Frantically, he looked around for a place to hide, but the hallway was devoid of any nooks or crevices. The only thing around was a lifeless Society agent, curled in the fetal position, still holding her hand over the glistening wound in her chest. And as the voices got closer, she gave him an idea.

“Get down!” he whispered and dropped to the floor, face down, letting his body go completely limp. He heard the thump of Leta doing the same beside him. Playing dead. Like animals, he thought bitterly.

The footsteps came closer, then stopped. Cyrus stilled his breath, but nothing could still the heart pounding in his chest. One of the voices said, “Shit. It’s Larson.”

They must’ve meant the agent.

“Godsdamn,” said the other. “She was just a rookie.”

“Well, she knew what she was getting herself into with this mission,” said the first.

The other person released a sigh. “Yeah I guess. Still. Didn’t deserve it.”

The men started to move again, coming closer, only inches from where Cyrus lay. One set of footsteps walked right on by, but the other. The other, horrifyingly, came to a stop beside him. He could feel eyes on the back of his head and inside, his mind screamed to stay quiet, to not move, to blend in.

But just as he was sure he was about to be discovered, the man hovering over him muttered, “Damn pirates,” and instead Cyrus felt a sharp pain in his stomach as a booted foot planted itself there. It was all he could do to just let his body take it and keep in the cry, but even if he had tensed, the man’s footsteps started again and he walked away, unnoticing.

Reeling from the pain, Cyrus still forced himself not to move until the sounds of the men had finally faded off into the distance of the hallway. And then Leta was above him, grabbing his arm and lifting him to his feet.

“Are you okay?” she breathed as Cyrus stumbled to his feet, clutching his arm over his stomach.

“Yeah,” he choked, shaking his head and hobbling onward. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. Let’s just…get to the shuttles.”

The stairs were right around the corner and, thank the gods, empty. They flew downstairs and Cyrus breathed a heavy sigh of relief when the starboard corridor of Deck F also seemed devoid of life. They were almost there. They could get out of here. This was almost over.

But as he hit the controls to open the bay door, his heart sank and the dream of leaving became distant once again.

The shuttle bay was a mess. The Titan’s support ships were in pieces, strewn across the cold metal flooring, some tipped over, damaged, a few even destroyed entirely. Evidence of explosives littered the area. Bullet holes and blood riddled the scene. There had been quite a firefight here and by the looks of it, it had ended badly. Even the shuttles still intact were risky. If its hull was breached and its sensors didn’t pick it up and they flew out of here into the black of space? They’d be better off on the Titan.

But just as the thought materialized, the span decided to remind him otherwise.

“Hey, you think we should check the shuttle bay?” called a voice past his shoulder, just outside the bay doors. “Might be someone hurt in there.”

Cyrus froze. And then he grabbed Leta’s arm and dove for cover behind the nearest crumbling hull as the doors slid open, allowing entrance to a small team of agents.

His heart lodged painfully in his throat as he crouched down to hide, shielded by the pillar of one of the shuttle’s legs. His hands were shaking terribly but he closed them around the metal bars and told himself to be still. Paralyzed as he was, he hardly dared to breathe as he watched with stricken eyes as the agents made their way into the bay.

What he expected was more gunmen. More of the lethal Society agents dressed in their slick all-black attire, heavily armed, ready to pick apart the ship limb from limb to gleefully find their prizes. And the reward — to then bring them to slaughter. If that were so — if execution was inevitable — Cyrus silently told himself he would not go down without his last shred of dignity. Not to the Society.

But it was not gunhands who entered. It was a group of people dressed in dark crew uniforms that could have belonged to any other passenger vessel, with a small silver librera stitched into the shoulder. No weapons in sight. Their voices carried through the room.

“Gods, I hope there’s no one else, the med bay’s already full as it is,” a woman was saying. Cyrus recognized the accent at once. Satieran. “I still can’t believe this even happened.”

“Makes sense though, doesn’t it?” added another voice thoughtfully.

“What do you mean?” asked another.

“Well, how weird command’s been acting lately,” said the other. “Think about it. All the extra security, the weird route, releasing the cruisers? I thought it was strange, but now it makes total sense.”

Perplexed, Cyrus darted a look toward Leta. Were they trapped? Could they slip by these people? Remain hidden? He knew one thing: if Fiearius were here, and it was a group of lowly unarmed crew members, they wouldn’t have been hiding. They would have been on the offense.

But even with the element of surprise, Cyrus knew he was in no shape for an attack of any kind. They wouldn’t get anywhere. Just when he managed to take a low breath and told himself to think, he heard it: a voice that was much, much closer.

The first woman laughed bitterly. “Wow, rumors spread fast apparently. You’re really buying into that bait theory Marshall came up with?”

“I’m not buying into anything,” said the other voice. “You know it’s true.”

“Sure,” the woman laughed. “Well, I don’t think there’s anyone down here. Just a whole lot of wreckage.”

To Cyrus’ horror, the woman rounded the corner of the ship. Cyrus caught a flash of her appearance — petite, curly jet-black hair hanging loosely in a bun, olive-tinted heart-shaped face — before the woman gasped, throwing her hand over her mouth. She was just as startled to see them as they were to be caught. Her eyes were wider than a whole planet.

In a shaky voice, she lowered her hand, and said the least likely greeting imaginable.

“Cyrus?” she gasped.

Cyrus head spun and with a jolt, he realized: he knew this woman. The curly hair, the wide green eyes.

“Delia?” he breathed, his mouth falling open. It really was her. They’d both worked at Sonnete years ago, though she had been little more than a receptionist at the time. But she had always greeted him with a smile as he passed her desk each morning, even when he was too busy, tired or cranky to return it. And now, here she was. Standing before him. On the Titan.

“What are you–” he began, just as Leta muttered, “You know her?” with her eyes wide and thunderstruck. By now, the other agents were rushing over, both of them shielding the woman from Cyrus and Leta as though they might attack at any moment. One of them drew a utility knife on them and it was enough to break Cyrus’ distraction.

Helplessly, he held his hands in the air. The armed man near Delia growled, “They’re raiders! Someone call security.”

The other woman pressed the button on her COMM and opened her mouth, but Delia held out her hand to stop her. “No, I know him!” she yelped, staring at Cyrus.

“They’re armed, Dee!” gasped the man with the knife, gesturing towards the pistols on both of their hips. “We need to report them.”

Feeling he had very little to lose at this point and desperate to cling onto any hope available, Cyrus muttered, “It’d be really nice if you didn’t…” and locked his pleading eyes with Delia. Her confused expression softened for a moment, it snapped right back.

“What — what’re you even doing here?” said Delia in exasperation, holding each side of her face in despair. Alarm shone in her face as she added, “Cy — did you — were you hurting those people? Were you part of — ”

“Of course not,” said Leta at once and Cyrus nodded fervently in agreement.

“Dee, you can’t really believe this,” said the man. “They’re armed. They’re not one of us. They’re obviously part of the raid. And we need to report them.”

“Arker’s right, they could be dangerous,” the other woman said.

But, thank the gods, Delia shook her head. “If we report them, they’ll be killed,” she groaned. “Do you want that kind of blood on your hands?” Both Arker and the woman looked away from her in shame. Apparently, they did not. Satisfied, Delia turned back to Cyrus. “Me either. But what I do want. Is answers. What’re you doing here, Cyrus?!”

It didn’t help matters that he could barely make himself focus. Three days had passed since he’d last taken one of those tiny white pills. He’d been wrong — he should have just given in this morning. He would’ve been on top of his game, but he’d felt moral obligation to resist, rather stupidly, he thought now. He’d congratulated his choice at the time. Now? Now his vision was blurring, his ears were ringing, his response time was delayed and people were dying. Now, he damned his choice to hell.

“Just hang in there,” he growled, clenching his fists around the edge of the console screen. “I’ll get back-up to you as soon as there’s bodies to spare.”

“May find nothing but bodies by the time they get here,” Rax snapped.

“How’s your brother doin’ with the blast doors?” came another voice — Quin’s. Judging by the background din, things were not faring well on her end, either. “Could sure as hell use ‘em right about now.”

Fiearius took a deep breath. “Status report, Cy?” When no answer arrived, he growled, “Cy? Cyrus, come in. Leta? Where the hell are you two — ”

“The command center’s blocking their transmissions,” Dez explained. “I was just there. He’s having trouble, the system appears to be predicting his actions and blocking him.”

“Sounds familiar,” Quin grunted. “This lot’s been predicting our actions and blocking our movements since we fuckin’ boarded.”

“It’s probably not a coincidence,” Dez added smoothly. The line went momentarily silent.

“Well of course it’s not a damn coincidence, ya genius, it’s–” said Quin, but Dez cut her off.

“They knew we would come.” His voice was cold, unsurprised. “And they were ready for us.”

Fiearius opened his mouth, then shut it quickly. “No way. No way they could have known. We were halfway across the Span last time they saw us. All the ships involved have the Society’s own damn stealth technology. They couldn’t have seen this coming.”

“No,” Dez agreed, his voice oddly calm. “Unless they put the ship here to make us come.”

Fiearius wanted to feel disbelief. He wanted to refute the insulting idea. But what he felt was a terrible, twisting shock in his chest.

The logic slid into place. They’d been winning so often. So easily. They had taken so many ships, downed bases, stations, remote checkpoints, of course the Titan seemed the ultimate prize. Of course they’d go straight to it. And of course the Society would put it right within their grasp.

“Shit — it’s a set-up,” Quin breathed, reading his mind. “They’re just planning to wipe us all out in one fell swoop — “

“And they’re fuckin’ succeeding,” added Rax angrily.

Dez’s voice cut through the others like a knife. “We need a plan.”

“Soliveré, the fuck do we do now?” shouted Quin.

“You’ve got that special chip thing,” said Rax, his voice rising with panic. “Can’t you do something with it?”

But Fiearius could barely grasp their voices. They were coming at him like waves, and he could feel himself sliding away from the moment, drowning in his own head. How — how — had he let this happen? Cyrus and Leta were on the ship, and he was here, and —

“Soliveré!” Quin shouted again.

“Fiearius, a course of action.”

Course of action? He could hardly plot the course of his finger as he moved it to press the COMM button. “Uh –”

“That’s not a fuckin’ answer, Soliveré, don’t you go still on us now!”

Answers. Solutions. Of course. Finally, the fog started to clear.

“Retreat,” he barked. “Back to the ships. Undock and fire at will. We need to get the hell out of here.”

—————

Leta paced across the command center floor, her figure periodically appearing and disappearing from Cyrus’ peripheral vision as he furiously tapped away at the console. “Please tell me you’re getting somewhere with this,” she begged.

Cyrus twitched in irritation. No matter what he did, no matter which method he tried, he just kept getting error after error after error. Every trick he knew kept yielding the same negative results and despite Leta’s hopes, he really was getting nowhere.

“I don’t think this is going to work,” he admitted as he hit the return and got the same blinking red screen. “It’s too secure, I can’t break into it. It’s–”

Abruptly, the floor beneath him began to tremble — slowly at first, then more urgently. Then the console screens flashed, the lights on the ceiling brightened, and a tremendous sound of electricity — like it was seizing and surging, powering up — overtook the room.

“Cy.” Leta grabbed onto a wall as the floor rattled below. “What’s happening?”

“It’s — it looks like — “ His eyes flew over the screens. He could barely answer her. “This ship, it’s about to make a jump.”

“What?!” Leta’s voice was shrill and horrified. “With us on it? Cy, stop it, you have to — “

“Stop it?! I can’t even access the basic oxygen recycling functions, let alone navigation!” he cried, one hand digging into his hair as his other flew over the keyboard.

Just then, a cool, calm female voice erupted over the intercom, making them both freeze. Please take your seats and prepare for jump. Please take your seats, and prepare for jump. Please prepare for …

“We need to get out of here,” Leta breathed, pushing away from the wall and grabbing Cyrus’ wrist in one motion. Together they flew into the hallway, which was mercifully empty now.

As they ran, Leta shouted into her COMM, “Fiearius? Fiear, are you there? We need you!”

The speaker crackled, and Fiearius’ voice broke through. “Leta? What’s going on?”

“We’re in the B-deck of the Titan and it’s about to jump out of this system, you need to guide us to one of Quin’s ship’s — “

Fiearius’ voice crumbled in disbelief. “One of Quin’s–but you’re on one of Quin’s ships. They saw your team board the Lagartha, Eve and–’

Cyrus and Leta exchanged a look of naked horror. “Fiearius,” he yelled, “Eve’s not with us!”

“Then where the hell are — ”

But then, Fiearius’ voice began to fade in and out, dissolving into crackling, hot static. Leta kept calling his name desperately into the COMM, but Cyrus felt himself going numb, enveloped by shock: around them, the dark metal walls of the ship gave a warm rumble, the floor seemed to jut out below them, and bright starlight streaked in long, horizontal lines past the nearest window. In one second, Fiearius and the Dionysian and Quin’s ships had become galaxies away.

“Cute, real cute, now can we focus?” said Eve, coming to a stop so sharply that Cyrus nearly staggered into her. It was obvious why Eve was joining he and Leta; she was the muscle and weapon. Her favorite assault rifle was clutched readily in her hands. “Cap’n, where to?” she said to the piece in her ear, and seconds later, Fiearius’ voice filled the line.

“Command center is around that corner. To the left. It’ll be — ”

But then, Fiearius’ words were drowned out by a thunderous, rumbling of metal, like the Titan had fired off one of its cannons.

“What was that?” said Leta.

“Don’t worry about it. Just get to the command center, alright?”

“That’s reassuring,” said Leta dryly, dropping her hand from her ear and crossing forward quickly. “C’mon, this way.”

Cyrus followed Leta as she rounded the corner toward the command center entrance, but they didn’t find the deserted hallway he’d been hoping for. Instead — his eyes widened — it was a growing firefight. Down the hallway, Society agents ducked down against the walls as Quin’s people (considerably less organized) stormed down the stairs, gunfire zinging around them …

For a full ten seconds Cyrus was paralyzed — until he felt Leta steer him towards a console in the wall. “Cy, get the door open!”

“Wh — right, on it,” said Cyrus quickly, stepping toward the screen and pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. In his peripheral, he felt Leta keeping watch over their corner of the hallway, her gun in her hand at her side. Meanwhile, Eve was stalking up and down the corridor, rifle at the ready, like an extremely protective watchdog.

“Snap to it, would ya?” she grunted as his fingers flew over the screen. “This fight’s gettin’ closer.”

“I’m working on it.”

“Can ya work faster? Don’t reckon the captain would appreciate anything happenin’ to either of you.”

At last, with a rush of air, the doors to the command room glided open. Cyrus hurried inside, his companions on his heels, and quickly closed the doors behind them — they were barricaded in safely. For now.

“Leta, watch those security screens,” he ordered, moving toward the main row of consoles. “Make sure no one’s coming this way.”

“And what about me?” said Eve curiously, like Cyrus was telling her what to bring to the family picnic. Then she added helpfully, “Your brother usually has me on headshot duty. Y’know, keep people from comin’ up behind him and shooting him in the head.”

“Well … do that,” Cyrus said blankly. “Yeah, keep doing that.”

Then he quickly started tapping away at the screen of the main console. This should be easy, he thought to himself. Just a few minutes. There was always a very simple trick to Society systems that made them practically childsplay to override. All he had to do was type in that and hit this and–

But where he expected to see the full access control screen, he instead saw an error. He started to try again when Leta caught his attention.

“Hang on, someone’s coming — “ said Leta, and when Cyrus looked up in alarm, she added, “Wait, it’s Dez,” with an expression of relief and confusion on her face. Frowning, she hit the controls to open the doors.

In marched Dez, like a determined soldier. His face was hardened with seriousness as he said, “What’s going on? Have you accessed the ship yet?”

“No, it’s–” Cyrus began in frustration, but shook his head. He didn’t have time to explain this. “They’ve caught on and closed the backdoor I use. I’ll have to find another.”

“How’s it going out there?” Leta asked, but Dez clenched his jaw grimly.

“Badly. It’s a bloodbath. My team’s pinned down. We’re losing ground and quickly. Haven’t you been getting my COMM messages? I’ve been calling for back-up for the last ten minutes.”

Fleetingly, Cyrus glanced at the COMM piece in Leta’s ear. Its usual green glow had switched to red. “This room’s too sealed, must be blocking our signals.”

“Sorry, Dez, couldn’t help ya anyway,” said Eve, shouldering her rifle. “Cap’n specifically told me not to leave these two. Have to find help elsewhere.”

“The captain ordered that before we started losing,” Dez grunted.

Eve pursed her lips. “Dez, I like ya, but I don’t take orders from anyone but Fiearius.”

“Time is running out, Harper,” Dez barked coldly, stepping toward the door. “We’re dropping like flies, and you’re doing nothing in here?”

“Go,” said Leta suddenly, to Cyrus’ surprise. “Eve, you should go. We can handle ourselves here. We’ll catch up to you, okay?”

Eve hesitated. “Adler, the captain told me personally to watch you real close — ”

“I’m sure he did.” Leta smiled. “But go. I promise, we’ll be fine.”

At last, she clenched her jaw and nodded.

Dez snorted his approval. “See, they’ll be fine, let’s go.” He headed for the door and Eve reluctantly followed, her eyes trailing back on Leta and Cyrus as she entered the hallway and disappeared.

As Leta crossed the room to seal the door again, Cyrus couldn’t help but mutter, “Hope we can keep that promise.”

———–

This was not how this was supposed to go.

This many ships on their side, their army of people, it should have been enough. Mathematically, it should have been enough to take on the crew of the Titan. They had done this so many times before now. They were good at it. They should have been winning this. Easily.

Fiearius knotted his fingers in his hair, clenching his eyes shut as he stalked around the Dionysian’s bridge. Why was everything going so wrong? He felt like he was ready to snap in half, and it didn’t help when Dez’s voice came through the speakers.

“They’ve cut off access to the bay. We can’t get through.”

Fiearius groaned. “Double back to the C5 corridor, there’s another entrance.”

“Send ‘em back our way!” shouted Rax, his voice nearly drowned out by gunfire. “We’re getting slaughtered over here. Four men down, ten injured from that proximity blast.”

Fiearius lowered his hand from his hair, trying to absorb this news while fighting the urge to kick over the captain’s chair.

Finn lowered his beer glass to the counter. “Of course.”

Fiearius was staring over the bar, gazing at the row of bottles though Finn was sure he wasn’t seeing them at all. “I–after Satieri, y’know, when I came back, I was pretty…well, fucked up.”

“You mean when you were talking to yourself and wouldn’t get out of bed?” said FInn brightly. “Yeah, I recall.”

“It was bad. Real bad,” Fiearius admitted. “It was like…I could feel my consciousness drifting away anytime I wasn’t clinging onto it. Which was bad enough, but then Daelen showed up and said I wasn’t going to walk again and–” He put his forehead in his hand and shook his head. “I was just losing it, y’know?”

“You got low,” Finn agreed.

“Worse than low,” Fiearius groaned. “Do you–you’ve heard of Flush right?”

Finn absorbed the sudden, odd question quickly and invisibly. “That shit Society agents used to run on? Yeah, it was in all the best back rooms on Archeti.” He grinned. “Too expensive for me, though.”

“Well. I have a source.” He turned his gaze on him, and it was then Finn noticed how bloodshot his eyes were. “I didn’t know what else to do. I thought–I was in a pit and I didn’t think I could ever get out of it. But Flush was–I don’t know, it looked like a rope so I grabbed it.”

Finn couldn’t mask his shock. He had no idea, and he considered himself an excellent judge of people. “You’re using now?” he demanded in disbelief.

Fiearius closed his eyes, a portrait of guilt. “It’s not like I want to,” he breathed. “But it helped! It really did. I don’t think I could have gotten better without the stuff. It was the only option I had. Now though?” He sunk again. “I don’t need it anymore. I’m better. But–I can’t kick it.”

“You’ve been trying to quit?”

“For over a month,” Fiearius admitted. “I can make it about four days before it starts to feel like my insides are trying to wring themselves out. I made it five last week and I was coughing up blood for a straight hour before I gave in.” Digging his hands into his hair, Fiearius shook his head. “It’s what they always say with Flush. Either the drug itself slowly kills you…”

“Or the withdrawals will,” Finn finished. “Yeah, I’ve heard that.”

“I managed it before. But that was–well, it was hell as it was then and I’m not nearly that young anymore. This time, I–I just honestly don’t know if I even can do this.”

Finn paused, and then said slowly, “I take it Leta doesn’t know.”

Fiearius cast him a hopeless glance. “Would I be here if she did?”

“And you don’t plan to tell her.”

“I almost did. A few times. But–I couldn’t. Gods, she would never forgive me. She’ll just see it as a betrayal. Not only am I taking a potentially fatal drug she certainly wouldn’t approve of, I took it because her treatment wasn’t working. After everything she did. I can’t tell her. I can’t.”

Finn lapsed into a stunned silence. Of course Fiearius couldn’t tell Leta, but of course he should have; she was a doctor. But Finn wasn’t going to be the one to tell Fiearius to confess to his girlfriend that he’d been lying for six months.

“But you need off of it,” Finn finished. “And here’s the thing: she’s going to find out eventually.”

“I know. Trust me, I know. Either I tell her now or when she finds me expelling my internal organs into a rubbish bin, I know. The results will be the same regardless. I guess I’m just trying to delay the inevitable…”

“And you need off it,” Finn reminded sharply. “And you can’t ask your doctor-lady for help. So what about Daelen? Talk to him.”

“Daelen? Sure, can’t talk to Leta, talk to her longtime friend instead.”

“He’d keep it quiet, mate. He wouldn’t tell Leta. He takes confidentiality seriously.”

“Maybe he would, but then she’ll think he’s betrayed her too,” Fiearius argued. “I won’t put the guy in that position. It’s not his problem.”

“Well you need off this drug. And apparently quitting cold turkey isn’t going to work.” Finn looked him up and down in concern. “So what’re ya gonna do?”

“Honestly?” Fiearius looked over at him, hopelessness in every facet of his expression. “I have no idea.”

————

Hours after they’d left the Dionysian, when Cyrus and Addy were slowly wandering back to the ship docks, it was hard to believe Cyrus had ever been nervous at all. He was no expert on what constituted a ‘good’ date, but the way she had shared in his excitement as they perused the science museum, the way she had humored his stupid jokes over dinner, and particularly the way she strolled beside him now, so close that their arms brushed against each other every other step — well, those couldn’t be bad signs, could they?

Currently, he was listening with interest as she relayed to him a tale from years past.

“So I was only an assistant at the time, but even as an assistant, I was supposed to have some say in the repairs. But the whole team just thought ‘oh she’s the boss’ daughter, she’s only here to appease him, she must not know anything.’” She rolled her eyes. “And go figure, they ignored my suggestion and used the TXC sealant and what happened?”

“The water line exploded,” Cyrus guessed.

“The water line exploded!” Addy said, shaking her head. “If only they’d listened to little old me.”

Cyrus laughed. “You’ve basically just described my entire university experience.”

For some reason, Addy’s smile faded slightly. “Oh yeah?”

“I guess it was since I was younger than most everyone there, but any group project? Same story. Though I guess that’s kind of inevitable when you get five undergrad egos in a room together, huh?”

“Oh, I bet,” she said agreeably, but there was no denying it — she definitely lost her smile this time, she had definitely shifted her gaze away. Had he said something wrong? But how could he have upset her? The evening air was warm, with a pleasant breeze; the sea of stars overhead were bright white; they were entirely alone, walking down the docks along a row of darkened ships.

But before he could venture a guess, Addy suddenly said, in a rush of a confession, “I actually never went to university.”

“What?” said Cyrus at once, confused. Together, they came to a stop beneath the Beacon. Addy hovered next to one of the ship pillars, massaging her neck in embarrassment.

“I didn’t want to tell you because, well, it’s humiliating. That you finished grad school when you were freakin’ 21 and here’s me — no actual education, working in my dad’s workshop — ” She caught her hand around her neck and stared at him with wide, startled grey eyes.

Cyrus was stunned — not that she hadn’t gone to school, but that he had the power to make anyone, let alone Addy, feel self-conscious. She was searching over his face as if scared he was about to insult her, and he quickly began shaking his head.

“You really–I can’t–but you’re so amazing!” he sputtered in disbelief. Addy looked skeptical. “I can’t believe you’ve never had formal training. I mean, the things you’ve done with the Beacon, they’re incredible. You may have never studied engineering, but you’re amazing at it.”

“Without a degree,” Addy argued dully, “I’m really just a mechanic.”

Cyrus scoffed. “No. No no no, you are not a mechanic. Trust me, I’ve worked with some of the more renowned engineers in the field and you.” He smiled at her and took one of her hands in his. “You are one of the best engineers I’ve ever met.”

Addy let out a laugh, a genuine, ringing laugh. “You’re just saying that because we’re on a date and you have to flatter me.” She took his hand and swung it playfully to the side.

“No way,” Cyrus laughed. “If I was trying to flatter you, I’d say you’re the most beautiful engineer I’ve ever met. But that’s not the truth.” She raised her brows at him in interest. “The truth is, you’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever met.”

She shook her head, adopting an air of disbelief. “Now I know you’re trying to flatter me.”

“Believe what you want, I know what’s real,” he said with a shrug, and it was then that Addy tightened her hold on his hand and stepped closer, gently closing the distance between them.

Cyrus felt his insides clench with nerves. But when Addy’s expression softened with affection, her fingers hooked around his shirt collar and her lips brushed against his in a soft, warm kiss, he realized this wasn’t difficult or awkward at all. His eyes fell closed and he thought that this, somehow, felt impossibly natural.

Quietly, Addy said, “I had a really good time tonight,” and he could feel her smiling against his lips. He also feel himself turning red, so all he said was, “Me, too,” before leaning into their kiss. She responded in turn, gently leading him backwards until her back met the ship’s wall. Her hand tightened around his arm, his hands slid down to her hips and just as passion surged through their embrace, Cyrus felt an instinct that made him draw back an inch.

“We should–shouldn’t we take this–y’know, slow?” he breathed, forcing himself to drag his gaze away from those incredibly tempting lips.

“Oh, right, yes.” Addy nodded once in agreement, her breath short and her face flushed. “Slow. Slow is good.”

Cyrus paused for a moment longer before he couldn’t help but blurt out, “But a little more couldn’t hurt, right?”

A shy grin spread across her face. “I doubt it,” she said quickly, wrapping her forearm around his neck as he leaned in to deepen their kiss.