The shielding was weak, slowly headed toward failing.

Life support was in the yellow.

Weaponry was either fully active or completely offline at any given moment.

And those weren’t even the major problems.

Unable to fix them on the spot, all Zoe could do was pull the crystal powering the alarm.

The ship had barely made it out of the Lyriumian atmosphere and now had to enter the Terpolite one which had a very different chemical makeup. Zoe made a mental note to take that into consideration the next time she built a ship. Or in the unlikely event this one survived.

There was good news. The ship was still in one piece. Well, more or less. Zoe flinched as sparks flew from wiring in the roof. Carmin rushed to put the fire out with her powers.

All things considered, only two people seemed to have a problem with the ship itself. Ema would send Zoe the occasional withering glare to show her discomfort. Kayla pretended everything was all right but cringed with every rattle.

Dan placed a hand on Zoe’s shoulder. She sighed, “Well, I’ll know what to fix when it falls to pieces.”

“You will have plenty of time to work on the next on,” he assured her. “Right, Leo?”

Leo made a wounded sound. “It’s not like you had a better idea.”

“Teleportation.”

“Faulty at best.” Leo glanced over his shoulder. “Weren’t you the one to give clearance on those prototypes?”

“Hey, fuck you.”

“Your wife is right there.”

Carmin barked a laugh. “Ah, sorry,” she said at Dan’s glare. “Ignore me.”

Zoe handed the steering to Dan and moved to look over Carmin’s shoulder. She was attempting to integrate her power into the head shields so they could, at the very least, survive re-entry. A good idea.

Zoe returned to her screen. Shield power had jumped from thirty-five to eighty percent. She sent Carmin a thumbs up.

“Niks, how far we got?” Zoe called.

The Shifted pointed through the tinted windscreen. “You see that big white thing?” she asked, gesturing to the Sun of the two worlds. “We have to go around it. You know, like sensible people.”

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Sensible people,” Jay snickered. “Ow!” He rubbed the back of his head, glaring at Leo. “Arsehole!”

“Going around the Sun,” Zoe interrupted, reclaiming the controls and angling the ship slightly to the left.

How there was a star between the two words, she still didn’t understand. Everyone knew it had fallen to Lyriumia billions of years ago and now resided in a crystal around the Queen’s neck. No one knew what the star in front of them really was. Short of flying through it—which Zoe did have an urge to do—no one would find out. Although, considering how much energy they would need to enter the Terpolite atmosphere, she decided that was a mission for another day. It was the real reason she’d tried to build a ship, not that Zoe would ever admit it. The Sun was one of the two worlds’ greatest mysteries, and she wanted to be the one to solve it.

No time for that now. They had a mission.

Behind the Sun, on an orbit directly opposite from Lyriumia, was the red planet Terpola. It was kind of beautiful from a distance. There were times during the year when the world was visible in the sky. It was terrifying in a way. To see your enemy in the sky above you . . . There were times when Zoe wondered why no one had done something like launch a massive rocket during that time of year. The damage would be immersion and the explosion would be incredible. Depending on the strength of the rocket, of course. And assuming it actually hit the planet. Solar wind was a thing even here.

Zoe snapped her attention back to the sight of the red planet. She was surprised nothing had come to investigate a strange object in the sky moving closer and a rather quick pace. Then again, spaceships weren’t exactly a thing for either of the worlds.

“Where is the prison?”

This was directed to Ema. She leaned over Nikki to have access to the console and patched the co-ordinates into the computer system. They appeared on the screen in front of Zoe. She gaped. No one had said anything about the prison being under a mountain! Underground, yeah, sure. But a mountain?

She shot Ema an accusing glare only to see the Fae doing the same to Dan. Zoe changed targets.

Dan cringed. “That’s what I forgot to mention.”

“How the hell are we supposed to break into a mountain?” Leo moaned.

“I have an—”

“No, Jay, you don’t have an idea.”

“Dude!”

Dan stepped in before the fight became violent. “What is it?”

“Easy,” Jay said. “Smash the ship into the mountain.”

Everyone was silent.

“All in favour of not dying today,” Ema muttered, raising her hand. No one else agreed. She huffed. “I see how it is.”

The group glanced at Zoe.

“Your ship,” Nikki said. “You make the call.”

Zoe looked over the faces of her fellow Court members. She looked over the ship which had taken so long to build but so little to fall apart. A deep breath. A reluctant sigh. “She might as week go out in a blaze of glory.”

Jay grinned. “That’s the spirit!”

“I’m still pissed, and I blame you for anything that might happen next,” she told him.

“Duly noted.”

With a final glance over her creation, Zoe lined the ship up with the co-ordinates provided.

She gunned the engine, the ship reaching the highest speed it would in its now short lifespan.

They passed through the crimson atmosphere, hull temperature rising rapidly as Carmin’s power struggled to keep up. Mental screeched and screamed under the change in pressure as they went lower. Lower.

Ten seconds.

They could see the mountain. Their target. Zoe took a moment to do a final check to be usre they were en route. All was fine.

Five.

“Brace for impact!” she screamed over the sound of her ship being torn apart.

Everyone grasped onto something, throwing a personal shield around themselves. Nikki was kind enough to extend one over the terrified Ema.

Three.

Zoe squeezed her eyes shut, unable to bare the sight of her creation about to be ruined.

Two.

One.

Impact.