Relm laughed as he looked at Faitrin. "How's it feel to be born again, only to die a few days later?"
"At least I won't have to listen to your shitty jokes anymore." She looked down the row at Caesar. "I think what Pro means is, what's the best way to get inside? The way that's least likely to kill us?"
The giant nodded and pointed at the tower. "Through there."
Servia spoke from the end of the line. "Alistair, I need to talk to you. I can do it here, or I can do it in private. Which do you prefer?"
Alistair kept his eyes forward. He hadn't expected that. He'd thought he and Servia had worked out their issues about Thoreaux, and now as they were about to attack an insurmountable force, she wanted to tell him not to? Again?
"Private," he said curtly. He turned away from the cliff's edge and walked back to the transport a half-kilometer away. Servia followed. When he reached the transport, he turned quickly. "This isn't the time, Servia. If you have doubts—"
She raised a hand to stop him from speaking. "Hear me out, okay?"
"Go."
"I need to ask you this. How important is Thoreaux to you? Is he worth losing everything?" She met his eyes and was calm as she spoke. "It's a fair question since we will have to risk everything to get him back. Do you need him to do what you're supposed to do? Is he irreplaceable in this machine?"
It was a fair question, Alistair couldn't deny that, and it came down to this, as selfish as it was: did he need Thoreaux to get back to his wife? Could someone replace him?
Alistair leaned against the transport and retracted his suit's hood into the neckline. He stared into the distance, unable to see the fortress in detail. "Is there someone else in the universe who can do what Thoreaux does for me? Yes. No one is irreplaceable, Servia. Not you, not Thoreaux, not me. Maybe the AllMother. Will I find another Thoreaux with no time to plan or search? I won't. I'll get far without him, but at some point, I'm going to need him, like I did back in that dreadnought."
Servia nodded. "I believe you, and I'm all in. Thoreaux is like a brother to me. I had to hear you say you need him before I went along with getting us all killed. The giant isn't going to be able to figure this one out. He's gotten us here, and he's telling us the easiest way in, but that's as far as he'll be able to think through this. He's not dumb, but his tactics center around brute force. We're all going to die if we do that."
"Do you have a plan?"
Servia smiled. "I do, though I only give us a ten percent better chance of living if we use it."
I'm going to die, Alistair thought. It had come up in his mind many times before, and in all honesty, he should have been dead by now. Despite everything, however, he was still alive, but now it seemed as if he’d decided to take his own life.
Nothing else could explain what he was about to do. Truly, if anyone in this group could think clearly, they would have gone back to the Terram. At least, that was what Alistair thought as he sat inside the transport. The AI was ready to fly it, and everyone else had left a couple of hours ago. They, of course, were en route to the tower on foot.
It was Alistair's job to meet them there.
He'd invaded dreadnoughts, killed countless men, became Rex at the Academy, yet he'd never attempted anything like this. He'd never even thought of doing something this crazy.
He spoke into the comm, hiding his pessimistic outlook on the endeavor. "Confirm you are ten minutes out."
Servia's voice came back. "We are, Pro. Good luck."
Her voice was solemn. She'd presented her ridiculous plan, and he'd tried his best to come up with something different. There was nothing.
"Taking off," he said. Faitrin had managed to connect Jeeves to the transport, boxing the current AI into a small portion of the ship’s mainframe. "Jeeves, let's go."
"Yes, sir," the AI responded.
The transport rose into the air and started flying toward the tower. Two minutes passed. Alistair flew in silence, saying nothing to Jeeves. The AI remained quiet as well.
Another three minutes. Alistair spoke into the comm. "Five minutes out. Same for you?"
"Yes, sir," Servia responded.
At four minutes, they were nearly at the point where the defense tower could fire, though a direct hit would be hard. Jeeves spoke up. "I hate to bother you right now given your near-certain death, Pro, but I'm beginning to wonder if you're alive. Your resting pulse rate is still at fifty-five beats per minute."
Alistair smiled. "My body never panics, Jeeves."
"You and I are a lot alike in that fashion then, even though I don't have a body."
The first laser streaked through the sky. Jeeves controlled the ship with ease, shifting to the left and dodging it.
"Those people are extremely rude, Pro. They didn't even send me a warning."
"That was the warning," Alistair told him.
More lasers ripped through the sky, and Jeeves stopped speaking. All of his computing power was being used to bridge the distance from his ship and keep this transport from exploding. Alistair held onto his seat as the vessel moved up and down, left and right, spinning through the air as it barely avoided the streaking death rays.
"Thirty seconds," Jeeves said curtly.
Alistair was dressed in Caesar's gear. It didn’t fit him, but it was better than the simple SkinSuit he wore. He stood and moved to the back of the transport. Inside his armor, even walking was hard. The side door opened, and the wind ripped at him.
"Five seconds. Good luck, Pro."
Lasers whipped past the transport. Alistair looked at his target, closed his eyes, and fell.
As he dropped, he brought
