10. Dead Boat

. . .

"Ross." Loki didn't look at him, frozen between the pilot seats, sounding oddly calm considering the circumstances. His fingers were stretched out as far as they could go. "I'm afraid I'm going to need most of my attention. And my energy. Do not scream."

Ross felt hot fire in his throat, reached up to rub anxiously along it, ending with a scrape of his palm along his jaw. "You. You're doing that. You're…" He faltered, regaining control. They were alive. The ship's systems weren't screaming anymore. All right. Let's start there, said the cold pilot part of his mind. "You don't want to panic anyone."

Loki nodded. "We have time, Ross. We've got hours of life support, and that was a long distance emergency transmission. There is no need to be frightened." There was a not yet hanging in the air, despite his attempt to veil it. Ross saw it anyway, because it was a given. It was always a given.

Curiosity warred with the fear. More magic in front of him, more than he'd ever really known existed. "What exactly are you doing?"

"I am, in effect, telling countless shards of metal that they are still one cohesive wall." Loki swallowed, belying the amount of effort this was taking. "I can do this for some time, and for probably longer than even I think, if I have to. I rather hope I don't have to. It will grow unpleasant for me."

"Guys?" Daisy's voice filtered up, closer.

Ross took over. "It's okay," he called back, with a confidence he didn't feel. It felt like plastic in his mouth. "We're dead in the water, but we're working on it up here. Got a call for help on the, the whatever systems. Comm lines." He watched a shard of metal dance in the middle of nothingness, watched a star beyond it move like a slow moonfall. Dead in the water wasn't quite it. They still had momentum, drifting past the moon and outwards. How fast were they going? He didn't know for certain. The engine had cut out at a relatively slow fifteen klicks a minute, but the solar system was so vast that he couldn't math it, not the way his head currently was. Would they pass Mars? Would they end up lost forever in the asteroid belt beyond?

He caught back up to the moment, sensed that Daisy was still hovering just beyond the cubby hallway that led to the belowdeck systems. "How are the engines?"

"Screwed. Like, I don't speak space, but I know a fried nest of wires when I see one. Trying to untangle what I can, maybe goose some energy back into the ship." Daisy's steps drifted back down. "I'll get back to it. You guys let me know if anything changes up there."

"Yeah, no problem," said Ross, and the lie came serenely out of him. He waited until he couldn't hear her anymore. "You don't want to scare her?"

"She can take a scare. She doesn't need my condescension towards her feelings." Loki's fingers flexed slightly. Ross watched them move. That was going to cramp. He might have the power to keep up whatever he was doing, but it was going to hurt him eventually. "I don't want her guilt." A quick glance came his way. "This was my idea. I pushed for it. But she made the decision, and she'll tear herself apart over it. She should not. This is on me."

Ross looked at him, the realization hitting him hard. "She's really your friend, isn't she?"

A look of displeasure crawled across Loki's face and he resumed his focus on the savaged curve of the ship.

"She's going to come up here eventually. It's just a delay." Ross chewed on the inside of his lip for a moment, thinking. "If we're really off-limits, is anyone gonna risk coming in to help us? I mean, what if they think they'll get in trouble for it? Why would they?"

There was silence, longer than a minute. That one distant star spun beyond where Ross could see, lost again among billions of others. He wondered if it was part of anything, if it gave warmth to one of those unknown civilizations. Loki broke into his thoughts. "Not everyone is like what you've seen so far, Agent Ross. Many people, even across the galaxy, tend towards trying to be better than you expect. Your world feels like it has been unfortunate in that respect, I know. Today has done nothing for that belief. But for every one of me, there are a hundred… Thors, I suppose you could say." His voice trailed off before strengthening again. "There are countless people out there whose first instinct is to help. All we have to do is wait for one of them to hear our signal."

Ross thought of the illusion of their galaxy, of the quadrant beyond them, and all that empty space. "But it's possible no one will."

"Anything, Ross, is possible." It came out heavily.

"Like someone like you immediately moving to save our lives, and keeping us calm." Ross nodded, watching the shoulders tense. Prickly recognized prickly. "Jesus." He looked away with a laugh. "Jesus, I'm so far out of my fucking element, Jesus Christ, I should have… I don't know. I don't even know. I shouldn't be here." He took a deep breath, realizing he was about to give in to panic. "That's not helping anything. Okay." He took another, centering himself. "What can I do to help right now, besides leave you the hell alone for a while to focus on telling space to go fuck itself?"

"Mostly that, Ross, although I am actually rather enjoying the invective company. It's good for a chuckle. Monitor the grid. If you spin the lower ring, you'll widen the range that it's scanning. If Daisy succeeds at firing the engines, which is unlikely, but, with her, possible, I'll try to help you right the ship. We're technically off the only Corp lane in this region, and I'm sure you've guessed we're tumbling out."

Ross nodded. His mind cleared, and he gave actual thought a shot. "About fifteen klicks a minute." He thought some more, then grinned, wry. "About a thousand odd klicks to Mars, if we match up with its orbit?"

Loki couldn't help a small laugh at a small question. "Roughly that, yes."

"So about two hours. We'll pick up Matt Damon when we go by. A bag of potatoes. We'll be fine." It was sarcasm, the final refuge. Ross felt a little better.

The laugh went silent, but stronger now. "Go watch a map, Ross, now you're distracting me."

"You actually saw that movie." Ross stared at the ceiling of the ship, realizing they'd shared a moment. "What a universe," he said, before heading back into the pilot's nest.

. . .

May hovered over Fitz with the same tense expression she had since hurrying off the Wakandan transport. The lack of contact from the field team was now a real concern. Amusement at the team's snap decision had turned into worry. Shuri was on the channel, looking at the same information they had. "Anything?"

Fitz shook his head. It was Shuri that spoke. "You've seen what we have. Two vessels, the same signature as what left Morocco. Both enter the atmosphere. After two minutes, they leave the range of all of our satellites. One is the team in pursuit. The other is hostile. Neither are on our sensors any longer. Mr. Fitz?"

"I'm trying to get access to some of the restricted mirrors and other telescopes, bounce some shots around. But that's going to take time, and it's looking for a single glimmery needle in a very dark, very large haystack, May. Even if we focus on the likely paths based on atmospheric trajectory-"

"Quinn said Loki thought these guys were panicked. It's a good trajectory. They went straight out." May's hand was gripping the table next to Fitz, her knuckles white. Two hours without a contact from the team. Even if they'd gone hard on the chase, they would have sent a message back by now. If they could. "Focus on that."

"Then they would be going towards the Moon, and if they curve around that, or land on it, or anything, we lose them again. Even focusing in that area, there's much that will be left unscanned." Shuri sounded frustrated. "I think we would have seen-"

May's other palm banged on the desk, flat and loud. "Dammit!" She straightened up, calming herself down. She looked back towards Coulson. "Anything?"

Coulson shook his head. "I tried the old device we used a couple years ago during the Thanos mess. It's shut down, like Nova Prime said it would be. I tossed Loki's room, which I'm gonna have to pay for later. Nothing. I can't get contact with the Nova Corp. Not with what we've got on hand."

"What about those weird friends of his? The raccoon and the plant-guy?"

"The who?" Shuri leaned into her camera. "A raccoon and a what?"

Coulson glanced at Fitz's monitor. "Long story." He shook his head at May, concerned but still serene. "If he's got something to jingle them, I can't find it or I can't figure it out. I did find my old copy of Master and Commander, which has been missing for at least a month. Would not take Loki for a guy into seafaring naval war stories. Maybe he isn't, he only had the first book."

"So what do we do?"

"We wait, mostly." Coulson gave his most calming smile, knowing its effects were mild when there was this much unknown to counter. "It's all we can do right now, but we'll keep working scopes and see if we can get a message out deep. But we've got three smart people in the air, and one of them's always at home in his old stomping grounds. Loki won't let anything happen to our people. I know that. You know that. So, let's focus on what else we can do, meanwhile. May, grab Okoye, see if you can get anything out of those two guys in our brig. Fitz, keep on it. Okay?"

Fitz nodded.

"Shuri, thank you for staying on the line. You get that sample?"

"It's secured now. I've already got someone studying it. First scans were completed just before I logged in." Shuri leaned back from the monitor, seeming to shrink from their view. "I can tell you this much so far - the cosmic and solar radiation still coming off of it is not from our sun."

Coulson frowned, then glanced at May. "Work that into your questioning, if you can. If they know anything."

Having something concrete to do was always a plus. May nodded, her fingers relaxing where they still gripped the table. "Will do."

. . .

The silent jumper passed Mars, but it was too far away on its own long and lonely orbit for Ross to do anything but admire its own polar ice caps from closer than anyone else on Earth. There were no potatoes, and nothing but the soft beeps of the console and the faint sound of strained breathing behind him. Daisy was still working the engines, eating time in her way. She still didn't know how bad it was. The longer that knowledge waited, the harder she was going to take it. Ross considered going down to tell her, but this was, ultimately, between the two SHIELD agents. He wasn't the one to create extra strain. It wasn't his place.

The beep changed after a while. Then there was an intermittent frantic streak. The ship seemed to vibrate, so soft Ross thought he imagined it. But Loki did not. "What was that?"

"Dammit!" Footsteps came up from the engine cubby, closer this time. "I almost had something."

Ross got out of the pilot's seat again, meaning to only glance at what stood between them and the vacuum of space on his way towards her, but stopping to look at Loki instead. Sweat was already beading on his forehead. The strain on him was growing fast. Loki didn't bother to look at him. He seemed fixated on the ruins, but he could still talk. "What was that, on the console?"

"Five rapid beeps from the second left red, two from a red above them."

Loki swore under his breath. "Daisy?"

"There was something under stress between the two main engine connections, it was going to pop eventually. Part of why we lost power in the first place, it's kinked out. I was trying to get the pressure off of that, but it full on broke. Was too cracked for me to recover it. Felt the ship shimmy. I covered up some holes, so it's not leaking much anymore. But I can't stop all of it."

Loki licked his lips. Ross read the expression. It was bad. Whatever it was, it was bad news. The footsteps came closer, along with the voice. "Any idea what that did?"

Ross tilted his head at Loki. It was up to him to answer. "Can you rig something back into that space?"

"No. I already did what I could." Closer yet. "You okay up there? You haven't come down to check it yourself, this stuff isn't exactly labeled, dude."

"I can't, Daisy." A grimace. The game was over. "The engine connection that snapped is a power modulator."

"And what does that mean?"

Loki closed his eyes. "We're going to lose life support faster than I estimated."

Ross heard Daisy scrambling up the metal ladder. "I can maybe get something off the console," she started, in emergency mode. He watched the top of her head come up, not wanting to be here, not having anywhere else to go. "But I-" She stopped.

Loki didn't look back at her. He couldn't. Ross met her stare, raising his hands, palms up, looking helpless.

"You asshole," said Daisy at Loki's back. Her eyes were wide, her hands clenching. The words came in a furious hiss. Ross saw Loki flinch, tried to tell himself he hadn't actually seen that. But he had. "You should have told me."

"There was nothing you could do, Daisy. If you can get the engine going-"

Daisy cut him off, not impressed with Loki's attempt to sound calm. "I can't. I tried and I can't, and all I did, apparently, was help nuke the support. Which is just great, huh? I'm doing great at this." She whirled on Ross, fury and guilt and upset mixed on her face. "Why didn't you come get me?"

"I don't know," said Ross, quiet. He didn't, not at first. Then something occurred to him. "I think I agreed with him."

"That, what, I'm supposed to be cut out of this for whatever dumb Asgard noble bullshit reason? This is my operation. I need to know, not get treated like some little kid. This is my responsibility. We got blown to shit, and you guys are… God. Loki, I swear to-"

"No. No." Ross stepped toward her, his hands still up and helpless. "That you shouldn't feel guilty about this."

She stared at him, stricken into silence. Then the anger came back. "Excuse me?"

"I." He stared at the gap in the ship. "You know, in your place, I think I might have eventually made the same call. We know he would have." Ross shrugged. "It was the right call. I know I wasn't lining up at first, but it is. We've got to look out for ourselves eventually. Whoever this Corp is, you know, nobody can be everywhere. So it's not your fault. Sometimes you're just in the shit, even… when you did everything right."

"I still should have been told right away."

"Yes. You should have." Ross shrugged, paradoxical. "I told him that, but…"

"He has no reason to get into a fight between us. He was already with us against his original wish." Ross could see Loki's hands shake. What he was doing seemed unimpressive to someone raised on overwrought fantasy novels. But this small thing, life-saving defiance against all natural physics, was taking a very clear toll. He was tiring, but he was also holding steady. "He's doing his best, considering. And he did well avoiding any further damage. I'm sorry I didn't come down to help with the engines, Daisy. I am sorry."

Daisy continued to stare at his back, still visibly angry. "Fine. I'm gonna hold this against you for a month." She inhaled. "Once we get out of this. Assuming we do."

"We will," said Loki, in a way that suggested he would argue with the fabric of reality itself if it had other plans. "We are going to survive this."

"Good, because I am so goddamn mad at you right now."

"I know." It came out oddly quiet.

"Okay." She turned to Ross and gestured to the pilot's nest, her expression going all-business. "Think there's anything left we can divert to life support?"

"I hit a big shiny switch that presumably slapped everything over."

"Comm system. You can get a little more from the comm." Loki sounded reluctant. "Smaller switch on its left."

"That'll kill the emergency message, won't it?" Ross frowned, not liking the sound of that.

"It will, but the message is already echoing on comm systems everywhere in the local region. It lasts, Ross, it just won't add updated repeats."

"I still don't like the idea."

Daisy shook her head. "If nobody's heard that message by now, nobody's going to. It's been, what, three hours?"

"At least, yeah."

"And switching over gives us how much more life support?"

"Maybe an extra hour or two, with luck." Loki shifted his weight. A touch of wryness came back. "Efficiency upgrades. As I said."

"Okay. I'll take that trade." Daisy nodded to Ross. "Let's do that, and keep hoping. See if I can do anything else to the systems. Anything at all."