“EJECT!” JORGEN SHOUTED at me over the radio.
I scrambled for the eject lever on the side of my seat, and my seat destabilized, still attached to the ship.
Scud, that wasn’t the eject lever.
Where is it? I shouted at him through the negative realm, and an image formed in my mind, perfectly clear, of a lever directly under my knees. My ship shuddered toward the surface of the platform—
And I hauled up on the lever, my canopy exploding outward and rockets beneath my seat propelling it into the air. I prepared to hyperjump again if the ejection shot me up into the path of the autoturrets, but I flew through the air below them, and then my parachute opened, yanking me back and dragging me along the surface of the platform. I rolled to a stop at the base of one of the autoturrets.
I unstrapped from the chute and ran along the metal platform in the direction of my wreckage, the miasma clinging to my flightsuit.
The autoturrets fired above me, warding off Quilan and his people. They were peppering the platform with destructor fire, though their shots went wild because they couldn’t shoot accurately from beyond the range of the autofire. I ducked under the metal roof that stretched around the autoturrets, working my way toward the hangar entrance Kimmalyn had found. Skyward Flight and the Independence fighters had all parked their ships on the empty hangar floor. Both humans and UrDail had already climbed out of their ships and removed their helmets, staring at each other.
Jorgen popped his canopy open, looking around at the other ships.
Counting them. Making sure his people were all right, seeing how many of the Independence ships we’d rescued. There were about two dozen of them, plus the broken Superiority ship. I recognized Rinakin’s daughter among several other people peering out of it.
I pulled off my helmet. Kimmalyn was right; the platform was still generating atmosphere. I wondered if scavengers had maintained the generators to make their jobs easier. Getting past the autofire was difficult and dangerous, but not impossible if you had enough drones to distract the autoturrets. Those who had been here would have had to be well funded, in addition to crazy. We could only claim the second.
“We made it,” Jorgen said. “Alanik, your ship—”
“It’s gone,” I said. There might be something we could salvage, but it wasn’t going to fly again.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” Jorgen said. He didn’t say a word about the destruction of their property.
My brother climbed out of one of the Independence ships and approached me slowly, eyeing the humans like he was afraid of them. When he reached me, he embraced me. “Alanik,” he said. “I worried they’d captured you.”
Leave it to Gilaf to worry about me when he was the one who’d been captured.
“I’m glad you’re okay, but—” He looked around the hangar. “Humans?”
I hadn’t told anyone in my family what had happened on my mission to Starsight, only that things hadn’t gone as planned. “They are willing to ally with us against the Superiority.”
I saw several of the other Independence pilots looking at each other, trying to make sense of this news. Inin, Rinakin’s daughter, stepped forward. She wore a fitted maternity jacket over her round stomach. I remembered now—she was expecting a baby in a few sun cycles. When she’d first announced it, Rinakin had said he wished he could retire from his position to help care for the baby, but of course the political situation made that impossible. “My father was worried the Superiority would come after you,” she said. “Do you know if he’s—”
I wasn’t going to spread jam over this news. “They took him,” I said. “We need to find him before he’s turned over to the Superiority. Quilan is trying to gather us together to use as leverage. Rinakin and me—and the rest of you—in exchange for better trade terms, more advancement.” I didn’t know exactly what they were asking for, but…
“Progress for ReDawn,” my brother said with disgust, and I heard murmurs of agreement throughout the group of pilots.
Inin looked to Jorgen. She didn’t have a pin to translate, but Jorgen did. “You’re here to help rescue my father? To help us turn the wind to our favor?”
“Um,” Jorgen said. “We’re here to make an alliance.” He looked at me. “We’re stronger together, in theory, but we’re in a bit of a spot here. This isn’t exactly a strong position from which to mount a counteroffensive.”
“That’s true,” I said. “But we saved my people, and for that I’m grateful.”
Gilaf smiled at me, but he looked worried. All of them did.
With good reason.
FM looked up through the skylight of the hangar, scanning for ships. “Can they get to us here?” she asked.
I searched for Quilan in the negative realm, and felt his mind hovering out in the miasma. “I don’t think so,” I said. “They don’t have any cytonics who can hyperjump. They could try to bring drones to distract the turrets, but they wouldn’t be able to get many ships in that way, maybe one or two, so we’d have the overwhelming force.”
By a large amount, with the Independence fighters here. Quilan would have to fall back and regroup. Given his current position, he knew it.
If the Superiority was really bent on collecting me, they’d show up eventually. But even Quilan didn’t have Superiority cytonics at his beck and call—and especially not if he expected to prove himself to them—so we’d bought ourselves some time at least.
“Can you hear their communications?” Jorgen asked. “Are they making a plan?”
I didn’t hear any hypercomm transmissions in the area, but Quilan would know I’d be listening for that. He might have switched to radio. “Can you try to find their channel?” I asked Jorgen.
“Sure,” he said. He reached for his radio, disconnecting the headset so we could all hear. He flipped through silence and static, and then a voice projected from his dash.
“—people of ReDawn, with bipartisan support, we are greatly pleased to announce—”
Gilaf swore, and I almost echoed him. The voice belonged to Nanalis.
“Leave it there,” I said, and Jorgen pulled his fingers away from the dial.
Nanalis addressed the audience imperiously. “—our collaboration to elevate the UrDail onto the galactic stage.”
“Who is that?” Arturo asked, drawing closer.
“Council President,” I said. “Elected leader of ReDawn. Currently, anyway.”
Inin folded her arms and leaned back against the Superiority ship. Her father had been opposing Nanalis at Council for years.
“Thank you,” a familiar voice said, and Inin’s eyes widened. “This is Rinakin, High Chancellor of Independence.” It was Rinakin—I recognized his voice. “We may have our differences, but one thing both Unity and Independence agree on is that we want the best for ReDawn, and for her people.”
“Is that the person we were here to save?” Jorgen asked.
I nodded, though all around the room I could feel the Independence pilots tensing. Our side wasn’t supposed to talk like that, particularly not while Unity was in the middle of a military coup.
“It is time to set aside our differences,” Rinakin continued, “in the name of progress for ReDawn. I would like to announce a bipartisan cooperation with the Superiority.”
That was rotten wood. Rinakin was using nearly the exact words Nanalis had used in her announcement during the game. Jorgen looked at me.
“They’re making him say this,” I said. “They have to be.” Inin’s face hardened, and she nodded.
“I will be working with Nanalis and the Council over the coming days,” Rinakin said, “to ensure the future of both Unity and Independence, and—first and foremost—progress.”
“Progress,” Gilaf said. “That’s what they say, but they’re selling us out. All the other outposts gave in. All of them but us.”
“There is one matter that concerns me as we move forward with the coalition,” Rinakin said. “Alanik, if you are out there, turn yourself in. It’s not too late to be part of the solution. Thank you.”
The broadcast ended, and Jorgen switched off the radio.
