“Nah. Not all of us knew. Some of the people in the Crew are dumbasses. Can’t put two and two together, but a good number of us figured it out. Not that Jorge would confirm.” He looked away and pulled out the rag from his pocket, busying himself with wiping his hands again. “Don’t you think it’s kind of messed up that what you’re mining will be used against you?”

“They’ve got more than enough to fuel their war, so a little more isn’t going to make that much of a difference. What choice do I have?” Hopefully, I’d only have to do this one time.

He shoved the rag back into his pocket and met my gaze. “It’s just messed up. This whole fuckin’ place is messed up. I hear things. Made friends with Matthew while working down here. The shit he’s found out—it ain’t right.”

“I know.” But there wasn’t anything I could do about it. At least not right at this moment.

I stepped inside the ship. It only had one seat—for the pilot. No copilot. Behind the controls was an empty cavern. Big enough for three speeders. Instead, there was a pile of round containers that were all collapsed to look like a pile of plates, but Carl told me that each of those would need to be filled before I came back or else it wouldn’t count as a full run. Apparently, only full runs counted toward the five required to get out of here.

That wouldn’t apply to me, but he didn’t need to know that.

I glanced over the control panel, and then looked back at Santiago. “I went over the ship yesterday, but you’re the mechanic and my friend. What do I need to know? Any quirks?”

He gave me a long look—uncharacteristically sober for Santiago—and turned to the ship. My mouth grew dry. I’d known that this was dangerous, but seeing Santiago scared made it so much worse.

Santiago was thorough in what he told me for the next twenty minutes. How one switch was faulty—to make sure that the light above it turned on, otherwise try it again until it lit. He would almost caress the ship as he talked, and I realized that this was the first time I’d seen him in his element. It wasn’t while he was joking or talking to people. That was a side of him for sure, but this—the mechanic—that was a big part of him that I’d never known about.

I noticed a tremor in Santiago’ voice as he talked and wondered if he was just as nervous as I was, which made my palms start sweating.

He’d been here for longer, knew what I was up against, and most importantly, he knew me.