There were screams, but they were drowned out by the bring arms and rending, crushing noise of the left wing tearing off.

  The ship continued to fall, the outside heating up as its atmospheric protection barrier colpsed.

  “Crazy bastard! He’s trying to knock us out of the sky!” Andre yelled. He’d managed to grab onto the controls at the st second, and now clung to them for dear life.

  Zan was holding onto a leg of the desk bolted to the floor, his other arm around Aneeta’s waist. May had been thrown across the room, and now smmed into the ceiling as the ship spiraled towards the ground below.

  Rey had been thrown back, but grabbed another leg of the desk and wrapped her arms around it when she slid within reach.

  “How did they-” Zan started to say, but was cut off when a second impact hit the right wing of the ship, obliterating it. The ship fell below eight miles above the surface.

  The other ship tailed it, but didn’t fire any more shots. Instead it sped up, closing the distance between them. The attacking ship wasn’t much rger than their own, but it was built for combat. Multiple guns were attached on the underside of both wings, and the windowless exterior was covered in a thick, defensive yer of armor.

  Their ship continued to plummet towards the green expanse below as the pursuing ship caught up behind them.

  Now less than a mile above the forest, the attacking ship fired two harpoons that pierced their ship with ease.

  The other ship pulled ahead, bringing the falling wreck into a diagonal descent as it began to reel them in. Just as their damaged ship started skimming treetops, they broke out into a rge, grassy clearing.

  The ship that’d harpooned them pulled up then disconnected at the st moment so they hit the ground at an angle and weren’t destroyed on impact.

  Instead, the wreckage crashed into the field and skidded across the ground as the friction tore chunks off, leaving a trail of destroyed earth and debris behind.

  As it neared the other side of the clearing it slowed down, eventually coming to a jarring halt as it smmed into a tree at the forest’s edge. The tree fell, knocked to the ground by the force of the impact.

  Smoke billowed from the burning remains of the once mediocre ship. Inside the control room, Zan coughed. He opened his eyes, but couldn’t see far in the dark, smoke-filled interior. The air was hot, but he forced his arms to move, pushing himself up and getting to his knees. His wound had reopened, but he ignored the pain.

  He looked and saw Aneeta squirming on the floor next to him. He pulled her up before straining his eyes to see Andre still hunched over, gripping the controls.

  He crawled across the floor towards where he saw May lying, but found her unconscious. Her left leg was bent at an unnatural angle, and blood was seeping from a rge cut on the left side of her colrbone.

  He looked over and saw Rey still clinging to her desk leg, eyes shut and face white with fear.

  Zan got to his feet unsteadily, then slowly stumbled towards the controls. He climbed over them and out the shattered window frame onto the hot metal outside. He managed to jump down onto the ground after getting burns on his hands and forearms.

  He looked up into the sky.

  The ship that had shot them down circled around and drew closer to the clearing. It passed overhead once, then circled around one final time and descended to the ground on the other side of the clearing.

  He jumped back into the control room, determined to get everyone out.

  “Aneeta, give me energy!” he said, kneeling beside her. She looked at him, then grabbed his wrist. As soon as he felt her energy flowing through him he picked her up and carried her outside, where he y her on the grassy earth.

  He sprinted back into the ship and returned with Andre. He made his way back inside and scooped up May as carefully as he could, then returned to where Andre and Aneeta were.

  Lastly, he pried Rey from the desk and brought her outside to the others.

  He set her down and looked over at Andre, who had pulled out a small gun. Their eyes met.

  “We need to get out of here as fast as-”

  A short bde embedded itself in the side of Andre’s head. Zan’s mouth fell open as he watched Andre’s body fall sideways onto the grass.

  He turned his head and saw a figure approaching them from the other ship.

  They were cd completely in a dark suit of armor that was built for mobility. His head was covered in a helmet and visor that made it impossible to determine what he looked like, though it appeared he was most likely male. He was at least six feet tall, and appeared to be well built.

  A young woman wearing a metal colr around her neck stood wearily behind the armored figure. She wore simple gray clothes and had loose-hanging brown hair. Slightly hunched over, she appeared malnourished and unkempt. She gnced around fearfully, but always returned her gaze to the man in armor.

  Zan looked at them in shock. The armored figure put his right foot forward, bent his knees, and shot towards the small group of survivors.

  The attacker picked up a jagged pte of metal from the debris lying on the ground as they ran and threw it straight at Zan, almost as if he could sense that he was the biggest threat.

  Zan tried to dodge to the left but reacted too te, and his right arm was sliced off just above the elbow.

  He fell to his knees as his arm nded on the ground and blood exploded from the open wound, dousing the grass and his entire right side in dark red blood. He screamed in pain as he clutched the wound with his left hand, trying to staunch the flow of blood.

  He scrambled towards a chunk of the engine that had been torn off in the crash and was still glowing, the air above it wavering with heat.

  Zan pressed his wound onto it and screamed in agony as the hot metal seared his flesh. As much as it hurt, he had to temporarily close the wound.

  Aneeta stared in horror as the figure pulled a bde out of its armor and turned her way. She looked at Rey, who was on her knees beside her.

  “You should run,” she said, but Rey was still in shock.

  “Well, I didn’t see it ending like this…but I guess this is what I get for being too naive.”

  She reached over and pinched Rey’s cheeks, forcing her to look at her.

  “Ow ow ow,” Rey said, coming back to her senses.

  “If you somehow make it out of this, keep searching for that something that will give your life meaning. Find something truly special, so you can tell me all about it when we meet again.”

  She stood up and looked across the grassy field towards Zan, who was on his knees.

  She cupped her hands around her mouth and called out to him.

  “Take Rey and run for it! And don’t you dare give up!”

  His eyes widened a bit.

  The armored figure turned and threw the bde with tremendous force, piercing her heart and impaling her against a tree several feet behind her.

  His helmet then turned in Zan’s direction.

  Zan was still in shock, partly from blood loss, but mostly because of the horrific scene unfolding before his eyes. He had thought he’d been prepared for the consequences, but now he realized how utterly ignorant he’d been.

  “Who are you?” he managed to ask in a weak voice.

  “Just a bounty hunter. Nothing personal, but there’s a pretty big offer for your heads,” he said in a deep voice, striding towards Zan. “Although, I gotta take the girl alive…”

  Zan felt his strength drain away with his blood, leaving him barely able to stay on his knees.

  “What a way for it to end,” he thought. “Damn it. Even after all I’ve done, I never stood a chance. Damn it.”

  “What the hell’s going on here, huh?” a new voice said from atop the wreckage behind Zan.

  Both the bounty hunter and Zan looked up to see Marcus emerge from the broken windows of the control room, holding May’s limp, lifeless body.