Cage and Mia, of course, might never see it that way. But it didn’t matter: Rune was the only one who could land the ship. We didn’t have time to get her to safety once we touched down. Bad enough that the three of us were marching into enemy hands; no point risking the rest of our crew. Besides, we needed people on the outside if things went wrong.

That must have settled the matter, because Mia gave a slight nod and left us on our own. Cage, Rune, and I inspected one another, Rune apparently forgetting to be angry at her twin in the heat of the moment. “All right,” I said. “Are we doing this?”

Cage flashed me that smile of his, the all-teeth one that simultaneously gave him a dangerously wolfish edge and made me go weak in the knees. “No sense delaying,” he said. I found myself smiling in return. I loved this about Cage, this willingness to plunge headfirst into whatever ridiculous scheme he’d concocted, so bizarre to my strict Omnistellar upbringing. His everyday was my forbidden. In this moment, we could almost have been on Sanctuary again, fighting side by side in a last-ditch attempt for survival. All we’d been through together—huddling under the bed, clutching each other for safety, saving each other’s lives—all of it losing the edge of panic and taking on an almost romantic allure until more painful memories intruded.

Claws hoisting Cage in the air, hurling him across the room.

The gun bucking in my hand, Matt’s scream in the distance.

Standing in total silence, trembling with effort, as aliens prowled a heartbeat away.

Rune cleared her throat. “Kenzie,” she said.

Right. The plan. I shook off the memories of Sanctuary. Some of my Omnistellar lessons needed reinforcing. If we wanted to survive, I had to stop letting the aliens terrorize me from beyond the grave. We might have vented them off their own ship, but that hadn’t exorcised them from my mind.

Rune and I approached the console. She closed her eyes, focusing, and plunged her arms elbow deep in electronics. Her shoulders relaxed as she melded with the circuitry, which she always seemed to embrace like a long-lost friend.

“Found comms,” she announced after a moment. “Kenzie, you ready? I’m going to put it on speaker because that’s all I know how to do. Cage, once I do, keep your mouth shut. Kenzie knows the protocols. You don’t.”

I looked over my shoulder in time to see him blink back an expression of mingled surprise and hurt, but he only muttered, “Understood.”

A moment later a voice cut through the room as clearly as if its owner stood beside us. We had no visuals, which felt strange and wrong for ground-to-ship communications, and would definitely set off warning bells on Mars if their sensors weren’t already going crazy.

“Unidentified spacecraft,” came a sharp male voice with an unfamiliar accent. “You are in the space of Mars Mining Incorporated and approaching weapons range. If you do not identify yourselves at once, we’ll be forced to open fire.”