“Mack…” I began, sliding out of the chair to stand beside it, but the queen was having none of it.
“Weavers and Vespis have been allies before,” she said, laying a hand on my shoulder. “Even if some have forgotten. We will be allies, again.”
I glanced down at her hand, shifted my eyes to her face, and then turned away to take a closer look at what was on Poli’s screen. Sure, it was rude, but I’d been dumped in the shit, and I didn’t see how these folk were going to help me out of it.
“Where’s the ship?” I asked, and Poli stroked an antenna down the side of my face.
It was gentle, his touch feather-light, but it reminded me I wasn’t anywhere I knew how to be. I backed up a step, before I could stop myself, and felt a hand set lightly in the center of my back.
“We will rescue Mack,” the queen told me, and turned to Poli.
“There was a shuttle incursion,” she began, and Poli angled his head so he was looking up and to one side. He made a series of clicks and followed it with, “is trying to trace it. We think it crossed into what the humans call Sekekna’s Hills.”
The queen followed Poli’s gaze, and caught the eye of one of the operators typing away on the ceiling. It had four monitors arranged in an arc around its keyboard, and was dividing its attention between them. It glanced down at her, and briefly lifted its wings, before laying them back against its back.
“Thank you.” The queen turned back to Poli. “I also need the drop bag, and the instructions that came with it. That should have been shared, already. Find out what the delay was.”
I listened, knowing I could understand her words only because she dropped them, in perfect Galbas, into my head. The sounds she was making to communicate with the others? Those? Those I had no hope of comprehending. I wondered if her translations were honest, and felt the hand pat my back.
It was not a comforting pat, more like a cross between a slap, and a pat, and I remembered that she could also read my mind. Well, damn. Even if it was true, I still knew she really could be saying something entirely different.
“I am a queen,” she reminded me. “A queen’s word is her honor, and her honor is paramount.”
Askavor gave a soft his, making a clattering sound with his mouth parts, and the queen’s hand stilled. She half-turned to face the arachnid, and he froze. A heartbeat passed, and he touched his head to the floor, his words, once again, coming clearly through the implant.
“I am sorry,” he said. “I meant no disrespect.”
Around us, wasps moved in uneasy irritation, stopping only, when the queen raised her hand.
“Contact the port authorities. Tell them I need a shuttle.”
A shuttle?
“How else do you think we are going to reach your Mack, before he is drained totally dry? I have never seen a human allowed to live, after landing a hit like that… let alone the ones that followed. Whatever operation you were needed for, it must be very important.”
“But we will get Mack, first?”
She smiled.
“We will rescue Mack and his people. You can repay the retrieval fee by helping us defeat the plot you were part of, and destroying this incursion.”
“Agreed,” I said, knowing Mack would honor the agreement—even as I wondered just how many rounds on the mats it would cost me, this time.
As if she caught that thought, the queen’s smile grew wider—and then it vanished. Her expression grew blank, as most do, when answering a call using their implant.
“Yes? Yes. This is she.” Her voice took on a regal tone, laced with authority and expectation, but, all too soon, the expectation was gone, replaced by displeasure, as the conversation continued. “You can’t? The monthly shipment? Not even for a few hours? How could that possibly affect the bottom line? I see.”
She sighed, and then closed her eyes, as though listening to something that made it difficult to rein in her temper.
“Yes. It is an emergency. Of course, we can pay for the interruption. I see. Thank you. We’ll see if we can find an alternative for the interim. No. Yes. If you can find a window for us to borrow one of your shuttles, we would definitely appreciate it. Yes. Yes. That’s correct.”
She opened her eyes, and I took that as a signal that she’d ended the call.
“We can’t get a shuttle,” she said, and the air filled with a low hum punctuated by human gasps.
Again, the queen raised her hand, and, again, silence fell.
“I will deal with it, once this crisis is over. In the meantime, we will find the shuttle responsible for the incursion, and we will acquire it for ourselves.” She turned to Askavor, and beckoned him over to stand behind Poli’s console. “Come and take a look. See if you can tell me who attacked us at the garden border.”
The spider hesitated, tilting its head to get a better look at me, before sidling around the other side of the queen and peering past Poli’s winged shoulders at the screen. That was fine by me. I could just about handle Askavor being in the same room, as me, just as long as he didn’t get too close. It was strange how he seemed to feel exactly the same way.
At least he had more manners than I did, because the poor creature translated its recognition straight into the implant.
“He is from the River Weavers,” Askavor said. “The third born. His name is…” and here he laid down a pattern of sounds that the implant could not decipher. “You can call him Chen.”
Chen…
“It is a common name amongst the humans here,” the queen informed me.
She laid a hand on the side of Askavor’s head.
“You did well. Now, can you find me somewhere in the
