During Sunday’s “Afternoon Tea,” the air surrounding me and Felix festers with tension. He doesn’t apologize, and nor do I. Although, he does update us on knowledge he acquired while Huxley and I were together.

“There have been increased shipments of aluminium,” Felix states. “At first, it didn’t particularly stick out. But then I realized we don’t customarily import aluminium—magnesium is our choice of lightweight structural metal. After a bit of digging and a lot of decrypting, I discovered the true name of the import: ‘Fibronium.’”

I swivel my head to look at Timour. He’s already staring at me with wide eyes.

“You’ve heard of it?” Felix questions.

Timour nods, and I repeat what he once told me, “Stronger than tungsten, lighter than magnesium, and very toxic.”

“Any special properties?”

“It blocks EMPs,” Timour answers, “high damping capacity, and used correctly, it’s bulletproof.”

Felix tilts his head, impressed. “Well, those are special.”

“Anything else?” I wonder.

“What, the fibronium isn’t good enough for you, sweetheart?”

I shrug. “I remember a certain someone announcing that Boss would tell him all his plans and secrets.”

“All?” Felix scoffs sardonically. “You can’t be serious.”

I give him a sour look. “Did he say anything to you?”

“And what if he did?” He lifts his chin and pretentiously sips his alcoholic tea.

Timour’s eyes shift back and forth, from Felix to me then Felix again, and he chooses to address the Quartermaster, “Look, man, I don’t know what’s going on between you guys, but let’s not kill time acting like children. What else did you learn?”

I’m surprised when Felix simply sighs, responding, “There’s a recent order. It hasn’t shipped yet, but I thought it odd, since it was labeled ‘mildew.’”

“Like the fungus?” Timour queries.

“That’s the only kind of mildew I’m familiar with.”

“Why is he ordering mildew?” I ask.

“Perhaps composting is a new hobby of his—frankly, it’s a fine stress reliever. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention, he requested fifty-eight-thousand kilograms of the stuff.”

Oh. My. God. “So not mildew,” I conclude.

“Most likely not.”

* * *

Ice travels up my forearm, waking me in the middle of the night. Did someone turn on the air conditioning? It’s too early for this, especially on a Monday.

Reaching over to cover myself with more blankets, the fogginess trickles out of my mind as I comprehend two things: No one else has access to my thermostat, and only my left arm is cold. Maybe I accidentally cut off its circulation during sleep. I shake my arm to restore feeling—

I feel fire.

I jump, bumping my head against the wall behind me and pulling my arm back—anything to rid the sharp pain. The movement causes water to drip down my arm in searing rivulets. No, not water.

Blood.

Something crashes into the headboard beside me. Too dark to see what.

I scurry off the bed, landing gracelessly on my knees, and flick on the nearest light. A string of blades a meter tall and seventy centimeters wide comprise the deadly robot on my bed, staring at me with one beady eye—a camera. The thin blades pack together and slither toward me.

But this is no snake.

The creature undulates at an impossible speed, an impossible angle, and if I step on it, the knives will cut my feet in half.

I duck just as one of its “arms” tries to puncture my face. It leaves a hole in my upper arm instead, and I scream.

Forcing myself to endure the agony while I quickly pull my arm out of the blade, I sprint to the main door. It’s locked from the outside. Spinning around, I take out Huxley’s gun from the garter on my thigh and fire at the approaching robot.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Useless. The creature seamlessly shifts its blades to the side, becoming so thin it’s virtually invisible. The bullets lodge in the floor and wall; my enemy’s unharmed but doused in my blood.

I rush into the bathroom, close the door, and lock it. Unstrapping my portal, I call the first person I think of—

The robot drills through the door, resembling a giant eastern Hercules beetle. No time. I throw my portal into the dry sink as it’s ringing and hop over the bug. A pincer runs down my calf, drawing a fountain of blood. I cry out as I land on the other side. I shoot at the robot again, and the first bullet hits, but the rest miss after the robot shifts its blades.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Exiting the bathroom, I scan the main door again, but there’s no way I can shoot through the lock nor the hinges. Maybe I could with a high power rifle or shotgun. Not with a little pistol.

I examine the messy bed and broken headboard, above it an air duct within reach. It’s small, but I can fit. However, I doubt I’d be able to shimmy very far before the robot spaghettifies me.

I turn my head, and a light emanating from the fake window temporarily blinds me. A light that has no business shining from the perpetual sunset of Na Pali Coast. A bullet earlier left a hole in the wall portraying the simulated environment—the white light is coming from another room, which means the wall isn’t very thick. Nor is it made of dense material.

I hear a clink clink clink behind me. I need to move. I start by throwing my gun onto the couch. Scrambling over to the circular table, I pick up a chair with metal legs, my arms’ nociceptors so overloaded with pain they’re numb, and throw it as hard as I can at the bullethole. Two legs snap off the chair, but at least cracks are forming around the small opening.

I swipe a leg from the floor and hack at the fissures in the wall. Again and again and again, until the skin on my hand is peeled away by the jagged edges of a hole just big enough for me to fit through. I drop the chair leg. Glancing back, I watch the robot undulate toward me like a serpent, and I get the hell out of there.

I practically fall through the hole, landing into a hallway with elevators directly in front of me. I crawl to my feet as the creature follows, now in huntsman spider form. Damn it, who sent this son of a—

Yes. Yes, that’s what I need. I run—it’s more of a skip since my legs refuse to function—a few meters down the hall where a transparent fire cabinet exhibits fire extinguishers, axes, and CirCuts. CirCuts are small gadgets that you stick on a device to halt its electrical flow. Usually they’re used to open locked doors or lower the chance of electrocution during a fire, but… desperate times.

Opening the cabinet, I grab one oval CirCut, pull the bottom tag to release the copper wires, and chuck it at the robot spider a meter away. The blades dodge it. My next throw strikes a leg, and that leg goes limp, but the spider keeps advancing. Fine. Snatching a third CirCuit, I wait half a second then fall to my knees, stretching my “good” arm until my hand covers the unblinking eye.

The robot shuts down, most of the knives crashing to the floor in a rain of indestructible ice.

Unbearable pain blossoms from my stomach, and I gasp. Looking down, I see a string of blades lodged in my abdomen, blood staining my red tank top a darker shade.

Did this just happen?

My head spins, my eyes repeatedly blink, and I don’t realize I’ve collapsed—but I think I have, because the back of my head pounds and all I feel is white. White, like a blank canvas. But I’m afraid if I draw my mother again, I’ll draw her with a third eye.

The sensory universe gradually fades out, similar to the heat departing my body. I’m shivering.

“Ailee!” someone exclaims, the voice sounding as though it’s traveling through water. Curly blond hair and ocean-blue eyes fill my vision, shading me from the penetrating light.

“Are you an angel?” I try to ask, but my lips barely move.

The angel’s brows crease, and he shakes his head, his eyes incapable of staying at one location as he inspects my body. “Oh my G—what am I—what hap—” he curses and removes his shirt, applying pressure to my stomach. He starts speaking into a portal.

I watch, fascinated as tears roll down his cheeks. “No, don’t cry.” It’s hard to breathe.

“Doctor River,” he rushes, “I need your—I know what time it is!—I need your help right now. Ailee is—she—she’s dying.” His voice cracks. “She’s so cold—I don’t know if I should move her, I—”

The woman on the other end asks a question.

“Stab wounds. A lot of blood,” he answers.

She barks out an order.

“Okay, okay. Hurry!” the angel demands.

My eyes close.

When they open, I’m in an emergency room. There’s something stuck to my face. I attempt to grab it, but my arms are pinned to the bed. Ugh, this brings up memories I abhor.

“What in the ever-living hell is going on?” a man complains as he strides into the room from the right. “I get a call at three in the morning to clean up an intribot, and I just have to get a look at the moron who—” The man’s black eyes widen when they fall on me. He stops, then runs closer, but a woman steps in his path.

“You can’t be in here, Thomson,” she states.

“Get out of my way, Nupan,” Thomson commands, pushing her.

Nupan pushes back.

“Help her!” Thomson yells, gesturing to me. “She’s lying there like a corpse, and you’re all just staring at her?”

“If you don’t calm down immediately, I’ll tranquilize you,” Nupan threatens, holding up a dart gun.

“We hooked her up to—” Doctor River begins, standing by my legs.

“I don’t care what machine you’re using on her, she’s been stabbed—” he shuts up when Nupan aims her gun at him and glares at her.

“It will heal her faster than anything a team of human surgeons can do,” Doctor River says.

Thomson clenches his teeth. Sighs. “Will she be alright?”

“We’re trying everything we can. She’s lost a lot of blood—”

“But she’s awake, isn’t that a good sign?”

“In most cases, yes.”

“Doctor?” I call. My voice is gravel, and my eyes won’t stop blinking.

She rushes closer to me. “Hey there. How are you feeling?”

“Terrible.” I chuckle—a mistake. My insides are tearing apart. “The pain is—there’s a lot of pain.”

She tilts her head, confused.

“Give her more oxycodone,” the angel says. Timour. He’s sitting on my left, wearing a different shirt, and holding my hand. “Holding” is a loose term. He’s more letting my hand rest atop of his.

“I already gave her the highest dose,” Doctor River explains. “Any more, and she may fall into a coma. Does she have a history of drug abuse?”

I begin to reply, but she isn’t asking me.

Timour shakes his head. “I don’t think so. She wouldn’t be a Sergeant if she did.”

Nupan shrugs, interjecting, “Well, she has connections.”

“The drug abuse would need to be recent for there to be this large of an effect,” Doctor River states.

“Unless she’s had access to drugs on this ship…” Timour trails off.

“You’d be surprised,” Thomson asserts.

Timour cuts him a sharp look. “What do you mean?”

“You can get opioids anywhere. There are no drug-related crimes on Titan. Just ask Nalani how many overdose patients she treats every week.”

“Too many,” the doctor swiftly responds, shutting down further inquiry.

“The serum I gave her during the investigation didn’t work either,” Nupan adds. “It might be genetic.”

“Ailee,” Doctor River’s brown eyes bore into mine, “I can administer anesthesia if you’d like.”

As I become more conscious, the tortuous aching pulsates more frequently. I nod.

“Okay, hang tight.” She rolls over a tall, thin machine resembling a computer, and links it to the breathing machine.

The last sensation I’m aware of is Thomson tenderly touching my right hand. Warmth.