Rhys awoke with a sudden jolt, instinctively bringing Quinn closer to him.

It roused his fated as well. She looked around in the Gech's lower interior, blinking sleepy eyes.

The world had gotten cold.

Their breath was misting in the air and Rhys could feel the diadon in his chest pulsing slowly, trying to keep his body at a maximum level of efficiency. That was all good, but it meant Quinn's time was quickly running out.

"Rhys?" she asked, the concern plain in her voice.

"Come," he said. "The Gech is moving. We need to get up to the controls and see where it's going. If it's anywhere near someplace we can try and use as shelter, we have to take the chance. We can't stay here. The insides of a Gech aren't made to sustain life and there are barely any supplies here."

"Are there any?" Quinn asked hopefully.

"Yes," Rhys said. "Come on. Can you climb?"

He didn't want to think of the possibility that Quinn was hurt from her tumble with the carrier. When he'd found her and gotten them both inside the Gech, Rhys had seen no outer injuries and ruled out some deep internal bleeding, but the exposure had ways of sneaking up on people.

"I'm fine," Quinn promised him, trying to smile bravely.

"You need to tell me if you're not," Rhys warned her. "If I'm going to try and save us, I need to know that you are able to keep up with me."

"I'm okay," Quinn repeated, the light slowly returning to her eyes. "Scared. Tired. Hungry. But not ready to lay down and die just yet."

Rhys grinned.

"Good," he said. "Then we still have hope."

"After what you told me, I've begun taking that as a bad thing," Quinn said, following him up the ladders higher into the Gech.

Rhys chuckled. He led them mostly by memory of some lesson his tutors had once given him about the construction of the Gechs. The titanic harvesters weren't his area of expertise after all. The harbinger regretted now that he hadn't taken the time to study them more when he had the time, but it was no use to him now.

If he survived, Rhys made a mental note to make sure his warriors were introduced to the Gechs.

They came out of the smaller maintenance tunnels and ended up in the central part. It was much more stable than the rest of the harvester with all the technology that needed to stay still and not be shaken. There was a lift there and they took it up to the last floor.

If it had been a bright, sunny day, Rhys could have tried to find them a route and see if he could reprogram the harvester. As it was during the storm, the best they could do was gauge some information about their likeliest tomb.

"Right here," he told Quinn, stepping into a large control room with panels that looked out into the storm.

It was all dark out there. Even the lightning had stopped or perhaps it just didn't show through the pitch black anymore.

Rhys opened a hatch. It sprung open with a hissing sound and Quinn nearly yelped, seeing the contents inside.

"Go on," Rhys said, pointing to the emergency rations the technicians left each other. "It's not anything the body will enjoy eating, but it's food. There's water there too."

Quinn didn't let him say that twice. She went for the food, hesitating then when Rhys walked over to the controls and frowned.

"What about you?" she asked. "You need to get your strength back too. And don't give me that macho crap about always being in the best shape."

Rhys laughed.

"I'll take a sip of water, but Nayanors are not built like humans," he told her. "The diadon can keep me going for a long time. Much longer than we have left, anyway, so it's not a problem. You, however, need all the strength and stamina you can get."

Quinn gave him a sharp look, but the harbinger didn't feel any anger behind it. In fact, after their fight downstairs, he couldn't help but think that things had gotten better between them. There was a new sort of trust, the one that stemmed from knowing every issue the other had and accepting them.

It made their need to survive all the more pressing. Rhys refused to die like that – or let Quinn die, even more so – now that they finally had a real shot at being happy together.

He looked at the panels. Most of them were in passive mode, following a program that had it moving around on the plains of Luminos. That was their first problem – Gechs rarely approached fortresses during the time of the storm. They were too big to safely go near them and there was no need for it either. The gates could no longer be opened.

The rest of the controls seemed to be diagnostics, running a scan on the ground the Gech covered. Rhys glanced at them, trying to find some sign that could give away their position. If he knew where they were, he could begin working out the best route to survive.

Quinn came closer, looking at the controls with interest.

"Amazing," she said quietly. "This is incredible. If I could take just one of these to my trips to the outer worlds, they would flip!"

The harbinger turned to her, surprised.

"You know how this thing works?" he stated.

"Not exactly," Quinn said, casting her eyes over the panels, running her fingers over the controls. "This is an amazing machine, built by someone with much more technical knowledge than I have, but I think I can understand most of it, yes."

Gods. If she can move this thing...

"Can you find out where we are?" Rhys asked, stepping out of the way so Quinn could take a seat in front of the controls.

His fated was looking at him, wide-eyed.

"You think there's a chance we could live?" she asked.

"If you can take control of this thing, then yes," Rhys said.

Quinn's beautiful light eyes reflected her shock.

"I can find out the location, sure," she said, "but walk a Gech? This thing is as large as a small city! What if I crash it? It takes years to learn the controls of complicated machinery such as this."

"It's the only shot we have," Rhys said. "It doesn't have to be eloquent or particularly nimble. Even rough steering would help. Can you do it?"

Quinn looked at the panels, drawing a deep breath.

"I can try," she said. "If it's either this or dying, I'm willing to sit here until I'm frozen to the seat."

Rhys snorted.

"I won't let it come to that," he said. "Location first. Then we can figure out the rest."

"Alright," Quinn said, her hands flying over the keys. "Let's see what it can do."

The Gech shuddered around them. Rhys cast a glance at the harvester's interior. What had been a peaceful, quiet rumbling a moment ago was now grumbling in response to whatever Quinn was doing.

"Sorry," Quinn said, not looking his way, never lifting her gaze from the controls. "It's an interesting program. I get why, but it's a pain in the ass to change its protocols. The Gech is resisting me every step of the way."

"Can you fight it?" Rhys asked with interest.

He loved seeing her like that, concentrating, fierce, alive again. That was his fated, the one he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

"Yes," Quinn said through gritted teeth. "Hold that thing down. Don't let go."

Rhys stepped closer, pulling the lever Quinn was struggling to hold onto out of her hand. It stayed fixed in the position she'd been trying to get it in.

His fated glared.

"It figures you have to be a Nayanor to handle this," she murmured. "Okay now. Don't let go."

"I won't."

In the next second, the entire Gech shuddered so violently Rhys was certain it was going to topple over. Nothing would save them then, from under the rubble of tons of machinery, exposed to the storm outside. The lever stayed where it was, but Rhys could feel the desperate pull.

"Quinn?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered, moving as fast as she could. "I'm working on it."

"Why is finding our location this difficult?" Rhys asked.

"Nothing really works until I've taken control," Quinn replied. "I'm sure there's an easier way to do this, but right now we just have to wrestle this thing because I don't know the shortcuts."

"Very well," Rhys said, catching Quinn when the Gech lurched suddenly again.

"It's like a beast right now," Quinn explained. "One that needs to be tamed. The program is its first priority and everything I do is drawing its attention away from it. The Gech doesn't like that. So it is literally trying to shake me off. Someone has worked some serious defenses into this."

It went on for long minutes where Rhys thought that every second would bring about their fall. None of that happened. He had no idea what Quinn was doing, specifically, but she seemed to familiarize herself with the Gech faster than he could have imagined.

"There," she finally said victoriously. "Okay. Just a moment. Now!"

The Gech stopped growling. It stopped moving altogether. Behind them, something moved instead. Rhys and Quinn turned to watch as a command chair rose from the flooring. It looked like a harness with straps for hands and legs.

"I think that's the manual control," Quinn said, grinning wildly. "Gods above. That's insane. What if I stumble? Will the Gech stumble with me?"

"I think it's too heavy to do that," Rhys said, looking at the harness. "Quinn?"

"Yes, yes, the location," she said, sitting behind the regular controls again. "Okay, I'm bringing up a map of the area. This is where we are. Does that tell you anything? There are no names here, only coordinates."

Rhys observed the map, looking for something that seemed familiar. He didn't have to search for long.

"It's close," he said with a grin.

"What is?" Quinn asked.

"Jos Gharo."

The hopeful smile on her lips was a thing of beauty. She followed the path that Rhys traced on the map with eager interest, nodding happily.

"It's not far! Do you think we can make it? Do we have the time?"

"We must," Rhys said.

Quinn's expression changed, becoming worried.

"But what good will it do to us?" she asked. "The gates are closed, you said it yourself. I don't think Kol-Eresh would risk everyone for just the two of us. I wouldn't want him to either, after what you said."

"The pathway," Rhys said. "You got through it once, we can use it again. The storm will make it incredibly difficult, but we have to try. There is nothing else close enough. Do you remember how to turn the block off?"

"Yes," Quinn answered carefully. "Can we really risk it? What if we let the storm in? What if we can't close it afterwards?"

"We don't have to," Rhys said. "We can blow up the entire path. It's small enough not to do any damage to the rest of the fortress. It'll be hard to rebuild, but we will be alive to do it."

"Okay," Quinn said, the smile back on her lips. "It's going to be alright. I can feel it. We can survive the storm –"

She stopped, staring at the screens. Rhys followed her gaze to where a new object was blinking on the map Quinn had brought up.

"Is that a ship?" Quinn asked, looking at the codes running on the screens. "Rhys? Is there someone else out there?"

Rhys frowned. What he was seeing didn't make any sense.

"It's your sister's ship," he said.