Page 55 of The First Spark (Dynasty of Fire #1)

Lunging for Zane’s discarded pulser, she hit a puddle of blood and rolled. Tap. Tap. The pulser didn’t recoil. As blasts screamed towards the legionnaires, a bolt tore through a man’s shoulder.

The other lunged. Kalie fired off six shots, and a blast connected. He crumpled. Steam oozed from a crater in his chest.

“Dammit, run!” Zane roared.

She pulled his arm over her shoulders and hauled him up, clenching her teeth against the cry that threatened to tear from her throat. He was heavy. Too heavy. He limped along beside her, wincing with each step, but they were moving too slow.

Blasts shrieked around them, and Kalie’s chest heaved as she glanced over her shoulder? —

Her eyes widened.

She tried to lunge, but Zane’s arm held her in place.

There was no time to scream as the flash of red slammed into her. There was only an endless sea of burning pain, as the world splintered into fiery agony.

They were falling, falling, and the stench of scorched flesh flooded Zane’s senses.

Vibrations shot up his legs as Kalie’s head struck the floor.

Screaming. Someone was screaming. Was that him?

Kalie’s blood soaked his hands. He needed to staunch the wound.

It had ripped through her thigh, and the blast should’ve cauterized it, but it must’ve nicked the femoral—holy Mordir, there was so much blood…

Get to a ship.

Flames streaked across the hull of the silver shuttle. The ramp was lowered. Thrusters rumbled.

Pulsers wailed behind him. Gasping, Zane twisted around. Excruciating pain ripped through his sides, his back. But—there. Reinforcements. Praetors, firing at the legionnaires.

A diversion.

Hooking his arms under Kalie’s, Zane dragged her towards the ramp.

His burning leg threatened to give out, and black spots covered his vision.

As he clenched his teeth and staggered up the cargo ramp, Kalie’s blood trailed behind them.

His legs gave out at the top of the ramp, but he pushed himself up on trembling arms.

He couldn’t rest yet. Kalie was in danger. They needed to get out of here.

Zane punched the button to raise the cargo ramp. Staggering into the cockpit, he grabbed the controls, smearing the blood on his hands— Kalie’s blood—across the panel.

His pulse thrummed in his ears as he stared at the scarlet streaks. He needed to help her, he couldn’t let this happen again …

But a tourniquet wouldn’t do much good if they got blasted to pieces.

The radar wailed, flashing red. Zane rammed the levers forward, and the ship burst out of the hangar bay.

They plunged into the burnt orange sky. As Zane glanced at the radar, his blood turned to ice.

Three destroyers hovered in front of the Etovian stargate, and four more had appeared over Etov’s neighboring planets.

He needed to get to a gate, but the closest one was over Renan, an hour away, on the other side of the Etovian system.

Kalie’s cry made his heart stop. He tapped Renan on the nav chart, hit the autopilot button, and ran to her. Sweat covered her face. Pain scrunched her features. She pressed her hands to the wound, but blood gushed between her fingers.

“Zane…”

Her voice was scarcely a whimper as she squeezed her eyes shut. Blood pooled around his knees and soaked his shoes.

The world flashed, and Lysa was falling. He screamed and crawled to her side. Sticky blood coated his shins as Lysa gasped for air. Her hands fumbled with a gaping wound.

“Medic!” he roared. “Medic!”

His vision blurred. Kalie laid in a pool of blood on Oppalli, then Lysa was slumped in front of him on the ship.

He shook his head. This wasn’t Oppalli. Kalie was not Lysa.

Banishing the fire and smoke to the depths of his memory, Zane peeled his bloody shirt off. Staunching the wound was the first priority, so he pressed the bundle of fabric against her bleeding thigh and put Kalie’s hands on top of it. “Keep pressure on this.”

He bolted to the cockpit and rifled through compartments. Energy cells, food rations… come on … cables… a first aid kit. He tugged it open.

Bandages and saline solution.

Holy Mordir. She was going to die.

Zane sucked in a hitching breath. He had bandages. He could make a tourniquet. Then…

Then what ?

As he turned to Kalie, his jaw dropped. Her head lolled to the side. Her hands had lost their grip on the shirt.

“Kalie!”

She didn’t stir.

His throat sealed as he dragged her into the cockpit, strapping her into the co-pilot’s chair.

With shaking hands, Zane unrolled the bandages, wrapped them around her thigh, pulled them tight and knotted them.

His crumpled shirt was stained red. Flicking open his pocket knife, he cut the excess bandages from the makeshift tourniquet, wrapped them around the shirt, and tied it around her wound.

The chair was covered in crimson fluid.

He needed help, needed to call someone. She was bleeding and there was so much blood…

Alarms wailed as the ship lurched violently. The dashboard beeped, an explosion boomed, and the ship shook again.

Zane dropped into the pilot’s seat as black warplanes streaked by, spraying red lasers at his ship as they shot into the atmosphere.

He grabbed the controls and threw the ship out of the way.

Shoving the control sticks aside, he gripped the cannons and squeezed the trigger.

The ship rocked. He groaned as his ribs slammed into the dashboard.

Blinking spots from his vision, Zane looked down at the atmospheric radar.

Fifty thousand feet above the ocean. He inhaled sharply, cut the engines, and threw the ship into a nosedive.

His stomach dropped as the ship plummeted; alarms whined and fires raced along the ship’s hull.

The temperature meter shot up. A blast clipped their left thruster. They spiraled downwards.

Ten thousand feet. Five thousand feet.

Flames reflected on the waves, casting them in shades of red. Lightning split the sky.

Eight hundred feet. Five hundred.

Black warplanes streaked after him, unloading a barrage of lasers.

One hundred feet. Now .

Zane grabbed the controls and wrenched them upwards.

The hull of the ship skimmed the roiling waves as he strained against the lever.

Ships crashed into the ocean, and water sprayed the viewport as a flash of lightning struck a warplane down.

Then his ship lurched up, and they rose into the air, leaving the wrecked enemy planes behind.

The radar whined. Another cluster of warplanes, incoming.

Dammit, he couldn’t do this alone.

He fumbled in his pocket for his holocomm, but it was a splintered mess of wires and scrap. He gritted his teeth, then his hand closed around a small sphere, and he let out a puff of air. Thank Mordir. Pressing his thumb into the crevice shaped for it, he set it on the dashboard.

“Zane?”

A holoprojection of Mira’s head appeared in front of him. Her eyes widened, and the background shifted as she leapt to her feet.

“What’s going on?”

They’d been attacked, he was trying to escape Etov, and they were going to die. It sounded logical in his head, but what came out was, “I can’t—I think she’s dying and it’s my fault?—”

“Zane, calm down and tell me what’s happening.”

An explosion thundered, and their ship jolted. “Left thruster destabilized,” a robotic voice warbled. “Engines down to fifty percent power.”

Zane stared at the diagnostic scans. The left thruster was gone.

“Are you under attack?”

Mira. Right, she was talking to him. Why had he called her? Help, he needed help…

“Destroyers. Seven of them. The stargate’s blocked, and warplanes…” Zane glanced at Kalie, and the words stuck in his throat. Blood matted her hair and coated her skin. The bandages around her thigh were soaked.

His throat swelled shut. This couldn’t be happening. Not Kalie.

“Cybel!” Mira yelled. “Zane, listen to me.”

The blood had drained from Kalie’s face. Her eyes were closed. When he blinked, he knelt over a body on Oppalli. Blood crusted Lysa’s hair and her lifeless eyes stared up at him. When he blinked again, it was Kalie in his arms, and he was screaming her name.

“Zane!”

The ship lurched again .

“If you want to make it out of this alive, listen to me!”

Alive. He needed to keep Kalie alive.

“Cybel’s going to hack into the mainframe and remotely maneuver your ship. I need you to read me the serial number and switch the controls to autopilot. Do you hear me?”

Zane crawled across the steel floor and removed a wall panel. The sixteen-digit serial number was etched into a metal block. As he read the code to Mira and flipped the switch to autopilot, his ship veered away from an incoming laser.

“Good. I need you to talk to me, Zane. Tell me what’s going on.”

He stared at her.

“Status report, Marine!”

A switch flipped in his mind, and he slid into his chair, scanning the room.

A wounded noncombatant was sprawled in the seat beside him.

Kalie . A cluster of warplanes trailed him.

They’d left Etov’s atmosphere and were following the nav computer’s route to Renan, and an ally, Cybel, was controlling the ship.

“Etov was compromised. Three destroyers here, and one on each of the neighboring planets. The closest available stargate is over Renan, but that’s at least a forty-minute flight. Kalie’s wounded. I don’t have any medical supplies, and she needs immediate attention.”

He could shave the time down. The motions came back to him, and he seized the lever regulating the heat, lowering it to zero. Cold seeped into his toes and chilled his skin.

“Lowering the heat,” he said, shivering. It was risky; Kalie needed to be kept warm. But more than that, she needed to be alive. “Frees up more power for engines. It should cut the time to…”

The math eluded him, but Mira nodded. “Good. Lower the oxygen levels, too. That should cut the time to Renan in half.”

With shaking hands, Zane twisted the knob regulating the oxygen level. He flicked off the lights, too. On the energy readout, eighty-five percent power was diverted to the engines and thrusters. That would get them there in… twenty minutes? Twenty-five?

“I’m on my way, but I won’t get there in time. Head for Renan’s gate. Gar has an outpost across the border in Seven. I’ll have him send a frigate to meet you after the first connector. ”

An explosion boomed, and as a laser struck the hull, Zane lurched into his safety harness. Seizing the cannons, he tapped a plane on the radar and fired. The ship burst into flames.

“Do you hear me, Zane?”

“Yes, I hear you!”

“Good. Thought I lost you there for a second.”

Another blast connected with the hull, and the ship lurched into a steep dive. The planet Ason loomed before them, but a black shadow blotted out the stargate.

Mira’s holo turned away. “Dammit. I have to go. Cybel will keep?—”

Her crackling projection disappeared.

“Mira?”

No response. He was alone.

The ship rocked, and he threw his arms up. Fires tore across the viewport. He punched a flashing button on the dashboard; gray foam spurted onto the glass and squelched the flames. He tapped a plane on the radar and squeezed the trigger. It exploded, and its comrades met the same fate.

Zane sagged into his chair as the ship lurched and Cybel took full control. He pressed his fingers to Kalie’s neck. Her pulse was faint. Trembling, he scanned the dashboard. Eighteen minutes to Renan. Then they had to take the connector, board the frigate, get her to surgery…

Tears fell, turning to beads of ice on his cheeks. He shivered as he seized her frozen hand. Then, closing his eyes, he prayed.

Not to Mordir, but to her gods. To Azura, whose blood allegedly ran through Kalie’s veins.

To Calla, the first duchissa. To the goddess of hope, Samora.

To the sun god Kalie was named for, Kallus, and to the god of healing, whose name he forgot.

If the god was real, he hoped he didn’t hold it against him.

“Please.” Zane clutched her hand. “Please, save her.”

“Vitals aren’t stable.” The woman’s voice warbled like it was deep underwater. “Third degree burns to the lumbar region, shrapnel lodged near his spinal column… he’s lost a lot of blood…”

“Take him to room two.”

Excruciating light pierced Zane’s closed eyes, but serene darkness swiftly replaced it.

Erratic beeping pulsed in his ears, blaring and painful, like a holocomm’s whine during a hangover. Groaning, Zane cracked his eyes open. The light still stung. He threw an arm over his face. As he tested his leg, there was only a cramping twinge of pain.

Blankets covered him, and a plush pillow propped his head up. The frigid ship must’ve been a nightmare, he was so warm…

The beeping fell silent, then grew more persistent.

“Her pulse is dropping!”

Rubbing his sleep-crusted eyelids, Zane turned towards the commotion.

Medics scurried around a bed across the room. One rattled past with a supply cart, jostling the metal implements laid across it. One was firing up a regenerator. Another was huffing for air, doing rapid compressions on a patient’s chest. Long golden hair fanned across her pillow. She wasn’t moving.

Zane gasped. It wasn’t a dream.

The man bent over Kalie and blew air into her mouth. He started the compressions again, but the green line racing across the monitor flattened. “We’re losing her!”

“No,” Zane mumbled.

The woman holding the regenerator flicked a switch. Its glowing purple light dulled, and she set it aside. “It’s no use. She’s too far gone.”

No. Nononono ?—

The man doing compressions glanced at the monitor.

Zane stared at that damning green line, and blinked, and blinked again, and stared some more.

But it didn’t change. The monitor kept wailing.

His stomach gave a gut-wrenching heave, and he tasted acid in his mouth as he forced his eyes towards Kalie .

The man pressed on her chest again and again. But the line was flat. She was still.

And he stopped .

“No!” Zane lunged to his feet, but blankets tangled around his ankles and yanked the world out from under him. His elbows bashed into the floor. “She’s alive! Save her!”

A woman crouched beside him. “Sir, calm down.”

“She had a pulse!” His chest heaved as he fought for air. The world fractured around him as they just stood there, staring at the unending green line. “She had a pulse! I felt it!”

Two nurses stepped around Kalie’s bed and pushed him back. He flung his arm at one and launched a kick at another, but his heel slipped and he lost his balance. Something pierced his neck as he crumpled onto his bed. His eyelids crashed down. The machine kept screeching.

“There’s nothing more we can do.”