“Dag, make them stop talking,” Panya said. She nudged Malachi’s shoulder with her weapon. “Well? Can you restart the rest of the systems?”

“As far as I can tell, the ship’s engines are functioning normally.” Malachi didn’t look away from the screens, didn’t look at any of us. “There are a lot of systems failure alerts, but nothing critical. Nothing to keep the ship from traveling. Is that what you wanted to know?”

She leaned over his shoulder, arm braced on the terminal to hold herself in place. “Our vision has not changed, Malachi, even if you and Zahra have lost sight of it. Our duty is clear. We will rendezvous with Homestead. Shut down the security web.”

A moment of quiet, then Malachi said, “Done. It will take a few minutes for the drones to return to their hull docks, but the web is disabled.”

“Contact them now.”

Malachi hesitated. “Orvar is dead. I don’t know who—”

There was a crack as she slapped his cheek. “Do not stall. Contact Homestead.”

Malachi touched his face where she had hit him, then reached for the terminal. He stilled with his hand centimeters above the surface.

“Panya,” he said softly.

He grabbed her wrist. She looked down. There was something moving beneath her skin. It looked like a small, round stone pressing up from the inside, rolling along her forearm toward her elbow.

There was a moment of stillness—a second in which nobody breathed—then everybody was moving at once.

Dag swung his weapon away from the hostages toward Panya without the slightest hesitation. Malachi twisted Panya around, jamming her arm up behind her back and slamming her face down onto the communications panel. The force of the blow was enough to stun Panya for a moment; she released the gun from her other hand. I darted forward to grab it. Panya shrieked and kicked at Malachi, trying to fight and flail.

“Let me go! What the fuck are you doing? Let me go!”

Malachi held her tight. “You’re infected.”

A look of pure shock overtook her face. “I am not!”

“Panya. Listen to me!”

Then Dag was beside him, taking hold of her other arm, dragging her away from the terminal. She was screaming and thrashing, spluttering with fear as she shouted, “Let me go! Dag, don’t believe him! Help me!”

For a second, only a second, Dag hesitated. It was enough. Panya wrenched one arm free and swung at him, but she missed Dag and struck Malachi’s cheek instead. Dag grabbed her arm and tried to wrestle it back behind her. As she cursed and fought, spittle pinked with blood sprayed from a bitten tongue or split lip. Malachi spared a second to wipe his face before reaching for her again.

“No!”