Page 105 of Blightfall

“A bit,” I said, leading Dayan over to get a better look at her. “How did you escape?”

“Took them on a wild chase until Alanik woke up enough to jump us out,” Gilaf said.

“I’m glad she did,” I said.

“I might have shaken her a little,” Gilaf said.

“He did,” Alanik said. “It hurt.”

“But you’re not dead,” Dayan said, “so I think you came out—”

They were interrupted by Sadie and Nedd, who suddenly appeared next to the nose of the Dulo. Dayan jumped.

“I know we just did that,” Dayan said, “but it’s still disorienting.”

“You get used to it,” I said. I nodded to Nedd and Sadie. Nedd’s face still looked bruised from the stunt with the light-lances, and Sadie had a mark on her arm where she’d been burned, but otherwise they appeared unharmed. “You guys okay?”

Nedd marched up to me and punched me in the arm.

“Ouch!” I said. “What was that for?”

“For making us all think you were dead,” Gilaf said. “Obviously.”

“When did we think he was dead?” Alanik demanded.

“Yeah, well,” I said. “Next time you can be the one to jump out of a crashing starship with nothing but your flightsuit and a hyperslug. How about that?”

“Did you seriously do that?” Alanik asked.

“If he hadn’t,” Dayan said, “I’d be dead.”

“I’m okay,” I said to Alanik, though she still seemed horrified.

“Jumping off a tall object with a hyperslug actually sounds kind of fun,” Sadie said. “If you’d already received permission to hyperjump, of course.”

“You need to visit ReDawn sometime,” Gilaf said. “I’ll take you rubber-jumping from one of the branches.”

“We’re doing that,” Sadie said. “As soon as possible. I cannot wait.”

“People have died rubber-jumping,” Alanik said.

“This is all beside the point!” I said. “We need to talk about getting back into the city.”

“Is that where we’re going?” Gilaf asked.

“We have to,” Sadie said. “The space station was a bust, so now the only place where we might find answers and a way off this planet is the nowhere portal under the arena. Right?”

“Right,” I said. “Though we don’t know what we’re going to find inside, so we can’t say whether it’ll help until we take a look.” I hated the idea of sending my team in with so little intel, but we’d exhausted all our other options.

“Can we even get through the nowhere portal?” Sadie asked. “What if it’s locked?”

“There’s going to be a final tournament tomorrow,” Dayan said. “If they plan to take gladiators through, it’ll have to be open then.”

“That’s a good point,” I said. “And around that time, there could also be a really big distraction in the coliseum.”

Sadie smiled. “We’re going to make one, right?”

“That’s what I’m thinking,” I said. I turned to Dayan. “What do you say?”