Elara smiled, blood on her teeth, and watched the stars spin. She had failed to remove. But she had not failed to save.
She stared at the words, her gloved hand still pressed against the cold, black monolith in the asteroid’s core. Her mission was simple: extract the relic, jump home, and save the solar system from the solar flare that would sterilize Earth in seventy-two hours. The relic was the only thing that could absorb the flare’s energy. remove failed
She closed her eyes. Seventy-two hours became seventy-two minutes of oxygen. The asteroid was tumbling toward the sun. If she left without the relic, Earth burned. If she stayed, she burned with the asteroid, and Earth still burned. Elara smiled, blood on her teeth, and watched the stars spin
Static hissed. Then, a voice she didn’t recognize, low and calm: “Captain, Control is gone. A pre-flare surge hit the orbital relay. You’re the last voice in the black.” She stared at the words, her gloved hand
She wired the core to the monolith’s base. If you won’t be removed, she thought, then you’ll be moved.
She set the timer for ten minutes, climbed back into her ship, and fired thrusters at maximum burn. The asteroid lurched. The monolith screamed—a psychic shriek that made her nose bleed. But the rock began to turn, its new course set not away from the sun, but toward Earth.