traveling the long way to Earth and back.
Thorzi cargo ships had multiple access points. Aldor docked on the far side of the damaged hull. Unless every wall inside had been ripped open, there would be survivors. I had to believe that—that my mother’s people would not be brought all this way, get so close to their new home, only to die out in the cold of space.
As I stood before the closed hatch while the ship attached, a single breath cleared my mind, and the doors between our ship and Crux’s opened.
There, already waiting on the other side, were bleeding Thorzi, Crux himself with his arm slung around the shoulders of another warrior who was listing sideways.
“Life systems are failing,” Crux’s navigator told us, voice tight with anxiety.
On the way past us, Crux grabbed my arm. “The humans. I did not travel to far Earth to leave them here to die.”
My jaw set hard. “I will find them.”
He nodded once and released me, allowing his crewmates to help him onto our ship while we cleaned up his mess.
“Lethen. Jax. With me.”
The ship’s grav sim was offline, but a tap of my toe against the heel of my other boot activated the magnetism that kept me attached to the metal floor of the ship.
Each step took strength to detach from the floor, but when we made it to the bridge, lights were flashing red. Sirens wailed a warning, as if the sparking wall would not have caught our attention.
Lethen fought his way to the nearest console. His thick brow furrowed as he worked the controls, but in moments he’d returned our gravity with a stomach-churning lurch. I disengaged the magnets on my boots.
“There is not much time,” Lethen said, frowning at us over the flashing console. With the engine room gone, the life-support systems would be working overdrive to pump air into open space, to heat the freezing void outside.
Already, the temperature had begun to drop at the center of the ship. We had minutes. Maybe less.
There was a shout from the nearest hall. Jax was already across the bridge. He slammed his hand on the panel to open the door to the next corridor.
The hallway itself was nondescript, same as any other Thorzi ship, lined with sleeping quarters for our kind. But there at the end of the hall, his knees on the floor after the quick push of gravity, panting as the air grew thinner and bruised after being tossed around, was Crux’s son, my half-brother, Vorian.
“Stars’ blessings, our savior is here,” he ground out between his teeth, his solid-blue eyes narrowed my way.
“If you would prefer to die, we will leave you here.” Jax marched past him before he had a chance to rise.
Jax and Vorian hated one another—nearly as much as I suspected Vorian hated me. But there he was, in the middle of this corridor, when he could have followed his father to safety. For his father’s approval or for the sake of the humans, he had stayed behind to try and save the humans.
I followed Jax to the end of the hall, the largest room and the last door. The panel slid aside, and there were beds along the walls, and humans crumpled on them or on the floor, shaking and terrified. There was a sharp scent in the air, not like cold metal, but like warm blood.
There I stood in the doorway, as heads turned our way, every face featuring wide, fearful eyes. Blanched skin. Some bleeding the same ruby red that coursed through my veins.
“I am Kaelum. You are safe.”
