Kadin gaped at him, making no attempt to hide his outrage that time. “Do you think they meant to say more?”
Gaelen frowned, struggling to recall any sense that they were still trying to communicate when he broke away, and finally shook his head. “No.”
Disgust twisted Kadin’s features. “You do not think they might have saidwhenthey planned to rendezvous with us?” he asked tightly.
It was Gaelen’s turn to gape. “How could they know that?”
Kadin blinked at him several times and flicked a look at Hauk—who was clearly paying no attention to the discussion at all. “The machine?” Kadin suggested.
“How woulditknow that?”
Kadin struggled with the urge to roll his eyes, reminding himself that none of them were especially expert at manipulating the machines of the Sheloni and he had little room to throw aspersions at the Hirachi, who were not to blame for the fact that they were so technologically challenged. They had had little time to advancebeforethe Sheloni had begun to prey upon them and none since. It was a struggle at any time they needed the damned things. But they damned well knew that it was capable of such things given the fact that it guided the ship through space. “You tell it where you are going and it calculates the distance and the time it will take to get there.”
“Except they do not know where we are … exactly.” Gaelen mulled over it a few moments. “I will go back and see if they can calculate and tell me when they believe they will be able to rendezvous.”
Hauk dragged his feet off of the console and planted them loudly on the deck as he surged to his feet. “No. It was a risk to summon them. If you go back to chat, the enemy will be on to us and they will find us before our people do.”
They might anyway and they all knew it so Kadin decided to keep his frustrations to himself.
Chapter Seven
And, in point of fact, it did transpire that the Sheloni had somehow intercepted that one and only attempt to contact their people for help.
Or perhaps merely stumbled upon them in the vast emptiness of space?
Or maybe the Sheloni were intent on another raid for breeders on Earth and as surprised as they were when they stumbled upon one of their own ships in an area where none should have been?
Then again, maybe not.
Kadin, Gaelen, and Hauk shifted to high alert once they had contacted their allies about the damage to the ship and began to wear the armor that was available and to carry their weapons, or at least keep them close to hand.
They knew if the Sheloni found them they would be obscenely outnumbered, but none considered simply yielding when Nye’s life would be at stake. They would fight until they could fight no more.
There was no warning that they had been discovered. They had expected that, at the very least, they would have a few moments to brace themselves.
But it transpired that they were relaxing after a meal one moment and the next, the great metal beasts of the Sheloni almost appeared to crawl out of the bulkheads of the ship.
Kadin’s first thought was that Emma had only just left to return to the cabin and he was focused immediately on an internal calculation as to whether or not she had had time to reach it or if the mechanical monsters of the Sheloni had invaded the ship everywhere at once.
He shared a quick, speaking look with Hauk before he launched himself at the closest target.
They were almost overmatched. Although only two of the metal giants were able to enter the dining area at once to battle the two of them, the beasts were four times bigger than they were and probably ten times stronger.
They were not as agile, however, and many battles with them had finally taught them the weaknesses of the Sheloni machines.
It still took a great deal of effort to reach the part of the robot that controlled its functions, to pry the panel off that protected it and disable the thing.
Sweat was rolling off of Kadin in rivers from the effort and he was huffing for breath. Even so, he turned away without pause and leapt toward the corridor. Hauk was almost directly behind him.
They managed to cover maybe half the distance that separated them from the cabin they had assigned to Emma and Nye when they encountered Gaelen, who was struggling to hold off three of the machines by himself.
Undoubtedly, he had been returning to the dining hall to eat when the beasts invaded and that meant Emma had managed to reach the cabin.
They had some hope, at least, that she had and that she had managed to find a safe place to hide with the baby.
As powerful as Gaelen was, it was unlikely he would have been able to hold his own against three of the things if they had not been constricted by the bulkheads that formed the narrow corridor.
They joined him, each pitting themselves against one opponent.
They had managed to disable only one, however, when they heard a scream that turned their blood to ice in their veins.
The Sheloni had the little king and Emma.
* * * *
Emma’s fear level went up several degrees after she discovered there was a chance that they might be captured by the enemies of the people she was traveling with—surpassed the uneasiness she had felt before by many times, in point of fact.
Unfortunately, not only did it not have time to mellow from familiarity, though, it multiplied many times over that when she saw the thing coming out of the wall.
Or maybe it just materialized in the corridor? Used something like she’d seen in science fiction movies to particalize and then
