Page 38 of Crave

Page List

Font Size:

“So it is.” Taking a calculated risk, he pushed more energy into the shuttle’s scanners. “They were covering their ident when they hit theDeepWander, but they are projecting publicly now, in accordance with intergalactic treaty. Which suggests they don’t know we’re here.”

It might also suggest the other ship intended to eliminate anyone who saw them skulking in the general vicinity of a recent battle scene, but he didn’t say that aloud.

“Or they plan to blow up anyone they find,” Kinsley noted.

He grunted. Why did he try to hide anything from her?

Other than the i’lva, of course.

“They are listed as thePratorim, a third-tier member of the Luster with aspirations.”

“Oh, so with Dorn’s help, they were shooting for first place,” she muttered, then added, “I wish I hadn’t said shoot.”

He hesitated. “As members of the Luster, even third tier, they could sponsor theDeepWanderas an affiliate.”

“They punched a hole in theDeepWander,” she reminded him. “They weren’t going to give you a hand up. They wanted to knock you out of the sky and take Roxy.”

“Well, as the IDA has noted, first encounters can be tricky.”

When he slanted a glance at her, she snorted.

She was not fearless, or even bold in defiance of her fears. She just acted anyway, even when she wasn’t sure. Even when she was wrong. She had been more his guide since the Earthers arrived than all his studies and experiments before.

“The downside of hope,” he murmured. “Unfulfilled wishful thinking.”

Much like becoming a singing brigand with an abducted alien lover.

“How do they even know about this place?” Kinsley mused. “Dorn was already in the brig when you came up with this idea and asked Roxy to make a map. Is there another spy on theDeepWander? Or did they follow us?”

“How would they follow us, unless…” All his hands flew across the shuttle controls as he reversed the shuttle’s scanner upon themselves. He’d been looking inward so much lately, but he’d never meant it literally. “Vug. There is an anomalous tracker on the shuttle. Which means—”

The shuttle’s comm crackled. “DeepWandershuttle,” came the sharp voice through the speaker. “Our transponder indicates your presence in the vicinity. Respond.”

Kinsley shook her head. “They’re guessing.” But her voice wavered.

“With all the interference, they can’t know exactly where we are—or who we are,” Sil said. “Dorn must’ve planted one of their transponders so that when he made his getaway with Roxy they could retrieve him. They can’t know if we captured or killed their people. They might even be wondering if wearetheir people. And since the shuttle is out here alone, without theDeepWander, they must be wondering if this is their second chance.”

“I know I was just losing my cool over sharing hope,” she said. “Let’s not give them a second chance.”

“Definitely together on that,” Sil confirmed.

A flare of plasma cannon burned across the scanners, igniting denser pockets of dust an alarming preview of the weapon’s likely effect on the shuttle.

“Respond,” thePratorimrepeated in an even sharper voice. “This is your last chance.”

“They’ll keep firing until they flush us out,” Sil said through an angry clack of his tusks. He turned to Kinsley, urgency beating alongside the i’lva. “Put on the exo-suit. You know how to use the controls now, you’ve had practice. I will put you out into the scanner shadow of this boulder. The interference and your small size will keep you hidden. If I surrender to thePratorim, they will be too preoccupied retrieving me to notice you. Just wait here. As you said, theDeepWanderwill be coming soon—”

“Oh hell no,” she exclaimed.

Her ferocity was gratifying, he supposed, if ill-advised. “It’s your best chance. They only truly want Roxy. The suit will sustain you if you keep life support at low. You will be all right until my brother comes.”

“For once, I’m not thinking about myself,” she snapped. “I’m not hiding behind a rock to save my own skin.”

“Kinsley—”

“Don’t. We’re not giving them Roxy.” The crack of her voice sent a stab of pain through his antennae, not from the volume but from her intensity—more than that, an unwavering truth. She said it aloud: “And I’m not leaving you.”

Though the i’lva within him burned to be with her forever—following her through the deepest of lightless ways, his guiding light—he knew they had no more time. But even as he steeled himself to lay hands on her, to stuff her into an exo-suit to toss her out the airlock, another blaze of plasma seared across the darkness.