“You realize,” Jorgen said as we flew back toward Alta, “I’m starting to get very suspicious.”
I looked over the side to where the booster dangled from the bottom of his hovercar, connected by chains to the tow ring on the underside of the chassis. His car’s small acclivity ring had been barely enough to lift the weight.
“First you steal my power matrix,” Jorgen said, “now this. What are you doing? Building your own Poco?” He laughed.
When I didn’t join in, he looked at me. Then he put the heel of his palm to his forehead, rubbing it as understanding sank in. “You are. You’re building a starfighter.”
“I told you not to ask too many questions.”
“And I never agreed. Spin, you’re building a ship?”
“Repairing,” I said. “I found a wreck.”
“All salvage belongs to the DDF. Claiming it is the same as stealing.”
“Like you just helped me steal a booster?”
He groaned and leaned back.
“What did you think we were doing?” I asked, amused. “We spent half an hour pulling a chunk of salvage from the ground!”
“You told me to assume you were emotionally unstable because of Hurl’s death!”
“I didn’t expect you to believe me,” I said. “Look, I’ve done this forever without getting into trouble. Down in Igneous, I used salvage to build my own speargun for hunting.”
“An entire fighter is different from a speargun. How are you planning to fix the thing? You don’t have the expertise for that—or the time!”
I didn’t reply; no need to get Rig into trouble.
“You’re insane,” he said.
“Admiral Ironsides won’t let me fly. She’s got a grudge against me because of my father. Even if I graduate, I’ll spend my life grounded.”
“So you build your own ship? What do you think is going to happen? That you’ll show up on a battlefield in the nick of time, and everyone will simply forget to ask where you got your own scudding starfighter?”
I … honestly didn’t have a response to that. I’d shoved logic aside, figuring questions like that were bridges to be burned once I captured them.
“Spin, even assuming you could fix a crashed Poco yourself—you can’t, by the way—the first time you took the thing into the air, the DDF would pick it up on scanners. If you don’t identify yourself, you’ll get shot down. If you do, they’ll take that ship from you faster than you can say ‘court-martial.’ ”
I’d like to see them try. “Maybe I don’t fly it for the DDF,” I said. “There are other caverns, other people.”
“None run their own air force. They’ve been able to settle down because the Krell attention is focused on us.”
“Some use ships for trading,” I pointed out.
“And you’d abandon the fight?” he asked. “Go run cargo?”
“I don’t know.” I sank back in my seat, trying not to sulk. He was right. He was usually right. I was starting to kind of not hate him, but he was still Jerkface.
He sighed. “Look, if you want to fly, maybe I can get you duty as a private pilot. A few of the families in the deep caverns maintain fighters as escorts for trading operations. You wouldn’t need to repair any old salvage. You could use one of our ships. Arturo’s family has a few.”
I perked up. “Really? That’s something I could do?”
“Maybe.” He thought for a moment. “Well, probably not. The slots are highly contested, usually flown by retired DDF pilots. And … and you need a really great reputation.”
Something the daughter of a coward doesn’t have. And will never have, unless I can fight for the DDF.
The great contradiction of my life. I would never be worth anything unless I could prove myself—but I couldn’t prove myself because nobody would give me the chance.
Well, I wasn’t willing to give up the dream of flying M-Bot. Ridiculous—and ill-conceived—as my plans sounded when Jorgen laid them out, M-Bot was my ship. I’d find a way.
We flew in silence. And that left me thinking about the booster, my mind shifting to the wreckage. Strangely, it seemed that I could still feel the flames against my skin. I’d hoped that performing the funeral would help with the pain, but I still ached. Hurl’s passing left so much emptiness. So many questions.
Is this going to happen every time I lose a friend in battle? I wondered. It made me want to run away and become a cargo pilot like Jorgen said. To never have to face the Krell or their destructors again.
Coward.
Eventually Alta came into sight in the distance. I took Jorgen’s arm and pointed a few degrees to the left, toward my hidden cavern. “Fly us that direction.”
He gave me a suffering look, but did as I’d asked. I had him stop forty meters or so from my hole, to avoid any blowing dust revealing the part of the ground that was a hologram.
He lowered the hovercar to gently set the booster down. As soon as I felt it hit the surface, I attached my light-line to one side of the car and prepared to lower myself to unhook the booster.
“Spin,” Jorgen said, stopping me. “Thank you.”
“For?”
“For making me do this. It feels better to have seen her off properly.”
Well, at least it had helped one of us.
“I’ll see you in a week,” he said. “My family will probably schedule every moment of my free time.” He looked at me, then got a very strange expression on his face. “This broken ship . . . it’s got a working acclivity ring?”
“I … Yes.” He’d helped me out, and he knew enough already to get me into trouble ten times over if he wanted. He deserved honesty. “Yes, it’s got an acclivity ring. The whole ship is in better shape than you’d think, actually.”
“You fix it, then,” he said. “You fix it, and you fly. You find a way, and you defy them. For those of us who don’t have the courage.”
I cocked my head, but he turned away, setting his jaw and taking the wheel in both hands. So I lowered myself down, then unhooked the booster. We were close enough that I could maneuver M-Bot over and attach it, then lower it into the cavern. I’d need the chain though, so I only unhooked one end.
I waved to Jorgen, and when he rose up, the chain slid through the tow rings underneath his car and fell beside me. He didn’t ask after it. He just flew off toward Alta. And responsibility.
Somehow … it was true. Somehow, I was more free than he was. Which felt crazy.
I pulled my radio from my backpack. “Hey, guess what, M-Bot. I have a present for you.”
“Mushrooms?”
“Better.”
“… Two mushrooms?”
I smiled. “Freedom.”
