“What…” Gin asked.

Saul’s lips had narrowed into a thin line. He typed quickly, bringing up the cameras that monitored the outside of the ship. Maren gasped—a black beast gripped the rear of the ship, covering the thrusters and storage units. It was unlike any of the Cymic Parasites Maren had seen before; it was massive, easily large enough to cover the ship’s rear quarter and drag it to a halt.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

How did it get that big? Maren wondered in sick fascination. Then, as the creature moved, she understood: it wasn’t one beast, it was hundreds. They stuck together, rippling over each other, flowing into new shapes. They were simultaneously many and one, liquid and solid.

A glitter of silver behind the station explained where they’d come from. Forty buggies, most likely from Station 491, were parked just out of view. That means we’ve lost both of our sister stations. Damn it.

Saul pressed on the throttle again, and the ship dragged forward painfully slowly before pulling to a standstill. He hissed in frustration.

“They’re too heavy,” Maren said, hands pressed over her mouth as she watched the monsters swarm the rear of the ship. “But the flare will be here in a moment. If we just wait—”

Saul’s frown wasn’t comforting. He was pressing more buttons, charging something up.

“They’re trying to pull the ship apart,” Gin said. She’d drawn her knees up under her chin and had both hands gripping her short teal hair. Her face looked ghostly pale in the light reflected from the dashboard.

Sure enough, the mass was constricting, squeezing the craft’s back end. A metallic wail came from deep in the ship, and Maren felt her heart flutter. “If they compromise the hull, we’ll be cooked.”

“Hold on,” Saul said.

Maren glanced at the dashboard and saw he was drawing all of the ship’s power to the rear thrusters, and she suddenly understood what he had planned. “Wait. If they’re holding us back, the ship will—”

“I know,” he said. “Gotta try.” He pressed the button to activate the thrusters, and a high, painful whine rose from the ship’s hull as it was stressed to its limit.

Maren watched the screen. The Cymic had enveloped the rear of the ship. While the monster had been clever enough to avoid the main engines, its bulk was covering the giant grill that served as the rear thrusters, used only for a fierce burst of speed. As the thrusters activated, they shot a stream of intense fire straight into the creature’s core.

The scene was one of the most gratifying things Maren had ever seen. The Cymic froze and shivered, then the flames broke through its body, digging a hole through its centre and shooting clouds of black smoke and soot at least forty meters behind the ship. The remainder of the creature coiled up, peeling off the craft as it tried to protect what was left of its body.

That’s when the ship moved. The thrusters were only supposed to be used to get the ship out of a planet’s atmosphere or to accelerate in space. Using them on a grounded ship was disastrous. The ship lurched, pressing Maren back into her chair, then the seat’s harness dug into her chest as the ship, filled with far too much momentum, caught on the dunes and flipped.