Under Pressure

In the last installment of Critical Mass…

Into the Breach

The sound was wrong.

The House of ThorneR. Adrian Thorne

They didn’t even bother drying off.

The moment Argus’s voice crackled over the comms, Elias was moving—a blur of bare feet slapping against cold metal, towel slung low around his waist, water still tracking down his spine.

Jace was half a second behind him, cursing under his breath as he wrestled with the access panel to the lift. The door stuttered open just as they reached it, and Elias slammed the override, bypassing the standard biometric delay. No time.

“Bridge,” Elias barked. “Full override. Priority route.”

The lift whirred, faster than usual—Argus obliging without comment.

Jace leaned one arm against the panel opposite him, chest heaving, towel barely hanging on. His hair was soaked, curling in loose tendrils at his forehead. Drops clung to his collarbones, catching the emergency light that bathed the interior in pulsing red.

“If we die like this,” he panted, “I swear to god—”

“Don’t finish that sentence.”

“I mean it. If my last known image is ‘half-naked and underprepared,’ it’s going in my file, isn’t it? I’ll be posthumously mocked.”

Elias didn’t answer. His eyes were already locked on the panel readout—Cryo Bay B flickering yellow, then orange.

Failure curve trending up.

They hit the bridge at a sprint.

The door hissed open and Elias dove for the central console, fingers flying across the surface, summoning diagnostics, pulling live schematics. Jace slid into the copilot’s seat and synced into Argus’s priority queue, calling up real-time vitals on the remaining crew.

“O₂ saturation down twelve percent,” Argus announced, voice crisp. “Auxiliary scrubber array has failed to engage. System attempted restart. Response time exceeded safe margin.”

Jace growled low. “What the hell’s choking it?”

“Unknown. Diagnostics incomplete.”

Elias didn’t blink. He was already drilling down into the logs. The towel shifted low on his hips as he leaned forward, the edge of it clinging precariously to his thigh.

Jace noticed. He definitely noticed.

But he didn’t say a word.

Not now.

“Argus, are you still feeding atmosphere from the primary generator?” Elias asked, jaw tight.

“Affirmative. Output currently compensating, but trending toward critical overload within 18 minutes.”

“So we’ve got a scrubber down and a backup loop that’s seconds from collapse,” Jace said, fingers flying. “You thinking blockage? Circuit fry?”

“Neither,” Elias said, eyes narrowing at a strange flicker in the readings. “I think something’s siphoning power from the secondary scrubber controller. There’s a ghost signal here, look—see that dip?”

Jace leaned in. Their shoulders brushed.

The contact was brief. Warm. Intentional?

Elias didn’t move away.

Jace’s voice dropped just slightly, not teasing—just closer. “You always get this intense when things are failing around you?”

“I’m always this intense.”

“Yeah, but right now you’re wet, intense, and mostly naked. That’s new.”

Before Elias could fire back, Argus interjected:

“Warning. Load threshold at 89 percent. Bridge systems will be affected next. Recommend immediate action.”

Elias snapped back into motion. “Alright. We’ll split—you reroute power to isolate the scrubber circuit. I’ll pull the panel from the utility deck and see what’s drawing the drain.”

“You’re going in a towel?”

“You’re coming too.”

They moved fast.

No time for uniforms. No time for modesty. Just breath, bare feet, and one towel away from disaster.

Steam curled from their skin as they jogged down the corridor, bare feet slapping against chilled deck plating, towels flaring behind them like capes caught in low gravity. The emergency lights strobed red against the bulkheads, casting everything in blood and shadow. Somewhere in the walls, the ventilation fans had shifted tone—a whine that signaled strain.

Jace wasn’t used to feeling this exposed.

Not physically. Not like this.

Not with Elias a pace ahead, broad shoulders glinting from the moisture still clinging to him, his hair still wet at the ends like they’d just been yanked out of a different life. Which, to be fair, they had.

Elias punched the access panel to the main utility corridor, and the doors hissed open with a groan. The room inside was cramped: an access junction lined with wall panels, breaker stacks, and diagnostic holoscreens. It smelled faintly metallic and sharp—like overheated circuits and sterilized plastic. Argus’s voice hummed through the ceiling grille.

"Power reroute grid available. Diagnostic console active. Fault location: Node 2-C. Voltage bleed at 23%. Risk to auxiliary life support systems exceeds mission parameters."

Jace wiped his hand on the edge of his towel, fingers skating over the touchscreen as he loaded the grid layout. "I’ve got the bleed pattern. It’s running down a redundant line—like something’s cross-wired. Could’ve been overlooked during last cycle’s patch."

Elias dropped to one knee in front of the wall panel. “Then we’re about to overlook it right back.” He pried the panel off with a clang, revealing a tangle of wire bundles and cooling nodes pulsing dimly.

Jace leaned close, heat radiating between them, shoulder brushing shoulder as he zoomed the map. “That one,” he said, pointing at a flickering coil wrapped in graphite shielding. “Trace that to the junction and bypass it. I’ll keep Argus feeding you live draw stats.”

“Copy that,” Elias murmured, already elbow-deep in the wires. The towel tugged awkwardly around his waist as he reached up, muscles flexing under the strain. Jace tried not to look. Failed entirely.

The sweat wasn’t helping.

Elias grunted and twisted the node connector, arcs of static flickering as he rerouted the current. Jace flinched back instinctively, bumping into the console, towel slipping slightly. Elias didn’t look over—he just said, voice even, "You alright?"

Jace adjusted the fabric and cleared his throat. “Yeah. Just didn’t expect you to go full arc-welder in a bath towel.”

“Try not to act too impressed,” Elias replied, the corner of his mouth twitching.

Jace grinned despite himself, but the warmth in his chest lasted about half a second.

Because then Argus said: "Warning. Junction stabilization unsuccessful. Current rising to critical threshold. Immediate system redistribution required."

Jace cursed, fingers flying over the diagnostic console. "We’ve still got a draw from the galley sector. What the hell is still active over there?"

Argus responded immediately. "Food processor units in standby mode. Nonessential."

"Then shut it down. Pull everything. Send it to life support."

"Confirmed."

Below him, Elias’s voice was tighter now. “I need ten more seconds. This clamp is fighting me.”

Jace’s eyes flicked between the status bars and the sweat running down Elias’s back. The numbers stuttered, dipped, then stabilized as Argus redistributed power.

Finally, Elias yanked the connector free and slotted the bypass clamp in its place. A small hum filled the room as the new flow redirected cleanly.

Argus confirmed: "Auxiliary life support stable. Backup oxygen scrubber now online."

The silence that followed wasn’t quiet. It was full of shared breath and adrenaline and the way Jace was looking at him now—like maybe this was the first moment since the breach where he could actually feel the ground again.

Elias looked up, eyes locking with his. “That ought to buy us a little time.”

Jace swallowed. “Yeah.”

The tension hung there for a second too long. Not just crisis tension. Something else—closer. Hotter. A beat suspended between what almost happened and what still might.

Then Argus ruined it.

“Advisory. Environmental sensors detecting irregular oxygen flow in Sector D. Secondary leak suspected.”

Elias sighed and stood. “That’s the bridge.”

Jace stepped back, already moving. “Then we’d better get there fast.”

Towels flared again as they ran.

Sector D wasn’t far, but Jace was already out of breath by the time they slid into the narrow compartment just outside the bridge. The emergency had downgraded from flashing red to a steadier yellow—still serious, but not catastrophic.

“Argus,” Elias said between breaths, “where’s the leak?”

“Confirmed: pressure drop localized to a single relay conduit. A microfracture in the bridge ventilation elbow has caused a slow oxygen bleed.”

Jace was already at the wall panel, fingers swiping to the schematic. “That’s fixable. We’ve got a spare elbow coupling in the maintenance bin.”

Elias nodded, reaching overhead into a recessed cabinet and grabbing a toolkit. “I’ll swap it. You watch pressure stats—make sure we don’t spike while I pull the line.”

While Elias climbed the short access ladder, Jace leaned on the console, towel clinging low on his hips. Argus dimmed the overhead lights automatically, adjusting for maintenance visibility.

“You know,” Jace said, watching Elias torque the valve clamp loose, “if we keep working up a sweat like this, we’re gonna overload the water recycler.”

Elias chuckled softly. “We’re conserving water by skipping showers halfway through. Pretty sure that counts.”

“Yeah, but if I have to go to cryo smelling like panic and armpit, I’m filing a complaint.”

Elias shot him a look over his shoulder—just long enough to grin—then returned to the coupling. It clanked free with a metallic pop, and he slid the replacement into place. Jace watched the pressure graphs stabilize.

“Seal’s good,” he confirmed. “Oxygen flow returning to baseline.”

Argus spoke softly. “System normalized. Sector D is now secure.”

For a moment, the only sound was their breathing.

Elias descended the ladder slowly, sweat beading along his collarbone, towel barely clinging to his hips.

Jace exhaled. “Now can we finish that shower?”

“Lead the way.”