I pause and glance at Velith; he has so much more to lose. He could’ve walked away, played it safe. I don’t understand him at all. “Why are you doing this?”

“Perhaps I have always wanted to play the hero, Sirantha.” That’s not an answer, but I let it be, as we proceed through silent halls.

So ironic. I ran so long and fought so hard to escape the Corp. And now here I am, returning all but naked and unarmed. It doesn’t matter anymore. All I know is that I can’t let it end like this, where March becomes a conscienceless butcher because of me, even if they are Corp automatons and wage slaves. He’s better than this. Better than me. And I’d die for him. That’s why I’m here. Nothing else makes a bit of difference; I’m here to share his fate.

Finally found something more important than me, baby.

My throat burns. There’s nobody anywhere in the building, but on the third floor, we run into two MPs dragging a struggling man in a suit toward what I presume to be the comm center. I guess they finally decided to give up the button man. The Corp certainly doesn’t hold human life sacred, after all.

“You’re dead,” he shouts. “You’re supposed to be dead. Mother Mary of Anabolic Grace, what will it take to kill you?”

“People keep saying that.” But then I take a closer look at him, straining against his captors. “Simon?”

Vel frowns, glancing between us. “You know this man, Sirantha?”

“Not well enough to have foreseen this, but technically he’s my husband.”

I disregard whatever Simon’s screaming as they tow him toward the doors. Had no idea he’d climbed so high on the Corp ladder that he’d be placed for involvement in something like this. Then again, he always was ambitious. I think he chased me because he thought it would help his career, being married to a nav-star. Too bad I came equipped with a mind of my own and no compunctions about telling him that he couldn’t get me off with a handbook.

“Save the reunion,” the guard says, clapping a hand over Simon’s mouth. “Let’s take this inside before that crazy bastard in there starts making people explode.”

“I told you, nobody gets in but the one responsible for her death.” Every muscle tenses at hearing March on the speakers. Mary, I’ve never heard him sound like that. Cold. Determined. Hopeless. He’s likely monitoring the building from inside. “Keep fucking with me, and this whole place goes up. We planted enough charges to take out this whole quadrant, and I’m tired of waiting.”

“Just, please, let us in,” the guard begs, sounding like he wishes he was in another line of work. “We brought him for you, didn’t we?”

There’s a long, tense silence, and I’m almost afraid he’s going to snap before we get inside. But then the lock clicks, and the doors swing open. I don’t wait; I can’t. My feet pound the floor as I break into a run. But I draw up as I realize sudden movement is a really bad idea.

The room smells of stale sweat and terror, faint acrid reek of urine. People lie facedown on the floor. I recognize Dina and March, note a couple strangers with disruptors, hired guns most likely. Oh Mary, look at what I’ve done to him. He carries hell in his eyes, the set of his mouth. He regards me with a blank, dead stare.

“You fragging twats,” he says, a low, hoarse voice. “You’d try anything. Trying to fool me with a dupe? Get that bitch out of here.”

“March, it’s me, baby. I’m here. I will always come for you.”

I move toward him, knowing he might shoot me in the chest. I can feel that he’s gone away somewhere inside his head, a fire-washed wasteland where nothing matters, and the burning never stops. I know the place all too well.

I’ll wind up there myself if anything happens to this man.

CHAPTER 53

I keep walking.

“Dina, you dumb bitch. Why’d you let him talk you into this?” That earns me a sharp glance. I sense it more than see it. Less than two meters to him now. I see his fingers trembling on the weapon. “Remember when I sat on your lap in the rover? I expected you to grab my ass, but you never did. Guess I’m really not your type.”

“Shit,” she breathes. “March, it’s Jax. It’s really her.”

He comes roaring into me then, although he doesn’t move, not gentle exploration, more of an invasion. I feel everything inside him—the despair of my own death washes over me, and I stop. My chest feels tight; it’s almost impossible to breathe.

Then I don’t see anything at all because he crushes me in his arms. My ribs contract as he squeezes me, trying to make me part of him. The hired gunmen are screaming at the guards, and Simon adds to the clamor, but I can’t make out what they’re saying over the roaring in my head. Distantly, I’m aware of a woman sobbing, hoarse and desperate in the cadence of her weeping.

“I wanted him to die,” March whispers. “I wanted the whole world to die. Jax, Jax…” His fingers tremble as they brush across my scalp, down over my temples to my jaw. He touches my bruised eye with such reverence that I might be a holy artifact.

I don’t know what might have happened then, but everyone in the room freezes as the forty vid screens around the room light up, and Velith steps away from a sys-terminal, looking pleased. The first thing that pops up is a document. It’s a meeting agenda with the heading: Matins IV—a Conglomerate summit to vote upon deregulation.

Deregulation…

A chill washes over me. But that’s not all. Up on-screen, we see footage from the crash, smoldering wreckage, and I suddenly know what Vel’s doing. Mary, he’s fragging brilliant. This is what he was splicing in the trawler, but I’m still surprised when the display patches to the grainy record taken from his cranial cam. Didn’t even know he had one, but I guess it eliminates any question of how a capture went down. I see myself pinned, his claw on my throat, hear myself surrender to save the others.

Then we bounce to the Silverfish, where I say, fuzzy but audible, “Did it ever occur to you to that the Corp is guilty of disseminating false information? I’m the only survivor from the Sargasso, but I didn’t do that. The landing authority used override codes on our vessel and supplied incorrect coordinates, the wrong trajectory. They fragging engineered that crash.”

And now everyone watching this feed, not sure how many that is, knows it, too. But he’s still not done. Vel shows the world the way I provoked the Morgut, feeding them my blood like a moron, and we hear his voice on the comm. “Why does my target claim that Farwan Corporation is responsible for the crash on Matins IV? Why does the target prefer to provoke a pack of Morgut to being extradited into your custody?”

“She’s insane,” comes the soon-to-be-infamous response. “She would say anything. Just sit tight, and help will arrive shortly. We have a unit en route.”

The last scene shows us crouched behind the rocks, as the Corp ship blows the Spiral all to hell; and then it starts to play all over again. Outside, I hear the crowd roaring, the impact of something exploding against glastique. Farwan Corporation murdered the last hero the whole galaxy recognizes, Miriam Jocasta, because they were afraid of the vote. Afraid the Conglomerate would vote to deregulate jump-travel and permit freely established academies.

Security’s going to have a hell of a time containing the riots—if they even bother. The public never likes being duped. Hostages clamber unsteadily to their feet because even the hired gunmen look stunned and numb. Nobody stops them.

“It is finished,” Vel tells the guards. “I bounced that feed to every Conglomerate world, and it is only a matter of time before they arrive demanding justice for their murdered representatives. Once exposed, a secret loses all its power.”

He’s right. Although it may flail around like an enormous decapitated beast, doing collateral damage, Farwan’s days are numbered. They failed to break me before March got me off station, and now it’s too late. They should’ve killed me instead of trying to turn me into their sacrificial goat. I’ve said that all along.

I can’t even begin to imagine the economic ripples this is going to have. I foresee world after world seceding from the Conglomerate until it ultimately dissolves. And who can prosecute a company so large, it essentially became a galactic government? But perhaps a strong leader can hold it together. They’ll have to create a tribunal, so much ground-breaking here. It’s a new universe, or will be, once the shock waves cease.

The security officers exchange a long look, then pull the patches from their uniforms. Silently, they drop their weapons and nobody stops them when they leave the room. I guess they’re unemployed now. A lot of folks will be before this thing is done. Hard times are coming, but I think perhaps it’s a good thing. Change is good, chaos can be beneficial, and this will open a lot of doors. Maybe ours won’t be the only start-up academy; maybe we’ll have competition. And that’s exactly as it should be.

“I was only following orders,” Simon whimpers. “They told me to select someone expendable, and you’ve been jumping a long time. Statistically speaking, you should have burned out long since. Sirantha, please…”

Deliberately I turn my back on him, content to let the incipient tribunal deal with him and all the rest of his ilk. I hear the sound of one of his former employees shutting him up. It’s distinctive, the repetitive thud of a fist hitting a face. The room empties, some hostages looking broken, others disbelieving. I can relate; rather suddenly, the face of the universe has changed.

March pulls me back into his arms then. He let me turn when the screens came to life, but now he’s compulsive, running his hands over my back, my shoulders, my hips. He holds me as if it hurts him to breathe, and he can’t seem to find his voice.

Dina comes up behind us, and I’m surprised to feel her arms encircle both of us. “You stupid bitch,” she mutters. “I don’t need you dying for me. I need you to stick around because…you’re my best friend.” She squeezes us with her corded arms, then steps back, clearing her throat. “We got a message from Doc, by the way. He’s all right, just stuck on Gehenna. Said he had some news for you, but he didn’t say what.”

“I’ll bounce a message to him later,” I answer.

But I think I already know, something about the L-gene appending to the J-gene. Maybe he knows why since he’s had nothing but time since we left and access to the excellent Carvati research facilities.

“Come on,” she adds to the hired guns. I hear explosions in the distance, shattering glastique. “Let’s loot this place before the angry mob gets inside.”

Then it’s just the two of us. I meant to thank Vel, but he’s gone, and I didn’t see him leave. Maybe for him it was as simple as getting to the truth. Maybe we didn’t bond like I thought we did, but I can’t think about that right now. I’ll locate him later if he wants to be found.

It’s time to say the words. Wherever he is, Kai knows my feelings now don’t lessen anything we shared. March is such an odd dichotomy of buried cruelty and brutality, overlaid by the kindness and compassion that Mair taught him. He’d kill the world for me, so it’s my place to make sure he never has to.