Chapter 19 · Two Versions of Tomorrow

The first thing Evan heard was metal screaming.

Not the clean shriek of a hull under pressure. This was deeper, uglier—the sound of a ship remembering every impact it had survived and deciding it had suffered enough.

He opened his eyes to a ceiling webbed with emergency lights. Red pulses washed over the command deck of the Blue Heron, turning faces into fragments: Mara Quill gripping a med-bulkhead with one hand, blood dried black along her temple; Oren Cade wedged beneath an open maintenance panel; two navigation screens spitting blue static.

And Sera Vale, standing three steps away from him with one knee braced against the deck.

Her left glove was burned through. Her breathing was controlled, but not calm. Evan had seen her face while the relay core collapsed. He had seen the instant she chose him over the only escape window.

He still felt her hand locked around his harness.

The memory should have been impossible.

In the future he remembered, Sera Vale never came back.

A tremor rolled through the ship. Evan’s shoulder struck the deck. Somewhere behind the bulkhead, a valve burst with a wet cough.

Oren slammed the panel shut. Sparks spat between his fingers.