Cole peered out the maw of the Bern craft’s broken windshield, past the jagged carboglass teeth lined up top and bottom, and watched the diving ships head their way. One of the enemy craft had fired on another one, sending it into a smoky spiral. Those two seemed to have been heading toward the ruined village just ahead. The third ship—the one that had been heading straight for them moments ago—began to bank around, racing back to help its wounded comrade.
“That’s one of ours,” Cole said to himself.
“
“No, the one firing. It must be one of the Underground groups that came through before us. Has to be.” Cole looked down at the dash, which was sprinkled with small broken triangles of nearly-indestructible carboglass. Indicator lights winked with power, but only some of them. The screen in front of the dead pilot was still on, the SADAR showing in blinking dots what Cole and Larken could just as clearly see with their naked eyes.
“Help me move him,” Cole said, tugging on the pilot. Together, they were able to slide the man’s body, once a member of their raid squad, out of the seat and into the hallway. Cole ran back and plopped down in the vacated seat. He closed his eyes and bent forward, then blew a puff of air over the controls to get rid of the sharp dust.
“What does this say?”
Larken leaned over Cole and followed his fingers. “It’s a systems menu. That says life support, and that one’s for the grav panels, but it looks like they’re not selectable.”
“What is?” Cole asked.
“Choose that one,” Larken said. “It’s defenses.”
Cole scrolled down to it and pressed the control dial in with a click. Everything seemed to work just as he’d expect, even if he couldn’t read any of the gibberish on the screen.
“Anything?” he asked Larken.
“The chaff looks like it works.”
Cole laughed. Chaff was useless on the ground. He jogged the control dial to the left, and the previous menu came up. Again, he marveled at the familiar design aesthetics.
“What about weapons?” he asked.
“Scroll down,” Larken said.
Cole did.
“There!”
One of the menus was lit up. Cole had already begun moving to select it when Larken pointed excitedly.
“What is it?” Cole asked as he drilled down into the menu.
“Oh shit,” Larken said. He slapped Cole on the back.
“What the hell am I selecting?” Cole asked.
“You’re not gonna believe this,” Larken said.
“Get those flankers!” Scottie yelled. He and Ryn pumped their fists in the air as the lead ship spiraled out of control, a plume of dark smoke trailing from its rear. Their allies in the Bern craft, one of the squads Ryke had formed up with in hyperspace, had nailed it with a series of laser blasts. As the wounded ship went down, it spat out desperate bursts from its own canons, but the shots flew wide over the old village. Where the bolts of plasma struck the earth, they sent up geysers of dust and soil in fantastic kinetic explosions.
“Aw, shit!” Ryn said. He grabbed Ryke by the shoulder and pointed behind them. The third ship, the one from the rift, had doubled back and taken a perfect bead on their comrades in the ship above. Plasma cannons erupted, furious bolts of pure energy lashed through the sky, and one of the shots clipped the wing of the allied Bern craft.
The hostile ship closed, adjusting its angle of attack. Another round of plasma flared across the gap, catching the ship square, and their friends blossomed into a lumpy ball of orange with a black, smoky fringe.
Gone, just like that.
The attacking ship banked hard, pulling away from the fireball it had wrought, and angled down toward the base of the rift. It had dispatched the only ally Ryke and his friends had nearby, and now it was turning around to do the job of its wounded comrade, which finally reached the ground a kilometer away in a mad, screaming, explosion.
The two blasts from the destroyed craft reached them at almost the same time, the roars of destruction deafening and coming from all directions at once. The three friends flinched in unison, ducking from the onslaught of compressed air that followed the explosions. Recovering quickly, they stepped back from the console, watching the remaining ship line up on them, bringing its cannons to bear—
And then another ball of flames appeared, another explosion, right where the enemy ship had been. The orange cloud blinked into existence like an eyelid peeling back on an impossibly large and brightly colored orb. The fire blossomed out, its edge fusing with the billowing smoke from the other ball of airborne destruction, three large ships meeting their sudden end in bizarre and rapid succession.
Ryke scanned the sky, dumbfounded, looking for a clue as to why they were still alive and the Bern ship destroyed. He finally saw, and followed, a thin plume of gray smoke, an ephemeral and dirty rope of exhaust, as it threaded its way through the bright, blue, Lokian sky back to Mortimor’s downed ship. It was the spiraling vapor trail of a lone missile that hung in the sky, slowly dissipating but still tracing the flight of its maker to the sad, crashed craft on the horizon.
Group two’s ship sat there, listing to one side, a wing drooping, its body broken, and yet—still very much deadly.
48 · Byrne’s Ship
As soon as Molly noticed the Wadi chewing through the webbing holding her in place, the creature stopped and looked up at her, its scent tongue flicking out like a whip. Molly blinked away her tears and noticed the sheen of wetness on the Wadi’s eyes. The animal blinked at her. Its tongue spiraled out, then disappeared back in its mouth.
Molly looked to her restraints, which were partially eaten through. She tested them, wrenching her hands apart, but they wouldn’t budge. She glanced to her side to see Byrne and the pilot conferring. To her other side, she saw Walter watching her and the Wadi with interest. Molly turned her attention back to her lap. She focused on the chewed portion of the harness, imagining herself eating through it. She ground her teeth as she had been doing moments earlier.
Her Wadi resumed its efforts.
Her Wadi could read her emotions!
So much dawned on Molly all at once: The tongue-flicks and the head-bobs, the hiding in her pocket when Molly was frightened, the pawing at the air when she was enraged. All the nuances and small behaviors Molly had superstitiously been reading into for weeks were confirmed! Her desire to avoid anthropomorphizing the animal had blinded her, and now she knew how the sheriff had used her Wadi to attack his deputy!
The webbing holding her into the seat parted, leaving her hands shackled, but her arms free. She thought about having the Wadi test the metal bands around her wrists with its teeth, but worried they would be too much for her jaws. Molly kept her hands in place so she wouldn’t alert Byrne and turned and saw Walter eyeing her freedom. He glanced down at his own buckled harness.
Molly looked to the Wadi, who stuck out her tongue and waved it in the air.
She forced the words to the surface, just as if she were wearing a Drenardian headband, then realized the Wadi probably didn’t use language that way. Why would it know English? She closed her eyes instead and tried to form pictures in her mind that the animal might understand.
It was harder than she thought, so reliant was she on using words to convey instructions and meaning. And
