We cut our engines as we approach and come down on toes and fingertips, caught on the armour’s cliff face and scraping down its surface. We’re still riding in Horizon’s bubble of inertia, and we keep its perspective; up is where the ceilings are inside the ship. We move like a climber, hand over hand, thrusting when we cross a gap or change grip, slowed to a crawl across the cliffside. We snag one of the doors to twenty-eight and let ourselves hang, trying to get an eye over the side. Even here, right against the edge, we can’t see much of the block behind it.

“Moving up.”

I can feel Salt drop his aim and hear his augurs dim, so our ears won’t ring when we make our way inside.

“I’ll be ready,” says Salt. He doesn’t like it; the only thing worse than going in blind is watching while your wingmate does.

The Juno and I hold ourselves tight against the plating and let our sensors do some work. The doors are stuck fast, but the gap is probably big enough to fit us, assuming we hold our breath. Good thing Salt’s on overwatch; the Decatur’s too big and too heavy, no matter how he folds it. We’re just over half his size, all told, and even we have to tuck our wing-mounts in behind our shoulders.

It feels strange going without them. Naked, like we’d fall if we lost our grip. I can see the froth far below us, cloud-tops dancing in the Eye-light, bright and impossibly deep.

I have to swallow a moment’s vertigo, but the Juno holds us tight and steers a free hand to touch Avery’s sword, bolted into a recess in the small of our back. The grip is solid, and fits our fingers like it’s meant to.

I take a deep breath. “Breaching.”

We press our feet against the hull, pull our grip tight, and hurl ourselves into open air. We float for a heartbeat, maybe less, but it feels like minutes.

I kick for thrust, and our engines throw us like a curveball through the doors. We come down on the deck with a trail of sparks and a shriek of steel. No space for the long-gun in here, and so we reach for the blade again, raising the other hand in a guard.

A broken Decatur rests in one corner, streaks of paint and a trail of shattered armour marking its passage across the floor. Mangled wings prop it up against the wall, one arm twisted in its socket, the other in pieces on the ground. Its chest has been torn open, split around massive rents in the armour. Not bullet holes, or rail-wounds either; if I didn’t know better, I’d say another shell tried to claw its way inside.