My Husband and Son Gave My Escape Pod to the Prophet

The thick polymer canopy of Pod Three slammed shut, cutting off the wail of the evacuation sirens.

I slammed my fists against the reinforced glass. "Open this hatch, Caleb!"

In the adjacent launch tube, my son refused to meet my eyes from inside Pod One. Seraphina sat alone in Pod Three—my pod—her pale lips parted in feigned exhaustion.

"Press the emergency release," I demanded, tapping my wrist console to override the pods’ external comms. My voice echoed sharply through their helmet speakers.

Caleb flinched. He pressed his bare palm flat against his transparent canopy. His fingers trembled. The yellow emergency-release control flashed on the console beside his other hand. With command-family clearance, he could still abort Pod Three's launch.

He didn't push it.

"Mom, please," Caleb’s voice crackled over the radio, thick with unshed tears. "Don't make this harder."

"Harder?" I asked, my voice dropping to a dangerous calm. "You are strapping a parasite into my seat."

I shifted my glare to the adjacent launch tube. Marcus sat strapped into Pod Two. He kept his head locked forward, his fingers flying across the pre-flight dashboard. He avoided looking out his side window. He avoided looking at me.

"Marcus, look at me!" I shouted over the open frequency. "You know exactly what she is. I gave you the security logs!"

Marcus flipped a row of toggle switches. "This is not the time for your paranoia, Evelyn."

"Paranoia?" I struck the glass again, the impact rattling my shoulder. "Six months ago, the South Wall didn't just collapse. She claimed she foresaw the breach. But six veteran guards abandoned their posts that exact night. Six men made consecutive, fatal errors."

"The Oracle was weak," Marcus replied, his tone flat and mechanical. "Her visions drain her physical form. She couldn't warn them in time."

"She didn't warn them because she orchestrated it!" I yelled. "I handed you the evidence. The guards were manipulated. She engineered that breach, just like she engineered Caleb’s fall on this platform!"

"That is a severe accusation," Marcus snapped. He finally turned his head, glaring at me through his canopy. "I ignored your report because it was baseless. I will not let your petty jealousy sabotage the survival of our species."

A harsh, bitter laugh tore from my throat. "I am telling you there is an infected traitor sitting next to our son, and you call it jealousy?"

In Pod Three, Seraphina shifted in the pilot seat that should have been mine. Her eyes met mine through the thick glass. The corners of her pale lips twitched upward into a faint, mocking smile.

She mouthed two words at me.

*Thank you.*

My stomach twisted into a hard knot. I locked eyes with Caleb.

"Caleb, get away from her," I ordered. "Her eyes flashed red. She carries the Tide."

Caleb shook his head, pressing his hand harder against the glass. "Stop lying, Mom. Sera is just scared. She needs my healing light when we reach the rendezvous."

"She needs a host!" I screamed, pulling my spatial blade from my belt. The weapon hummed to life, projecting a lethal blue edge. "Step back from the console. I am cutting the door."

"Warning," the automated terminal blared. "Launch track engaged. T-minus ninety seconds."

A blinding strip of blue neon ignited beneath the pods, vibrating through the metal floorboards.

At the far end of the platform, the twisted remains of the titanium blast doors gave way. A deafening, metallic shriek echoed through the cavernous room. The heavy steel crumpled inward, tearing violently off its hinges.

The Black Tide spilled onto the evacuation deck.

Scores of infected poured through the broken threshold. Their flesh hung in gray, rotting strips. Noxious black sludge dripped from their elongated claws, hissing as it melted the metal grating beneath their feet.

"They breached!" Caleb yelled, panic spiking in his voice.

Marcus slammed his fist onto his console. "Evelyn, run! Find a secure sector and hide!"

"Hide?" I asked, lowering my blade. "You took the only three seats out of this hellhole."

"You are the strongest fighter in Haven-7," Marcus argued over the comms. "You always find a way."

He was right about one thing. I was a fighter. But I no longer fought for him.

I turned my back on the pods. I planted my boots firmly on the scorched floor, placing my body squarely between the launch track and the surging horde.

"Mom, what are you doing?" Caleb asked.

"Giving you your fighting chance," I said.

I raised my left hand toward the high ceiling. I focused on the spatial vault I had maintained for two agonizing years. The dimensional pocket held nearly everything our base needed to survive.

"You wanted the supplies, Marcus?" I shouted over the roaring infected. "Take them!"

I wrenched open the section of my void space that held our reserve arsenal.

A massive, shimmering tear ripped open in the air above the platform. Dozens of heavy steel crates rained down from the rift.

Metal boxes smashed onto the floor, bursting open upon impact. Thousands of rounds of ammunition, high-explosive grenades, plasma charges, and medical kits spilled across the platform, forming a jagged barricade of raw firepower.

I stood alone in front of the mountain of stolen munitions.

"Are you insane?" Marcus roared over the radio. "You just dumped our reserve arsenal into a dead zone!"

"My supplies belong to me," I stated, drawing two plasma pistols from the chaotic pile at my feet. "And I decide how they are used."

The infected scrambled over the loose ammunition. They shrieked, their glowing red eyes fixing on the brightly lit Ark Pods behind me.

I leveled my weapons at the leading monsters.

I did not raise my guns to protect my husband. I did not stand my ground to save the Oracle who stole my seat. I planted my feet because the boy I raised sat in that pod, and I would not let him die today.

"Initiating final launch phase," the automated voice announced. "T-minus ten seconds."

"Mom, get out of there!" Caleb screamed, pounding both fists against the glass. "They are too fast!"

I ignored him. I squeezed the triggers.

Twin bolts of searing blue plasma tore through the air, punching massive holes through the chests of two infected. They collapsed into bubbling puddles of sludge.

Four more leaped over their fallen bodies.

I fired again and again, tracking their erratic movements. My shoulders burned. My boots slipped on the slick, melting floor. I kicked a rolling plasma charge directly into a cluster of the horde and shot it mid-air.

The explosion rocked the platform, sending charred limbs flying into the burning walls.

"Five seconds," the intercom droned.

A massive infected, twice the size of the others, burst through the smoke. It vaulted over the barricade of crates, its jaw unhinging to reveal rows of razor-sharp bone.

I aimed my pistol, but the weapon clicked empty.

The creature lunged, its claws extended directly toward my throat.

Behind me, the Ark Pod thrusters ignited, unleashing a deafening roar and a wall of searing white fire.