Page 106 of Shades of Earth (Across the Universe 3)

“Fire! Fire! Fire!” Dad shouts from the street. More gunshots ring out as a bright, yellow, glowing object arcs across the sky toward the colony. Another solar bomb. It hits higher now, and there are screams as the people inside the buildings try to run away.

“Up the mountain! Farther up!” Dad shouts.

But I’m not listening to him.

I’m behind the building, and the path Chris and Elder and I used to sneak to the compound before is clear. No one’s looking this way; the fight is focused on the streets and the center of the colony. I can go behind the latrines, cut down near the lake.

If I can reach the compound, maybe Elder can tell me what he’s learned.

And if I can’t reach Elder, maybe I can detonate the weapon that will kill the aliens.

I take a deep breath.

I have to make a run for it.

Another solar bomb goes off, this one behind me. The aliens are nearly at the colony’s edge, lobbing their solar bombs as far into the buildings as they can.

I tell myself I can do this. I’m a runner. I can outrun an alien army.

And then I go.

60: ELDER

I wake up with four tanks of oxygen pointed at my face, blowing cool air right at me.

“Thirty-seven,” Bartie says, leaning over me.

I blink.

“Shite, Elder, your eyes are red. ”

“His ocular blood vessels burst,” a familiar voice that I can’t seem to place says. “Subconjunctival hemorrhages. ”

My body shifts, but my shoulders roar in protest. I whimper, sinking back into the ground.

Doc leans over my body, concern on his face. He presses a med patch against my skin. I look through blurry eyes at my arm and see that three other med patches are already adhered there.

“What the frex happened?” I wheeze, my voice raspy.

“I counted to thirty, like you said,” Bartie says. “But you never commed me. ”

“Then how?” I croak, unable to finish the sentence.

“I kept counting. I had my ear pressed against the hatch door. At thirty-seven, I heard a dull thud. ”

“You opened it?”

“I was scared as shite, let me tell you! But I figured I could close the hatch again if I needed to, and . . . ”

I shut my eyes; the light hurts them too much.

The tanks aimed at my face sputter, then hiss into silence. I take a deep breath, imagining the last of their oxygen filling my lungs, filling my whole body.

“The effects of your little adventure should wear off in time,” Doc says. “Your heart didn’t stop, and although you exhibit signs of decompression sickness, you’re surprisingly well kept for someone stupid enough to jump out into space. ”

I crack my eyes open, but I’m not looking at Doc. I’m looking at Bartie. “It worked?” I say.

He grins at me, and I see my old friend, the one I had when I was thirteen and neither of us thought a world existed beyond the ship. “It worked,” he says.