Molly Fyde and the Parsona Rescue

Academy to appreciate the graphics. Surely he hadn’t programmed the whole thing. “You made this?” she asked.

“Yesss,” Walter hissed, his voice dripping with pride.

“It’s amazing,” she told him. And it was. Running across the surface of a detailed planet, a space cadet waved blasters in both hands. There were all kinds of things to shoot and kill—typical boy stuff—but done realistically enough that even she might get into it. She handed it back to Walter, who beamed at her.

“Keep it up,” she said, patting his head. Walter resumed control of the figure, destroying things for points, while Molly retreated to her stateroom. She closed the door and hoped that small ounce of attention would keep him satisfied all the way to Canopus. She didn’t have enough energy to take care of herself, much less someone else.

She sat in the bathroom for a few minutes, pretending to use it, then got up and flushed the air chamber, capping the pointless ruse. After another pause, waiting for answers that should’ve been forming, she gave up and walked out of her room.

Instead of going to the cockpit, though, she snuck back to Cole’s quarters. His door was locked—sealed with her Captian’s codes. She could key it open and demand answers, but how would Jakobs and the Navy see that?

She took off her helmet and pressed her cheek to the door. The thrumming of the thrusters vibrated through the metal, singing along the length of the ship. Molly could hear her pulse racing through her ear.

She pulled herself away and went to Edison’s door, pressing a hand to the cool metal. She wondered what the Navy would do with him. Especially when they found out he was one of the last of his kind. The pain of what happened on Glemot piled on top of her new miseries, crushing her. She didn’t know what would come out in a trial, but it would be difficult to explain the things she didn’t understand herself.

She headed toward the cockpit and noticed that Walter’s door was open. She stepped inside, looking for any excuse to stay close to the two prisoners. Surveying herself in the mirror over Walter’s dresser, she hardly recognized the person looking back. The girl’s brown hair was too long—matted and unkempt. Her eyes appeared too old for the rest of her. Her mouth was sad. The poor thing’s shoulders drooped like someone who had worked for years under a heavy burden.

Molly took a deep breath and tried to hold it in. Her eyes wandered to a few of the pictures Walter had taken and printed out with the ship’s computer. They were tucked in the frame of the mirror, their edges curling.

One showed a group of Glemots working on Parsona. She didn’t even know he’d snapped any photos back then. The lush greenness in the background didn’t do the planet justice, but Molly reached up to brush her fingers across the image—the image of a land she’d helped destroy.

Another photo he had on display must have been pulled from one of the security feeds. It showed her patting Walter on the head. She didn’t even remember when it had taken place, and before she could be upset at him for hacking into the ship’s computers, she saw another picture behind it. Hidden. She pulled it out. It didn’t make any sense. She stared at it, as if it eventually would.

The picture showed the simulator room at the Academy, taken from eye level. A few cadets milled about that she didn’t recognize. Rows of simulator pods faced the familiar block wall.

Why in the galaxy would Walter have a picture of this? She turned the photo over and looked at the back. Nothing was written there, but it wasn’t the photo paper the ship used. Where had he found this?

She put it back in its place and reminded herself to ask him about both pictures. The one he hacked from the computer upset her, almost as much as the hidden one confused. Molly put her helmet back on and stepped back into the cargo bay. Walter looked up at her, sneering. He was playing his game and obviously having the time of his life.

She thought about the video game.

And the picture of the simulators.

Her vision squeezed in from the edges until only the center was visible, like looking through a straw. She nearly fainted to the ground, staggered forward, steadied herself on one of the large crates, then sank to her knees.

Molly looked up to the cockpit and spotted Jakobs’s video player on the panel by his seat. Past Jakobs, and through the carboglass, she could see the Firehawk ahead of them. Dinks was slowly pulling away for the jump through hyperspace. Beyond that, glints of a fleet winked in the starlight, dashing about in a cluster. The ships of Darrin I were chasing down another customer.

Molly took all of it in—and none of it. Her brain raced and reeled, assembling pieces like a planet coalescing out of dust, all of them orbiting Walter’s video game. How realistic it looked. The little cadet running around with his pistols—she recognized that figure. Knew his artificial gait from somewhere. She realized how easily that alien world could be substituted for a room full of simulator pods.

For a Navy reward, of course.

••••

Jakobs turned to look back at her, his visor up. He must’ve been yelling at her to return to her chair so they could prep for the jump. Molly knew this, but she couldn’t hear him—her head pounded with depression and rage. She pulled the lower half of her helmet closed, sealing it tight. If anything, the pounding just got louder.

She dug her gloves under one side of the crate, tossed the lid off and peered down at the gleaming metal contraption inside.

Molly thought about them killing Cole. For what? For protecting her? And they would do it with bad information. Dirty information. It reminded her of that day in Saunders’s office. Of being berated after having done everything right. And now an innocent man, a good man, was going to be killed by liars and cheats.

Over her dead body.

Over all of their dead bodies.

She sighted down the length of the crated laser cannon, eyeing Jakobs. He froze in the act of unbuckling his harness, his mouth and eyes wide open. Molly allowed herself to sink down—down into the well of dark thoughts rising up within her. Part of her, some sliver of sanity, yelled. It pleaded for a return to her senses. But it was a small girl—lost in a nightmare—unable to find her voice. The rest of Molly flared with anger. Betrayal after betrayal had finally worn her down. Eaten to her core. Her thin crust of hope had been ablated off by a galaxy of cruelness.

She peered into the crate. Her head roared. She ignored the consequences and hit the lever Edison had shown her.

Hit it and held it.

32

Dinks died never knowing he was in danger. One moment he was spooling up the hyperdrive, the next moment a bolt of laser bored a tunnel through his defenseless Firehawk. The vessel combined explosion and implosion in a confused cloud of debris with a hint of gore.

Molly, Jakobs, and Walter flew through the new hole in Parsona’s carboglass. The vacuum outside sucked at them greedily, pulling out every ounce of pressurized air within. Molly didn’t even try to catch herself on the edge of the windshield as she went past. She concentrated on reaching Jakobs ahead of her.

She collided with the boy’s legs and held fast. They both glided ahead of Parsona through a slightly warmer patch of space: the cloud where Dink’s Firehawk had been. Molly pulled herself up Jakobs’s body, which felt rigid with shock. His visor had snapped shut with the loss of cabin pressure, but there was always a delay. Molly could see it in his eyes; they were bloodshot and full of fear. Blood trickled from his nose.

Molly considered saying something through the suit’s radio, but decided he didn’t merit the trouble. She fumbled for the latches on his helmet, her gloves thick and unwieldy. Even in his haze, Jakobs seemed to grasp her plan. He pawed at her arms, trying to wrestle them down. They struggled for a moment, twisting in space. Molly’s