Chapter 19
“Something’s changed.”
Riina looked at Trac, then down at the consoles in front of her.
Their ship’s status go lights were coming on.
“Our systems are coming back online,” she said, not even trying to hide her relief. “When can we get in the air?”
They needed to get back into contact with Tim. She needed to see Tim with her eyes and not just sensors, though it was a relief to see his tracking device show up on her screen again.
“What’s that?” Lt. Dish said.
Riina looked up and back, saw the lieutenant was pointing outside and turned to look.
“Someone,” Trac said, “is firing at Tim’s location. Or close to his location.”
“We need to get in the air now,” Riina said, knew she did a poor job of muting her sense of urgency.
“Are you sure…” Drun began.
Riina cut him off. “I’m very sure.” She turned to Trac. “Get us airborne. I’m going to change.”
Trac met her eyes. His blank gaze still managed to convey that he wasn’t happy.
“I should…” he began.
“You have to protect the ship and our passengers,” she said. “We’ll need a ride out of here.”
All they needed was a route. She stared at the flashes coming from the vessel that now showed up on their tracking.
“Tim is very tough,” Trac said, “despite…”
He didn’t finish his sentence. He didn’t have to. Riina knew his humanity made him vulnerable in a way that was new to them both.
“He needs me to have his back,” she said. “Is our cloak working?” At Trac’s nod, she added, “I’ll gear up, and you can drop me near his location.”
“Do you wish me to engage with the intruder?”
Riina hesitated. She wanted him to blow it out of the sky but, “We don’t know who the good guys are or if there are any good guys out there.”
They might need that ship’s help. Or its databanks. Be a pity to blow it out of the sky and then find out they could have used it.
This time, when Trac answered her, it was on a private comm. It was better that Drun didn’t know everything they were thinking. He might panic. Or try to stop them, though she didn’t see how he could manage that.
She wished he’d go back with his people in the bay. She couldn’t quite tell where and how he fit into their command structure. If there was one. They all appeared to be civilians except for Drun.
But Drun hadn’t overtly taken the leadership role until he’d demanded to join them in the cockpit. But had that been a leadership move? Or a power move? An annoying move? It could have been that.
Riina ignored him now, heading for the bay. Back inside, she was aware of all of them watching her change out of her regular gear and don what she’d never worn before.
Assault gear.
She knew, without being told, that their passengers were growing unsettled as she strapped on weapons and checked her various suit’s levels.
She was bluffing. Oh, she knew how to put it on. It was part of her training. She even knew how to point and shoot. She just hadn’t done it before.
She dropped her faceplate, so that when she turned to face them, they wouldn’t see her fear, her uncertainty. The only thing that kept her going was knowing that Tim was out there alone, with enemies on every side.
They were a team. She should never have let him go out there alone. She would not make that mistake again.
Her suit’s comm activated.
“Cloaked and lifting off now,” Trac said.
“I have picked up the trail again,” Veirn said. “I believe they made a stop in this system. That increased the levels of the element I am using to track them.”
“Do we have any information on this system?” he asked.
“Nothing that would indicate why they stopped here,” Veirn said. “It is curious because it is, or was, within range of one of the older outposts, but that outpost went out of service.”
Kellen checked the data Veirn displayed on his console. It had gone down while they were all still in their long sleep. Had it been destroyed? It could have been either malicious or natural.
Many of the outposts had been damaged by space debris of one kind or another.
However, it was odd that there was no data previous to when it went offline. That seemed to indicate deliberate destruction.
“I am detecting life signs on one of the planets.” There was a pause, then Veirn added, “It is an inhabited planet, not a minor incursion.”
So, the entity had stopped here? Kellen frowned.
“No sign of the electro-magnetic interference that Arroxan Prime experienced?”
“No sign,” Veirn confirmed. “Previous data on the planet had no inhabitants detected.”
“If they destroyed the outpost,” Kellen said, “to hide their colonization…”
He didn’t, he couldn’t quite finish the thought, as he was unsure where he wanted—or didn’t want—to go with it.
They could have simply perceived the outpost as hostile.
Or they’d had something to hide.
Whatever their reason for possibly destroying the outpost, it all indicated that they were interstellar. They might be capable of launching an attack on the Quendala.
“We don’t have time to find out,” Kellen said, though reluctantly. If they were hostile, he didn’t like the idea that they were behind them. And if they weren’t hostile? They could be paranoid. Also didn’t like that behind them.
He checked. They were cloaked. So hopefully their passage through this system would go undetected.
“Let’s leave a sensor drone behind,” he said. He recalled Doc also saying something about protecting your six.
Tim was pleased that the big one and his smaller friend had taken shelter in the remains of a ship. It allowed whoever was shooting at them to concentrate their fire. It was in hopes of this outcome that he’d refrained from shooting back at the attacker.
And the fact that he felt some sympathy with the attacker.
This left him and his pilot companion somewhat free to find the ship that the pilot claimed was here.
Tim wasn’t entirely happy about working with the pilot. Riina would have said, “Trust issues.”
It was true he had many and for good reason. But he missed her at his side, watching his back.
It was much harder to both monitor the attacker and keep an eye on the pilot while in this human body. And he realized he’d missed something.
The constant attack against his cybernetics, against his internal systems, was gone. It had been a buzz against his skin. It wasn’t so much that he lacked the necessary inputs for so small a task. It was that he hadn’t thought about it.
He didn’t like that. Was it a failure of his human body or his imagination? In any case, it was a failure.
His comms crackled for the first time since he’d flown away with the big alien.
Did the viral attack going down also mean that the shuttle was able to come back online? It seemed so when he heard Trac’s voice over his comms.
“We are lifting off and will proceed to your location. Try not to die before we get there.”
One couldn’t accuse Trac of being overly sentimental.
“I will endeavor to remain alive,” he said. He might not need the alternative transportation, but he didn’t tell his pilot friend that. He preferred the arrival of backup to remain a secret for as long as possible.
Even if the shuttle could retrieve him, they had no way to leave without navigation data. He was going to have to find a way to—as Doc liked to put it—get down and dirty with some databanks. He’d have been happier about that if he weren’t half human.
Riina was waiting for the airlock pressure to equalize, so she could step inside when Harold, Dr. Walker’s robot friend approached her.
It didn’t speak out loud, but it instead initiated a private connection with her.
With equal parts curiosity and impatience, she accepted the connection.
“I would like to proceed with you,” it said.
She looked it up, then down. It wasn’t a heavily armed robot, but it did have some basic defenses. She knew its specifications. Knew these defenses were why it had been assigned to Dr. Walker.
She hesitated. It might be useful, but it might also be needed here. Trac could handle himself very well, but if their passengers got antsy and started causing trouble, even he might have a hard time piloting and doing crowd control.
She transmitted these concerns and watched the robot’s eyes flicker as it processed her response.
“We need to access databanks to find our way back, do we not?” It asked.
She nodded. “But Tim…”
“Tim is not fully cybernetic, and you might be taking fire.”
It had a point.
“How about this. I drop down and help Tim secure his situation. You scan for databanks now that the interference is gone. And if needed, you can join us.”
“That is a reasonable alternative.”
Riina blinked. Did the robot sound disappointed?
“I appreciate the offer.” She did. As far as she knew, the robot hadn’t been programmed to take dangerous risks.
The other reality was that the airlock only held one at a time and Trac would have to linger in the area to also allow the robot to join them.
“I really do appreciate your offer,” she said again, “and we will probably need you, so it’s better not to get you shot up by exposing you early.”
“That is fair,” the robot said. “And also reasonable.”
It did sound happier, which it should whether it was sentient or not. She’d worry about any robot that was eager to get shot at.
She was kind of worried about herself.
She heard a squawk and looked down. The bird, T’Korrin had apparently followed her out of the cockpit. Now the bird ruffled its feathers and shifted from foot to foot.
“T’Korrin wants to go with you,” Lira said.
Rinna looked at her, aware that Lira couldn’t see her incredulous expression. She kind of wanted both of them to see it, but she didn’t lift her faceplate. She looked down at the bird. It ruffled its feathers again.
“Why?” Riina asked.
Lira shrugged. “I have no clue. But whenever I’ve not done what he wanted, I’ve been sorry.”
Riina bit back a sigh. “When Harold comes down, T’Korrin can come with him?”
She made it a question, even though it wasn’t one.
Lira looked at the bird. It looked back and appeared to shake its head. Riina almost gave in, but she was dropping into a fire fight.
“Deal with it, T’Korrin,” Lira said.
The airlock signaled pressure balanced. Her last view of the bird was of it shaking its head from side to side. She opened the hatch and slid inside. It was small and she marveled that Tim had managed to get his shoulders inside.
He had wide shoulders. She sighed, recalling those shoulders as the air hissed out.
Tim had told the pilot he would keep watch, while the man tried to access the ship he claimed would fly. He’d prefer that pilot be distracted when the shuttle arrived. It was cloaked, and his human eyes couldn’t see it, but his cybernetics registered the shuttle’s proximity.
The ship that the pilot considered flight-worthy looked like a piece of junk to Tim, but if it kept the man busy, he was content.
That didn’t mean he took his sensors off him. He had a small video of his movements on a floating screen using his cybernetic eye. The man moved, as if to block visuals, so Tim deployed a small drone to keep on eye on him.
The man could just be trying to get away and planned to leave him behind. Tim might have understood that imperative more, if they weren’t so desperately in need of data.
His suit registered the shuttle overhead and he transferred the bulk of his attention up. He didn’t see the airlock open.
He did see a figure step out, dropping down toward him. He waited tensely for the flare of rockets that would slow her descent.
They didn’t…she’d waited until she was below the level of the debris he was hiding behind, he realized when they finally flared.
He understood why she’d done it, but he still wanted to shake her for scaring him.
Her gear could probably have absorbed some of the impact of a forceful landing, but it would have caused her pain and possible injury.
As soon as she’d touched down, she crouched and scanned for his location.
He signaled to her, then had his attention yanked away from her by something he saw on his drone camera.
The pilot had accessed the ship. And was now closing the hatch behind him.
It was so disappointing when humans lived down to your expectations.