Tred had gotten some of the terminals functioning.

Most had been dark when he came in here, but they were hardy engineering lines, part of the larger power system of the ship itself.

They were meant mostly for the computers of each section to be able to communicate with each other.

But engineers being engineers, they had also put in a method for human communication: a message board.

He saw posts from power engineers all over the ship, talking about what they saw where they were.

Tred posted his situation. He got replies immediately from others, confirming that all signs of reactor breach had disappeared.

But the power system was still in flux, and they did not yet know why.

"Does anyone have eyes on Reactor Seven?" he asked.

No one did.

Why would that reactor be cut off from the others? It implied something was going wrong, but he did not know what.

It was the nearest active reactor to him, but he did not know if he could get there. He had to get out of here - there was enough ambient radiation that it was a bad idea to just wait for rescue. He'd have a dangerous dose in less than an hour, at this rate.

The most direct path to Reactor Seven was blocked. He couldn't even get there right now. He could go deeper in, up, then out, but he did not know where it was safe. If it was disconnected from the grid itself, then there was bad damage around it.

He got a notification; he was getting a signal, but it was strange.

His first thought was that it was alien; coming from that horrible alien megastructure, maybe. But it wasn't strong enough to be that.

Yet it had a complex pattern, it wasn't just junk from some broken equipment, which would have been his second guess.

"Convert to sound," he said. His system blatted at him that it had no systems for parsing the data.

His heart suddenly raced. "Use StarAngelDecoder," he ordered.

Words played in his ear.

"Tred? Tred, I don't know if you can hear me . . . it's Jophiel. Something's wrong, Tred, please hear me . . ."

"Jophiel?" he returned. He did not know if his message could possibly reach her; he was just broadcasting a radio signal over the open.

"Tred!" she cried, her signal getting stronger. "You can hear me!"

"I can receive your signal," he said.

Her people spoke in radio waves, he recalled. Of course, she was just . . . yelling, and he was getting the signal.

But he shouldn't be able to get it. The fusion reactor's shielding should be blocking her. Which meant that it was damaged!

"Jophiel, what are you seeing?" he asked. "You said something was wrong."

"Yes, there's something wrong with the reactor here. It started turning off, but there's still a problem. I don't know what it is, but it feels . . . wrong. I'm worried."

Stolen novel; please report.

"Are you in danger?" he asked.

"I don't know," she replied. "Maybe. But I'm worried about the rest of your ship. I can't see or hear anything out there. What's going on?"

"A lot of stuff," he told her. "Just try to hang on, okay? I'm going to try and figure out how to help you."

"Okay, Tred. Thank you . . ."

He got onto the board again, messaging the other engineers. While he waited for a reply, he looked again at the ship's power data. It continued to fluctuate . . . perhaps Reactor Seven still had some connection to the power grid and it was largely the communication lines that were cut?

It had spun down, but it would still have a lot of residual heat. If it was not containing it well, it could spill out super-heated plasma that could cause massive damage.

But . . . he could eject it. It would not just be a plasma venting, but an ejection of the whole reactor. It was a messy thing to do, but . . .

He looked at the message board. Answers to him were all over the place. He hadn't really explained it all well enough.

There might not be time. He didn't know how long the reactor might last before it started leaking.

"Jophiel?" he called.

"Yes?"

"I have to get your reactor out of the ship," he told her. "It's . . . going to put you outside."

She was quiet a moment. Then; "Okay."

"You can survive in empty space for awhile, right?" He thought that had been said in briefings. Yes, it had! He knew it. But right now his mind was racing too hard to feel sure of anything.

"I can," she told him. "But not forever."

He did not know if he was sending Jophiel to her death or not. The uncertainty somehow made it worse.

"I'll do everything I can to get you back inside a reactor soon," he told her. He hesitated. "Do you trust me?"

"I do trust you, Tred."

He let out a deep breath, and pressed the button to eject the reactor.

*******

Jaya wished she could have a painkiller, but at this point her entire vascular system was breaking down.

Her breaths came in short gasps, struggling to fill lungs that were filling with fluids.

The lights in the closet were turned high, but she could barely see anything. That she could see at all was only due to enhancements; natural eyes would be blind by now. A natural body would simply be dead.

Was this even a blessing, she wondered?

"Alexander," she whispered through cracked lips. No sound came out.

Was the man alive still? It mattered that he live. But she could not make herself move anymore.

She felt the door open; she was touching the wall, she realized. She had not been aware of it.

Someone loomed over her.

Her eyes opened wider, trying to see them, and show that she still lived.

"Help him . . ." she mouthed, hoping they understood.

The person was not wearing a spacesuit. She saw their hair, it floated in the lack of gravity.

Had atmosphere been restored?

It was likely a man, but she could not focus and see more than that.

The man's head shifted, looking to Alexander. There was an air of decision about him.

He reached out, and took her arm, pulling her with him. Pain lanced through her at the touch.

"No," she mouthed. It had to be Alexander! Her death had to be worth something, and it was his life that mattered now.

But the man did not hear her, and moved her out of the closet.

There was nothing that could be done to save her. This much damage to her entire body could not be healed. There was nothing left of her to salvage. That this meant that Alexander could not be saved either did not even occur to her in her current state.

She became suddenly and startlingly aware that there were two other presences. She felt more than saw them, and once she looked, she could make out their forms. For a moment, she thought it must be a team of Response officers.

But no. Those were not Response.

She found herself trying to look, but her vision was blurring more. Fading, she realized, as death took hold.

In the dimming of life, their shape was not human, not any species she knew. It was not like life.

Two beings, who simply watched, and waited.

She looked again to the one who was pulling her. But she could not even move her lips now; she had faded too far. Thoughts themselves became something she could not form, and darkness took her.