Free HostileIntent by Chandra Ryan Page A

nodded and typed. “It looks like a couple of breakers
are flipped in engineering.” She shook her head as she kept typing. “But that
can’t be right.”
    “Hang on. Let me see what my reader says.” He double-checked
her findings and got the same result. “Looks like you were right. They’ll have
to be manually reset.”
    She shook her head. “But that means they were thrown
manually. Which could only mean that McNeal…”
    He let the words remain silent between them for a moment. “Right
now it doesn’t matter how they were thrown. We need to focus on getting them
reset.” He took off toward engineering before she even had a chance to give the
order. McNeal had done this and Adam would undo it.
    “Two of the Coalition ships have already left. Only one is
hanging in the fight.” The captain’s voice sprang across the comm, startling
him.
    “Let’s see if we can get the systems up before they pull out
as well.”
    The door to engineering was locked but it only took a few
seconds for Adam to override McNeal’s security codes. Thankfully since he
served with the Coalition, he knew all their tricks. “I’m in engineering. It
should only be a minute now.”
    Except McNeal had torched the breaker system. Maybe he didn’t
know all their tricks just yet. “Fuck me. This has been shot to hell. It’s
going to take me longer than a minute.”
    “We’ve only got a couple of seconds, Sans.”
    “Then tell me which system you want up first.”
    “You work on engines. I’ll see if I can bypass the breaker
for weapons from the bridge.”
    “And Aimes can take the shields.” This might be her ship but
he was used to taking charge in a crisis. And this had definitely reached
crisis level.
    “Sounds like a plan.”
    The panel was still a little warm but not hot as he peeled
the metal away. That suggested the damage had been done before the other group
of raiders showed up. He hoped that meant McNeal had only intended to strand
them, not leave them defenseless for a slaughter. That gave him some amount of
comfort.
    Once the panel was removed he found the maze of wires he’d
been looking for. During his years with the Coalition, he’d jumped and hotwired
more ships than he cared to remember. It was a menial job thrown at the new
recruits and he’d hated every minute of it. It’d been a waste of his time. Only
now, as he grabbed wires and started stripping them, it didn’t feel like such a
waste. He twisted them together systematically until the circuits for each of
the drive systems were complete.
    “Engines should be up, Captain.”
    “Even jump?”
    “All of them, sir.”
    “Then let’s get the fuck out of here.”
    He couldn’t have said it better himself.

Chapter Five
     
    Renee’s back was stiff and her head throbbed as they punched
a hole through the universal veil. She always hated being in null-space but
this particular trip was extra excruciation. Not only was she in pain, so was
her ship. It’d been breached. It was hobbling through the universe with its
guts held together with duct tape and luck.
    She growled at the image. When she got a hold of the
bastards responsible, they’d be lucky if the worst she did was toss them out an
airlock without a suit on.
    The Hawk shuddered violently as it came back into
regular space and for one brief moment she was afraid even exhaling would cause
the ship to fall apart at the seams. When it held, she finally relaxed. “Systems
report.” Her voice cracked as she gave the order. She wasn’t usually one for
shows of emotion while in uniform but she reasoned that a little break in her
voice was acceptable under the circumstances. It wasn’t until Sans started
rattling off the list of damaged systems, though, that she truly knew how dire
the circumstances were.
    Their jump had drained most of the energy left on the ship.
What little was left was being used to keep life support up and running. They
were stranded. “Bring up the view screen. Let’s see