Page 48 of Defiant

“It’s temporary for now, I’m afraid,” I explained. “Peg, this is my flight. My friends.” I waved toward the others.

“The family you were so,soeager to get back to?” she said. “Words. I hope you all know what she left behind. We offered her paradise.”

“So…that’s great,” Arturo said. “But, Spin, timing? How is rescuing this…person going to help us?”

“This isn’t a rescue,” I explained. “Peg isn’t interested in leaving the nowhere, I don’t think.”

The large pirate shook her head. “The belt is my home. Though there are many at Surehold who would love the chance to come back through.” She focused again on the captive aliens. “Temporary, you said? What are you up to?”

Behind us, Alanik and Arturo arrived through the front cargo doors with a starfighter each—Superiority interceptors, modern design. Not bad ships. Peg eyed them.

“I have fifteen of those,” I said to her, “for you. As payment for hiring the Broadsiders.”

“Hiring us to do what?” Peg said.

I smiled, pulling out my datapad and bringing up the display of the locations of the other four Superiority mining stations in the nowhere. “Nothing you wouldn’t want to do anyway, Peg.”

15

We arrived back at Platform Prime six hours later, hyperjumping into the airspace above Detritus and flying in formation. And my cockpit was even more cramped than normal when we did.

Because I’d brought back two new pilots. In the shape of two large crystals, each roughly the size of a flight helmet.

“Is this it?” Shiver asked, her voice a crystalline peal vibrating from her core. “Is this your home?”

“Yes,” I said. “You can’t see it?” I’d never quite figured out how a chunk of crystal—a creature known as a resonant—could see.

“I require instruments to see through a vacuum,” Shiver explained. “All I can see right now is the cockpit.”

“Currently, Shiver,” Hesho said, describing it as we got docking permissions, “we’re approaching a large space station—flat, and shaped kind of like a large rectangle—that hovers in orbit around the planet Detritus. It is one of hundreds that orbit the planet—the place where Spensa was born, and the place that is now our home.”

At that word, the second of the two resonants—Dllllizzzz—projected some thoughts. She was cytonic, and had fared poorly during her time in the nowhere, growing quiet, withdrawn, evenmentally broken. But today she projected images of happiness, rest, and satisfaction to me.

“Home,” she said, the word vibrating from her core, from just behind my seat.

“Home!” Doomslug fluted.

“She’s feeling better!” Shiver said. “Dllllizzzz is already feeling better! I resonate with satisfaction, Spensa. Coming to the somewhereiswhat she’s needed, as I always thought.”

I didn’t say anything, as I wasn’t so certain as Shiver. Dllllizzzz had communicated like this with me before. Still, the two resonants had long wanted to escape the nowhere, and so I’d decided to make good on my promise. Maksim—another good friend from the other side—had opted to stay for now. Peg and her team were going to need every ship they had for the task I’d given them. Fortunately, they had a few extra pilots to take over Shiver’s and Dllllizzzz’s ships.

“If Dllllizzzz wants to go straight home to your caverns,” I said, “I’m sure we can find a ship to take the two of you back to your planet.”

“No, no,” Shiver said. “If we go home right away, that will only alert the authorities who banished us to the nowhere in the first place. Perhaps sometime in the future—but for now, we don’t want to be a burden. I am certain we can find something to do.”

It took a little longer than normal to be contacted by the flight deck as we waited to land. Finally, Hill—one of the flight operators—called us. “Sorry for the delay, Skyward Flight,” he said. “Admiral Weight wanted to be here to greet you when you returned from your secret mission. He’s on his way.”

Secret mission, eh? I steeled myself, but passed the time by reaching out cytonically to the ship hovering next to mine. Kimmalyn’s ship, which carried the rescued slugs.

You have a friend,I sent to that slug.She wanted me to save you. Can you contact her?

One of the newly rescued hyperslugs replied with impressions of many slugs in cages, of a dark and frightening place. Of thousands upon thousands of thoughts bombarding them, shoving against one another, being sorted and sent out.

The communications hub,I sent.Yes, I know.Though the awful sensation was stronger than I’d realized, I did know about this place.How can I reach her?

Sorrow followed. The slug didn’t know how. The commslug reached out to others sometimes to comfort them in their captivity, but only when she was scheduled to contact the supply depot for another reason. It was like…she smuggled them empathy along with the data stream she was required to send.

Scud. I didn’t know how the communications hub worked, only that through some mechanical means, the Superiority could force commslugs into slavery, allowing the planets to talk to one another. And I realized we’d never rescued a commslug. Apparently they were kept under even tighter wraps than the hyperslugs who teleported ships.

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