“Air up emergency passage,” Ky said. The passage filled with vapor; her faceplate fogged, then cleared as its automatic functions dispersed any surface contaminant. “Temperature?”

SHIP AMBIENT TEMPERATURE 299 DEGREES STANDARD. Her implant thoughtfully provided a scale with normal shipboard range marked across the scale. Within reasonable limits.

Her suit eased its grip as the pressure rose, as the vapor slowly cleared… the pink snow now looked like what it was, smears of blood, rehydrated from the inflowing moister air. Finally—it seemed to take forever but was only minutes—PRESSURE EQUALIZED. COMPARTMENT LOCKDOWN?” Reverse,” said Ky. In front of her, the thick compartment seal slid back into its recess; she could now hear the hiss and squeal and imagine as well the power being used.

She left her helmet fastened, her suit light on. The figure in the rec area was Rafe—helmet fastened, eyes closed, but she could see the movement of his breathing. Alive. She would worry about the rest later. Up the passage to the bridge… and as she passed her cabin, she heard the sharp imperative yips of the puppy. She opened the hatch there. Toby, on her bunk, with Stella’s arms wrapped around him—both unconscious. The pup, tail wagging vigorously, yapped and scratched at them, trying to wake them up. He growled at Ky, making dashes for her boots, sniffing, backing away, his back hair raised in a miniature ruff.

She probably did smell like death, and not even warmed over. “It’s just me,” she said to the pup, who continued to wrinkle his lips at her. She backed out, closing the hatch behind her.

On the bridge, Lee was slumped in the pilot’s seat, but stirring, groaning slightly. Ky looked at the boards. Drives: red, no response. Defensive suite: standby. Communications: red, no response. Environmental: yellow, emergency power level only. Personnel: red. Nothing picked up from sensors or implants. But she knew they weren’t all dead…

Drives had to be the first priority—they needed internal power. She tried automatic restart first, without much hope, and wasn’t surprised when nothing happened. Manual restart was a long tedious sequence that led to nothing but the discovery that there was no longer any electrical connection from the bridge engine controls to the drive.

“Power consumption analysis?”

40% ARTIFICIAL GRAVITY GENERATOR.

Of course. How had she forgotten that? “Cut to twenty-five percent, refigure reserve.”

28.6 HOURS.

That was something. Not enough, but something.

“Uhhhh… ow!” That was Lee.

“Lee… talk to me; it’s the captain.”

“Don’ wanna talk… my head…”

“Lee!” She went around in front of him and unsealed her own helmet. The stench from her suit almost made her gag. “Lee, what is it? What hit you?”

His eyes opened, the left one bloodshot, his gaze unfocused. “Captain… when ya ge’ back? Where… we… are?”

She couldn’t see any sign of head trauma but that bloodshot eye. “We’re where we were, Lee. Did something hit you?”

“In… side. Spike in my head.” His gaze wandered past her, then focused again. “Thought you were outside—”

“I was. I’m in, intruders are dead. Ship’s got some problems.”

“Others?”

“Unconscious, the ones I’ve seen. Haven’t been everywhere yet. The drive’s down; I can’t get it started. But we have air and some gravity—don’t try to get up, I had to cut it to conserve power.”

He looked pale and slightly green now, and gulped visibly. His eyes sagged shut. “Feel… lousy. What’s that stench?”

“Just stay there,” Ky said. “I’ll be back.”

“Said that last time…,” he said; then his head lolled and he was out again.

But he was alive. She opened the door to her cabin again, and again Rascal rushed her ankles, bravely but uselessly. Toby was stirring uneasily; Stella didn’t move.

“Toby,” Ky said. “Toby, wake up.”

His eyes opened slowly. “Ky—Captain?”

“Yes. Are you all right?”

“I’m—I’m—alive.”

“Which is good. Hurt anywhere?”

“My head…”

Stella groaned and started to roll off the bunk; Ky steadied her. Her eyes opened. “This is the worst headache I have ever had… Ky. Is it over?”

“Not entirely,” Ky said. “The ship has a few problems. Just stay where you are, for now.”

Toby blinked several times. “I’m… I could get up.” Then his gaze locked on to the front of her suit. “Captain—you’re hurt—”

“Not my blood,” Ky said. She had left smears on Stella’s suit, she now realized, and a smudge on the edge of her bunk.

“I really could,” Toby went on. “Help, I mean. I have a headache, but it’s going away now.”

“Let’m go,” Stella said in a slurred voice. “I nee’ slee…” and she, like Lee, went limp again.

“All right,” Ky said to Toby. “But leave your helmet on and locked. Ship systems are coming online very slowly, and our power supply’s limited.”

“But yours—” He stopped himself. “Can I bring Rascal?”

“Sure,” Ky said. “Just don’t let him bite me. He doesn’t like my smell.”

But with Toby awake, the dog was more interested in licking her boots than biting her ankles… gruesome, Ky thought, suggesting that somewhere in the dog’s ancestry was not a boy’s best friend, but somebody’s worst nightmare. Toby fairly bounced down the passage in low g with the resilience of youth.

“I could fix something to eat,” he said, as they came into the rec area. Rafe was still sprawled over the fallen chair.

“We’re conserving power,” Ky reminded him. “Help me move Rafe.” That was easy enough in the fractional gravity; they stretched him on the padded ledge along the far side of the compartment, on his side. His eyelids fluttered but didn’t open.

They made their way then to Environmental. In the dim light, suit lights flashed. Mitt, Ted, and Mehar… Mitt and Mehar both with pistol bows aimed at Ky, until they recognized her face in their headlamps.

“What happened, Captain?”

“I made some mistakes, but we still have a whole hull and clearly you people have life support working.”

“For now,” Mitt said. “Did they set off an EMP mine? Is that why we lost power?”

“It was an EMP mine, but I set it off—one of the intruders was setting up a limpet inside the ship. Only way I could think of to disable its programming before he could set it off.”

“Well… we also lost a few circuits in life support. I gather the drive’s down? And how are the others?”

“Some unconscious, Toby here’s fine, I haven’t checked everyone yet.”

“Must’ve been quite a fight,” Mehar said, nodding at Ky’s suit.

“It was… strenuous,” Ky said. Her back was beginning to tell her how many times she’d tried to tie it in a pretzel. She ignored it.

“How many of them were there?”

“I think three,” Ky said. “But let me check everyone else first; we can tell the stories later, when the ship’s back up.”

“Want help?”

“Yes,” Ky said. “Number two cargo and Engineering will be the worst, they were closest to it.”

Mehar came with her; they found Engineering dark and silent. She looked around. On the far side of the compartment, a heap of bodies. As she watched, one of them rolled over, shook its head and looked up. Jim.

“What happened, Jim?”

He shook his head, pointed to his ears. Blast damage? Ky came closer, and spoke directly to his face. “Can you hear me at all?”

“A… little. Scared the—I didn’t know what happened, Captain. Quincy ran over here, said get down, and then everything blew up.”

“Not everything. We’re still in one piece. The others?” She was already checking them for pulse, for any visible injuries.

“Dunno. I just woke up, kinda—” His voice sounded strange, uninflected. Quincy was underneath the pile. She, Alene, and Cele were all unconscious, but alive. Ky relaxed slightly.

“Let’s get Quincy to the medbox,” she said. Jim nodded, clambered up, staggered a moment, then steadied.

“Low grav…”