Renegade Runner Nicole Conway (christmas read aloud txt) 📖

“Excellent.” He unclipped from the cable and shut the door, still shaking sand off his shoulders as he stomped over to shoo me out of his seat. Buckling in, he brought up the windshield’s simulated topography mode so we could see where we were going.

The flashing, red outline of Sienne’s ship appeared directly in front of us.

She was heading straight at us.

Alarms blared through the cockpit immediately.

PROXIMITY ALERT! PROXIMITY ALERT!

“DAMMIT!” Phox snarled as he snatched the joysticks and dialed up our thrusters, throwing us into a frantic backward dip. Metal screeched against metal as she skimmed right past us, her wingtips scraping our hull with a shower of sparks. What the hell was she trying to do? Ram us?

“She’s trying to pin us against the side of the canyon!” Phox thundered again as he leaned into the throttles, throwing us both back in our seats as we streaked toward the opening to the tunnel.

Oh, no. Did Sienne know what we were trying to do? Was she going to follow us? Her ship was a little bigger than ours, but it might still fit, right? Its wings were shorter and stubbier, with engines mounted right over them to give it a more spear-like shape. Ideal for speed.

But maybe … No. Stop it, Brinna. Now was not the time to start coming up with more insane plans. This was going to work. It had to.

The wind pitched against our hull, forcing Phox to lay in hard on the controls as he turned our nose toward the opening of the tunnel. Directly ahead, the green outlines revealed the low, narrow opening in the rock like a garage door that was cracked only part of the way open. Hopefully just far enough.

Our ship rattled and shook, the engines beginning to tremor as sediment buildup warnings flashed over the displays. The eyes of the storm had almost passed. The winds surged, battering us, and making our nose pitch dangerously to the right as we zoomed straight for the tunnel opening. Just a little closer. A few dozen yards.

Phox yelled, his eyes squinting up in a snarl as he gave our engines one final, desperate blast with the throttles kicked up to max. I gripped the armrests until my knuckles paled, my breath caught in my chest. We punched straight through the opening, the bottom of our hull scraping and grinding against the cavern floor as we barreled inside.

Instantly, the sand-choked winds stopped. Phox jerked back on the sticks, dialing down the thrust and steering us under a low section of the cavern’s roof. We snapped off dangling salt-stalactites as we roared through the tunnel, the green-gradient rendering of the path ahead scrambling and wavering until, finally, it displayed a single message: NO TOPOGRAPHIC DATA AVAILABLE.

My blood froze in my veins. We had no map.

Without a word, Phox turned it off. Our normal view out the windshield resumed, revealing nothing but inky blackness until he switched on our external running lights and revealed the path ahead: nothing but more darkness and reddish rock studded with salt crystals.

I shut my eyes tightly. Don’t freak out. It’s going to be fine. At least now we were safe from—

“You’ve gotta be freaking kidding me!” Phox snarled through clenched teeth as the proximity alert wailed again.

Sienne was still on our tail, her bigger ship smashing its way after us in hot pursuit.

We jolted suddenly, throwing Phox and me against our harnesses as she slammed into our rear. He let out another long, fuming rant of profanity. But it was no use. He couldn’t go any faster, not without running the risk of crashing.

Time for another radical, Brinna-plan. We’ll call this one my Plan B-1: The Slightly More Life-Threatening Version. Patent Pending.

Unbuckling my harness, I ignored my co-pilot’s fuming, profanity-laced objections as I ran for the back of the ship again. “Just focus on not crashing, would you?” I yelled back as I rummaged through our gear until I found it.

The long belt of extra ammunition vials for the rifle. The gun was gone. But Phox had mentioned that even these rounds were dangerous on their own. I was about to test that theory.

“Fly steady and let her get in close again,” I called as I began strapping myself into the cable and winch.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, human?!” His head snapped around long enough to cast me a wild-eyed glare.

I punched the panel to open the door and flashed him what probably looked like a crazed grin as I held up the belt of rifle rounds. “Going skiing!”

His expression went pasty and he turned back to focus on the path ahead. “You’re crazy!”

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Heard that one before.

Leaning into the cable, I hung out the side of the ship and looked back. The end of my ponytail snagged in the wind and my bangs blew around my face as I arched my back to look past our tail to where Sienne’s ship still hung in close. Perfect.

With the belt of ammo firmly in hand, I let the cable out slowly, my boots sliding down the side of the ship as I rappelled away from the open door. I skidded slowly over the wing and quickly threw the brake on the cable, flailing a little as I tried to get my feet under me. I slipped, slamming face-down into the wing’s hard metal surface. My vision spotted, my brain scrambling and my nose throbbing as I floundered.

Up. I had to get up, dammit, or this wasn’t going to work! Phox was right. I mean, what the actual hell was I doing? Had I totally lost it? Die—I was about to die!

With my knees shaking and the rush of the air and roar of the engines howling in my ears, I planted my feet back on the slick curvature of the top of our wing and coiled my legs beneath me in a crouch. Then, slowly, I forced myself to stand up on our wing. The