Chapter 106: Boxed In

  Emergency lights flickered red above the windows of the Algreil Aerospace booth. A woman's voice, incongruously soothing, advised Ellie to “Please remain calm and stay in your seats.”

  Ellie didn't remain calm. She sprinted to the door and slapped her palm to the release and shouted, “Jack, what's happening?”

  “I don't –” Jack's eyes snapped back and forth, following something on the bridge of the Pacific Resolution. “The hell?!”

  “Jack!” Ellie's hand trembled beside the door. Fear for her husband overrode any fear she’d felt for herself. She took a deep breath. “Jack, I'm closing the connection.”

  “No, Hon –”

  “You need to concentrate,” Ellie said. She didn't say, because she didn't have to, ‘and you won't as long as you're thinking about me.’ She understood the sentiment, and Jack, too well to have to express it. “I love you, and we'll see each other and Chloe soon.”

  “I love you too, Ellie,” Jack said. He gulped. “You be careful.”

  “You too.” She severed the connection.

  It didn't matter what the Oligarchical fleet faced beyond the walls of Etemenos's core. Jack and – damn him – Otto Algreil were better equipped to deal with it than Ellie could ever hope to be.

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  With the situation spiraling out of control, Chloe needed her mother.

  Ellie stepped into the hall.

  There were no warning lights on outside the box. Apparently, the alarm in the Algreil box was only company-wide, not a general alert. Nonetheless, the guards gave her unsteady salutes. She could tell they still weren't used to showing respect to a hybrid, but Rudy's example – or his orders – forced their hands. “You should stay in the suite, Ma'am.”

  Ellie shook her head. “I have to pass.”

  “Don't worry,” one of the guards said. “Mr. Algreil will have everything under control soon.”

  “Then I'll be perfectly safe out here,” Ellie said. While she spoke, she measured the distance to the next corner and the guards' tense faces. If she had to, she assumed she could out-sprint them but not outrun them for any length of time. Would she need to? Would they care enough to chase her?

  Milissa's voice from the end of the hall ended Ellie's deliberation. The Kyrillos girl skidded to a stop, panting silently, her hair plastered to her head and her face still streaked from where she'd been crying. She saw Ellie and gasped her name.

  Ellie dashed past the guards in the half-second of their confusion, ignored their protests and gripped Milissa's shaking arms. “Mili,” she said. “Where is...?”

  “Chloe's still in there with the president and the Animus Hunters,” Milissa said. “She's... she was okay when she sent me away, Ma'am.”

  Ellie took Milissa's hands and met her eyes.

  “She saved me,” Milissa said. She hugged Ellie, or at least collapsed into her hug. “She said I hadn't done anything wrong. She made them let me go. She... she said she'd see me, us, soon. But...”

  Milissa's voice trailed off. She rubbed her nose. She whispered, “Chloe said she wanted me to watch Rudy's match. 'Cause I... she said I was his biggest fan. She said he might n-need...”

  Ellie patted her back. “Chloe isn't a liar, Mili. If she told you she'd see you soon...”

  She would. Ellie believed that.

  She had to believe that.