DN - Screw Throw

In the lattice, I see a burning corona of momentum behind what looks like an astronaut’s hand tool. It’s coming right—

—it snaps by me as I desperately pivot out of the way.

By the time I think to look and see if it hit Red Steel, maybe a half-second later, it’s already miles behind us. Then a bolt slips by me so close it musses my hair, and I go icy with belated fear. My suit buzzes at my shoulder blades, and big red letters scroll across my goggle lenses: NAVIGATIONAL HAZARD—YOU HAVE ENTERED A KNOWN DEBRIS FIELD—DESCEND IMMEDIATELY—NAVIGATIONAL HAZARD—

I squeeze my eyes shut and blot out everything but the lattice. There’s no room for fear; I’ve got to focus on pushing my perceptions as far out ahead of me as I can. Swirling currents of radiation skitter and dance off the Van Allen belt high above us. The night sky is alive with trailing, twisting lines of momentum. There, a screw—

And as it’s passing, I grab its momentum and pull it through my pattern. A hot buzzing behind my navel, like some cosmic string is being tugged through my guts, the heated crunch of my left ring finger breaking, and I’ve dragged it off its course and shot it right at that haunting void behind me. A half-second later I open my eyes to glance behind me, and Red Steel is twisting in the night, one hand clamped onto his shoulder where the screw hit him.

Okay, yeah, so this is a game plan.

- Sovereign, Chapter 23