Page 46 of Consume
I was only halfway to the infirmary when the elevator dinged and the door slid open.
“Absidy.”
I whirled. “Mase.”
“Is that your blood all over you?” He peeled off his coat and thermal as I staggered toward him past Parker’s downed men.
“Only some of it. What happened? How did Parker get on the ship with us?”
He pressed his shirt to the cut along my chest, and once I took his thermal from him, he shrugged into his coat. “He had to have gotten in when we were still on Mayvel. He got on his own ship, a back way I never saw or knew about. I managed to open his bay doors and get theViciousout of there, but he’s right on our heels, and he isn’t very happy the captain didn’t hand me over to him.” He pulled me along with him. “Come on. I crashed us near the treatment plant to save us time. And because we were going to crash anyway.”
“Wait.” I tried to dig my heels into the floor, but it was too slick with blood. “I’m not going with you.”
“What?”
“Absidy! Mase!” Ellison’s voice called from the direction of the open dining room door. “Crispin’s badly hurt. We can’t move him off the ship.”
“Then be prepared to shoot,” Mase said, his voice hard and rough. “There’s a gaping hole in our ship. When he lands, Parker won’t hesitate to climb through it.”
Her head popped from the doorway, her face smeared red.
We shared a horrified look, taking in each other’s states, and our current predicament.
Shouts sounded from the lower part of the ship.
“That would be him.” Mase dragged me forward, and the wall blocked my sister out.
“We love you,” Ellison called, her voice breaking. She slammed the dining room door shut and locked it.
Everything inside me clashed together. I needed to go. I needed to stay here and protect her and Pop, but how could I do that? I couldn’t even trust myself alone.
“Mase, I...” What had I done with the knife? I patted my pockets, the back of my pants, searched behind me down the hallway. “Shit,” I hissed.
“What?”
Not only was my knife gone, but all the iron in my pockets was too. When I’d grabbed the cube currently in my mouth, what had I done with the rest? I needed more. My bruised mind tried to remember what part of the ship I hadn’t yet stripped of iron, but...
“Absidy?”
“Do you have a spare gun?” I asked, my voice shaking uncontrollably.
“Just one, but plenty of ammo. We can get one from Poh when we find her.”
I tossed his bloodied thermal into the corner and took his hand. Where we were headed... Maybe it would have iron, and then I could come back. I had to trust Ellison and Pop would be fine without me, for a little while.
He gazed at me, seeming to search for something as his hand settled against my back. “I love you, Absidy Jones.”
It sounded like a goodbye, and it nearly eviscerated my will to stand.
The shouts came closer, as well as a burst of gunfire.
“Open it,” I told him, clinging to his hand.
He pressed the button to lift the door to the outside.
