The Prison of Luna

Cinder

"She'll be here any second, we need to make a jump!"

"We can't, this ship doesn't come equipped with it!"

"She'll have a fleet on us any minuet now, we need to go faster!"

There was a bone crushing bang.

"There she is!"

Cinder rushed to the round cockpit window, where a dozen lunar ships hovered in the blackness of space. They shined, and Cinder had to squint against their painful glare.

A voice boomed in the ship that wasn't any of the crew.

"Give up, Selene. You've lost." The voice of Levana echoed through the ship's corridors, through every wire, rattling every screw.

The voice made an uncomfortable tingle buzz just underneath Cinder's skin. She ignored it, and pulled away from the window, having to jump over Kai to reach Thorne, who was sitting in the captain's chair, his hands stalling over the controls.

"Thorne, does this ship have any weapons?"

"I - I'm not sure," he said, fear gripping his voice. He tapped some buttons and pulled up a holographic blueprint of the ship. Low to the ground, aerodynamic, like a crouched hawk.

"I think these are guns." Cinder spun the hologram, zooming in and pointing to a cannon-like protrusion jutting from the bottom.

"Wolf is close," Thorne said, referring to a dot floating close to the gun, showing Wolf's information above it. "I'll send him." He pressed a shaking finger on a button and spoke into a small microphone. "Wolf, there are weapons near you, can you man them?"

Silence for a moment, then, "yeah," a gruff voice over the speakers.

BANG! The ship shivered.

"I turned on the shields." Cress walked into the cockpit, her face covered in grime. Scarlet came in behind her, looking equally tarnished. "These ships don't usually need shields, because ... because I cloaked them. So we had to crawl to reach the lever," Cress explained, trying in vain to rub grease from her arms.

"Here ..." Cinder began, reaching for a damp towel, but Thorne beat her to it. He snatched it up, strode to Cress and gave it to her.

"Oh ... thanks," Cress mumbled, avoiding Thorne's eyes, her cheeks pink.

Cinder turned away. Scarlet had manned the controls, and she looked a little perplexed, but nevertheless determined as she gripped the controls.

"We need to get out of here," Cinder said, but there was no strength behind her words. Outside the windshield, lunar ships surrounded them, their reflective surfaces glinting, like they were teasing them.

There was a loud bang, but not from one of the Lunar ships rockets hitting them. Wolf had figured out how to shoot, and he had hit one of the Lunar ships head on. It exploded and began spiraling out of control.

Cinder winced, wondering if that guard, the bear-like one named Wood who had cried in her presence, manned one of these ships.

She pushed the thought away, they were trying to kill them.

Another Lunar ship was hit, and there was another bang as they were hit as well. Cinder silently thanked the stars and Winter that they took one of the more sturdier Lunar ships and that Levana took the flimsy ones. Perhaps she thought they would be easy to get rid of. Cinder growled despite herself.

"What was that, Cinder? You sound like Wolf," Scarlet suddenly said, knocking Cinder from her thoughts.

"Maybe he's rubbing off on me. Can you fly this thing?"