“Sure, Captain.” The soldier tucks the e-filer under one arm. “We’ve just got to search the shuttle.”
I freeze, heart stopping for a split second.
“Search the shuttle?” Jubilee echoes, her voice sharpening. “Why? There’s no point; if anyone had stowed away, they’re going right back to the surface.”
The soldier on duty shrugs. “It’s commander’s orders. Came through right before you landed.”
“Before—before I landed?” Her head half turns, but she catches herself before she can look at me. They know. Somehow, they suspect I’m here. Or that Jubilee has been sheltering a fugitive. Maybe someone at the spaceport recognized my face before I got on board.
“Yes, sir.” The soldier regards her with respect, but shows no signs of wavering.
She hesitates. “Fine, fine, search it. But make it quick.” She stalks back up the aisle, footsteps tense and quick. She comes to a halt right beside the row I’m hiding behind, her body further concealing me.
I sink down, no longer able to risk watching through the seat cracks. Instead I can hear their booted feet clanking up the grid floor, the dull click and slam of lockers opening and hatches being inspected. Getting closer.
Jubilee’s grip is white-knuckled on the armrest beside my head. The soldiers—I can make out three distinct sets of footsteps—are nearly on us.
“Satisfied?” she says, interrupting them. “They need me on the ground, I can’t afford to get stuck up here on the wrong side of a blockade.”
The footsteps halt. “Yeah, yeah, okay,” says the one who insisted on the search. “You’re good. Move out, guys.”
I let out a slow, silent breath as the footsteps start to retreat. I can see Jubilee’s shoulders relax a fraction, and with the soldiers in retreat, she spares a glance at me; her eyes are wide, but there’s relief on her features. She turns to make her way up the aisle and head for the cockpit.
“Wait—Captain, your paperwork!”
The moment freezes, then unspools with slow, heavy finality. The booted feet come running back up the aisle. Jubilee whirls back around. A voice breaks the fuzzy roar in my ears. “There’s someone here,” it says. I look up, and there’s a soldier staring at me. His hand moves toward the gun holstered at his hip. The other two soldiers are coming up behind him. I look up for Jubilee and find her eyes on me in an instant of horrified indecision.
Then she flows into action. Lunging forward, she grabs at the man near me and hauls him down so she can knee his shoulder. The gun drops from his nerveless hand. Jubilee’s boot catches the man’s jaw, then she steps forward to get an elbow under the chin of the second soldier, this one a woman, sending her reeling backward to hit the wall with a crack. Jubilee’s perfect, deadly, a predator.
All this has happened in the space of a heartbeat. Jubilee whirls to face the third soldier, a man who has kept his distance just enough to escape the initial blows. “Captain,” he gasps, clearly afraid. “I am placing you under arrest for assault and—and treason—”
Jubilee’s breathing hard, her muscles tense. “Back away, Private. This isn’t your fight. Take your friends to the sick bay, and report me there.”
The third soldier hesitates, his eyes swiveling from Jubilee to the two motionless bodies slumped on the floor. Then his fingers twitch, barely noticeable, but it’s enough; Jubilee sees him reach for his gun and gets there a moment before he does, the two of them grappling for the Gleidel. A bolt screams in the confined space of the shuttle, but dissipates harmlessly off the metal interior.
Jubilee wrenches the gun from his grip and then lashes out with it, slamming it into the soldier’s temple. It’s over before I can blink.
Jubilee stands above the three unconscious soldiers, chest heaving as though she’s run for hours. Gun in hand, she has her feet planted firmly, like she’s ready to start all over again. Nothing I’ve heard about her is true. She’s even faster than they say. She could have killed me a dozen times each day we’ve been together.
Though we’re only standing there a few seconds, it’s longer than it took her to drop the three soldiers. Finally she moves, looking at me over her shoulder and then tossing me the gun she took from the soldier. “Know how to use one of these?”
I swallow as I catch it, my stomach uneasy. “You sure about this?”
“Just point that end at the bad guys if we make it back to Avon.”
“And who are the bad guys?”
She doesn’t have an answer for me, and for a moment I can see the weight of what she’s done in her eyes. She’s crossed the line. When these trodairí wake, they’ll report her for treason. Like me, she can never go home.
Jubilee clears her throat, and then the two of us drag the unconscious soldiers out onto the platform, concealing them behind some cargo containers. It won’t last long; someone will find them, or else they’ll wake and sound the alarm. But it’ll buy us a little time. Time to figure out our next move. We clamber back aboard, and this time Jubilee has me sit in the copilot’s chair. She starts flipping switches, so quick and so sure that I almost can’t see the way her hands are shaking. But I can tell by the set of her jaw she doesn’t want to talk about it, doesn’t want to process what she’s done. She just wants to keep moving, and that much I understand.
The shuttle shudders as the autolaunch takes hold of us, and there’s a faint sense of movement as we’re lined up on a launching pad. Jubilee’s silent as she programs in the holding pattern. The computers take over. There’s another shudder, and a hum, and then I’m pressed back against my seat as we’re shot out into space once more. Neither of us speaks as Jubilee guides us forward. She’s monitoring our course on a readout, the viewshields still in place; finally she stops, toggling another series of switches until the engine noise cuts back to a tiny hum and the cabin lights dim.