Chapter Forty-Eight: Bull

Bull and a mixed security team ambush four of Ashford’s armored soldiers in engineering, but their small arms cannot penetrate powered suits. Naomi reports she can dump the reactor core and possibly drop the grid, but the attackers press through, ignoring small-arms fire and tearing up consoles to reach controls.

As the mechs overrun the room, Bull orders a retreat. Naomi successfully dumps the core but is cut off from finishing a grid shutdown. The enemy seals the path to the drum, forcing Bull’s group to fall back to the elevator-shaft airlock under fire, where they hurriedly suit up.

They push into the vacuum shaft, pairing off to cover one another. The pursuers breach behind them, trading long shots up the kilometer drop. Juarez snipes one attacker, but Sergeant Verbinski dies en route, and a Behemoth security man is killed when his air supply is blown out. The survivors reach the trapped elevator via Corin’s burned hatch.

Inside the car, Bull urges Naomi to continue alone toward command to try any access and to reunite with Holden. After a moment’s hesitation, Naomi departs up-shaft. Bull sends Juarez and Cass after her to support any assault on command, then prepares to make a stand with two grenades as his air and stamina fail.

Monica Stuart hails Bull from the drum, reporting chaos and fearing Anna’s death. Bull confirms engineering is lost, the core is dumped but the grid remains, and Ashford will likely restore power to fire the comm laser. When Casimir appears at the elevator hatch, Bull greets him and tosses two short-fused grenades, choosing to delay the pursuers at any cost.