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Elissa took a last look at Lin, bright and alive, surrounded by people who’d told her she was human, who’d told her she was worth as much as any of them, who were prepared to die with her.
I did that. I gave her that. And it’s okay that she’s not even noticing me, not thinking about what I had to lose to do it. I didn’t do it for what I could get. But if I can just have a few minutes
—
here at the end of everything
—
just a few minutes to get something for myself . . .

She followed Cadan down the steps from the bridge.

As she stepped onto the lower area of the flight deck, the ship shook, the shields dropping another increment. Once through the trapdoor that led into the corridor, Cadan turned, taking hold of one of the grab handles set into the wall. Elissa climbed down after him and curled her fingers around the grab handle nearest her. Above them the door clamped shut.

“Elissa.”

He’d never said her name that way before. She felt it the way she’d felt him look at her, as if he’d reached out and touched her skin. Her heartbeat picked up.

“I didn’t want you on the ship,” he said.

Oh
. She took half a step back, feeling slapped.

His face changed. “No. Wait. I need you to listen. I’ve gone through a hundred ways of saying this, and none of them come out right. But if I don’t—if I don’t say it now—” His eyes were intent on her face, his hand white on the grab handle. “I’ve run out of time. I have to say it now, whether it comes out right or not.”

Another blast hit the deteriorating shields. Elissa felt it go through her, a vibration through every nerve and bone and muscle.

“I didn’t want you here,” Cadan said. “For ages I’ve thought you were—okay, I thought you were spoiled, and self-centered. And way too pretty for your own good. And I”—he flushed—“I wanted you to be impressed by me. When I’d been at flight school for a while, there was this time, I remember I came back and you—you weren’t a little girl anymore. And like I said,
far
too pretty. But anything I did that you should have been impressed by, you
never
were with Carlie and Marissaum cl b. You always just gave me this
look
, and it was like whatever I did, however high I climbed, I’d always be the kid who was lucky to be there, who’d never really belonged. It’s when I started calling you princess—do you remember?”

“I remember. But, Cadan, I
never
—”

“No. No. You have to let me say it. You’ve changed. You’re brave, and tough. I mean, it’s not like I can see you fighting pirates—or firing against other ships like your sister’s doing. But you’re . . . well, I wouldn’t like to have to work against you, I can tell you that. And thinking you were self-centered—I don’t think you even remember
how
to put yourself first anymore.” He hesitated. “Maybe that was always there, and I just never noticed it. Maybe it’s me who’s changed. Or maybe it’s just this last couple of days, with everything that’s
happened . . .” He paused again, swallowed, and she saw that the corners of his lips, as well as his hand, were white.

“I love you,” said Cadan. “I know it’s the worst possible time to say it, and it won’t mean anything because it can’t, because it’s too late, and I’m an idiot to even want to tell you—” He swallowed again. “I just wanted to tell you. That’s it. I love you.”

She felt that go through her too. She stared at him, her body locked into motionlessness, the words vibrating through every nerve and bone and muscle.

“I wrecked your career,” she said.

“Yes.”

“I’m in the middle of getting you killed.”

Cadan gave a tiny, rueful smile. “And again, yes.” There was a breath of a pause, then he shifted, made a little dismissive gesture with the hand holding the grab handle. “Like I said, I’m an idiot. I wouldn’t even be telling you if we weren’t in the middle of getting killed. So, please, feel free to finish it off by telling me that you wouldn’t be interested even if I were the last person on the last ship in the whole of the known universe—”

“I can’t.”

He’d begun to look away, but now his gaze jerked back to her. “You can’t?”

“I can’t. I can’t tell you that. I . . . it’s crazy, and it’s—oh my God—
so
the wrong time, but I—” Their eyes met, and suddenly she was shivering. “I was in love with you when I was
thirteen
,” she said. “Then you got all grown-up, and were such a
pain
, and I told myself I didn’t care, and I didn’t even like you. Then, on the ship . . .” It was difficult to keep looking at him. She dropped her gaze, talking to the floor, heat
rising in her cheeks. “Like I said, I thought you were amazing when I was a kid. And now, seeing you doing your job, everything you’ve done to help me and Lin . . . how I used to feel about you—it all came back.”

“ ‘It all’? You mean . . . the stuff you felt when you were thirteen?”

Her face was flaming now. She still hadn’t raised her head, but she_her faceing to heard all the layers of questions in his voice and forced herself to look up. “An awful lot more than I felt when I was thirteen.”

Cadan stepped across the space between them, taking hold of the grab handle above where she held it. Their hands brushed. Her mind short-circuited at the jolt of his skin against hers.

“It
is
crazy,” he said. “And the wrong time. And there’s probably no point to any of it, because, like you said, you’re in the middle of getting me killed.” Pain flashed in his eyes, but amusement, too, and she couldn’t help laughing a little, dizzy with the feel of him standing so close to her.

“I’m sorry,” she said, for the sake of saying something.

“Oh, well,” Cadan said. “I’m not looking to change anything.” He leaned down, his hand sliding to cover hers, his other hand braced against the wall next to her waist, and he kissed her.

Another blast rocked the ship, tipping them sideways, Cadan’s arm close around Elissa and his body between her and the wall.

The ship wouldn’t hold out against the attacks forever. She hadn’t told him yet that she loved him. She must, she must say the words before it was too late. As soon as she had breath to speak, she needed to tell him . . .

Above them the door to the flight deck sprang open. They both jumped, heads jerking up to look.

Lin’s face was pale, her eyes wide. “You have to get back to the bridge. Quick!”

Cadan leapt up the steps, pushing past where Lin stood. Elissa hurried after him to grasp her sister’s arm. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

“You have to get up there too.”

“But why? What’s happened?”

Lin yanked her arm away. “Don’t ask questions. Just go, Lissa, please!”

Elissa ran up the steps to the bridge, confused, heart pounding. What could have gone wrong that needed both Cadan and her to fix it? What was the crew doing? And why was Lin not following—?

She got onto the bridge. “What is it? Cadan?”

He whirled to face her. “Lissa! Don’t let the door shut!”

But it was too late. Behind her the barrier thumped closed. Cadan raced toward her, slammed his hand on the panel that should have reopened it. There was no swish of it obeying him, but Elissa’s attention was on the sight in front of her.

On the floor Ivan and Felicia lay sprawled, as if they’d fallen where they’d been standing. Markus was slumped in his seat, held up only by the safety harness.

It was so not what she’d expected, so inexplicable, that Elissa just stared for a moment, unable to take it in.

“Lin!” shouted Cadan, and Elissa spun to see him bang his hand against the barrier. Above the thumbprint panel a little red
X
shone out. The door was locked. “Lin, open this door!”

“What are you doing?” Elissa asked. “How can she have locked the door? Against
you
?”

Cadan didn’t answer. He banged on the glass again.
“Lin!”
with Carlie and Marissake”rt

No answer.

Elissa pushed in next to him, panic icing her blood as she saw the flight deck stretching empty beyond the suddenly impenetrable door. What was going on? Where had Lin gone? And what had happened to the crew?

Lin came out of the hyperdrive chamber. The ship lurched beneath another blast as she did, and she grabbed, one-handed, for a hold. With her other arm she cradled a slim black box. The hyperdrive.

The hyperdrive?
Elissa banged on the door. “Lin! What are you doing? Why have you locked us in?”

Lin bent, laid the hyperdrive carefully on the floor. Her hair swung over her face, and she didn’t answer.

“Lin!”

Lin went back out of sight. Elissa looked up at Cadan. “She’s in the hyperdrive chamber again. What is she doing? Can you open the door?”

His face was overcast with confusion and anger, his hand still pressed hard against the glass. “She’s overridden it somehow. It’s not responding to my thumbprint. She— I had no idea she could do that, operate machines so precisely. And I don’t know what she’s doing. She—”

He broke off. Lin had come back, on hands and knees this time, presumably because it was safer to roll rather than carry the thing she was bringing back with her. The energy cell.

She rolled it across the floor, then reattached one of its cables to the hyperdrive. The other lay slack beside her. Its two-pronged plug was clearly visible from where they stood, and a little shiver ran over Elissa’s skin. Lin must have pulled it out of the place where the dead Spare was, must have—
ugh
,
how could she?
—broken the glass cylinder and pulled it out of his skull. Elissa had hardly been able to bear seeing it. What was Lin doing, salvaging the disgusting thing?

“Lin!”
said Cadan again, and this time his voice was sharp not with irritation but with fright. “Talk to us. You’ve locked us in, you’ve incapacitated my crew—you can’t be worried we’ll interfere.”

Interfere?
With what? What was Lin doing that she wouldn’t want them to interfere with? And why did Cadan sound suddenly afraid? In the back of Elissa’s mind, like the slow drip of a faucet, a little voice began to repeat a single word.
No. No. No. No
. If Lin could lock the barrier without touching it, overriding even Cadan’s thumbprint, she could operate the spaceship controls from outside the bridge. The spaceship controls, including the hyperdrive.

Lin stood up, pushed her hair back, and looked at them. There were tears running down her face. In Elissa’s head the drips got faster, louder, all joined together.
Nononononononono.

“I don’t see why everyone should die,” Lin said clearly, through the glass.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Elissa’s voice came out shrill. “What are you doing? What are you doing with that thing?”

“It didn’t break,” said Lin. Despite the tears her voice was so calm, it sounded flat. “The only thing it needs is an energy source.”

“No! activated. Security breached at Section her faceing to ”
It came out as a shriek. “Lin, don’t even think about it!”

Lin shook her head. “Ssh. It’s just stupid, us all dying when we don’t need to. And no one else can do anything.”

Elissa fought to make her voice come out quietly, trying to get through to her sister. “Lin, you can’t. You know how
it hurt you before, you know what that thing does. And that one doesn’t even work properly—”

“It worked properly for years before it went wrong.”

Elissa felt another shriek pressing against the sides of her throat. Lin just kept talking so
calmly
, as if she actually thought she was talking about something reasonable, something that made sense.

“It didn’t just
go wrong
. It killed that boy! It doesn’t work. It’ll kill you, too.”

Just a shiver of emotion ran over Lin’s face before it tightened again. “Probably not right away, though.”

“Lin.”
Oh God, it was no good trying to control her voice. She was crying too now, much more messily than the slow slide of tears down Lin’s face. She had to force the words out through sobs. “Lin, the pain, it’s too much. It killed him. It’ll kill you.”

“Maybe not.” Her eyes met Elissa’s. “And if it does, it still makes more sense than all of us dying.”

“
How
does that make sense? It doesn’t make sense! It
doesn’t
.”

Behind Elissa, Ivan spoke. “What . . . ? Cadan, what’s going on?”

Elissa snatched a look back. He and Felicia were sitting up, and Markus was straightening in his seat, hand to his head. Whatever Lin had done to them, it had been precisely timed. She hadn’t intended to make them unconscious for any longer than it took her to get Cadan and Elissa here, to shut them up so they couldn’t stop this awful, insane plan.
How did she even do it? If I’d known she could do that . . . But oh God, all this worrying about what she might do to other people
—
I never thought to worry about what she might do to herself
.

Frantic, Elissa turned to Cadan. “
You
talk to her! Make her listen!”

“No,” said Lin, speaking to Cadan as well. “You listen to me instead. You need to give Elissa something—a sedative or a painkiller or something. When I use the hyperdrive, it’s going to hurt her if she’s not drugged.”

How long had she been thinking about this? It had to have been since they’d discovered the Spare. If Elissa had never left her, if Elissa had stayed, Lin wouldn’t have gotten the chance to knock out the crew. And oh, to think she’d
wanted
Lin to develop empathy, to care about other people.
If I’d known, I’d never have made her feel bad about what she’d done, I’d never have tried to get her to be different. Oh God, Lin . . .

With a shock Elissa suddenly realized Cadan was no longer looking at Lin, but down at her. She didn’t need a when you were very youngnd cl b telepathic link to know what he was thinking.

“Don’t you
dare
,” she said. “Don’t you dare even
think
about drugging me. You have to get the door open. You have to find a way to stop her!”