Page 9

A Lone Wolf

SAVVINE

T he hushed ambiance of Eterna’s hospital wing washed over Savvine as she pushed through its swing doors, the lights dimming to a soft pre-dawn glow.

She crept between the beds, nodding to the med techs and offering quiet words to the injured crew from The Odalon .

She chanced on its skipper, who was no longer MIA.

Lying in a hover bed and hooked up to a drip, Captain Mike Therros sported a cracked rib and a concussion.

‘I’ll live,’ he grunted. ‘Promise me though, Chief, you’ll get the Lombardis for that shit they pulled. My ship was a fantastic frigate.’

‘On it,’ she promised him. ‘We took out three of their fighters, and I’m hunting down the rest.’

She visited with him, then left when he gave a tired grimace.

His XO, Leo Tucci, a friend of Savvine’s, was half-strapped into a regeneration bed next door with plasma burns down his right arm.

Ever-stubborn, Leo was already trying to sit up, chatting with the Eterna’s salvage crew via a holo call.

His commtab slipped from his hands and almost fell to the ground.

‘I’ve got it.’

Savvine rushed in to catch it before it hit the floor. ‘Rest, or I’ll strap you down myself.’

Leo smirked. ‘Wouldn’t be the first time.’

She rolled her eyes, chatted with the waiting salvagers, and chided her friend.

‘Shut down your device and nap, Leo, and that’s a command,’ she called, with a smile, as she strolled out of his room to visit with the remainder of The Odalon complement.

They’d only lost three crew members, which was a miracle.

The rest made it out to escape pods, haulers, and cruisers, lighting out before it blew.

Such a freakin waste , she thought as she walked out of the medical center.

Outside, the corridor lights flickered into full daybreak mode as Savvine tapped her neural link and pinged Abby.

.:: Going dark for a few hours. Debris field check. Keep comms clean ::.

.:: Copy. Don’t get blown up again ::.

.:: No promises ::.

The rear deck of Venantia Eterna’s security bay hummed with activity.

Savvine headed to her locker and stripped her day wear.

She changed into a matte-black flight suit and moved in her customary rapid pace.

She cinched her gloves as she walked, fastened the oxygen feed lines, and pulled her helmet into place.

The HUD blinked to life with a soft blue glow, running diagnostics in the corner of her vision.

Her pinnace sat in its launch cradle like a coiled blade, small and built for speed, sleek, silent, and modified beyond regulation.

She walked across the deck past a pair of crew members who paused and nodded. She raised her chin back at them, tracking fast to the command console.

She found her mark lounging in his seat, sipping from a mug, far too relaxed for the hour.

Tapping her visor open, she stepped into his space.

‘Javier,’ she called.

He glanced up and grinned, just a little too charming for someone projecting a neural feed from one cybernetic eye with his feet propped on the instrument panel.

‘Well, if it isn’t the most daunting, beautiful, and stubborn woman to ask out on this ship. Don’t tell me you’re taking another joyride before breakfast?’

She ignored his ribbing. ‘I need a favor.’

He arched a brow.

‘I’m not filing this jaunt. Please leave it off the traffic logs.’

He leaned forward, interest sparked. ‘Flying dark, huh?’

She didn’t answer; she just held his gaze.

Javier whistled, then took a slow sip. ‘That’ll cost you.’

She crossed her arms. ‘You’re going to try charging me for an unsanctioned egress?’

He grinned wider. ‘One drink. Real stuff. Not recycled bar synth.’

‘Done,’ she said before he could change the terms.

Javier tapped a few keys. ‘Log scrubbed. You’re a ghost for the next seven hours. If you’re not back by then,’ he warned, his voice trailing off.

‘I will be.’

He paused, then nodded, a genuine concern flicking across his expression. ‘Watch your six, Savvine.’

She shot him a grateful smile and wave as she climbed into the pinnace.

The canopy hissed shut, pressurizing around her as the cradle unlocked.

Her hands moved over the controls with muscle memory precision, ignition, external sensors, and life support.

The engine purred beneath her as she lifted off the mag rails and exited into the void.

Thrusters kicked in with a soft roar, and the Venantia Eterna fell away behind her.

She silently breached the perimeter grid, slipping through the outer buoy markers and cutting her thruster signature to a whisper.

The journey to the debris field stretched before her, black, glittering space speckled with wreckage and dust. She leaned back into the seat, the hush wrapping around her like a second skin.

Her mind didn’t stay still.

Questions fired through her thoughts in rhythm with the quiet thrum of the engine.

Who gave the Lombardis the Hades-class missile? How many more of those did they have? Was Signet supplying them? And if so, why?

Her fingers tightened on the control yoke.

She had to know.

The truth, whatever it was, was drifting out in the cold, muted dark.

Ahead, the debris field loomed like a floating graveyard: twisted shards of alloy and hull plating and shimmering clouds of frozen vapor spread over kilometers of silent void.

She throttled down as she entered the wreckage zone, the glint of ruined metal catching starlight and casting phantasmic glimmers across the field.

She killed her exterior lights and drifted, searching the area.

No transponder pings. No signals. Dead space. All good signs for a sly reconnaissance.

Savvine slowed the pinnace down to a stop, so the racer hovered in the void.

Releasing the capsule, she launched into the bone-deep, absolute silence of space that met her hard.

She activated her HUD beams.

The twin cones of white light pierced the darkness as she pushed off the side of the pinnace and glided toward the remains of the Lombardi stealth fighter.

Just ahead, floated the weapons array.

At first glance, it was intact, tumbling in slow motion, a jagged crown of deadly beauty.

It sported Hades -class mounts and modified pulse chambers.

Fokk! This was the illegal tech she needed proof of.

Without thinking, Savvine reached out, her gloved hand trembling as it neared the scorched plating.

A bloom of light flared somewhere to her left.

A flash too white, too close.

Time fractured.

The explosion unfurled like a monstrous flower, tendrils of heat and pressure lashing out toward her in slow-motion brilliance. She barely managed to scream. It tore from her throat, but there was no sound, no echo, only the void.

She was dead, she knew it.

A massive force slammed into her.

Thick, muscled, sinewed limbs wrapped around her torso, one across her waist, the other bracing her shoulders.

She screamed into her comms, but she got no signal in return. No bounce-back.

No sound.

Panic hit like a flash freeze.

She thrashed, elbowed, and drove her foot back into the solid mass.

Whoever it was, whatever it was, did not flinch, held her tight.

She could not move.

Whoever it was turned in milliseconds, shielding her from the impact.

The force of it still jolted them backward as they were both flung wide by the extensive energy shockwave.

Her eyes rolled upward, and what she saw wasn’t human.

She jolted at the spectral vision, one of a giant lycan spirit.

Golden and violet, rippling with kinetic energy as if stars and wolf were meshed and made flesh.

The shimmer of his spirit plane masked his face, but she saw his frame, broad as myth, radiant with an aura so dense it bent the starlight around him.

They rocketed backward through the field, her rescuer carrying her with little effort, it seemed, past shrapnel and debris.

They rocketed through the pressure quake, moving so fast they stayed ahead of the central blast radius.

Debris zipping past, the heat singeing the edges of her armor as her rescuer twisted mid-flight.

The dissipating discharge rolled over them just as they crossed the outer edge of a vessel’s docking bay.

A feral jolt of loose rubble smashed into her helmet.

Her skull rattled, her vision blurred.

She tried to shout, to claw away, to understand.

The spectral arms didn’t loosen.

They surged into an airlock.

She was dimly aware of the heavy alloy door sealing behind them, keeping out the flame tsunami still churning over them.

She and her deliverer floated in zero g until the compartment re-pressurized.

Giving her time to lift her woozy head to glance outside the viewport.

To where explosions lit the dark in the far field, sending shockwaves rippling through the void and turning wreckage into molten dust.

She stared, breath caught, blinking behind her helmet.

Whoever dragged her from the debris field had just saved her life.

She also spotted her pinnace still visible, hanging a few hundred klicks away through the outer portal.

Safe, untouched, rocked slightly by the dissipating blast wave.

Her rescuer’s feet touched down with a whisper as gravity sensors kicked in.

Next, they were tracking through the foreign ship.

Still in his arms, she caught flashes of her new surroundings through the trek.

Lights pulsed underfoot, forming a path in a soft violet glow that rippled like an invitation.

Her heart slammed again, this time with curiosity and a touch of wariness at the unknown.

The hallway her knight strode through was spacious, high-ceilinged, and elegant.

The materials were advanced, from ultra-light graphene paneling to a denser titanium composite with an internal shimmer, like starlight trapped in synth-alloy.

Every detail balanced between ruthless utility and quiet luxury.

They moved through a glass-walled corridor, passing a well-stocked, lethal-looking weapons bay.

Behind smoked crystal and violet glyphs, a tactical station blinked.

They retraced into a larger space, but by this time her head was whirling, lolling about on his shoulder.

The arms laid her down gently on what appeared to be a cushioned divan.