Cibola Burn (Expanse, #4)

by James S.A. Corey

“Guys,” Havelock said. “Recoilless is an exaggeration. It doesn’t mean there’s no recoil at all.” It sounded like more nonsense talk to Basia until he looked at the Rocinante’s video of the pursuing team and saw one of the four men spinning and rotating in space, frantically firing his EVA pack to get under control. It only seemed to make it worse, as every blast of gas from the pack just added a new axis to the rotation. “Then that’s an inaccurate name for the weapons,” the man called Kemp replied. “And if we’d gotten to more advanced zero-g tactics, I would have explained that,” Havelock said. “I also would have taught you to use the integrated compensation software to have the EVA pack do stabilizing bursts every time you fire the gun.” “Seems to me there’s a lot you didn’t show us,” Kemp replied. “Yeah, and now that you’re shooting at me, I’m just sick about that. In the meantime, please stop. Drake is way out of control and drifting away from you guys. Someone needs to go get him before he gets too far.” “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” the one Havelock had called Koenen said. “Get us to call off the chase.” “I’d like,” Havelock said, his voice sad, “to keep Drake from falling out of space and dying. Also, I’m arguing with the pilot of the gunship behind me so that he doesn’t need to turn you into a cloud of red mist with his point defense cannons. But you guys are making it harder and harder to be convincing.”