The dorsal airlock slammed open with an explosive hiss of equalized pressure, venting a thin cloud of micro-crystal-clear moisture that instantly turned straight into ash into the empty pocket. Arthur Vance lunged onto the silver-steel spine of the Aethelgard, boots clamping down on the magnetic deck runner with heavy, rhythmic clangs. Behind him, Grimm surged into the void like a black glass battering ram, his massive four-ton frame instantly adjusting to the zero-gravity environment with the gut grace of a seasoned void-prowler.
Hard, raw sunlight struck Arthur’s faceplate with blinding intensity. The solar wind here was not an abstract concept. It was a physical gale of relativistic protons and charged helium nuclei rushing past at five hundred miles per second. That made his outside suit hum with static tension. Through the sole of his boots, Arthur felt the steady, low-hum pulse of the ship’s star-fire drives. That kept time like a huge clockwork heart.
Above them, Pip was already airborne. The raptor didn’t rely on sky lift. His wings generated powerful magnetic repulsion fields that pushed directly against the solar wind. Pip carved a blazing streak of molten gold through the blackness. His feathers left a trail of shimmering, spark-charged embers across the hull. The bird screamed with joy, tumbling through three in a row aileron rolls in the hard empty pocket, reveling in the boundless expanse of solar radiance.
