That was an option. Even though it wasn’t armed, the Vireo was a fast-moving craft. It was nearly all engine, with a 350 twin ion drive mounted behind a tiny two-man cockpit.
When I was in my early twenties, I had flown a later model Vireo, the T-11, during a visit to my dad’s friend’s star ranch off of Lekkadabra. I bet I could figure out the controls of this T-9. If anything, it would be simpler than the T-11. I peered into the cockpit and saw something that made my heart jump. It was an aftermarket cloaking device, small and primitive enough that the Rhya hadn’t confiscated it. Someone had pimped out this T-9 pretty good.
What I really needed, though, was a way to track the Faiurae ship. The Vireo had an extremely rudimentary nav system. You basically flew it by the seat of your pants—just eyeballing off general coordinates. I’d need to figure out a destination first, and then I could punch it in and I’d be on my way.
I decided to head over to the engine room. There was a chance that Obarral might be some help. When I got there, I saw we were coming up on Bandala. And we weren’t alone.
“Do you see what I see, dear boy?” Obarral asked.
I nodded. It was the Faiurae ship. And I knew Chiraine was on it.
“What are they doing?” I asked.
“Without a doubt the same as us. Plotting how to get into Bandala without getting turned into so much Faiurae mush.”
That meant that it was even more likely that they had coerced Chiraine into talking. I needed to move quickly.
11
Back at the engineering bay I found Yates immersed in Chiraine’s data constructs. The biklode had been returned to its resonator and pulsed with light as it interfaced with the system.
“The good news is that, thanks to that little doodad, we have access to everything, including the schematics of Bandala and the control system for its defense grid.”
“So Chiraine came through for us?”
“Yes, she did. One hundred percent. The only thing we don’t have is the exact location of the Kryrk. Her decryption slicers got about halfway through before she yanked out the biklode. I’ve re-initialized everything, and thankfully the slicers save their state every millisecond.”
I wasn’t sure if that was good news or bad. Since Chiraine didn’t know where the Kryrk was located, she couldn’t tell the Faiurae. Would they torture her? Or would they just accept the truth that she hadn’t yet found the Kryrk’s location?
The display showed a visual representation of a data scan mapped to Bandala’s geo-projection schematics. Different colors indicated the slicer progress. Yates was right. We were only halfway there.
“So it could be anywhere in this area?” I pointed to the gray area on the schematic.
“Exactly. We could find it in the next second—or have to wait until it reaches the end of the scan.”
“And how long would that take?”
Yates checked a progress readout. “A few hours maybe.”
I nodded. It looked like we might be heading for a standoff with the Faiurae. Even if they couldn’t get the location of the Kryrk from Chiraine, they’d know enough to follow us into Bandala. Then it would be a free-for-all, and who knows what would happen to Chiraine.
I decided to confide in Yates and tell him my plan. Out of everyone on board, I felt I could trust him the most. Unlike the rest of the crew, he was a long-time Beck Salvage guy and he worked with my dad a lot.
So I took him through what I was thinking. I’d fly the cloaked starhopper and sneak up on the Faiurae ship. Then once I was docked at an airlock, I’d use explosives to force my way in. From there, I’d just have to play it by ear. Their ship wasn’t so big that I couldn’t find Chiraine. And hopefully, I’d get the drop on the Faiurae commandos and hit them before they knew what was happening.
“What do you think?” I asked.
“I can’t go with you.”
“I’m not asking you to. The starhopper only has room for two.”
Yates scratched at his beard, deep in thought. “It might work, but there are a lot of ifs.”
“Such as?”
“There’s seven of them—and one of you.”
That was true, but I had a fair amount of training. Hand-to-hand combat. Evasion. Gymnastics. Mostly it was to keep up appearances. But some of the skills stuck. At least I hoped they had. Plus, with the cloaking device, I’d have the element of surprise on my side.
“You won’t be able to blow your way in,” Yates said.
“Even with a magna-charge?”
He shook his head. “We’re talking about a class-c atmos hull. Even the hatch is rated against meteoroids up to four meters.”
“Then I’m screwed. I can’t just knock politely.”
“I might have another idea for you.”
He led me back to the mech hold and the incursion team’s sled. It hadn’t been unloaded since the incident on Taullae.
Yates rifled through the supplies on the sled until he found what he was looking for.
“This might work.” He handed me a device that looked like someone had made it in their home workshop. It was a metallic cylinder the length of my hand with a fluted end—almost like an old musical instrument.
“What is this thing?”
“It belonged to Xooth.”
Then I remembered. “His donokkal?”
“Yeah.”
“How does it work?”
“No one knows. It’s Plargondian tech. But you don’t have to know how it works in order to operate it.” Yates went on to explain that you pressed the fluted end against a locking mechanism
