DN - Reentry Survive

We’re falling now, our orbital momentum almost completely wasted. This is it, no turning back now, so I shove aside my fatigue, shake off the pain, and burn away our altitude as fast as I can. His hands come up to claw at me, to punch my wounded thigh, to try and peel me off him. The initiative is mine now, and if I lose it I die, so I ignore my broken fingers, switch to open palm strikes, and rain punishment down on him.

But it’s not until the first wisps of the atmosphere start to flame off his back that he realizes how much danger he’s really in. My smile is tight and savage, my protective anger finally here at last.

You took my cape. You took my heat shield.

That’s okay.

I have you.

With one hand I hold his head in place, and with the other I throw a punch that comes all the way up from the root of my spine. His eyes, now milky with cataracts, roll up in his head, and for just an instant, Red Steel goes limp. An instant is all I need to unhook my ankles, roll him between my thighs, and get his arms twisted up behind him in a lock. He squirms and bucks, tries to turn this against me. Too late. Far too late. Clawing for every ounce of speed I can, we head down, down into the atmosphere.

Orange and red whispers grow to flickers. Flickers grow to torches. The silence of space gives way to the roar of reentry. We enter a tunnel of fire that drags behind us for miles. With one last spasm he tries to get away from me, and I can feel his flight pushing against mine, trying to shove him in any direction, anywhere that will get him away from the pain, but I’ve got momentum and gravity to add to my own strength, and it’s no use. His resistance shudders, collapses. He goes limp in my arms, his legs kicking and jerking against the howling plasma.

The flames pull away from us and we’re down in the atmosphere, hurtling toward the ocean. When I poke my head over Red Steel’s shoulder, I spot a small island, mostly rock and sand in dark, chopping water. I bank us toward it. He’s starting to stir, and the last bits of his charred hair are flaking off in the blasting wind. I redouble my grip on his arms and push on as hard as I can.

Just a hundred yards off the deck I let go, curl my legs up, and give him a kick with everything I’ve got, right in the small of the back. Red Steel hits the island at Mach 5 and is instantly hidden by a huge explosion of dust and gravel that pings off me like shrapnel.

After the howling winds of reentry, the sudden quiet is almost disorienting. There is only the lapping of the waves and pattering of falling pebbles.

- Sovereign, Chapter 23