Jaejoong wasn’t sure what was happening. He wasn’t even sure where he was.

Space?

Wasn’t he in space? He and … Yoochun … they were trying to reach Rim space. They’d booked passage on a freighter, one with an exhausting Captain who Jaejoong now had serious feelings for.

Everything else was a little hazy.

There was something creaking around him, creaking like it was under strain--an immense kind of pressure, and threatening to buckle at any moment. Jaejoong just couldn’t guess what it was. Because when he looked up, all he could see was blackness. Was it the ship? Why would the ship be creaking?

All of his thoughts took a less than priority position a few moments later when he realized how much pain he was in. His body was aching, almost like he’d been through a fight of some kind, and for one brief second he wondered if he hadn’t been completely wrong earlier. Maybe he wasn’t on a ship. Maybe that had all been a dream, one coveted from such a young age, to escape his father and be free. Maybe he was at home, like always, curled up on his bed with Yoochun, trying to wait out the aches from his father’s latest beating.

Only … the ground underneath him was much too hard for his bed.

Was he on the floor instead? Had he not even made it to his bed?

And where was Yoochun?

“Hey.”

Someone was hovering over him, and Jaeoong supposed it was at least some kind of small comfort that he wasn’t as blind as he’d first imagined. No, there was some kind of flashing light as well, but it was hardly enough to make out the face of the person above him. He only knew it wasn’t his father, which was a relief.

“You alive?”

Jaejoong blinked a bit sluggishly. “Who …”

Emergency lights. He was somewhere with emergency lights, and even a siren. He could hear it now. There was a steady warning tone that was echoing all around, and after a beat more a second set of emergency lights kicked in, and he could finally see the person nearly squatting above him.

It was the man they’d picked up on the Moon Hub. More of his thoughts and senses returning to him, he was able to recall exactly what had happened from the moment he and Yoochun had boarded the Tohoshinki, all the way to the Moon Hub, Changmin’s injury, and arriving at New Haven. And the person above him was the passenger that was traveling with them until they could drop him of at promising location.

Xia. His name was Xia.

And Jaejoong recalled that the man made him extremely nervous. This man, Xia, was the type who spoke volumes with his eyes, was incredibly perceptive, and had a way of looking at someone like he was seeing straight into them. He’d never done or said anything aggressive or threatening to Jaejoong, and in fact they’d hardly seen each other over the past few days, but Jaejoong had made sure to steer clear of him.

“What happened?”

Jaejoong brought a hand up to the side of his skull where his head was throbbing mercilessly. He must have fallen. He must have hit his head, evidenced by the goose egg he could feel, but thankfully a lack of blood, and he most certainly had a concussion. It was too hard to think and move for it to be anything short of a concussion.

Leaning back a little on his haunches, Xia tapped his cheek almost too roughly and demanded, “You alive? Your brain addled?”

“Stop,” Jaejoong said, pushing weakly at his hand.

Where was everyone else? It was a slightly comforting thought that if he’d fallen, at least Xia had seen it happen and come to check on him. But where were the others? Where was Yunho who wasn’t nearly as difficult to deal with as Jaejoong had first believed? Where was Yunho who whispered to him about how beautiful he was and fierce and brave, and told him that he was maybe sort of falling in love with him?

Love.

Jaejoong had hardly known love. His patients showed him appreciation. His sister showed him respect. Yoochun showed him compassion, and his father showed him distain. But love? The kind that people held for each other and cherished? That was something completely new to Jaejoong, and exciting. Certainly Jaejoong’s feelings for Yunho were building into something that threatened to be labeled as love eventually, but Yunho was already half in love with him?

Mouth dry, Jaejoong asked Xia, “Accident?” The walkways were notoriously narrow, and the stairwells were perilous. It was possible he’d just lost his footing. In a few days everyone would be laughing at his clumsiness, and while embarrassed, Jaejoong would brush the whole incident off.

“Well, no,” Xia said, fingers at the side of his neck, counting the beats of his pulse. “I’d say that the explosion that just took out the engine was not an accident, considering I set the charges myself.”

Jaejoong frowned at him. “What?”

With a bruising, harsh grip on his arm, Xia sat him up. The world swam spectacularly and Jaejoong’s vision almost went black again.

“I may,” Xia added, not at all reproachful, “have miscalculated the time it took to extract you from the infirmary. And the Companion had more bite than I expected, for someone who’s brain is boiling in his skull at the moment.”

Jaejoong stilled.

He remembered being in the infirmary with Changmin. Changmin’s fever was still high, but less so than it had been before, and the wound at his stomach was showing signs of improvement already. The ship had lurched, and it had been so unexpected that Jaejoong had nearly fallen. Some of his equipment had. And Changmin had startled, confused and scared and wanting to know where Yunho was.

Jaejoong had reminded kindly, “He’s on New Haven right now? Remember? Your brother is attempting to steal the Eye?”

Changmin had rambled on lowly about the gem for several more minuets, saying things that Jaejoong couldn’t possibly understand, about destiny, the past, tattoos, hope, and even faith. Then the ship had lurched again, and for the first time Jaejoong had worried about the safeness of space travel. An aged freighter wasn’t nearly as safe as the luxurious shuttles his father owned to take them from Helios to one of her orbiting moons.

“You blew up the ship?” Jaejoong asked, horrified at the notion.

Jaejoong hadn’t even seen Xia enter the infirmary. He’d had his back to the door, focused on Changmin, and then suddenly there had been the barrel of a pistol pressed up against his spine and carefully placed words about the trajectory of the bullet and paralysis.

Xia gave a low chuckle. “Stop being so overdramatic. I merely disabled the engines. I needed to buy us some time, and I needed a good distraction.”

Changmin had lunged. Even in his state, sick and confused, he’d known Xia was a threat. He’d tried to buy Jaejoong time to fight back, or get help. He’d been braver than Jaejoong could ever hope to be.

At least until Xia had shoved him off the bed he’d been laying on and threatened Jaejoong with his life.

“Why are you doing this?” Jaejoong asked, getting awkwardly up to his feet as Xia raised his pistol on him. “I don’t understand.”

The explosion from the engine must have knocked him out. Maybe it had tripped him and that’s what he’d fallen from. They weren’t that far from the engine room.

“You don’t understand?” Xia said, pulling him along far before Jaejoong was ready to walk. “You don’t understand that your father has issued a bounty for your safe return?”

Jaejoong almost fell. He legs twisted up under him and as harsh as Xia’s grip on his arm was, it was the only thing keeping him from eating metal.

“You’re a bounty hunter!”

He was Yoochun’s biggest fear.

Jaejoong’s fear had always been the unknown. He’d wondered what he’d do when he started his new life, if it would be safe, and how long he and Yoochun would stay together. He’d wondered and worried and all of it seemed superficial now that he thought about it. At least compared to the threat in front of him now. Yoochun had always said that if a bounty hunter ever caught up with them, they’d be in the kind of trouble that got people killed.

The explosion. In the engine room.

If Onew had been hurt, Onew who never left his engine room unless absolutely necessary, or anyone else was caught up in the blast, Jaejoong would never forgive himself. This crew had taken him in. They’d protected and sheltered him, offered him a place, and become friends. If they were hurt because of him …

“You don’t understand,” Jaejoong said, not sure where Xia was taking him. “My father--”

“I don’t care,” Xia said sharply.

Jaejoong blanched. “I’m not kidnapped. I willingly left. No one coerced me. I’m not kidnapped!”

If anything, Xia’s grip on his arm was even worse.

“Then you can take that up with your father. That isn’t my concern.”

They were headed down in the ship. Down levels that Jaejoong had hardy ever been. It was unfamiliar territory and the emergency lighting was even worse.

Xia actual gave a stumble of his own as Jaejoong pulled back on him hard. “I’m a legally mature adult. You can’t do this.”

Jaejoong was expecting to have a verbal spat on his hands. He expected to have to argue his way out of the mess he was currently in. He certainly didn’t expect that with only a second to prepare himself, he’d be sprawled back on the ground clutching his jaw, his face aflame with pain as Xia loomed over him.

“Let me explain something to you,” he said, looking menacing, “I don’t care how old you are. I don’t care that you want to tell me you weren’t kidnapped, or that this has all been a mistake. I don’t care. That’s not my concern. Your father issued a bounty. The Alliance recognized it. I accepted it. Therefore, I retain the right to drag you all the way back to Helios with or without your consent. When I deliver you to your father’s arms, whether they’re loving or not, you can sort out your business then. But I am taking you back, I am going to collect my reward, and you trying to win me over with any kind of a sob story isn’t going to do you a world of good. Do you understand?”

Clutching the side of his face, Jaejoong asked, “You don’t care that you’ll be handing me over to a man who will very likely try to beat me to death for running away?”

Xia arched an eyebrow. “Do you have any idea how much your bounty is worth? I seriously doubt your father is going to kill you, after spending so many credits to get you back.”

“It’s the fact of the matter,” Jaejoong said, being forced back up to his feet by Xia. “It’s a matter of control, that he gets me back. He doesn’t care about wasted credits. He has more than enough to go around. He only cares about squaring things with how he thinks, and he considers me his property. I’m telling you, he’s going to likely kill me.”

They were walking at a rushed pace again before Xia said, “Not my problem.”

Fight, Jaejoong realized. He had to fight. If he wanted to live, he had to fight for himself. While it would have been a nice thing, the idea of Yunho sweeping in to save the day, or even Yoochun, the truth was Jajoong had to help himself. He couldn’t be helpless or dependent. He had to regain control of the situation. And quickly.

“So you’re just doing this for the money?”

Xia didn’t answer him.

Jaejoong tried again, “Or the recognition?”

“You should stop wasting your breath,” Xia advised him. “You can’t talk your way out of this, and you should be advised that your father said he wanted you recovered alive, not in pristine condition. I’ll shoot you in the leg if necessary, and drag your body back.”

He’d have bruises, Jaejoong knew, the size of fingers.

“And I might bleed out before we get halfway there,” Jaejoong said.

Xia shrugged. “You’ll still be worth something to me then. I guess we’ll just have to see how you prefer to play this then. Cold body or warm body.”

The escape pod. That’s what they were clearly headed towards. The shuttle was gone, ferrying Yunho and Zhou Mi and Kyuhyun down to the plant, but the escape pod was still there, and it was big enough for two. Xia’s plan was all too easy to figure out.

In an act of desperation, Jaejoong threw himself to the side suddenly, arching back unexpectedly to deliver an elbow to Xia’s face. The man howled in pain, but didn’t lose his grip on his weapon, and Jaejoong made a tactical decision to pull back. He had to get to Leeteuk, who knew the ship better than anyone else on board. He’d be able to track Xia down once Jaejoong left him.

Jaejoong had only managed to dash away a few feet by the time Xia recovered, tackling him down to the ground, smashing the air out of his lungs.

“Bad decision!” Xia shouted at him, crawling up his body to grip the back of his head through a fist full of his hair. “I told you what your options were,” Xia continued, and before Jaejoong could consider what was about to happen, his head was slammed down against the metal grates underneath him.

Once, then twice, and it probably would have happened a third time if a bullet hadn’t suddenly ricocheted dangerously close.

With Jaejoong’s vision swaying dangerously in and out, Xia forced him up onto his knees, the gun placed at the back of his head.

They weren’t alone.

“Drop it,” a heavy voice demanded, and despite the blurriness of his vision, Jaejoong could make out Yoochun in front of them, his own gun leveled up at Xia.

“I think you should drop it,” Xia replied, the gun nudging more forcefully at Jaejoong’s head. “Because there’s no way you’re going to shoot me, knowing that my finger is on the trigger here too. Unless you want to be cleaning up the gray matter of your little friend here.”

Yoochun’s eyes. “I can’t exactly see your finger on the trigger right now. Maybe you’re lying.”

In an almost light hearted voice, Xia assured, “You can come look, if you want to verify. And I very much can assure you that if you shoot at me, I’m going to shoot at him.”

Yoochun fell silent, and Jaejoong could see him thinking. They deliberately didn’t make eye contact.

“You’re a bounty hunter?”

Xia replied, “What gave me away?”

“I guessed,” Yoochun said sharply. “Did you go after Jaejoong because you thought he’d be the easier target? You didn’t think you’d be able to catch me unaware?”

“Truthfully?” Xia asked, seemingly not worried in the least as a different alarm began to blare. Jaejoong wasn’t nearly familiar enough with ships and space travel to know what the second alarm signified, but there was no way it was good. “I didn’t want to touch your bounty. Yours has Alliance fingers smudged all over it. And yes, for the record, I knew it would be easier to take this one here, even if your bounty was worth more the last time I checked.”

Jaejoong’s fingers braced on the ground as he tried to bring his heart rate down. It was dangerously high, almost painfully so. Though wouldn’t that be ironic if he fell over in the throes of a at the moment, and ruined everyone’s plans?

Finally, after so long Yoochun’s eyes flickered to Jaejoong. In one look he tried to say everything, from how sorry he was over being such an easy target, to how much he was willing to risk Yoochun taking a shot. He’d never been quite sure about the night he’d almost fallen to his death--the night Yoochun had helped smuggle him off Helios. Maybe he wouldn’t have gone through with it after all. But right now? Knowing what he’d be going back to? Jaejoong was more than willing to take a bullet to the back of the head, to spare himself from whatever his father would do to him. It would be more humane.

“But,” Yoochun said slowly, not showing the slightest bit of strain as he continued to hold the gun up, “my bounty is larger.”

Xia must have nodded as he said, “But almost two hundred and fifty thousand credits.”

“Then,” Yoochun said, not an ounce of emotion betraying his words, “I propose a trade. Me for Jaejoong. And I’ll go willingly.”

“No!” Jaejoong shouted, frantic with the thought of Yoochun being returned to his father. Yoochun would be killed as well. Jajoong couldn’t let Yoochun sacrifice himself.

Yoochun ignored him, adding, “And I think you can tell that Jaejoong is prepared to fight you the entire way. If you take me, I’ll go without fuss or a fight.”

There was nothing more said between the three of them, and the only sound echoing was that of the ship’s alarms.

“No dice,” Xia said abruptly. “You’re not worth the extra credits.”

Jaejoong let out a deep breath. At the very least Yoochun was safe for a moment more.

“Then what are we doing here?” Yoochun asked, taking a deliberate step forward. “We’re at a stalemate, aren’t we?”

Xia reached down and once more his bruising fingers were wrangling Jaejoong to his feet.

“Not necessarily,” Xia said. “Because I still think you care more about saving your friend than you do about shooting me. And that’s what this comes down to, doesn’t it? You won’t risk Jaejoong here, which means I win.”

“You’re so confident,” Yoochun said, taking yet another step. He was no more than a dozen steps away. “You think you’ve got me all figured out.”

“I do,” Xia said, and as if to prove his point, Xia began inching them backwards, bringing them ever closer to the escape pod that was now within eyesight.

The ship let out a groan of metal and pressure and Jaejoong wondered if the vacuum of space was about to take care of the situation for them. The ship seemed moments away from imploding around them.

With every step that Xia forced them to take backwards, Yoochun followed.

Yoochun questioned, “You realize that I consider Jaejoong to be my brother, yes? We grew up together. We sacrificed for each other. And I know him better than I know myself.”

“Your point?”

At the escape pod Xia pressed his finger against the door latch mechanism and stood back as it gave a pressurized hiss.

“My point,” Yoochun clarified, moving closer than he had ever been, “is that I know Jaejoong would rather die that go back to his father. So now it’s time for you to believe me when I tell you that I’m not letting you take him off this ship. Even if it means him dying, I’m not letting his father touch him even once more.”

Jaejoong could have wept with relief

“Understood,” Xia said, as if he hadn’t needed time to process the words at all. “Then I guess the only barrier between recovering my bounty, and losing it, is you.”

Jaejoong barely even registered the gun barrel being removed from the back of his head.

Then there was just screaming.

It was his own screaming. It wasn’t anyone else, and it was terrifying to realize his own voice could sound so raw and desperate. He was screaming and screaming as Xia unloaded a full clip in Yoochun’s direction, without warning, propelling him backwards and sending a spray of blood arching out to splatter against dark panels of steel.

Jaejoong spun on Xia immediately, throwing wild, random punches, kicking and screaming more, doing anything to keep his mind away from the fact that his best friend--his brother, was likely very much dead now.

He certainly caught Xia unaware. And for a few blissful moments it almost seemed as if he had the upper hand.

Then a heavy kick caught him in the stomach, sending him flailing to the side, and the boot driving into his ribs over and over left no doubt that Xia was in control of the situation.

More gun fire. There was more gunfire, but Jaejoong didn’t know where it was coming from, or who was responsible for it. Curled up into as small a target as possible, Jaejoong was unable to look. He was unable to do much of anything.

“Since we’re all sharing things that we think each other needs to know,” Leeteuk’s voice rang out, and Jaejoong watched as he came up from the other direction, an unflinching expression on his face, “I guess it’s my turn now.”

Xia put a heavy boot down on Jaejoong, causing him to groan at the extra pressure on his ribs. Then he leveled the gun down at Jaejoong and stood silently.

“Firstly,” Leeteuk said, “this ship is my home. This ship is more than just my home. This ship protects my family. And you’ve gone an hurt this ship.”

Xia replied, “By now I’m sure you’re aware of the sizable bounty on the two of them. At least one of them is wanted by the Alliance for questioning, and both of them will get this ship impounded at any checkpoint that you’re forced to run their documentation through. That’s just a hassle on your end. So let me take them off your hands, and spare you any unnecessary complications.”

Leeteuk gave him a disappointed look. “Did you think that was going to work?”

With a small laugh, Xia said, “Okay. Let me have them and I’ll transfer exactly forty percent of the bounty to you.” Something crackled and sparked around them and Xia said, “Something tells me you’ll need the credits for repairs.”

Jaejoong watched as Leeteuk held up two fingers.

Xia made a questioning face.

“Second,” Leeteuk said, “my family that lives on this ship, the same one that you disabled in an attempt to kill everyone here, means everything to me. And it doesn’t matter how long Yoochun and Jaejoong have been a part of this crew, they’re family now.”

“You can’t be serious,” Xia said blandly.

Leeteuk added, a steel edge to his voice, “I don’t let people touch my family, not when they have greedy, selfish little fingers that are sticky with dubious morality.”

Xia snapped out, “You still have time to save your ship. You let me go now and take Jaejoong, and you can keep her in space. You can’t be completely ignorant and not know that there’s a secondary navigation panel in the engine room. The explosion was meant to be a distraction. And dampen your ability to chase after me. I know the system is still intact.”

“Third,” Leeteuk continued, “the Captain? Yunho? He’s my best friend. And he’s kind of attached to Jaejoong here. I’m personally invested in keeping my Captain happy, so therefore I have a personal stake in keeping Jaejoong here and happy as well.”

“Is there a fourth?”

“There is,” Leeteuk said casually, lowing his gun in a way that boggled Jaejoong’s mind. Was he giving up? What about everything he’d just said?

“But?” Xia’s boot pushed down more harshly on Jaejoong’s ribs and it was like they’d crack and break at any second.

For the first time, and in way that utterly terrified Jaejoong, Leeteuk smiled. “But I’m not going to be the one to tell you what it is. He is.”

He?

Jaejoong turned at exactly the same time as Xia, and it was just in time to see Yoochun crouched on the floor, a winning grin on his face as he said, “You just don’t with family.” Then he was unlashing the whole of the bullets stored in his gun, raining a torrential downpour of metal in Xia’s direction.

The bounty hunter was fast. He was fast and agile, dancing backwards with quick footing to escape the bullets, throwing himself wildly to the side in a way that was too graceful to be anything but practiced. But then he was only human, and Jaejoong saw him stumble, taking a bullet to the chest, one that sent him rearing backwards.

Xia stumbled, gasping loudly for air, red blood rapidly staining his shirt.

“You idiots,” he rasped out. “You don’t know what you’ve done.”

“No,” Yoochun said, eyes narrowing. “It looks like you’re the idiot here.”

Yoochun squeezed the trigger of his gun again and Xia was knocked backwards, tumbling into the open escape pod.

He must have struck the launch mechanism inside, because a second later the pod released, taking him far away without any indication as to whether Yoochun had landed a fatal blow or otherwise.

Jaejoong could hardly believe what had just happened.

He could hardly believe Yoochun was still alive.

Wheezing a bit, and sure that he had at least bruised his ribs, Jaejoong scrambled towards him, tears in his eyes. “Yoochun!” There was blood on Yoochun, at his thigh, at his arm, and even at his temple. Jaejoong’s hands scattered across him, trying to assess the damage, even as he had to brace himself as another shutter from the ship sounded.

“I’m okay,” Yoochun insisted, catching Jaejoong’s face between his hands. “Jae. I’m okay. I mean, I’ve got a bullet in my arm, and the one that grazed my leg took out a big chunk of flesh, I think, but I’ll live. Nothing is life threatening.”

Jaejoong let out a huff and a laugh. “You are the luckiest son a of a that I have ever met in my life. What about your temple?”

“Hit it on the way down,” Yoochin said dismissively, and his reaction times seemed to be fine, which meant he wasn’t concussed or going to need more than a bandage or two for the wound.

“You two okay?” Leeteuk asked, coming to their side and squatting down.

“Thank you,” Jaejoong said, having to hug Yoochun, then Leeteuk just once to reassure himself. “Thank you, Leeteuk. For not letting him take either of us.”

Leeteuk stood slowly holstering his weapon. “I meant what I said. This ship is my home. This crew is my family. And you two are crew. Now, I need to know if either of you can get up and offer any kind of help. We need to get to the engine. We need to know how bad the explosion damaged us, and we’re running out of time very quickly.”

Yoochun grasped tightly to Jaejoong and all but barked out, “Onew was headed to the engine! If there was an explosion there he could be hurt!”

“I know,” Leeteuk said, offering a hand down to Jaejoong first and pulling him to his feet. “That’s why I need to know if either of you can help. If we have to dig him out or worse … Yoochun, you know a bit about ships. If Onew can’t help us anymore, I need you there.”

It was not something that Jaejoong and Yoochun had spoken about with any sort of frequency, but Jaejoong was very much aware of the fact that Yoochun had feelings for Onew that were growing with every day, no matter how reluctant he was to act upon them. It didn’t seem the least bit fair now that Yoochun would have that chance at happiness snatched away from him, all because of one lone bounty hunter.

“What about Changmin?” Jaejoong asked as together he and Leeteuk got Yoochun up on his feet. Injuries would have to wait until the threat of being spaced wasn’t very real. “Xia … he …”

“Changmin’s okay.” Yoochun said quickly as they started off towards the engine room. “I saw him when I went looking for you in the infirmary. He’s still sick, and confused, but he’s okay. He’s fine.”

“We won’t be,” Leeteuk cut in, “if we don’t move a little faster.”

Despite his burning ribs, Jaejoong helped nearly carry Yoochun the entire way.

The explosion that had rocked the engine room had left a good deal of destruction in its path. There were bulkheads crumpled, steel plates torn up, destroyed circuitry, and a whole mess of things blocking the entrance of the engine room.

“Onew!” Yoochun shouted, having to stop and lean against a nearby wall as Jaejoong and Leeteuk tried to clear the path in front of them. “Onew! Are you okay? Can you hear me?”

There was a fire burning somewhere. Jaejoong could smell it, and even more than the ship falling apart around them, the fire was the bigger danger. It was sure to up all the oxygen that they desperately needed. They had to get into the engine room where there was an extinguisher.

A groan nearby made Jaejoong double his efforts, especially when he saw a pale, exposed hand that had been blackened by debris.

“Leeteuk!” Jaejoong shouted, pointing sharply. “I think I see Onew!”

Onew was trapped under a good deal of metal railing that had fallen on top of him. But he was awake, even if he was blinking lethargically, and he wasn’t reporting an inability to breathe.

“I think I’m just stuck,” he said slowly. “What happened?”

“Onew!” Yoochun, as if he hadn’t been shot several times, barreled past them to drop down next to Onew. He took Onew’s hand in his own and said, “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay. There was an explosion but you’re okay. Just hold still and let Leeteuk and Jaejoong get this stuff off you.”

“Okay?” Onew asked, squeezing his eyes shut. “I think that’s a relative term.”

Yoochun chuckled. “Yeah, you’re okay.”

It took several more minutes, but eventually the railing was cleared off and Jaejoong checked Onew’s spine very carefully before deciding, “I think you’re going to have significant bruising, but there’s no damage to your back that I can feel at the moment. I’ll want to run some scans on you later on, but you seem okay. Consider yourself very lucky.”

“Onew,” Leeteuk said, with all the familiarity in the world. “We have to save the ship. We just lost our escape pod, and the Captain has the shuttle. If we don’t save the ship, we’re all going to die.”

Onew was unsteady on his feet, having to rely on Yoochun a great deal, who wasn’t exactly steady either, but they seemed to make it work. They looked to have a sort of counterbalance happening.

“Get me in there,” Onew said, wiping at some of the soot on his face. “Get me in there and I’ll save the ship.”

If the area outside the engine room was a mess, inside was an absolute disaster. Xia had claimed that the explosion was meant to be a distraction, more than anything else, but it had done plenty of damage. Jaejoong could hardly recognize anything as they plowed forward, determined to get to the secondary navigation unit.

“There!” Leeteuk called out, nudging Jaejoong. “There’s the extinguisher. Get that fire out!”

Jaegjoong gave a firm nod and broke away from the group, ambling his way over fallen bulkheads and crumbled steel. The extinguisher was mercifully intact and within seconds Jaejoong was putting the fire out. Jaejoong choked from the fumes of the extinguisher, but it was better than asphyxiation.

“The fire is out!” he called over to them, and began the trip back to where the rest of the group had moved further into the belly of the ship’s engine room.

“Here,” Onew said, lowering himself carefully to the ground in front of a panel that was scorched but not damaged. “I just need to pry this off.”

As they waited, Onew’s fingers working quickly, Jaejoong felt his balance tip precariously. It was the oddest sensation, something he’d never felt before, and then his feet were lifting up from the ground.

“,” Leeteuk hissed. “There goes our artificial gravity.”

“Almost there,” Onew said. And he very nearly did have the panel off.

Jaejoong braced himself in an attempt to stop from floating away and asked Leeteuk, “What do those alarms mean?”

“I’m not sure I want to know,” Yoochun said, accepting the panel from Onew when he broke it free and tossed it to the side.

“Life support,” Leeteuk said with gritted teeth. “One is the warning that we’re off course and not in control of propulsion or navigation, and the other is life support. The air isn’t being recycled now.”

“The explosion?” Jaejoong asked, and Leeteuk only nodded.

Onew whistled out, “Alright. This is good. This is very good.”

“Good?” Yoochun asked, and Jaejoong could see why he’d made such a wry comment in a second. Behind the panel that was supposed to house the secondary navigation was a mess of wires and circuits. Jaejoong knew nothing about ships in the first place, but even if he had, he had a feeling he would have been lost. At least Onew seemed to know what he was doing.

“I need more power,” Onew said, then turned to Leeteuk. “See that piston over there?”

Leeteuk turned to look, then nodded. “Give it a helping hand?”

Onew nodded. “The engine works like a battery of sorts. It’s out of juice right now, so it isn’t feeding power to the system we need it to. We’re going to have to manually get it charged before I can do anything about navigation. But it shouldn’t be too difficult.”

“What about me?” Jaejoong asked, desperate to be of help.

“There,” Onew directed. “I need you at the manual override. Leeteuk is about to give us one hell of a jolt. You need to manually let that surge through. The ship’s got safety protocols against something like this, so we have to override them.”

With a nervous chuckle, Yoochun asked, “Aren’t those protocols in place for a reason?”

“Nah, don’t worry about it,” Onew said, a huge grin on his face. “I mean, worst case scenario is that we’ll explode from the sudden rush of energy. That’s got to be better than burning up in atmo.”

“Point,” Yoochun said, retuning his smile. “Do you need me to do anything?”

Jaejoong didn’t miss the look on Onew’s face as he said, “You just stay next to me. That’s exactly where I need you.”

Thirty seconds later Onew twisted two wires together, flipped a switch on his end and was entering numbers into a data pad.

“Ready?” he asked them all, looking a bit worried for the first time. “I’m manually putting in our orbiting coordinates. We’ll know right away if the engines kick on and we’re out of our decaying orbit. Or if we explode. Everyone know what to do?”

Standing at the manual override Jaejoong took a deep breath. This was it. It had to work. There was no backup plan. There was no second chance.

And more than ever Jaejoong wanted to live.

Now he had a home. Now he had a family.

Now he had something to live for.

Onew shouted, “Leeteuk, fire it up!”

Jaejoong flipped his own override switch, and everything exploded around them.