Chapter 24 · The Ninety-First Day

The three knocks came again.

Polite. Evenly spaced. Almost apologetic.

Evan stood beneath the core's pulsing light, one hand braced against the navigation console while the deck shuddered under another impact. Somewhere beyond the armored hull, boarding clamps bit into the Blue Heron's spine. Metal screamed. Mara Quill's defense network answered with a burst of automatic fire, and the ship rocked as something large and burning tore away from the portside docking ring.

The core did not react.

It kept displaying the same message in thin white characters:

DAY NINETY-ONE: ORIGIN VECTOR CONFIRMED. BLUE HERON. ARCHITECT PRESENT.

Sera Vale stared at the sealed hatch. Blood darkened the sleeve of her uniform, and the emergency lights cut her face into hard planes of red and shadow.

"Tell me that's not what I think it is," she said.

Evan swallowed. His mouth tasted of copper and overheated circuitry. "If you think someone on this ship designed the missing day, then yes."

Oren Cade gave a humorless laugh from the engineering station. He had one hand pressed against a split in his brow, and blood ran between his fingers. "We're running out of people to accuse."

"Not people," Sera said. "Possibilities.