"You guys still in one piece?" Vance's voice came through everyone's comlinks.
"So far," Likhachyova said from her seat on Boner's transport while Cora powered up her ship's systems.
"Ludmila! Good to hear your voice."
"You, too. Is everyone still okay?"
"We're hanging in there." Vance paused and spoke in a softer tone. "We're deorbiting and our thrusters aren't enough to stop it."
"We're on our way. Prepping our ships for launch right now."
"Good." He lowered his voice even more. "See you in a few minutes, I hope." He signed off.
"Boner," Cora said, "prepare to burn your ventral thrusters the instant you detach."
"And hope we can get out of the way before any 'sticky-outy' parts of the station swing back around and bitch-slap us," Kim added.
"Ready." Boner took a slow breath. "Okay, Cora, on your mark."
"Stand by." Cora calculated the rate of rotation and the positions of nearby pieces that could damage the ships. She positioned her hands over the controls and counted down. "Mark."
She disengaged from the airlock and hit the thrusters a fraction of a second later.
"Burn complete," Boner said. "Huh. I didn't think this would actually work."
A screech reverberated through the hull, coming from the ship's underside. Cora and Kim winced as they were thrown to the left and yanked back by their seat restraints.
"Jesus!" Kim stared at the damage report and her hands hovered over her console while Cora glanced out the windows and found a cloud of debris spinning away.
The cabin lights and panels flickered and blacked out, leaving Cora in the same kind of dark she'd rebooted in after the collision. Kim's optics turned toward her.
"A power surge shot through the controls and now …" She tapped the panel. "Everything's offline."
"No," Cora whispered. "No, no, no, no …" If they couldn't get power restored, the six people they'd rescued would be in serious trouble -- and so would the rest of the crew. She pulled herself together and leaned over to open an access panel under the console to her left. "Switching to backups. Boot the systems as soon as power is restored."
"On it."
Cora reached into the panel, grasped the lever, and pulled it. The cabin lights faded back on and the consoles came to life. Kim tapped a series of icons and the ship's navigation and other systems began their startup processes.
"Come on," Kim said under her breath. "Come on, come on."
The computer's voice came from the speakers. "Please enter passcode."
"Dammit, Hardison!"
"Passcode accepted. Please stand by."
Kim slouched in her seat and stared at the console while clenching and relaxing her fist repeatedly. Finally, the familiar graphics appeared on the panels and Kim retrieved the damage report.
"No hull breaches or fuel leaks detected. Looks like there was still power getting to the manipulator arm and it discharged into the exact right spot to fry our primary systems. The backups appear to be okay, at least for the moment."
"I'll take any good luck I can get." Cora sent a status report to the other ship and turned hers toward the "live" half of Odyssey Station.
"Hell, yeah." Kim nudged Cora's shoulder and pointed. "Hey. I just saw a flash."
Cora turned off all the internal lights to provide a clear view of everything ahead. She kept her optics pointed at the station and waited to see if the flash repeated. When it did, she zoomed in and found a tumbling object shaped like a four-legged spider. The light reappeared and she realized it was from a set of spotlights flashing the Morse code for SOS. She opened a comm channel to the station and the other ship.
"Stand by, Odyssey. We've found Lopez."
"Yes!" Vance let out a relieved sigh. "I hope he's okay."
"Can't tell yet."
"We're suited up and we have thruster packs that'll keep us from drifting too far long enough for you to pick him up. Just reel him in before he's too far away to retrieve."
"Do we have enough time?" Kim said softly.
"We're on it," Likhachyova replied. "He's a member of my crew. We're not leaving him behind."
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