“Not quite so easy to take us down, though,” Eryn said. She marched over to the corner of the bridge, to the storage bins welded against the curved wall of the ship. Dex grinned as she hefted up a set of armor, the very same that they’d seen being made in the Underground. “I packed a little something for our journey.”

Three sets. Enough for Dex, Eryn and Soyina.

Klaren had the armor of Arachnid to protect her, and Andi likely wouldn’t be shot at. Likely didn’t ease Dex’s mind at all, but even if she was shot at, they knew now that she was immune. Nor wouldn’t be able to bring her over to their side—not in that way, anyway.

“We’re closing in,” Soyina said from the pilot’s seat. “Our team rigged the ship’s internal computer to combat their tech. No heat-seeking systems will work, so they won’t know anyone else is on board. But you’ve got to move quick once we land, Eryn. Be ready to shield us from view. When that loading ramp opens, the three of us will have to be silent and get off the ship before the cooling system shuts off. Otherwise they’re likely to hear us moving down the ramp.”

Eryn nodded, hands clasped together. “You won’t be seen.”

“And in the event that all hell breaks loose?” Dex asked.

Andi answered that one. “Hell has already broken loose. We don’t have any backups. If it goes badly, we get back in the ship, we get out...and we don’t return again.”

Dex heard the lie in her voice. She wasn’t going to leave that planet. Not without the girls. Which meant he wasn’t leaving, either.

“One-shot mission,” Eryn said. “Not great odds.”

Dex shrugged, because though he was scared as hell, he realized it was too late to care or turn back. “Andi enjoys missions with little to no chance of success. So this kind of thing isn’t new for us.”

“To not great odds,” Soyina said, lifting a pretend glass in the air. Then she angled the ship toward Arcardius, ready to take them down to the devil’s lair.

Dex took back what he said about everything looking normal, because the moment they soared into Arcardius’s atmosphere, they were met by a sea of black ships.

“Rovers,” Soyina said, bringing their ship in to hover in the sky just beside Averia’s floating mountain. “The same ones Nor has had seeking out the Unaffecteds across Mirabel all this time. Nasty little ships.”

The Rovers were small, but loaded with tech. The Solis crest was painted on their sides and underbellies, a menacing reminder of what they were soon to face. Dex wondered how many of the crews inside were there of their own accord, or if everyone was under the influence of Valen’s compulsion now.