She pushed off the hinges of the outer hatch, turning her light off, aiming at the spot she wanted with the clean image her exterior vid had picked up and recorded. She bounced off the bulkhead just beyond the inner hatch, flicked the light on and off again quickly, to let the vids pick up enough to refine their image. Though it seemed agonizingly slow, this zigzag approach got her to him before he had controlled his own rotation. Then, her light blazing directly into his faceplate, she struck, the saw-bladed knife ripping into his suit fabric.

He was bigger, heavier, undoubtedly more experienced in space brawls onship and off. He clutched her arms, pushed off the bulkhead, moving them perilously back toward the outside—and worse, toward the mine on the deck. Another kick, off the overhead, and she knew they would hit it if she didn’t change their vector. Twist, curl up to spin faster, stretch to slow… like a grotesque ballet, they rebounded again and again from bulkhead, overhead, deck, missing the mine by centimeters several times and only because Ky had marked it on her implant’s view and instinct drove the maneuvers that avoided it.

She got one hand loose, briefly, and ripped her gun from its holster, remembering as she did the salesman’s comments on zero-g and variable-g gunfights. No matter. Recoil would give her a vector she could not control, but she could not wait for something better.

The first shot shattered on impact, the many fragments each sharp enough to slice through a pressure suit. Her arm jerked back; she fought it into position and fired again, again, again. The helmet would be armored, as hers was; he might wear torso armor… but the legs, the arms…

Even in the created view her monitors gave her, where his blood was shown turquoise—the smaller droplets pale, the large blobs dark—it was grotesque. His grip on her other arm first clutched tighter, then loosened—the force of the impacts moved him away from her, and she was pushed back. Now she was no longer centimeters away, but a meter… another meter. Again. Again. She dialed her faceplate’s protection down, slowly, letting her eyes adjust, seeing finally in true colors what she had done.

It was still shocking, how red the blood looked, how much blood hung in the passage in patches of red mist, blobs, strings. His suit leaked foam sealant from a hundred holes, too many… arms and legs motionless, imprisoned by the suit’s attempt to save his life. The face inside the helmet looked gray now, the eyes wide. But still alive. He blinked. Beyond him was the black maw of the open air lock hatch. The way he was moving, he would rebound from the bulkhead before he floated away. Ky bumped gently into some surface and pushed off in pursuit.

She caught him as he hit the bulkhead; she had a leg locked on either side of the inner air lock hatch. When she pulled the head close, his eyes stared into hers. Osman. Rage greater than before rose in her like a tide of light. His eyes shifted, back to where the mine was positioned. Then he grinned at her, and stuck out his tongue.

“You killed my parents,” Ky said conversationally. He could not hear, but he could no doubt figure out what she might be saying. “You killed my brothers, and my uncle, and far too many people I cared about, including the ones I didn’t know.” She had him braced against the bulkhead now, immobile. “Gerry’s little girl,” she went on, as her utility knife widened holes the frangible rounds had made. “Gerry’s little spoiled bitch, I believe you said. You were going to have fun with me, you thought.” And now the knife had opened the front of his suit, along the seam, and she ran it up under the helmet seal, up through his chin, through his tongue, through the roof of his mouth.

And his eyes went blank. And she was covered with a disgusting mess, and the mine was still there. The surge of exultation, this time mixed with righteous rage, did not diminish so much as she pushed it aside. Later. Later to savor that kill, but now—now for her ship.

She eased slowly back toward the mine, brushing the vacuum-frozen flakes of Osman’s mortality off her suit, and examined the device. A standard, sturdy, inexpensive shaped-charge limpet, one of the several varieties they’d studied. Her EMP had fried its electronics, no doubt—the status telltales that should have indicated attachment and arming status were blank. If it hadn’t been attached, then she could move it—slowly and carefully. If it had, trying to pull it off would trigger the pressure-sensitive override. One standard method of determining attachment involved a short blast of compressed gas, but she had none. Except—she did: the emergency buddy-breather built into all pressure suits to allow partners to share air if necessary.

In this model the auxiliary supply tube had a safety interlock, which took her long seconds to disable, but at last she could direct a stream of air at the base of the mine. It quivered… then slowly slid across the deck. Ky let out her breath. Not yet attached. Not yet attached usually meant not yet armed—to the military anyway. Who knew what Osman had done? She used the tip of a finger and the slight current of air to tip it up, letting her see the critical undersurface. There, the nonelectronic mechanical switch showed orange. Prearmed, not fully armed. Unless Osman had changed the settings… but she didn’t think so. She could disarm it… but just in case, that would be better done somewhere else, with the charge aimed somewhere other than her ship.

Slowly, she nudged it down the escape passage, its deadly undersurface pointed away, past Osman’s corpse, now bumping on the overhead. She was about to give it a final push when she realized that would take it toward Fair Kaleen, now lit up but still tumbling.

It would kill her or it wouldn’t. Ky reached around and flicked the switch to disarm. Nothing happened. The mine was—or should be—inert now. She used the remnant of elastic cord at her waist to secure it to the exterior hatch, facing out, just in case, then pulled the hatch shut, dogged it, put Osman’s body in the air lock, closed and dogged the inner hatch, and at last had a moment’s leisure to consider what she might have done to her crew—her family—and her ship.

Somewhere along the passage—there—was a dataport connection. She attached a suit connector, keyed the implant, and asked for analysis.

AUTOMATIC SYSTEM RESET 92 SECONDS. OVERRIDE? Had the fight taken that long? She chose OVERRIDE. Weight landed on her shoulders and hips, then wavered, then returned. Pink snow fell to the deck. ARTIFICIAL GRAVITY FUNCTIONAL. Lights and life support should come back first. Gravity was nice, but the others were more important. She felt a vibration in her boot soles. LIFE SUPPORT FUNCTIONAL. THIS COMPARTMENT ZERO PRESSURE. REPRESSURIZE? “Pressurization reserves?” DATA UNAVAILABLE. That wasn’t good. If life support was back up, she should have access to the life-support recharge capacity, including air reserves.

She made her way to the forward end of the emergency passage. That compartment division had a window into the passage beyond, with a partial view of the rec space. She doused her light and looked in. Red emergency lights only—and aiming her suit light through the multiple layers of transparent material only gave confusing reflections. A flicker of light, then another flicker. ONBOARD POWER 65%. DEFINE LIGHT PATTERNS. Ky looked at the ship’s plan her display threw up. Bridge: light displays, one overhead light, controls. REMAINING POWER RESERVE 14.3 HOURS. So… the drive was down as well… that was a problem. Rec space: she needed to see something. One overhead light came on, showing two tables, someone slumped over a fallen chair… not good, not good. If they were all hurt… disabled—she would not think dead, though she already had—she needed to get where she could do some good.