Oh, I saw, all right. Absolute slaughter. I bet the spec-cams had looooved that.
“The Renegade Run Moderation Committee can’t agree on whether or not it should be allowed in the race. Some argue that, being semi-sentient, it counts as a participant and violates the two-person team rule. Others don’t believe all the spooky stories about it and class it as any other rare weapon.”
“And what do you think?” I asked quietly.
He stayed silent, his gaze fixed ahead as we passed through the checkpoint’s ribbon of light. It made all our displays flash and blink, bringing up the new coordinate data and updating our courses to find the most direct route. “I think it’s freaky stuff,” he answered at last, his tone so soft, I could barely hear him over the droning hum of our engines. “And I don’t want anything to do with it.”
34
FINISH IT
“Closing in on the finish line,” Phox announced, a tremor of excitement in his voice. I could’ve sworn he actually sounded hopeful. “Looks like it’ll be right at the base of the mountains, where they meet the flatlands.”
I couldn’t share his enthusiasm. Not when we kept passing through what basically amounted to one graveyard right after another left by Sienne and that creepy mineral scythe of hers.
As we blitzed past three more downed runner craft—flipped, crunched, and charred upon the sandy, dry soil—something tingled and nagged at the back of my mind. A pulling sensation deep inside. I couldn’t shake it. Something about this wasn’t right. Despite not seeing another runner craft anywhere on our scanners, I couldn’t shake the feeling that we weren’t in the clear. It was too easy, wasn’t it?
I was not that lucky—ever.
Straight ahead, the desolated expanse of the flatlands ended at the base of a steep and utterly barren mountain range. At the base, shining in the glow of Thermax’s red sun, the familiar shape of two towering, metallic obelisks made my breathing hitch and my heartbeat skip and stall.
This really was it. We were going to make it! We—
An explosion rocked our entire ship with a concussive BOOM!
We flipped, our ship pitching violently to the right and rolling. I screamed. Beside me, Phox cried out with a bellowing shout of alarm. The windshield crunched, its already compromised surface splintering under the impact as we smashed into the ground upside down. Then nothing. The emergency lights along our dash glowed in varying hues of orange, red, and yellow. Alarms wailed and gradually fell silent.
Dangling from my harness, I panted and wheezed as I floundered for the emergency release. For once, I had enough sense left to get out of the safety harness on my own. Or maybe I was just getting used to being a crash dummy. Whatever. No time to wallow around assessing the damage. I had to get out—now!
Pulling the release, I fell down and hit the ceiling of our upturned ship with a thud. My head swam, my vision swerving in and out of focus as another, much bigger thud rattled the ceiling right next to me. Phox groaned, lying on his back with his expression crumpled in pain.
“Y-You okay?” he rasped.
“Yeah,” I managed to reply. “You?”
“Fine.” He was lying. His tone quavered, halting with sharp breaths as he sat up. Had he hit his head again? Oh, god—he hadn’t even recovered from the last time. And I didn’t have another one of those super medical kits at my disposal.
Pushing myself up to my knees, I fought to focus on him, our wrecked ship, and what to do next. My forehead throbbed. Something wet and warm oozed down the side of my face. Blood?
“W-What the hell happened?” He growled through clenched teeth as he rolled over and sat up.
Without warning, purple light exploded through our ship, hitting like a crack of lightning and sending a shower of sparks in every direction. I jerked back, throwing up my arms to shield my face as the smell of scorched metal burned in my nose.
Phox hit me like a linebacker, pinning me down and covering my body with his. When I dared to look up again, daylight poured through a fresh gap through our ship. Someone had just sliced it in half like a giant loaf of bread!
And I had a feeling I knew who. But how? Where had she come from? It didn’t make any sense!
A slender figure filled the gap between the two halves of our ship, blocking the scarlet sunlight with the shape of a woman’s frame carrying a long, spear-like weapon tipped with a curved scythe blade.
Sienne.
She’d stayed behind—stayed in the race—just to hunt me down.
“P-Phox, it’s her!”
He didn’t waste a second. Breaking away from me, that giant alien moron barreled straight for her while shouting back to me at the top of his lungs, “BRINNA, RUN!”
Lying sprawled on my belly, paralyzed and mute with horror, I watched him smash into her at full speed. It must’ve caught her off guard, or she didn’t see him coming, because Sienne didn’t react until it was too late. He hit her head-on, knocking them both out of the ship and out of sight.
I should have run. That was what Phox wanted. But where the hell could I go? And how could I just turn and leave him behind to fend for himself?
I couldn’t.
I wouldn’t.
Shambling up, I ran after them, ripping the plasma pistol from its holster at my side. My vision scrambled in the glare of the sun as a blast of hot, arid wind hit my face and scorched my throat. My hair whipped around me, sticking to the blood still dribbling down my cheek.
I skidded to a halt on the parched terrain,
