Chapter 29 · Neither of Us Kneels

"Move." Dean hauled on the lever again, both hands wrapped around cold steel, veins standing up his forearms.

It didn't give. It never gave. The gears underneath just screamed, metal on metal, like the whole airlock was grinding its teeth at us.

"Let me try." I shoved past him, hip catching the frame, and got both palms flat on the wheel.

"You'll break your wrist."

"Better than standing here listening to Voss build up to my name on live radio."

I threw my weight into it. Nothing. The wheel didn't rotate a single degree. Somewhere behind the wall a relay clicked, and clicked again, useless.

"Forty seconds to the hour," Dean said, checking the wall clock over my shoulder. His voice had gone flat, the voice he probably used on hostage calls. Steady because panic doesn't fix locks.

"I know what time it is."

"Then stop pulling on a jammed gear and think."

"I am thinking." My hands were shaking. Not fear-shaking. The other kind. The kind that had been building since the suppressant line went dead in the Faraday seal, since my last dose wore off two hours before it should have. Sweat at my collar. Heat crawling up the back of my neck like something was lit under my skin.

Dean went still.